CRITICAL THINKING FOR THE SIMPLE FOLK - UNDERSTANDING THE FINANCIAL CRISIS
My friends, more than anything right now Americans are worried. We're worried about the elections. We're worried about energy. Here in the southeast we're worried about getting gas for our tanks. We're worried about the future. I've heard some call these the endtimes. We're living in the midst of disaster. And, as if to prove the point, we're facing the worst financial meltdown since the Great Depression (opinion).
Let's take a moment to apply critical thinking skills to this financial crisis. I'm going to try to keep this really simple. We won't dive deep. We won't get complicated. We're simply going to STOP and THINK.
Let's start with the image below. As part of making something extremely complicated and convoluted simple to understand I'm going to reference images as part of a narrative. We're gonna tell a story. I'm a simple man. For those of you that have been following my work, you already know this. Check out the author bio on www.2rulesof3.com.
The picture below is money burning. On Monday, September 29th, the financial markets had a meltdown. The impact was felt all over the world. People waited with baited breath to see if Congress was going to approve a $700 billion bailout package bill that was designed to stabilize the national economy. That's about as simple as I can keep it. However, the bill was rejected by the House of Representatives. The markets reacted immediately. Over a Trillion dollars in wealth vanished. Now, understand that even though stocks did trade and money continued to exchange hands, price setting is what caused this money to just vanish. People who wanted to sell their stocks had to keep lowering the prices in order to execute a trade. That's money, that's value, going up in flames. Understand this has a direct impact on you personally.
Let me make it clear. The financial markets are governed by EMOTION!
People take economics, accounting, and financial analysis. Numbers and complex mathematical models are developed to try to make sense, and predict how economies will behave. However, as a simple critical thinker, I'm going to say something that I want you to question, and come to understand on your own. Markets are controlled by people. How people feel about the economy, about their lives, about how we relate to one another, is the prime and only dictator of economic behavior. Models can only approximate, and never accurately predict. Why? Because we don't yet know how to see the future and accurately know how people will feel. How they feel determines how they will behave. Consider what I have just said.
KISS the situation. We Keep It Simple Stupid people. If you and I are worried, we don't buy stuff. As Americans we need to learn to not place so much value on material goods. We shouldn't be constantly buying stuff anyway. However, the point is if we don't buy stuff, companies will have to manage what they've already made, and start making less. This is a slowdown. Now, the people in these companies get worried to. They get scared. They don't buy from other companies. The fear goes all the way around, from one person and company to the next. Now, the economies of the world are contracting. When this happens, people get laid off. Wealthy people feel some pain, but they can insulate themselves to some degree. The middle-class and poor get hit hard. What I've just described is a simple example of how people and markets work. Because we are so tied to other countries in our global market model, the thought of burning money has spread across the globe The fear and the financial crisis has spread like wildfire.
See the image below ...
I added the above image to simply state that this is a global issue, and the economic powers of the world see it as such. For several years the people in power have been discussing the economic recession. People talked about the looming mortgage crisis. People on Wall Street, people on Main Street, regular people like you and me listened and learned. We knew bad things were on the horizon, and we did nothing. I'm talking about all of us. We spent on credit. We pulled money out of our homes. We lived a luxurious, debt-loaded lifestyle. Since the financial meltdown of 2000, the dot-com crisis, we knew there would be difficult times. However, the mortgage crisis created something new. And so, here we are. Now, we'll stop and think. We'll use 3FE to try and understand the crisis as of today, October 1st, 2008. What is it? What does it mean? What decisions should we make personally? And what should we ask our Congressmen to do?
We saw it coming. We ignored the signs. We've been consumed by MDC, Media-Driven Consumercelebreality. The government and corporations indulged us, they were part of it. It was the system, and we lived well. Hell was on final approach, and we allowed it fly right on in. It was huge, and we turned a blind eye toward it. Now, it's too late, and we can't help but see.
Still, too many of us refuse to think.
3FE: Find, Focus, establish the Fundamentals, Execute!
Find
What is it?
The mortgage industry has collapsed.
Financial institutions are failing ... banks are closing.
Huge corporations are feeling tremendous economic strain.
McDonald's can't even get a loan to buy new coffee makers.
People can't get loans for homes.
Homes aren't selling ...
Because people can't or won't buy ...
Because they can't get loans for homes.
The government has bailed out major financial institutions.
The effects are being felt worldwide.
Prices on goods increase.
Economic slowdown.
Credit markets freeze.
Stock prices fall.
People hold on to their cash at all social and corporate levels.
Money flow stops.
Complete global economic collapse.
When?
This started years ago.
Americans in particular are thoroughly infected by MDC (Media-Driven Consumercelebreality - www.2rulesof3.com).
The consumer culture began to grow.
More importantly the when is no longer important in the immediate.
Where?
This has become a global phenomenon.
Why?
This goes back to When. MDC is at the core of this situation. However, for individuals as well as corporations, the 4 Barriers to Critical Success reside at the heart of the matter.
In my book, Critical Success: The 2 rules of 3, I explain how the barriers prevent individuals from achieving Critical Success. However, this can be applied at a macro level as well. Note the following:
Think Not!
Corporations, the individuals that run them, stop utilizing critical thinkings skills from the executive level on down ... when it comes to accountability, responsibility, sustainability, and long-term financial stability. They didn't question pay based performance (right or wrong), costs overruns, or how revenues were being generated.
Debt!
Corporations, the individuals that run them, sought ever more imaginative ways to make incredible amounts of money, including heavily leveraging debt instruments. This is business. This is how things work. However, we must question everything. Why? Because they, we, need to think for the long-term. How will the debt be managed effectively? In the case of the mortgage crisis, it wasn't.
MDC
This is part and parcel to the machine. Don't get me wrong. I'm not blaming the media, as in the news outlets. I'm talking about the action at the Macro level where large corporations pay other corporations and firms to imagine, create, and facilitate things that drive us to spend more money then we should. We're talking about commercials and ads, things that peak our interest, and incite our lust, prevent us from thinking, and questioning, and promoting us to act on impulses ... even if the impulse lasts for almost 30 days, like when you closed that Option-ARM mortgage from the failed bank Washington Mutual.
Get Rich Quick Schemes
Large corporations facilitated the ginormously huge mortgage debacle, which was nothing more then one big Get Rich Quick Scheme writ large!
And there you have it. By our lack of questioning, our lack of thinking, we fell prey to our indulgences. We find ourselves far beyond any normal boom and bust economic cycle. We are in a disaster of our own making. We need help. We need a plan. We need someone to fix this.
In come Ben Barnanke and Hank Paulson, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and Secretary of the Treasury.
The image above can be indicative of cash, free-flowing through the US economy. In order to control the economy through the implementation of monetary policy the Federal Reserve prints money, increasing or decreasing the amount of money it allows to flow in the system. They also control inflation by manipulating interest rates. By combining monetary policy with fiscal policy, which is controlled by Congress and the White House through the creation of legislation that controls taxation, and government spending, our economy is maintained.
Focus
As we continued to flow through this crisis our government intervened in order to keep the economy stable. Then, along came AIG. American International Group controls some trillion dollars across the globe. The failure of this financial institution would have constituted a financial apocalypse that would have left devastation in its wake. It would have touched everyone, even people in the third world through aid that's provided. Charity organizations would have been struck just like everyone else.
All the details that we listed in the Find section painted a pretty bleak picture. Behind AIG we had Washington Mutual, and Wachovia lining up. Maybe we should have acted sooner. We most certainly should have been more responsible. Alas, we were not. Hank Paulson saw this painted picture and realized that we were standing on the precipice of disaster. Doomsday was just around the corner. He immediately went into action.
Now, people and pundits all over the country have been commenting on Secretary Paulson's actions. They've called him immoral. They've said he's an asshole. They called him a mouthpiece for the rich, the man that wants to save his fellow fat-cats on Wall Street. They've accused him of being a greedy power-monger. The bill he proposed to help heal our economy would have made him into America's Economic Czar, a man with almost limitless power bestowed by the virtue of his being able to control 700 Billion dollars.
STOP & THINK
Now, I want you to consider this. Some people have said this is what he wanted, limitless power. I ask you to think about it. How ridiculously spoonish would Secretary Paulson have to be to actually push for a plan that would do such a thing? Grant him limitless power? Do we really think he's so stupid as this? He's already rich. Is his greed so great that he would push for a plan not to help Americans, and the rest of the world, but rather just help his rich friends, fatten his own pockets, and gain power the likes of which even the President doesn't wield? Do we really think he's that dumb? Think about it people. Just consider it.
Secretary Paulson and Ben Bernanke partnered with other advisers. The poured over the facts, and considered the possibilities. They came up with a simple 3 page plan. Of course, it was not enough. It could not pass in its current form, no matter how much President Bush wanted it to pass. Still, the case was made. Leaders understood the crisis. Unfortunately, many in Congress did not, and still do not. They reasons they did not support the bill went back to the American people. And what did the American people think?
Don't bail out the stinking, smoldering, disgusting, lazy-ass, greedy as hell, make money off the backs of hard-working wage-earners, caviar eating, hated rich.
This, friends, is what the American people were thinking. However, go back to the Find phase and take a look at the facts. Secretary Paulson noted these facts, and this is why he insisted we have to act now. Think critically people. We don't want to just help rich people who screwed up. However, they'll get help anyway, because we all need the help. They're part of the fix. We can't just cut them out. In the Find phase we talked about a Credit Freeze. Let's clarify a few important points:
AT&T can't get a loan for its operations.
McDonald's can't get a loan for its operations.
Major Institutions are failing.
Small Business can't get loans for operations.
Your Mastercard & Visa are being cut off - no personal credit for you!
Car Dealerships can't sell cars because people can't get loans.
That's enough. Understand these points. Please see the words and understand what they mean. If companies the size of AT&T can't operate, then how will they survive? If small businesses can't make payroll, how will they survive? They will have to cut jobs ... thousands upon thousands of jobs. They will have to downsize. Still, they may not survive.
CAN YOU SEE THE GREAT DEPRESSION II LOOMING?
This, is what the common American is not understanding. This is what they don't get. The crisis has truly moved beyond affecting the rich. It will bring us all to financial ruin. IT CAN GET JUST THAT BAD! It will spread through the economic environment like a nuclear bomb quickly followed by a protracted Ice Age. Now, we'll survive. We always survive. We're just that strong. And understand, I fervently believe we all need a wake-up call from our consumerist ways. However, I can't advocate subjecting America and the rest of the world to such financial ruin. It would destroy far too many people that are no where near rich.
establish the Fundamentals
By the time this entry is published the Senate will have passed the Financial Bailout. It failed in the House of Representatives, but they'll get a second change on October 3rd, one day after the Vice Presidential debates (this should be interesting).
The Bill went from 700 Billion to 850 Billion. The bill expanded from 3 pages to over 400 pages. This is our, mine and yours, Federal bureaucracy at work. It is definitely a challenging thing. However, the pretty Christmas baubles that were hung from the original bill included all kinds of tax breaks for small businesses and the middle class. Still, it does not speak to decreases in federal spending, which is an absolute must. However, this does not excuse us from the need to act. WE MUST ACT!
The plan was in motion before the bill was proposed. Congress and the Fed have been taking action. They will continue to take action. However, this bill is critical to our recovery effort. We need to have funds ready and available in order to prop up institutions and readily rectify the effects of all this horrible mortgage debt.
People have been calling their congressmen, and asking them to vote no for this bill. I understand how they feel. Some have been stressing the fact that we can and must wait. I would ask you to not stop talking to your congressmen, but to start thinking critically. Why? Let me again say that emotion dictates the direction of the economy. The financial markets move based on how people feel, how confident they are in tomorrow. Understand that everyday we wait, more companies run up against the wall, with no ability to borrow more money, no ability to secure more credit. Again, AT&T is up against this very same wall. Understand what this means. I can't stress it enough. Those of you who are saying no to the bailout, please stop and think about the very real possibility of THE GREAT DEPRESSION II. We cannot allow this to happen.
The people below met and failed us (that's what happened ... don't be happy about it). The Senate has made the change. The House has to do the same. Please, stop and think. Understand what this means. IT IS NOT A WALL STREET BAILOUT! IT IS NOT JUST A MAIN STREET BAILOUT!
IT IS AN AMERICAN BAILOUT!
BY EXTENSION IT IS A WORLDWIDE BAILOUT!
BELIEVE IT!
there i go again getting impassioned.
Execute!
I'm trying to stick to Critical Thinking here. However, I really do feel strongly about this. I want all of us to look at the situation and understand what it means. I heard one guy say the government should give each of us, all 300 million of us, 1 million dollarsthat we could all use to pay off our debt, and invest what's left back in the economy, and through aggressive growth pay off the debt and allow our children to inherit a debt-free nation. What a beautiful fantasy. The point is yes, think, know that we must act, come up with ideas. This idea won't fly. The one that is before Congress right now will fly. Don't call your congressmen and tell him to vote no. Call him and tell him to take action, immediate action. Nothing is going to be right for all of us. However, the alternative, doing nothing, is simply not acceptable.
We must act. We can then consider the past. We can look to the future and make policy changes that aggressively lower government spending as appropriate. We can invest in the American future. We can eliminate the national debt. We can allow our children to inherit a smarter, stronger, critical thinking United States of America.
EXECUTE THE PLAN!
Let's take a moment to apply critical thinking skills to this financial crisis. I'm going to try to keep this really simple. We won't dive deep. We won't get complicated. We're simply going to STOP and THINK.
Let's start with the image below. As part of making something extremely complicated and convoluted simple to understand I'm going to reference images as part of a narrative. We're gonna tell a story. I'm a simple man. For those of you that have been following my work, you already know this. Check out the author bio on www.2rulesof3.com.
The picture below is money burning. On Monday, September 29th, the financial markets had a meltdown. The impact was felt all over the world. People waited with baited breath to see if Congress was going to approve a $700 billion bailout package bill that was designed to stabilize the national economy. That's about as simple as I can keep it. However, the bill was rejected by the House of Representatives. The markets reacted immediately. Over a Trillion dollars in wealth vanished. Now, understand that even though stocks did trade and money continued to exchange hands, price setting is what caused this money to just vanish. People who wanted to sell their stocks had to keep lowering the prices in order to execute a trade. That's money, that's value, going up in flames. Understand this has a direct impact on you personally.
Let me make it clear. The financial markets are governed by EMOTION!
People take economics, accounting, and financial analysis. Numbers and complex mathematical models are developed to try to make sense, and predict how economies will behave. However, as a simple critical thinker, I'm going to say something that I want you to question, and come to understand on your own. Markets are controlled by people. How people feel about the economy, about their lives, about how we relate to one another, is the prime and only dictator of economic behavior. Models can only approximate, and never accurately predict. Why? Because we don't yet know how to see the future and accurately know how people will feel. How they feel determines how they will behave. Consider what I have just said.
KISS the situation. We Keep It Simple Stupid people. If you and I are worried, we don't buy stuff. As Americans we need to learn to not place so much value on material goods. We shouldn't be constantly buying stuff anyway. However, the point is if we don't buy stuff, companies will have to manage what they've already made, and start making less. This is a slowdown. Now, the people in these companies get worried to. They get scared. They don't buy from other companies. The fear goes all the way around, from one person and company to the next. Now, the economies of the world are contracting. When this happens, people get laid off. Wealthy people feel some pain, but they can insulate themselves to some degree. The middle-class and poor get hit hard. What I've just described is a simple example of how people and markets work. Because we are so tied to other countries in our global market model, the thought of burning money has spread across the globe The fear and the financial crisis has spread like wildfire.
See the image below ...
I added the above image to simply state that this is a global issue, and the economic powers of the world see it as such. For several years the people in power have been discussing the economic recession. People talked about the looming mortgage crisis. People on Wall Street, people on Main Street, regular people like you and me listened and learned. We knew bad things were on the horizon, and we did nothing. I'm talking about all of us. We spent on credit. We pulled money out of our homes. We lived a luxurious, debt-loaded lifestyle. Since the financial meltdown of 2000, the dot-com crisis, we knew there would be difficult times. However, the mortgage crisis created something new. And so, here we are. Now, we'll stop and think. We'll use 3FE to try and understand the crisis as of today, October 1st, 2008. What is it? What does it mean? What decisions should we make personally? And what should we ask our Congressmen to do?
We saw it coming. We ignored the signs. We've been consumed by MDC, Media-Driven Consumercelebreality. The government and corporations indulged us, they were part of it. It was the system, and we lived well. Hell was on final approach, and we allowed it fly right on in. It was huge, and we turned a blind eye toward it. Now, it's too late, and we can't help but see.
Still, too many of us refuse to think.
3FE: Find, Focus, establish the Fundamentals, Execute!
Find
What is it?
The mortgage industry has collapsed.
Financial institutions are failing ... banks are closing.
Huge corporations are feeling tremendous economic strain.
McDonald's can't even get a loan to buy new coffee makers.
People can't get loans for homes.
Homes aren't selling ...
Because people can't or won't buy ...
Because they can't get loans for homes.
The government has bailed out major financial institutions.
The effects are being felt worldwide.
Prices on goods increase.
Economic slowdown.
Credit markets freeze.
Stock prices fall.
People hold on to their cash at all social and corporate levels.
Money flow stops.
Complete global economic collapse.
When?
This started years ago.
Americans in particular are thoroughly infected by MDC (Media-Driven Consumercelebreality - www.2rulesof3.com).
The consumer culture began to grow.
More importantly the when is no longer important in the immediate.
Where?
This has become a global phenomenon.
Why?
This goes back to When. MDC is at the core of this situation. However, for individuals as well as corporations, the 4 Barriers to Critical Success reside at the heart of the matter.
- The Lack of Critical Thinking Skills
- Our Willfull Assumption of Debt
- Insidious Media-Driven ConsumerCelebreality
- The Get Rich Quick Schemes.
In my book, Critical Success: The 2 rules of 3, I explain how the barriers prevent individuals from achieving Critical Success. However, this can be applied at a macro level as well. Note the following:
Think Not!
Corporations, the individuals that run them, stop utilizing critical thinkings skills from the executive level on down ... when it comes to accountability, responsibility, sustainability, and long-term financial stability. They didn't question pay based performance (right or wrong), costs overruns, or how revenues were being generated.
Debt!
Corporations, the individuals that run them, sought ever more imaginative ways to make incredible amounts of money, including heavily leveraging debt instruments. This is business. This is how things work. However, we must question everything. Why? Because they, we, need to think for the long-term. How will the debt be managed effectively? In the case of the mortgage crisis, it wasn't.
MDC
This is part and parcel to the machine. Don't get me wrong. I'm not blaming the media, as in the news outlets. I'm talking about the action at the Macro level where large corporations pay other corporations and firms to imagine, create, and facilitate things that drive us to spend more money then we should. We're talking about commercials and ads, things that peak our interest, and incite our lust, prevent us from thinking, and questioning, and promoting us to act on impulses ... even if the impulse lasts for almost 30 days, like when you closed that Option-ARM mortgage from the failed bank Washington Mutual.
Get Rich Quick Schemes
Large corporations facilitated the ginormously huge mortgage debacle, which was nothing more then one big Get Rich Quick Scheme writ large!
And there you have it. By our lack of questioning, our lack of thinking, we fell prey to our indulgences. We find ourselves far beyond any normal boom and bust economic cycle. We are in a disaster of our own making. We need help. We need a plan. We need someone to fix this.
In come Ben Barnanke and Hank Paulson, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and Secretary of the Treasury.
The image above can be indicative of cash, free-flowing through the US economy. In order to control the economy through the implementation of monetary policy the Federal Reserve prints money, increasing or decreasing the amount of money it allows to flow in the system. They also control inflation by manipulating interest rates. By combining monetary policy with fiscal policy, which is controlled by Congress and the White House through the creation of legislation that controls taxation, and government spending, our economy is maintained.
Focus
As we continued to flow through this crisis our government intervened in order to keep the economy stable. Then, along came AIG. American International Group controls some trillion dollars across the globe. The failure of this financial institution would have constituted a financial apocalypse that would have left devastation in its wake. It would have touched everyone, even people in the third world through aid that's provided. Charity organizations would have been struck just like everyone else.
All the details that we listed in the Find section painted a pretty bleak picture. Behind AIG we had Washington Mutual, and Wachovia lining up. Maybe we should have acted sooner. We most certainly should have been more responsible. Alas, we were not. Hank Paulson saw this painted picture and realized that we were standing on the precipice of disaster. Doomsday was just around the corner. He immediately went into action.
Now, people and pundits all over the country have been commenting on Secretary Paulson's actions. They've called him immoral. They've said he's an asshole. They called him a mouthpiece for the rich, the man that wants to save his fellow fat-cats on Wall Street. They've accused him of being a greedy power-monger. The bill he proposed to help heal our economy would have made him into America's Economic Czar, a man with almost limitless power bestowed by the virtue of his being able to control 700 Billion dollars.
STOP & THINK
Now, I want you to consider this. Some people have said this is what he wanted, limitless power. I ask you to think about it. How ridiculously spoonish would Secretary Paulson have to be to actually push for a plan that would do such a thing? Grant him limitless power? Do we really think he's so stupid as this? He's already rich. Is his greed so great that he would push for a plan not to help Americans, and the rest of the world, but rather just help his rich friends, fatten his own pockets, and gain power the likes of which even the President doesn't wield? Do we really think he's that dumb? Think about it people. Just consider it.
Secretary Paulson and Ben Bernanke partnered with other advisers. The poured over the facts, and considered the possibilities. They came up with a simple 3 page plan. Of course, it was not enough. It could not pass in its current form, no matter how much President Bush wanted it to pass. Still, the case was made. Leaders understood the crisis. Unfortunately, many in Congress did not, and still do not. They reasons they did not support the bill went back to the American people. And what did the American people think?
Don't bail out the stinking, smoldering, disgusting, lazy-ass, greedy as hell, make money off the backs of hard-working wage-earners, caviar eating, hated rich.
This, friends, is what the American people were thinking. However, go back to the Find phase and take a look at the facts. Secretary Paulson noted these facts, and this is why he insisted we have to act now. Think critically people. We don't want to just help rich people who screwed up. However, they'll get help anyway, because we all need the help. They're part of the fix. We can't just cut them out. In the Find phase we talked about a Credit Freeze. Let's clarify a few important points:
AT&T can't get a loan for its operations.
McDonald's can't get a loan for its operations.
Major Institutions are failing.
Small Business can't get loans for operations.
Your Mastercard & Visa are being cut off - no personal credit for you!
Car Dealerships can't sell cars because people can't get loans.
That's enough. Understand these points. Please see the words and understand what they mean. If companies the size of AT&T can't operate, then how will they survive? If small businesses can't make payroll, how will they survive? They will have to cut jobs ... thousands upon thousands of jobs. They will have to downsize. Still, they may not survive.
CAN YOU SEE THE GREAT DEPRESSION II LOOMING?
This, is what the common American is not understanding. This is what they don't get. The crisis has truly moved beyond affecting the rich. It will bring us all to financial ruin. IT CAN GET JUST THAT BAD! It will spread through the economic environment like a nuclear bomb quickly followed by a protracted Ice Age. Now, we'll survive. We always survive. We're just that strong. And understand, I fervently believe we all need a wake-up call from our consumerist ways. However, I can't advocate subjecting America and the rest of the world to such financial ruin. It would destroy far too many people that are no where near rich.
establish the Fundamentals
By the time this entry is published the Senate will have passed the Financial Bailout. It failed in the House of Representatives, but they'll get a second change on October 3rd, one day after the Vice Presidential debates (this should be interesting).
The Bill went from 700 Billion to 850 Billion. The bill expanded from 3 pages to over 400 pages. This is our, mine and yours, Federal bureaucracy at work. It is definitely a challenging thing. However, the pretty Christmas baubles that were hung from the original bill included all kinds of tax breaks for small businesses and the middle class. Still, it does not speak to decreases in federal spending, which is an absolute must. However, this does not excuse us from the need to act. WE MUST ACT!
The plan was in motion before the bill was proposed. Congress and the Fed have been taking action. They will continue to take action. However, this bill is critical to our recovery effort. We need to have funds ready and available in order to prop up institutions and readily rectify the effects of all this horrible mortgage debt.
People have been calling their congressmen, and asking them to vote no for this bill. I understand how they feel. Some have been stressing the fact that we can and must wait. I would ask you to not stop talking to your congressmen, but to start thinking critically. Why? Let me again say that emotion dictates the direction of the economy. The financial markets move based on how people feel, how confident they are in tomorrow. Understand that everyday we wait, more companies run up against the wall, with no ability to borrow more money, no ability to secure more credit. Again, AT&T is up against this very same wall. Understand what this means. I can't stress it enough. Those of you who are saying no to the bailout, please stop and think about the very real possibility of THE GREAT DEPRESSION II. We cannot allow this to happen.
The people below met and failed us (that's what happened ... don't be happy about it). The Senate has made the change. The House has to do the same. Please, stop and think. Understand what this means. IT IS NOT A WALL STREET BAILOUT! IT IS NOT JUST A MAIN STREET BAILOUT!
IT IS AN AMERICAN BAILOUT!
BY EXTENSION IT IS A WORLDWIDE BAILOUT!
BELIEVE IT!
there i go again getting impassioned.
Execute!
I'm trying to stick to Critical Thinking here. However, I really do feel strongly about this. I want all of us to look at the situation and understand what it means. I heard one guy say the government should give each of us, all 300 million of us, 1 million dollarsthat we could all use to pay off our debt, and invest what's left back in the economy, and through aggressive growth pay off the debt and allow our children to inherit a debt-free nation. What a beautiful fantasy. The point is yes, think, know that we must act, come up with ideas. This idea won't fly. The one that is before Congress right now will fly. Don't call your congressmen and tell him to vote no. Call him and tell him to take action, immediate action. Nothing is going to be right for all of us. However, the alternative, doing nothing, is simply not acceptable.
We must act. We can then consider the past. We can look to the future and make policy changes that aggressively lower government spending as appropriate. We can invest in the American future. We can eliminate the national debt. We can allow our children to inherit a smarter, stronger, critical thinking United States of America.
EXECUTE THE PLAN!
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