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Some Food For Thought In The New Year

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JOHN NASH

Of Kings and Cabbages

Published: January 9, 2009

Our nation's economy is in meltdown. We're printing unbacked, and increasingly worthless, currency as fast the presses will roll.

Unemployment is fast approaching a record level. Automobiles and homes are being repossessed far faster than we were building them at the height of the recent economic boom.

The few families who tried to act responsibly in saving for their future are seeing their savings vanish almost overnight. Our feckless gubbermint throws truckloads of freshly printed money at just about anyone who holds his irresponsible, or larcenous, hands out. Posturing politicians demand that business CEOs sell their private aircraft, yet they continue to sneak unjustified and unnecessary "pork" projects onto just about every piece of legislation they manage to slip through.

The president-elect, whom could set a fiscally responsible example for us, is happily planning to spend millions of our vanishing tax dollars on an unnecessary coronation on Jan. 20.

Why, it seems reasonable to wonder, doesn't he just take a taxi to the White House following his swearing-in at the Capitol, and call it a day? I thought that we divorced ourselves from such meaningless pomp and circumstance when we fought for our independence from the British Crown, more than three centuries back. Obama's election slogan for "change" meant what?

Then there's the little matter of economic bailouts for banks, insurance companies, and others dealing carelessly and recklessly with our money. Take Lehman Brothers for example. It's a financial company (i.e., they produce nothing) that was so carelessly managed and operated that it, along with several similarly poorly run investment and banking businesses, was saved from total failure by our corrupt and benevolent government, which happily handed them nearly $100 billion of the tax money you and I have paid, or will pay soon. Now what did the Lehman gang do with the bags of ill-gotten cash they were handed without even signing a receipt? They put on their Santa suit, and passed out the cash, as bonuses, to the workers that had caused the company to fail. According to one news report, Lehman Brothers "… will pay its average member of staff $335,441 this year …" which comes to $8.7 billion, or about a tenth of all the monies handed to the irresponsible financial sector by an apparently addled Uncle Sam. How was your Christmas bonus?

Then there's that little matter of President-elect Obama's reported economic recovery plan. Apparently, a cornerstone of that "plan" is a massive project to repair and restore our nation's crumbling roads, bridges, dams, and other infrastructure. Now, on the surface that sounds good, but there are serious flaws in the concept. First and foremost, more than anything, this nation needs to produce things, not just fix them.

It is the mining of coal, smelting of steel, building of ships, harvesting of wheat, and stitching of shoes that are at the foundation of any economy. Repairing roads may be necessary, but it doesn't build or sustain economic wealth. Secondly, the illegal immigrants now slipping back into Mexico (because our "unwanted" jobs are disappearing and/or becoming desirable for legal residents due to our looming economic depression), will return tenfold to take the jobs created by Obama's flawed plan. They will, as they have in the past, send 85 percent of their pay back to Mexico, so our nation will benefit little from those created jobs.

Bottom line: we either get serious about producing things, rather than working on services, or our endangered and faltering economy will slip into seemingly impossible and unthinkable failure. The new president's first line of business should be revitalizing/reopening the nation's productive capability. After that he can start to fill in potholes by using Mexican labor.

Finally, there's the matter of a salary, or perhaps hourly pay, for the President's wife. Yes, in case you haven't been reading the smoke signals, there's talk of paying Mrs. Obama for being the president's roommate. Now, since Michelle is — cover the children's ears — a lawyer, perhaps she'd expect to be paid by the hour; say, around $18 a minute. Now if that were for 24 hours a day, she'd be earning far more than her hubby (even with his connections to the infamous Illinois political machine). That brings to mind the days when Hillary proudly proclaimed that we were getting "two, for the price of one," because we elected Bill, and got her in the bargain. I wonder how Hillary now feels about paying Michelle big bucks for running the nation?

Of Cabbages and Kings is a regular feature of this paper. The author welcomes rational comment, which may be sent to him at john@have-eye.com.

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