The Diversion Game: Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Both President Obama and Treasury Secretary Geithner say they take full responsibility for the AIG debacle although neither says what he has done wrong or what he would do to correct it. This may be a good sound bite but is meaningless. Actions speak louder than words.

Observant people become aware when they interact with children that they rarely respond to merely a lecture. An appropriate consequence consistently enforced works wonders in changing behavior. Witnessing others or experiencing punishment helps us to resist temptation to engage in immoral or criminal behavior. When crime seems to pay, more people join the ranks of wrongdoers. Politicians seem to think they are immune to prosecution.

Our government has passed over a one trillion dollar stimulus package, when interest is added, without following the proscribed constitutional process of legislative deliberation. There was not a single member or the congress or the executive branch that had read the entire bill before voting on it. There was a rush that did not allow for examining and developing specific objectives and guidelines to restrain fraud.

Whenever large sums of money are distributed without specific instructions and oversight, corruption will occur. It is like dropping a ton of narcotic pills in the middle of a meeting of drug addicts and expecting them not to devour them. This is ridiculous for most addictive personalities do not have the inner discipline to resist. Not only would they swallow as many pills as possible, but also once confronted about their behavior would not accept any responsibility for their actions. They would absurdly blame the people who transported the pills not themselves for causing their irresponsible behavior.

Our politicians are addicted to power and money instead of representing their constituency. They blame Wall Street for this financial fiasco instead of accepting any accountability for their own blatant corruption. Our congressional leaders who finagle money and favors from corporate lobbyists are the same people who wrote the laws but did not enforce them. They have attempted to cowardly hide their culpability by lambasting corporate CEOs. Corporate executives are easy to scapegoat with their exorbitant salaries and bonuses but the corrupt political elite are the traitors to our constitution.

AIG has been given $170 billion; Freddy Mac and Fannie Mae have each been given $100 billion of taxpayer's money to bail them out after making decisions that were dictated by the congress. Senator Christopher Dodd has received over $280,000 dollars for political contributions directly from AIG. Barney Frank has received $40,100 from Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac and was romantically linked with an executive from Fannie Mae. Charles Rangel, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, received $110,000 from AIG and has multiple tax evasion problems. The congressional involvement in the Countrywide sweetheart loan scandal has never been investigated or prosecuted.

There have been no public investigations or political consequences for these shenanigans or criminal actions. Instead, the same characters launched a theatrical outrage on a previously retired CEO, Ed Liddy, who just came on board AIG. This gentleman chose to receive a $1 salary for the position and was castigated for attempting to do his job of straightening out the AIG mess.

These demagogues hypocritically focused on retention bonuses totaling only $165 million, which is only .1 of 1% of the bailout package. The political outrage of dirty politicians is an attempt by them to divert public attention away from their incompetence or personally corrupt behavior. It did nothing to make anyone accountable for his misdeeds.

The politics of diversion, personal destruction and corruption is not new but the scope of the pot of gold is. Eleven trillion dollars without strings attached, unleashed in a few short months defies basic economics and common sense. This assault on responsible economic behavior will erode our economy and individual freedom.

Intuitively citizens understand that the government cannot responsibly manage this overwhelming expansion of debt predicted by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office to be $9.3 trillion until 2019. This means the U.S. will have to borrow this money from other nations, which will affect our security.

We know the abuse of our money exposed up to this point is merely the tip of the iceberg indicating a much larger problem. Our government is usurping the power of the people and placing it in the hands of the political elite. This is contrary to our constitution of restraining the power of the government. Large government's centralized planning has never worked while a free citizenry making self-interest choices has produced the longest period of prosperity on earth in the United States of America.

The "New Politics" of hope and change has been shown to be nothing more than the old politics on steroids, Chicago style. There is the pandering to special interests, paybacks, ex-lobbyists put into positions of power, double talk instead of transparency, which ultimately will result in greater governmental interference in our lives. The power of the people is being stifled while the arrogance of power is going unchecked. Americans need to stand up and fight for our principles and freedoms found in our constitution or we deserve to be enslaved.

Let us get back to the best historical blueprint ever written. "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." (Preamble to the Constitution of the United States.)

Read our constitution and demand it be honored.