The bailout legislation enacted by a largely Democratic-controlled Congress, with strong support from the current Administration, will go down in history as the largest fleecing of the American taxpayer in history. This discovery will, of course, come after the election, in the hope that two years hence when Congressional elections occur, we ? the sheep ?will forget and move on to whatever the mass media is waving in front of our hypnotized noses by then.
The evidence for this fleecing began to unfurl with the realization that the portion of the bailout directed to banks had absolutely no wording in it to guarantee that the funds be used to extend credit.
In fact, accompanied by new regulations which encouraged banks to simply use the “loans” to buy up weaker banks and write down the losses on those banks books, this legislation actually created primary and secondary bailouts financed by the taxpayers. One bailout was obvious, the other buried in new regulations.
Thus this portion of the bailout funds are actually being used to help a few chosen banks consolidate power rather then “free up the credit markets” as intended, or at least promised. So the same folks who legislated forced credit to unqualified home buyers (the so called “liar loans” that fueled the mortgage crisis) now buy up that bad debt and bail out their buddies on Wall Street while destroying competition in the banking sector.
The sad reality reflected in all this is that both parties have been mortally corrupted by greed and lust for power. In the end, we really do have the worst government money can buy. So wear your campaign buttons and jump up and down when the puppeteers pull the strings. They love watching the show.
Jerry Nicoletti
Kelseyville
