I have to say I am angry enough to spit bullets, so I sent this letter to my Congressional representatives, Senator Sherrod Brown, Senator George Voinovich, and Congressman 16th District, Ralph Regula. I hope that they will share my opinion with the rest of their colleagues. If any of this hits home for you, feel free to cut and paste as you see fit and send it off to your Congressional representatives.
Dear Congressional Representative:
I have been closely watching the economy for a long time. It was easy to predict the present "crisis" as American families borrowed at high rates of interest on credit cards when they couldn't afford to do so. When they got into trouble on credit cards, the Fed lowered the rate of interest so they could double mortgage or use home equity loans to pay off credit card debts. The banks and financial institutions could not make their high rates of interest on traditional loans, so they made the risky sub-prime loans and jacked up the credit card rates on those who were already in financial trouble.
It is strange that the Congress now wants to "do something" about the economic crisis. People in Ohio have been losing their decent jobs for years. Credit card companies have been robbing us of what little money we have each month. We are as much tied to the credit card companies as the coal miners were tied to the company stores. What did Congress do about it? It changed the bankruptcy laws so it is harder to get free of the debt this government has encouraged consumers to shoulder and encouraged people to hock the house to pay off the credit cards. Our elderly are getting reverse mortgages to pay for health care and living expenses.
In the meantime, Congress went on an Iraq spending spree with billions that cannot be accounted for, and all we hear is that entitlements are breaking the budget. We are told that health care for everyone would break the budget, but federal and state funds are already paying the cost for those who are at highest risk among us, the elderly, disabled, and poor. Meanwhile the private insurance companies refuse to insure people with preexisting conditions and charge employers and the self-employed outrageous rates. Insurance companies have increased profits and higher salaries for their CEOs while the tax payer picks up the tab for the uninsured and those at highest risk. When a crisis does occur like hurricane Katrina, insurance companies refuse to pay their subscribers, leaving the government to give aid to the people who have been hurt.
Ah! But now the stock market is hitting the skids. Now there is a REAL economic crisis for Congress to worry about. What will we do?! The answer, of course, is for the government to spend billions of dollars they borrow from China, some Middle Eastern oil rich leader or our Social Security fund to goad the American consumer to resume spending. It is interesting that Congress has no money to help Americans who have no health care, have lost their jobs to China, owe their homes and their lives to credit companies and banks, but they have 160 billion to spend to prop up the stock market and the financial institutions that have been gouging us.
Here is what I have to say to this Congress and I hope you will say it for me. Keep your refund! You weren't there when the credit card companies and banks were enslaving me. You weren't there when my health cost were doubling. You weren't there when the good jobs in Ohio went to China, India and Vietnam. So don't be there for the bankers, CEO's, mortgage companies, day traders and house flippers. I might suffer a bit, but I know how to do with less. Lower and middle income people in Ohio have had a lot of practice.
Do you want to pass some legislation?! How about regulating the financial institutions, stock market, and insurance companies? How about changing our trade agreements to protect American workers? How about ending the Bush tax cuts to the wealthy, so that we can fund the war this Congress voted to get us into? Maybe you could stimulate the economy by fixing our bridges so they won’t fall and our levies to protect our homes. Maybe you could put some Americans to work fixing our broken infrastructure, policing our streets to make our neighborhoods safe, or fixing our schools.
Yours truly,
Angry Constituent
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4 comments:
There's a new UNCLE in town but his name isn't SAM.
He goes by the handle Uncle Dubya and tells everybody to "don't worry and be happy."
Sound familiar ?
His message is to .... SPEND, SPEND, SPEND and he's going to buy your vote in the next election by giving MOST everyone a candy coated check to ease their pain.
Read My Lips:
BEWARE OF SNAKE OIL SALEMEN WEARING RATTLESNAKE BOOTS SPEAKING A SOUTHERN DRAWL WITH A FORKED TONGUE !
Peace,
Cosmic
Hi Cosmic,
He is certainly one sly and sneaky snake oil salesman, but I think that the American voters are finally on to him. I am hoping that the Senate will turn down the candy coated incentive and go for some real reform in our economic policy. Of course, W will veto that, leaving it up to a newly elected president and a much revised Congress to work on the problems instead of trying to buy our votes with sugar coated tax rebates borrowed from our children and grandchildren's future.
I am teaching my students right now about the immediate period after the American Revolution in U.S. history.
What many people are unaware of is that immediately after securing independence, the U.S. was plunged into a decade-long economic depression. Britain, angry at having to relinquish its colonies, created an unfair balance of trade where the fledging US had no choice but to buy its goods but Great Britain refused to allow any American goods to be imported to its shores.
A variety of different strategies were tried, with limited success. Some of these strategies are being proposed now. Eventually, the recession ended when new markets were discovered--PARTICULARLY those in Asia. That's the thing about capitalism. To keep itself alive, it finds any and every way it can to make money.
If we want the economic times to come to an end we will ultimately have to redefine the ways we make money so that it is distributed more copiously. Rail against the system, regulate it, but the way capitalism functions---for it to succeed it has to adapt to changing times. We may not like it and we may see full well its failures and flaws but the situation remains that our system is the only one which has proved to work over time.
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