Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Panic should not have its rewards

A few weeks back the government said we were all gonna die financially. The banks were frozen and without a bailout the financial world as we knew it would collapse.

So what did you do and what did I do? We wrapped our little fists tight around every dollar and cent we had. Now the big news is that the consumer isn’t spending and consuming as much as we should.

Well duh, what did they expect from us? Even if we aren’t losing our homes to foreclosure or losing our jobs, when the government pushes the panic button, they should expect people to panic.

Hopefully the next administration will consist of people with forethought and a little moderation, especially when it comes to panic button pushing.

This administration has sold a lot based on panic button pushing. The Patriot Act and the rush to invade Iraq come to mind quickly. They have yelled, “Panic” and in rushed the congress with buckets of votes to put out what they believed to be a fire. Some of these votes I believe were cast in good faith and trust.

The new administration should either be retire the panic button or place it on a much higher shelf. The use of panic should not be an agenda and should not have its rewards.

10 Comments:

Blogger Fixer said...

But, you see, the Republicans push the panic button when their interests are threatened or they see a chance to make money off the panic.

Look at who's getting the payouts from the 'bailout' bill. Ain't shit helping the regular folks who are going under.

November 19, 2008 2:28 AM  
Blogger fallenmonk said...

I don't think you have to worry PoP as there will actually be somebody in the White House that thinks with his brain and not his gut or johnson. It will be refreshing.

November 19, 2008 4:19 AM  
Blogger Randal Graves said...

Exactly, it'll be nice -- look! A gay, flag-burning, abortionist fundamentalist jihadist Muslim pagan secularist! Get 'im!

November 19, 2008 5:29 AM  
Blogger FreakyNick said...

We need a "Chill Out" button.

I think people today entertain themselves by seeing crises where none exist. If every one would just chill out we'd see that everything is going to be fine.

This kind of reminds me of Kevin Bacon's character at the end of "Animal House" trying to tell everyone to calm down "all is well" as all hell breaks loose around him.

November 19, 2008 5:56 AM  
Blogger Matthew Hubbard said...

This bailout feels like the end of representative democracy in this country. Phone calls to congresscritters ran hundreds to one against, and still it passed without serious hearings. Moreover, it happened mere weeks before a major election, and while the Republicans took a pounding, an angry electorate could have punished people from both sides of the aisle who voted for this.

Didn't happen. We are going to pay for it.

November 19, 2008 6:01 AM  
Blogger Dr. Monkey Von Monkerstein said...

Amen.

November 19, 2008 6:20 AM  
Blogger roger said...

so....when we are conservative with our spending, saving money for retirement, the economy falls apart. what kinda economy is that?

November 19, 2008 7:23 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A friend was telling me about Naomi Klein's book The Shock Doctrine. This fits the scenario.

November 19, 2008 10:03 AM  
Blogger Mauigirl said...

I think once Obama is in charge there will be much less of this panic and fear-mongering. It will be nice to have a president who actually thinks about things and comes up with recommendations that make sense.

November 19, 2008 3:07 PM  
Blogger two crows said...

and I heard this AM that they're running out of things to spend the $700 billion on. so they're going to hang onto the rest and give it to Obama to parcel out.

do you remember last Sept when, if we didn't give em the entire $700 billion, the sky was gonna fall?
well, it didn't.

and now they don't know what to spend it on??????

what about a few hundred thousand mortgages?

what about a few car companies?

what about some airlines that could go belly-up because people aren't traveling?
[at least, I know a lot of snow-birds here in the Tampa area are planning on spending the holidays here rather than go home this year].
^^^
back in Sept, they even ADMITTED they didn't know how much they would need for the crisis.
they said, "We just knew it would be a lot so we picked a really big number."

well, so much for **ahem** well-thought-out-plans.

November 19, 2008 4:35 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home