|
The United States is in the middle of the worst economic crisis of my lifetime. The sad part is that I am partly responsible for it because I profited by it. On the news this morning the woman describing the plummeting stock market said that this could become the worst June in the Stock Market since the Depression. I may go to the bank and withdraw some of my money, just in case.
What is fascinating to me about all of this is the lack of anyone publicly accepting responsibility. The "Buck Stops Here" attitude of Harry Truman is absent in all of this. The President plots out a tax rebate check scheme (heh-heh-heh) telling us to go and spend when he should have been advising us to save.
The government is busy plotting out bailouts for homeowners caught in the mortgage crisis. This is merely an underhanded bailout to the banking industry and a long term increase in the national debt I'm certain. The FBI is beginning to arrest the henchmen of the wealthy and unscrupulous who perpetrated the housing bubble in the first place: the overlords won't be arrested.
I have not heard anyone, not a homeowner, not a banker, not an elected official say, "This is my fault and let me explain my role in it." That would be refreshing. I wonder where the character went that created this country. I wonder if it died out with the hardy souls who survived the Depression and rebuilt the country.
I wonder where the country goes from here. I wonder on what day does panic set in and set off a public run on the banks. I'm fairly certain that the wealthy were busy sheltering their money yesterday and over the past thirty days as the stock market took it's a dramatic plunge. Someone was taking their money out and it wasn't those of us locked into devaluing retirement accounts we can't touch.
There's a great scene in "It's a Wonderful Life" where there is a run on the banks when the stock market plunges. Jimmy Stewart has to talk the people out of taking all their money out of his "Building and Loan" or he'll go out of business. At the end of the day he has one single "samolian" left. Is a run on the banks the next step? Are there really nervous old bankers with strings on their fingers hoping they will have one dollar left at the end of the day?
Everyone who contributed to the real estate bubble and everyone who went belly up on a debt must take some share of the responsibility. Those who lived within their means and are now losing their jobs over this mess have a right to be angry. They have a right to point fingers at the irresponsible and the dishonest. But those of is who bought and sold riding the bubble to profits cannot totally avoid responsibility for the consequences of it bursting.
Nobody admits that the whole system got out of hand and even a simple guy like me could see it coming five years ago. The price of houses was out of control. Prices were so out of proportion to income that no rational person could have expected they would continue to rise. And yet people acted as though they would. They bought up and up and up. They financed up and up and up. And now it is crashing down and down and down.
Everyone who participated and got out early is responsible; Every bank that got stuck with bad loans is responsible; Every investor in the banks is responsible; Everyone who accepted a sub-prime loan on phony income amounts is responsible; Everyone who bought or sold a creative loan with the notion that they'd refinance in three years is responsible; Everyone who bought into a skyrocketing market that fizzled and fell back to earth is responsible. We are all responsible. We all knew or should have known the housing bubble was a farce and we all participated or benefitted from it for our own gain and now we are all losing. Now it is time to sell and save, not to buy and borrow. Now is the time to quit pointing fingers and begin pointing the way forward.
Now is the time for all of us to examine what our level of responsibility is for this mess and to make necessary changes. We need to face the pain and get our country moving forward again. I'd love it if the President would lead the way, wouldn't you? I love for him to say, "Look folks, we blew it and this is what we need to do now that we're in this mess. Follow me; I'll lead us out of this mess."
But old George is done, he's so done that Laura is even doing foreign policy speeches while George simply mopes around the world for photo-ops. There has never been a lamer, lame duck in the White House.
So I look to the future and I am listening to the candidates. The first one who claims some level of responsibility for this whole economic mess, not simply sidesteps questions and describes vague solutions; that person is going to get my vote. I am waiting for Barack Obama and John McCain to show me who has the character to LEAD us out of this new Depression!
|
