Hard Times or Huge Government?

Christmas dinner in the home of Earl Pauley near Smithland, Iowa. (Circa 1935)

Have you ever heard those “crazy” conspiracy theorists out there that say things like this;

“I think we should have small government because if you let the government get too big they could just come and take your house over and not even give you a choice”

What a bunch of nut jobs right? Like the federal government could ever just come and take over your house. People would riot in the streets. This could never REALLY happen!

I got news for you. Click Here to see the106 pages of the "Bailout Bill" from congress today stating exactly how they can and will do that to hundreds of thousands of Americans by the end of the day today. Pretty scary stuff. Now, for those of you who are saying well, that only applies to those people who got into sub-prime loans. That is not exactly true. One of the ways we got in to this mess was from companies like Countrywide taking a portfolio of loans and selling them as a package to Wall Street. For example. They may take two good solid “A” credit loans and package them together with three weaker “C” credit loans and sell all five of them to Wall Street as a package. This is what is referred to as a “mortgage backed security”. Now that they are a nice neat little package they cannot be separated back into five separate loans. So if you are so lucky to have your mortgage be part of one of these sweet little packages that is now being referred to as a “troubled asset” then guess what, the federal government will now be able to purchase that “troubled asset” and you have absolutely no say in the matter. (Makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside huh?)

Shame on every political leader since Jimmy Carter who ignored the warning signs of this disaster to preserve their own positions of power.
Shame on Bill Clinton for signing the law that incentivized all of these institutions to make bad loans under the pathetic disguise of “Equal Housing Opportunity”.
Shame on George Bush for sponsoring such a gigantic move towards big government!
Shame on every congressman and senator that votes for this bill.

I perfectly understand that the alternative could result in a total collapse of our financial system, the likes of which only today's senior citizens could begin to relate too. Has anyone other than me stopped and considered if that may be exactly what we need to purge our government and our society of such corrupt and entitlement based thinking? This is a country that endured a revolution from the British, a civil war, a great depression, two world wars and 9/11.

I for one put a whole lot more faith in the ability of my neighbor to rise to this challenge than I do in the politicians in Washington D.C. that seem to think that there is no problem on earth that they can't legislate their way out of. It's high time we swallow a big nasty dose of accoutability in this coutry and let it be a lesson to us of what happens when governments and people choose power over wisdom.