THE EXPAND-A-THON
Like most Americans, it is my most fervent wish that the stimulus package recently signed by President Obama will be effective in boosting our economy. Still, my pragmatic side tells me otherwise, and, apparently, many other citizens are getting the same message from the little voice in their head. I could write pages on just what has occurred over the last two weeks in Washington, D.C. . From our new Attorney General, Eric Holder, who regards us as a "nation of cowards" when it comes to dealing with racism, to our new Treasury Secretary who failed to pay his own taxes, and right down the list.
Look, I like this guy, Obama. He is intensely bright, funny, sincere, I believe, and casts a respectable impression of a Commander-In-Chief. Now, though, the inexperience begins to show. Inexperience is not a character flaw. The man won the campaign, but what we are witnessing over the last several weeks is a chapter in American History that will be revisited, I suspect, many times over the next many decades.
The sheer magnitude of this bill, this "national loan" from loansharks, is stunning. So large, it is, that every one of us owes, right now, over $10,000.00 on the interest. Experts are already speaking in terms of not paying it back. It will be, practically, an impossibility. Just weeks ago we were carping about having "mortgaged our grandchildren's future"...we have already surpassed that. That notion now stands as a pleasant memory. All the campaign rhetoric, on both sides, about "fiscal responsibility" and bringing an end to "pork" and "earmarks", also stands as a faded memory. The stimulus bill has over 9,000 earmarks. They're not calling it "pork" anymore, probably in fear of litigation from the powerful lobbying group, "Pigs Against Character Assassination", but you can put lipstick on an earmark, and it's still an earmark.
I saw Senator McCain being interviewed last night. He was in Washington and looked very tired. His eyes looked red, almost as though he'd been crying, and I thought, maybe he had, and if he had, I wouldn't blame him. Here, a Senator who has never brought a single pork-barrel dollar back to his State of Arizona during his entire career. His re-elections founded on the popularity of his character and discipline, not on the expectation of no-bid work on social programs. As he spoke about the impact that this spending, and a new 1.75 trillion-dollar budget, will have on the future of this country, I felt myself wanting to weep as well. I could quite literally see the pain in McCain's face. When one really stops and pays attention to the details of what is happening here, you can begin to see the bigger picture take shape.
This is an expansion of government unrivaled in our history. It will have its blundering hand in banking, in the auto industry, in Wall Street, in every conceivable type of social program you can imagine. It is one giant step towards socialism, towards a new era of government intervention into nearly every aspect of our lives. All this, while our, indeed the world's, economy teeters on the brink of collapse. It is a massive experiment. As Dennis Miller said of the government running our healthcare system, "it'll be like the Department of Motor Vehicles with wounds..." . 'Nuff said.
Karl From New Hampshire