Whazzinnitfuhmee

OK, so we're spending $700B on a financial bailout. That's easy to understand, but there is something very creepy and hauntingly familiar about the selling of this action. First, the real problem.

I am not, nor will ever be, an economist. I am a fiscal Libertarian with a social conscience (I like to tell myself). That means I believe government was put in place to build roads, protect the borders, and provide emergency services. Everything else should be private venture that meets a market need (if we had a private education system, I doubt we'd be in the state we are currently, and your taxes would be lower, but I could go on all day with like material). So I am generally chafed by any suggestion of spending billions on anything that doesn't meet the above criteria.

Unfortunately, I don't have a very clear idea of a) how we got into this mess, 2) what the ramifications are within the financial sector, ii) the short and long-term costs of the bailout package or b) the short and long-term costs of NOT acting. This leaves me in a quandary of trust. When we don't / can't / probably don't have time or inclination to spend several tears studying enough micro and macro economics to understand a situation like this (which is, I am told, unprecedented in the history of modern civilization), we have to trust those making the decisions.

Which brings us to the creepy and frighteningly familiar part. When the chuckle-head looks into the camera, furrows his brow and tells me "banks will close in your neighborhood, the value of your house will go down", etc., all I can think about is the absolutely imminent mushroom cloud that would circle my head had we not invaded Iraq. It's Lucy holding Charlie Brown's football. Countless billions have been funneled into the military industrial complex based on this administration's obviously disingenuous agenda. Same sales guy, same sales pitch, same bunch of bushmen standing in line to benefit.

The timing is also curious. It's at the merciful end of the lame-duck administration's kidnapping of our constitution, so there can be no deep, time-consuming assessment of all the aforementioned ramifications, nor can there be any accountability of the administration five years from now if the bailout blows up in our face (this can happen in a plethora of ways, and is as likely as its success).

So, like a good Libertarian, I say "What's in it for me?". Unless there are iron-clad, inescapable mechanisms in place to return the investment (give me back MY damn taxes) upon the financial success of ANY of these measures, I say let the markets do what they may. If the economy falters, goes into recession, or my local bank fails, so be it. We have seen this before, and we apparently didn't learn from it. Maybe we will this time, maybe not, but I am dead-set against buying this snake oil from that salesman. Hey, Warren Buffett just invested $5B in a failing financial institution, so that means there IS opportunity for private enterprise to affect the situation. My money's on his investment making better returns than my involuntary one.

At the end of the day, if they wanted me to get on board, they should have put somebody with greater credibility on the dais. Like Mel Gibson. Or Elliot Spitzer. Or somebody that could help me, in simple terms, understand what I currently don't. Help me, help you. But don't you dare try to sell me on another coffer-draining exercise premised on George W. Ass-hat's latest fear-mongering. I ain't buying.