McCain, More of the Same

I'm not an economist. I don't understand the economics of Wall Street and all of the back door dealings done there and among the big banks of the world. What I do know is that the Republicans have long advocated deregulation of just about everything and have refused to even watch over any big business, and certainly not the banks.

The oil companies are running rampant. I do not recall gasoline shortages because of a gulf hurricane until Katrina. Yet there was Camille in the late sixties that laid waste to the Mississippi gulf coast. Granted, there weren't as many cars on the road at that time. Suddenly, gas prices go up ridiculously over night. Why? Supply and demand? Or is it simply an excuse for more price gouging? The price of oil not yet refined or even pumped from the ground goes up on the world market and gas refined days or weeks before, goes up ridiculously at the pump. All the while, the President of the United States, a big oil man, says or does nothing, and the oil companies shamelessly reap incredible profits.

The U. S. economy appears to be on the brink of collapse, along with many banks large and small. Yet John McCain, a Republican, says regulation is not the answer. Someone should be watching over these people, particularly the mortgage industry, and closely regulating them. If that had been being done, chances are, we would not be in this situation. Of course, had there been regulations, the last eight years would have seen the Bush Regime, paring down the regulatory agency to one or two people in some out of the way office somewhere in Washington, much like the consumer protection agency. One man in that organization tests children's toys. One man.

Then there is the Interior Department agency that is supposed to be watching over the oil company drilling, but the personnel were, instead, having sex and doing drugs with their oil company friends. Great watchdogs. Or were these DOI employees instructed to cozy up to the oil companies rather than watch over them? They became too cozy, instead.

The EPA under Bush has been instructed to allow more pollution through less regulation. They have been pushed to turn their heads to climate change, or global warming. Their recommendations have been changed at the White House and their studies have been altered.

All of this is simply the Republican philosophy of laissez-faire, when it comes to business. Let big business rule. Let the toy companies make dangerous, poisonous toys. Allow the oil companies to charge outrageous prices and let them drill where they want. Don't even think about watching over the mortgage companies. After all, they know what they are doing. Why should the government become involved?

Now, the Bush Regime has decided to throw Republican philosopy to the wind and bail out the mortgage industry by assuming an incredibly bad debt with money the country doesn't have. It is all being done with a policy drawn up over a weekend by a man, who just might be one of the villans who caused the problem in the first place. After all, he headed up one of these bad companies before becoming Sec. of the Treasury. Being the same old, same old, Bush and his cronies don't want to see the CEO's of these rogue companies fail to get their golden parachutes, when they jump out of the crumbling company. I have an idea. Let's let the oil companies bail them out. They have the extra billions at the moment.

Then there are taxes. McCain advocates the same old, same old. Give the rich and the big companies more tax breaks and pass it on to the middle class. It's that same old Reagan tax lie that if the breaks are all given to the rich and big business, it will "trickle down" to the middle class and poor. It hasn't worked and it won't work. Every time a Republican president has taken office in the last 30 years, he has been given a surplus and almost immediately it has been blown away by these inept Republican economic theories.

McCain continues to rant about how Obama will raise our taxes, when in reality, Obama will lower taxes on the middle class and increase them on big business and the rich, while McCain proposes the opposite, or the usual tired Republican voodoo economics. Given time the mess may be cleaned up, if Obama wins. However, this mess may be more than even a Democrat can manage. Economists are saying that McCain's proposed economic policies will cause the deficit to increase. Therefore, if McCain wins, it will continue to be more of the same, while the middle class flounders and continues to drown in debt, high prices, and taxes to pay for more wars and more bad management. At the same time the deficit will continue to climb until the country finally cannot take it anymore. What will happen then is anyone's guess. It could, however, be a fatal blow.