The Government and the Big Three

While we all need a little financial help from time to time, the recent bailouts the government is handing out are getting more and more ridiculous. First, we go into foreign countries and bomb them because they killed over 3,000 American Citizens. While I am not against the retaliation our country has taken, I do not endorse it either. So someone kills thousands of innocent people, we retaliate, then we say we are sorry and spend billions rebuilding them.

Next, our housing market takes a tumble. Foreclosures are the highest in years because Mortgage Companies and Banks all over the country gave people loans they couldn't afford, or with terms that left them unable to afford it later in the term of the loan. So Wall Street takes a nose dive, a hard and heavy nose dive. We send them billions to turn this around, bailing out the CEO's and everyone else that had a hand in this disaster.

Then the big three, as GM, Ford, and Chrysler have come to be known as, come to Congress and ask for billions. They show up in private jets, more than likely wearing thousand dollar suits, begging for help. All the while they have been massively overpaid for decades. When they return, the government decides that they don't want the auto workers to lose their jobs if the Big Three crash, and likely without billions, they will, and soon. While I feel for the potentially unemployed, again we are paying people for their wrongdoing.

These recent instances are like smashing a mailbox, while driving a vehicle that is not inspected, under the influence of alcohol, and the government pays for the mailbox, the inspection and detox. What about the guy that ran that stop sign? These bailouts are just like cutting down that sign and telling him to continue on his journey, it was never there in the first place. We, the people, are bailing out all the wrongdoers, and it has to stop.

There is a limit to what we should be expected to bailout, and that limit is long overdue. Now that they approved $14 billion for the auto makers, what are they going do? Does that money save the 2.5 million workers from losing their jobs, ever? No. But, lets pretend for just a moment that this money is the savior of the car makers and the people who work in some relation to the car makers. What about the rest of the millions of people in America? Just because those big guys got their billions, does that now mean us little people have enough money to buy new cars to keep them afloat? Absolutely not! Us little people still don't have good jobs, we still don't have good enough credit to get a loan of any kind with the current economy, we still don't have the funds available each month to pay the high payment of new cars, and we are still hungry.

I do not believe the government is understanding in this case that if the every day working person can't afford to buy a house, buy a car, go shopping, or spend money of any kind on any thing in a hope to bring the economy back. Many of us are having a hard time paying our bills, our rent, our electric with todays economy. Layoffs are going out of control as the cost of the bills we have are rising.

But, Mr. Government, go ahead and keep helping the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. While the economy gets worse, and the middle and lower class lives get harder, we still have nothing and of course, we are too unimportant to you to get anything. A typical family of 4, with a husband making $400 bring home every other week, the wife $300 every other week working part time, and additional income of only $600, makes $300 too much to get food stamps, and makes a lot more than the limit for Medicaid. Meanwhile Mr. Government does not see how funding state programs are more important than funding the big car makers. John Doe and Jane Doe are meanwhile going uncovered for serious medical conditions because millionaires, possibly even billionaires, made a mistake and need billions to survive another few months.

And yes, I do mean a few months. Face it, if you make a product, you need to sell the product to continue gaining income. But since small time people are not as important as the big guy, the amount of people that can afford to buy that product was probably cut by at least 25% in the last few months. But keep up the good work Mr. Government, I am sure that there are at least 2 million people who are happy to still have a job, while the rest of us are still hungry without medical insurance.