So I have gotten in the habit of doing a weird thing. I am not sure where this habit came from. Most folks would call me conservative, a few old fashioned and some antique. This thing is called fiscal conservatism. I did not get this trait from my parents. I was not given this trait by a neighbor or friend. I think I picked it up when I got my first loan for someone with "no" credit and I paid 21% interest on a loan for something I just absolutely had to have new. I do things like live in houses that are below my income level. I drive used in some cases very used cars, I wait for the sales and watch my expenditures. Bottom line I have gotten accustomed to doing more with less and saving at every corner. I have also learned the value of giving back to God. It has been the life saver especially during tax time.
So here I am watching Detroit getting funds to stay solvent. The auto "bail out" as it is called. My Toyota has 280 thousand miles on it and runs like a top. My Detroit mini-van has 80K and I work to stay in front of the constant maintenance. Detroit has proven yet again that it can not be competitive. And Americans have proven yet again they have lost the ability to make the hard choices. Chrysler has been bailed out before and we are doing it again. GM and Ford have proven that they can not stay in front of the competition. And the UAW has proven that they are more concerned with the now than with tomorrow. So Detroit has mismanaged, failed to stay competitive and proven they can not compete on a global scale. The tough decision by Americans is to let them fail. The easy one is to tax folks like me to bail them out and to give them yet another opportunity to fail. Now the real rub. If I were a small business and I mismanaged my accounts, failed to plan for the next technology, failed to provide the best product for a competitive price I would not be in business and you would not be bailing me out. Why is Detroit different?
AIG has proven they can not provide a quality product for a competitive price. As such they went to the government watering hole for a bail out. And America did just that bailed them out. Then they went back for a second gulp, why? Because they needed more funds to become solvent. Oh did they fail to mention that solvency meant paying their executives lucrative bonuses. Once again America has proven that it has lost the will to make the tough choices. The tough choice here is to let AIG fail. Someone will scoop in and buy up the remains and turn it into a profitable operation but Americans are not comfortable with tough choices that mean change.
I have gotten in the habit of writing my congressional representatives and the president. The message is simple if they are going to reward the poor performance of Detroit, AIG, Bear Sterns, Fannie, Freddy, etc then the conservatives like me will jump on that band wagon. I want my hand out to. I want my neighbor to pay my bills, buy my house, and my car. If there is a line giving it away I want in it.
Problem here is I am not the only one. In fact everyone wants a freebie, but as I found out early in life nothing is free. So what happens when you are told there is no more, when you got all the way to the window just to have it close on you. This happened in the 30's it can happen again. I don't plan on being in line for the freebie. I will be out doing the conservative thing, like paying the bills, selling the unneeded unnecessary, unwanted. And doing what Americans use to do, be self sufficient.
No comments:
Post a Comment