Conservatives are furious.  Here’s a good Politico piece on McCain’s latest plan to bail out homegamblers with our money.  Excerpt:

“Last night, he took that position on the housing issue of buying up everybody’s mortgage,” former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said on Fox News. “Conservatives are scratching their heads today and saying, ‘What happened?’”

“What on earth is that about?” Huckabee asked. “Then you got to ask, which houses? The condos in southern Florida, where people bought $500,000 homes as a second home and now can’t pay for them? Are we buying those, too?”

And in perhaps the only time in history I wanted to echo the words of Michelle Malkin:

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Valleywag picked up a FriendFeed discussion between a few of us yesterday regarding the bailout bill within which Scoble blames “people like [me]” for the coming “breadlines”.  It rings a little hollow considering where I’ve been on all this and where he’s been (i.e. nowhere), but it brings a much more important issue to the fore.

To the thread in particular, I realize how acerbic my tone can be when discussing such things and try to be cognizant of that every time I write.  Sometimes my frustration – the result of a bit too much anguish about our national slumber – gets the best of me.  But Americans sat mostly silent as international and domestic crimes were perpetrated in their names and their economy was wrecked – choosing to glide along as if they had far more important things to think about.

Robert is right to describe the financial mess as the result of our collective idiocy.  The bill for one or two generations of stupidity has now come due and our remaining credit cards have been declined.  And for the moment, the social media characters participating in the specific tendril of web masturbation that is Robert’s “what to do” post have come up substantially empty.  So, I’ll see what I can come up with.

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The bailout will be yet another crime foisted on the American taxpayer.  All the reward from the “up” has been consumed – burned away like the vapor it was – and now the risk, the cost of the “down” will be borne by us.  Privatized reward; socialized risk.  Tonight, House minority leader John Boehner called it a “crap sandwich“  — that he plans to vote for anyway.   It’s a really bad idea for many reasons – not the least of which is: it’s not going to work.

Never been a huge fan of the man from Alabama.  But he had some great words of wisdom at today’s Bailout of the Century hearing:

“I understand the situation is dire.  But so is the condition of the taxpayer… yes, the market is overwhelmed by greed, a lack of oversight… and the bottom line, as I see it, is that you’re [sticking] the taxpayer with it.  I think that’s shameful myself.  I know there are better ways – would it be without pain?  Oh no… but the best – and Chairman Bernanke, I’ve heard you say this – the best disciplinary mechanism we have is the marketplace.  The marketplace will discipline all of us with pain.  But we learn.  I’m not sure people will learn if this goes through.”

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• Congress Told To Act Fast On Bailout Plan

Then allow Princeton economist and NY Times columnist Paul Krugman [on Bill Maher's show last night] to bring home the gravity of our current predicament.  “We hit the wall but good this time … there are no atheists in foxholes.”

I can’t help but notice some chilling similarities between the Bush Administration’s approach on the financial crisis and the Iraqi War Resolution.  I literally sat awake until almost 5:00 this morning fretting about this.
Let’s look at a few of them:

• We were told that calamity was imminent, and a failure to act and do exactly what Bush asked of us would result in a disaster;
• Congress was strongarmed into doing something big and something fast, without time for proper analysis;
• We were conned into spending hundreds of billions of our hard-earned dollars (much for the benefit of corporate malfeasants) – only to take a giant step backward;
• We handed legal immunity and absolute control to the very authorities who demanded the actions;
• We were lied to every step of the way.

And eventually the majority came around to see it as a colossal blunder.  So, I think Congress would serve itself and the People well if it took a much more measured approach to this, or even refused the bailout.  I know, I’m asking for cajones of steel here, but I can dream.

If this goes through, it will be the swindle of the century.

I’ll close with a few words from President Franklin Delano Roosevelt:

“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That is fascism; ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power.”

How did we get here?  Is it too late to stop it?

Today on MSNBC, lonesome truth-telling libertarian patriot Congressman Ron Paul said that McCain is “not someone I could endorse, ever.”  Not surprising, of course – but nonetheless interesting to hear from a fellow candidate for the GOP nod.

Every American should sit through (and actually digest) this interview in its entirety [Part 1] | [Part 2].  Whether you watch or listen, please take the time to do so with open ears and an open mind.  It is probably the most powerful and sobering assessment of the American condition I have heard in years.

Bacevich’s 2007 op ed in the Washington Post provides some sad but interesting background.  His new book is here.

I really want to push for everyone to feel that the Obama candidacy might be their best choice – Democrats, Republicans and independents – and that everyone should evaluate him regardless of their affiliation.  But it needs to be said that none have been betrayed by their “leaders” the way Republicans have.  Their party was hijacked by a few dozen neoconservative criminals, and our global reputation and economy are in tatters as a result.  The Republican party under Bush abandoned its ideals, and many Republicans are finding considerably more they like about Obama than they do about McCain.

I know more than a few smart Republicans – young and old school – who are supporting Obama.  But many of them don’t talk about it, or, if they do, not very loudly.  I hope that over the next couple of months they’ll speak a bit more loudly, because this is a candidacy that everyone should seriously consider.

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Growing up, there was a book that first got me excited about computers.  I’d never really forgotten it, but over the years it had faded deep into memory.  And fond memories they were – the book was whimsical, full of strange artwork and far-out metaphors.  It really helped me – a middle-school kid in the middle of nowhere trying desperately to think big – to see outside my small world and into a universe of infinite technological possibility.  I was probably 12 or 13, just starting to tinker with TRS-80s and early Apples and really having my mind opened up by these strange little boxes.

A few months ago – for some reason – that book popped back into my mind.  Who was that guy?  What was that book?  And off I went to figure it out.

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