You know I actually didn’t know that but that’s sick.

I’m sick of hearing about no republicans voted for this stimulus b/c they wanted tax cuts. Look, whether you like the stimulus or not tax cuts are going to do the deal.

I can tell you as a biz owner if my taxes get cut I will

1. Not hire anyone new
2. Not spend the money

Further, if you look at the tax cut proposal what exactly will it do for anyone. They are talking about a 5% tax cut across the board. Now I don’t even know what that means, 5% of total Gross Income, 5% off each marginal bracket, ??? In any even a 5% tax cut across the board for a family trying to live off of 40k a year isn’t going to save them. Won’t stop them from foreclosure, won’t help them send kids to college etc etc.

My oldest is still 9 years away, but I admit to being secretly concerned about ending up a (unintentional) liar about pushing the typical ‘college = better life’ sentiments almost daily, as it relates to his academic and athletic pursuits. “Work on that fastball and math, kid, if you want the good life…” geez, I seriously wonder…..

The financial damage inflicted on Americans by their own government is as great as would be expected from foreign conquest. While Washington “protected” us from terrorists by fighting pointless wars abroad, the US economy collapsed.

How can President Obama even think about fighting wars half way around the world while California cannot pay its bills, while Americans are being turned out of their homes, while, as Business Week reports, retirees will work throughout their retirement (which assumes that there will be jobs), while careers are being destroyed and stores and factories shuttered.

Americans are facing tremendous unemployment and hardship. Obama doesn’t have another dollar to spend on Bush’s wars.

Taxpayers are busted. They cannot stand another day of being milked by the military-security complex. The US government is paying private mercenaries more by the day than the monthly checks it is providing to Social Security retirees.

This is insanity.

The banksters robbed us twice. First it was our home and stock values. Then the government rewarded the banksters for their misdeeds by bailing out the banksters, not their victims, and putting the cost on the taxpayers’ books.

The government has also robbed the taxpayers of $3 trillion dollars to fight its wars. About $600 billion are out of pocket costs, and the rest is on the taxpayers’ books.

When foreign creditors look at the debt piled on the taxpayers’ books, they don’t see a good credit risk.

Washington is so accustomed to ripping off the taxpayers for the benefit of special interests that the practice is now in the DNA. While bailouts are being piled upon bailouts, wars are being piled upon wars.

Before Obama gets in any deeper, he must ask his economic team where the money is coming from. When he finds out, he needs to tell the rest of us.

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be reached at: PaulCraigRoberts@yahoo.com

That is going on in lots of states right now, I know PA and DE are having the same problems, I can only assume Ohio and Michigan, California, Florida and Nevada too.

You make a good point, I’ve been looking at this as a high risk bet, last year they lost about 100 million more than they made, I might take a shot at it however. As much as I agree with college being too expensive while most things are deflating some still aren’t

Food, Healthcare, College.

plus, part of this “stimulus” might help this along.

Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat who heads the Senate Banking Committee, vowed at a press conference at the Capitol to go beyond condemnation and seek a return of bonuses.

“I’m going to be urging — in fact not urging, demanding — that the Treasury Department figures out some way to get the money back,” Dodd said. “This is unacceptable.”

The senator said he will force executives whose companies received taxpayer aid to testify before his committee to explain their bonuses.

**

Ooooohhh, hearings!! How scary is that? This reveals that Dodd and others of his ilk (from both parties) are part of the problem and not the solution.

What is unacceptable is Congress voting to shovel huge amounts of taxpayer money to prop up corporations that should be out of business. Not only that, what is additionally unacceptable is giving such money without appropriate conditions. Such conditions should include at a bare minimum:

* replace the board of directors for failing to supervise top management

* replace top management who led these companies to the brink of insolvency

* pay new top management government wages with the ability to earn bonuses only upon repayment of government money

* suspend dividends or at least limit them to a very nominal amount

Current options are:

1) Cans of Spam
2) Campbells Soup
3) Cigarettes
4) Bottles of Booze
5) Military Rations
6) Ammunition
7) Seeds

Any other ideas?