Funny feeling this won't fix the financial sector

What do you think of this Financial Overhaul bill? I hear there is one right behind it to "fix" this one. (Here's an idea ... how about "Don't pass the bill til it's right so no need to 'fix' it?" Crazy, loco, I know, but sadly typical in Washington ... 

Wall Street Journal, July 15, 2010

"Sweeping financial-overhaul legislation cleared its final procedural hurdle Thursday, setting the stage for the Senate to give its final approval to the measure later Thursday.

"The Senate voted 60-to-38 to end debate on the wide-ranging legislation, a move that required 60 votes to succeed. A final vote is expected at 2 p.m. and will require only a simple majority to pass the bill. Mr. Obama has said he hopes to sign the legislation into law next week."

I heard this bill doesn't include any kind of reforms for Freddie Mac or Fannie May, so I ask you, what's the point? Those two have been sitting over there in the corner since the economy imploded, like Tweedledee and Tweedledum, looking so innocent. Meanwhile, this bill may have some BIG impacts on farmers. Somehow I suspect the folks in Washington haven's exactly got this bill and the repercussions all figured out.

I am a Tea Party Girl

Wrote and sent this to the New York Times. This article's comments really got me going.

Editor,

I am a Tea Party Girl, and it's amazing how wrong so many folks are about people like me and the "why" behind my beliefs. 

Let's see, with regard to the kind of people someone like me is, I've heard I'm a middle-aged, white racist bumpkin bigot who on the one hand hates Obamacare, but on the other hand insists on gripping tightly to Social Security and Medicare too. I've heard that I don't want to help the poor, and that I so stupidly think that the poor should bootstrap themselves up from poverty. I've heard that I'm a hypocrite, a moron, ignorant, and otherwise entirely dimwitted and dumb. 

As to the why behind my beliefs, I've heard that I see communists and socialists under every bed and behind every corner. I'm told that talk radio has entirely polluted my brain (with the glaring implication that I cannot think for myself). I'm told that I'm afraid, fear-based, and that I have no sense of economics or how my tax dollars are actually spent. Oh, and above all, I'm told that all I think about or see is race, race, race, and that I just hate the idea of an African-American president. 

If you're actually interested, here's a bit about who I really am and why ... 

Yes, I believe in personal liberty and less government involvement in my life. Yes, I believe bootstrapping one's way out of poverty is the very best way, and unless I'm mistaken, that has been the backbone of the narrative of these United States. "Work hard, get educated, find-a-need-fill-a-need, get busy, get successful, improve your life and that of your children, etc." I did it, starting at the age of 16, and that experience has served me very well in the 20 years since. Millions of others, of all stripes, have done it too. It is part of what has made our country so great. 

Yes, I am disgusted by Obamacare, on so many levels. First, it's not a health CARE program, it's a health INSURANCE program. It won't cut healthcare costs, it won't improve health outcomes / disparities, but it will create a whole new government system, and it will cost WAY more than we have or anticipate, and it will wreck havoc on the private sector and the jobs they could have created (but now can't) because of the enormous fines they will be paying to opt out (and trust me, they WILL opt out ... entire states will opt out too), not to mention further knocking down the private sector's ability to compete in the global economy much less to give philanthropically to nonprofits in need, both domestically and internationally. And as for how Obamacare was actually passed through the House and Senate, I'll be absolutely shocked if it stands up in the courts, but mainly, I'll remember how those people in Congress shoved it through our teeth and refused to hear us when we told them time and time again "NO, WE DO NOT WANT THIS." 

If Obamacare is bad, I believe that Cap and Trade that is coming down the pike is even worse. What will the temperature be after the government shoves that one down our throats? The same folks, the very same, except that the government will be even bigger, even richer, and even more intrusive in our lives.

On Social Security and Medicare, I have no illusions that I will ever see a dime of these outrageously unsustainable programs. These two programs are nearly as ridiculous as Obamacare, and anyone who thinks otherwise should do the math. The history books will show a very short window of time when people actually received these benefits and before the system went broke. 

The fact that so many people (Democrat AND Republican) in this country START from a place of looking to the government to provide things, or solve things, or over-regulate things, or otherwise insert government into every sphere of our lives is at best completely unsustainable, and at worst, tending to the tyrannical. Where does this insistence on more and more and even more government come from? Why do people wish to create another increasingly massive layer called government in everything from their health care to their cheeseburgers (read: transfat taxes) to their soda pop (read: sugar taxes)? Why do we think it will be better? How does more government improve efficiency or cut costs, and frankly, what motivation does government have to do either? I mean, there's no competition in government, and apparently those that are creating more and more government believe their revenues from the dim-witted taxpayers are limitless. Why do we think that it's okay for government to keep taking the people's money (that the people earn, that the people deserve), and spending it where the government sees fit, on more and bigger government? When will it end? And what does it do to our personal accountability and community responsibility? 

Tell me, what happens to our American narrative now? Like genetically modified grain, we're tweaking the DNA of our system here ... "pull yourself up and create your American dream" is now "suck off the 47% of Americans who actually do pay federal taxes and don't get anything back in a refund or a tax rebate because hey, we should spread the wealth around." 

Until we strip down this government class, until we extricate the hand of government from our pocketbooks and every inch of our lives to the largest extent possible, until we change the paradigm of tax, tax, tax, spend, spend, spend, and until we vote out all of the clueless career-politician hacks who wish to propagate more and more bloated government, I will forever remain a Tea Party Girl.