I have been silently watching these events unfold and reading and considering all the comments. I was raised by parents who were products of the depression. They were survivors and did not believe in ANY investment which was not FDIC insured. They lived modestly, well within their means, always on less than they made. They did not believe in going into debt for anything, including their house, which meant that the house I lived in as a child was very meager. Fortunately not all of their teachings fell on deaf ears. Although I have certainly not lived by all of their strict teachings, I have been in debt during some periods of my life, I certainly have done perhaps a bit more than most to save for a rainy day.

All that being said, it seems to me that the “bailout” is really nothing more than a temporary fix. It seems that the admission being made, top to bottom, is that our entire way of life, is based completely on credit and what can be borrowed. Or said another way, that there is no substance to our economy, or our society. Perhaps I am just an old curmudgeon but it seems to me that the fix sought is one to simply put off the adjustment necessary to get back to some substance. The simple analysis for me is that if our entire society and economy is presently based completely on credit and borrowing, and it is becoming overly extended on debt that is not secured adequately, and we do “bailout” Wall Street as well as Main Street, then the only way for our economy to grow and hope to pay off this debt is to continue to try to borrow ourselves into prosperity. Which to my way of thinking, never works.

I love stability as much as the next fellow and am not looking forward to the “hard times” which my parents and grandparents assured me would come again. But I fear that if we follow the same path we will wind up at the same place.

I know that my thinking is somewhat unsophisticated when compared to many here and I know that there will be a host of more learned folks to belittle these few thoughts. Simply put, I think that the only real solution to this is for all of us, society and government, to again learn to live within our means. But hey, I could be wrong.

But, let me ask you this: Would you have wanted FDR to lead a campaign to buy all the bad and worthless stocks the Masters of the Universe were buying during 1924 – 1929? Doubt it very much.

If one wants to have the “Main Street” Americans spend $700 billion to buy bad loans I would suggest a better set of investments would be in a new WPA or CCC. Main Street America would truly benefit from such expenditures.

I cannot imagine FDR and those close to him (some of whom I have known) and many more with true roots in democratic politics would have ever yielded a program of purchasing the bad money lender “assets.” It is, quite simply, unimaginable. I trust you will agree. . . . . .