Paying for stupidity

Hi Folks:

Can you believe that "we the people" are going to have the privilege of paying for the stupid behavior of the lawyers, bankers, and six figure (at least) executives that have ruined Fannie-Mae and Freddie-Mac, GM, Ford, and hundreds of thousands of home owners?

For years, many of us have been crying out for sensible sustainable economic and transportation policies that take into account the movement into a "full world". But no, the incumbent "fat cats" pay no heed, and now we get to bail them out. When our firm was put out of business by the NAFTA and WTO, we applied for federal assistance and retraining for our employees. We did not "qualify" and when we tried to find out why, they would not say. We were in the textile business. How could be not be impacted? Our cash flows and economic performance was placed under the highest level of observation by our "asset based lenders", the banks, who would not allow us to buy toilet paper unless it was approved. And this level of scrutiny was for a $3 million dollar line of credit with a firm that had $6 million in assets. How can the same banks allow this whole system to fail to the order of billions of dollars? There can only be one answer, stupidity, corruption and incompetence. Plus the willingness of "we the people" to allow it.

It is time in the USA that we hold our government to the same quality of performance and ethics as we expect from other vendors in the market. The ecology, the economy, and indeed the world's society cannot wait. If the government is going to bail out these market-based firms, then they need to be regulated and we need to quit pretending that we are working in a "free" market. It seems the only time it is a "free" market is when it is making money. It is not free to fail.

We have "green" communities all over the planet that are living and learning and improving everyday. There is no lack of positive examples of how sustainable communities can be run; there is only the lack of will and integrity. We must "creatively destroy" the corrupt, incumbent systems. Google "Scream, Crash, Boom" and read what Paul Gilding has said. He is right. Sam Moore