Debt Before Dishonor
Bailout Plan Passes the Senate
By
Varo Borja
The Economist, on October 2, 2008 stated that the Wall Street bailout plan proposed by George W. Bush and Henry Paulson has passed the Senate by a large margin. However, the bailout is somewhat revised and includes several “sweetners”, including a raising of the FDIC bar to 250,000 dollars and several giveaways to parties unnamed. My thoughts on this issue are myriad in scope, but my first reaction to this entire crisis is a cry of disbelief at the shamelessness of Wall Street. A legion of robber barons and petty gentry who in aforetimes decried almost as a whole the institution of public welfare and social services in general, now cries for a gargantuan aid package from the Federal government to “sweeten” their demise. What in God’s name is this “bailout” other than corporate welfare—a payoff for failure, greed, and irresponsibility of a magnitude hitherto unknown in the annals of economic history? Meanwhile, residents of ghettos, slums, and tenements across the United States live in such degradation and squalor as to make even the most stolid members of “decent” society cringe in disgust, and John McCain squawks about cutting all “unnecessary” spending. I suppose the good old spirit of greed, profiteering, and what was termed in the Middle Ages as usury will continue as sovereign in the land of the American Dream. Exactly how much wealth does one group of our population need? In Africa and Asia, starving denizens grasp for a bowl of rice and a little rat meat, while the baronial manors of the Hamptons burst at the seams with the amenities of the modern age. How, in God’s name can a generation of thieves and corporate Pilates underwrite their actions with the name of the Son of Man who hung on a tree in the desert, penniless and abandoned by his followers? Exactly what would Jesus do in this situation? Would he cosign this orgy of profiteering and abashed extravagance, or would he cast the money changers from the temple and feed the more than five million poor, hungry residents of America who borrow to the hilt just so they won’t be turned out on the streets? Something must change. Individual liberty relies not on a single document or 700 billion green pieces of paper, but on personal responsibility and justice for the downtrodden and the oppressed. Otherwise, we shall reap the harvest of our actions and fade into oblivion with the rest of the dynasties who turned a deaf ear to suffering and clothed themselves in the purple robes of dishonor.
The Economist, on October 2, 2008 stated that the Wall Street bailout plan proposed by George W. Bush and Henry Paulson has passed the Senate by a large margin. However, the bailout is somewhat revised and includes several “sweetners”, including a raising of the FDIC bar to 250,000 dollars and several giveaways to parties unnamed. My thoughts on this issue are myriad in scope, but my first reaction to this entire crisis is a cry of disbelief at the shamelessness of Wall Street. A legion of robber barons and petty gentry who in aforetimes decried almost as a whole the institution of public welfare and social services in general, now cries for a gargantuan aid package from the Federal government to “sweeten” their demise. What in God’s name is this “bailout” other than corporate welfare—a payoff for failure, greed, and irresponsibility of a magnitude hitherto unknown in the annals of economic history? Meanwhile, residents of ghettos, slums, and tenements across the United States live in such degradation and squalor as to make even the most stolid members of “decent” society cringe in disgust, and John McCain squawks about cutting all “unnecessary” spending. I suppose the good old spirit of greed, profiteering, and what was termed in the Middle Ages as usury will continue as sovereign in the land of the American Dream. Exactly how much wealth does one group of our population need? In Africa and Asia, starving denizens grasp for a bowl of rice and a little rat meat, while the baronial manors of the Hamptons burst at the seams with the amenities of the modern age. How, in God’s name can a generation of thieves and corporate Pilates underwrite their actions with the name of the Son of Man who hung on a tree in the desert, penniless and abandoned by his followers? Exactly what would Jesus do in this situation? Would he cosign this orgy of profiteering and abashed extravagance, or would he cast the money changers from the temple and feed the more than five million poor, hungry residents of America who borrow to the hilt just so they won’t be turned out on the streets? Something must change. Individual liberty relies not on a single document or 700 billion green pieces of paper, but on personal responsibility and justice for the downtrodden and the oppressed. Otherwise, we shall reap the harvest of our actions and fade into oblivion with the rest of the dynasties who turned a deaf ear to suffering and clothed themselves in the purple robes of dishonor.
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