Today i am going to begin my post talking about the national and local news events and such,then i will mention other relevant things i feel necessary.The first and foremost thing on the national news front is the passage of the new health care reform law changing one sixth of our economy in one fair swoop.But the sky did not fall in,as the President said,and we continue to wait and watch as the new law gets implemented around the nation.The republicans are using the slogan"repeal and re-do"regarding this new law,but that would take the presidents signature or two thirds of the senate to override a veto to happen,neither of which is possible.Continuing to play to the "Tea Party"activists and the fringes of the far right like Dick Army will not benefit them in the next election any more than this victory will help the democrats.Our nation is focused like a laser on a faltering economy and massive job losses.Without a middle class this nation will collapse under the weight of its debt alone.How we change to a green economy is still a question as the rest of the world catapults ahead without us.To change the old factories and empty industrial sights to produce "green"products while keeping a small carbon footprint will take a decade or more.Retro fitting facilities will take large investments that are not guaranteed to happen here.Corporations can do it much cheaper with much few environmental regulations over seas.And as far as utilities and taxes are concerned as well,all these things and more point toward the continuing shrinking and withering of the hard working people who were the worlds greatest manufacturing force on the planet.Middle class folks are becoming poor folks ,and the chronic poverty of the inner cities is spreading out to the suburbs at a rapid pace.The uneasy feeling about the nature of the economy and of the financial markets continues because absolutely nothing has been done to address the problems in the system that brought us to the brink of another great depression.Banking industry giants as still to complex and intertwined to be allowed to collapse.This "too big to fail" concept was brought back out at the beginning of this economic train wreck in order to explain the complexities of these immensely intertwined giants and the risk if one failed it could collapse the entire system.At this point after all this time to examine what happened and why,the people at the top levels of our government on the committees that oversee banking have done almost nothing to address the shady trades called "credit default swaps"and other things done outside the view of the markets.An exchange created to put these in the light of day has been rejected and put down.Sen.Dodd (D.)of Conn.has flatly stated that nothing will stop another similar crisis from occurring again.Millions of lobbing dollars have been spent to make certain the same practices that brought us to the brink of another depression should continue.Complex derivatives such as groups of mortgage backed securities and other investments pooled together and then insured and sold again,and loose capital requirements for financial giants to back their investment portfolios all still remain in place.Even the companies who received billions in taxpayer money to rescue them from disaster are engaging in the exact same risky behavior.It seems as though nobody in Washington wants to address anything other than their campaign coffers and re-election chances by collecting as much money as possible from any and all sources.This money fundamentally corrupts the system and allows Politicians the ability to ignore all but the groups responsible to getting them reelected and the groups that can effect the outcome of their election.These groups are usually at the far side of each party,no matter democrat or republican the concept of by the people for the people is now by the people with money for the people with money.As this next election slowly approaches we will continue to see zero progress on any financial regulatory reforms of the way the system operates.Hedge Funds and others will continue to place huge bets for short term profits,as will other financial institutions and corporations,putting all of our futures on the line with each and every day that goes by.We the people sat back and watched as insiders now in charge of the very government agencies that oversee their former employers,men like Tim Gietner and Larry Summers,and Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke,removed any question of "moral hazard"and kept these practices alive by using their positions to backstop massive losses with the taxpayers money.Now as these practices continue they hem and haw about making the sweeping changes necessary to ensure this idea of "too big to fail" is eliminated and create some way to oversee transactions that are still conducted completely in secret even though the outcomes of these transactions have global implications if they can bring about the implosion of a giant like for example Merrill Lynch.The majority of regular citizens are completely unaware of the risks involved in continuing to ignore the massive problems in the financial system that brought about last Septembers crash.I hope we can continue to thrive and grow as a nation,but with the way we continually ignore lessons taught by our mistakes i think we may hand our children a very different nation than our parents gave us.
Things on the home front remain about the same,i am fighting my battle with chronic pain every day,and advocating for my children to the best of my ability.My wife continues to work very hard to support us and is my partner in this current struggle with my health issues and kids school programs.One thing i will mention is that our female dog,sugaree,is 14 years old and seems to be struggling more and more as the days go by.I hope it is just a passing thing but am very sad at the thought of her being gone.I will continue to add more as the situation develops.Until next time,thank you for reading. spacewalker
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