food for thought

both iceland and ireland have now experienced major banking collapses of the scale warned by our politicians (first the republicans under bush, now the democrats under obama, and all, apparently, under the guiding hand of guys like ben bernanke who have "served" under both administrations) that we could not allow, "or else". (you know, end of the world as we know it, etc.). well, you know about the tens of billions being shouldered by the EU to bail out the irish. ever wonder why you hear nothing about the "poor" icelanders who neither asked nor received any sort of bailout? (they let their banks fail and took what came).

well, here's a bloomberg interview with iceland's president, olafur grimsson to tell you all about it.

the reason we've heard nothing from iceland is that there's nothing to hear. they opened a 4.6B line of credit with the IMF, (as opposed to a bailout roughly ten times that amount being proposed for ireland), and they aren't even going to need all of it. unlike in the us and in ireland, the bankers took their well-earned losses, and the temporary loss in value of their currency (as much as 80% at its peak) didn't impact the citizenry much at all, except to make their exports far more attractive to buyers, and improving both their incomes, and their balance of trade in the process. (does that sound like something we could use here?) any way you look at it, its a win/win.

so why here are we continuing to print bad money and add it to the tax debt currently crushing the citizenry to the tune of over $50,000 for every man, woman and child in the country. (tell me, how do YOU plan to pay back your $50,000? you've got the money, don't you? don't you?)

both the democrats and the republicans, duly bought and paid for via campaign contributions from the money interests, are doing their part to ensure we're all left holding the bag. we need to vote for unaligned candidates and break this pattern of financial abuse before we're all, like the irish, in the shitter.

if you're a registered democrat, or a registered republican, please consider this before writing your next contribution check. the only way this nonsense stops is if YOU stop.

or would you rather owe more than the $50K you already do?

and spare me the rant about the "other" guys making it worse than your guys. neither could do any worse than has already proven capable to be done. your records are established. and YOUR party has failed.

sapere aude