It's All About The Benjamins, Again

As the axe continues to fall on Californians, the suggestions for stopping the line to the chopping block become more ridiculous and dangerous at the same time.  While crossing guards earn minimum wage, what they contribute is vitally important.  Both mom (wish I could find the picture of her on the front of the Lompoc Record shepherding kids across the street in a really bad rainstorm) and I have held the job and we can both tell you stories of how dangerous it is.  If cities can put in cameras to catch red light runners in downtown areas, what makes them think that people don't run stop signs around schools?  Most people treat crosswalks like they're yellow lights.

I watched you very carefully. Red light stop, green light go, yellow light go very fast.

As the economy continues its death spiral it's nice to know that today's "upper class" are more determined to protect themselves than they are in helping the economy to survive.  I'm sure that tax cuts will solve anything, they've done so well so far haven't they?  Yes, I know the AMT is not a fair tax at the moment, but one of the comments was priceless.

"We are witnessing the beginning of the end of the private sector in this country as we know it "

Thank God for that. I can't take anymore Exxon Mobile record profits and 18 billion dollar bonus payouts while paying several dollars for apples.

What I find interesting in this whole mess is is that while most of the homes in the 9th Ward had been paid off for generations, Katrina ensured that those families became renters or homeless by way of a mismanaged disaster of a major city, homelessness has generously been extended to the middle class everywhere by way of foreclosures and job losses.  After you've been laid off I guess it doesn't really matter if your company closed or shipped the jobs offshore.  Either way, a large part of the tax base disappears.  It's so much fun watching everyone rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic, isn't it?  Most of those companies that thought they were making money by closing factories in the United States ended up closing themselves.   Duh!  Chinese Medicine refers to that as running on evil qi.

Umm, I hated Bush but I am in no way euphoric about Obama.  All things considered, there is no way that Obama can do a worse job than Bush did.  He doesn't have a surplus to lose, he can't start any more wars until the military is replenished and he's not a babbling about nonexistent WMDs like the village idiot.  Other than that the only skills I see from Obama so far have been a good deal of luck and having the right people help him out.  Which actually gives him the same start Bush had, except for the difference in IQ and that will probably keep Obama from doing as much harm as his predecessor.

BBB