if i understand correctly, you see the greatest drop in the stock market in two decades as a good thing?

if you're going to point me to Ron Paul and his Austrian School economics, and expect me to swallow that the financial market crash is not only inevitable but somehow part of the cleansing that must take place before healing can occur, i'd like to point out a few things that, in my opinion, ought to be taken into account before we celebrate congress' inability to pass the bailout bill.

have we, as the US sinned? very much so. kudos to "the good doctor" for predicting this perfect storm, and i couldn't agree more with him that the gov shouldn't print free money and we shouldn't keep charging things to this pie-in-the-sky national credit card.

the problem is that the perfect storm _has_ occured. the consequences of our sin have reared their ugly heads and we're heading for a cliff. can we wave a magic legislation-wand and *poof* all our problems away? no. no matter what happens in congress somebody's going to have to pay for this mess. the question isn't IF we're going to pay; it's WHO is going to pay.

on our current trajectory, the world's largest financial institutions are going to take a nasty plunge. who does this most directly affect? the constituents who are opposing this bill shout "WALL STREET," thinking that these executives with their golden parachutes are the ones who will bear the brunt of this fall. they couldn't be more wrong. the executives have already stored their parachutes in places that won't be touched by this mess. the people who will pay for this will be baby boomers. our country's largest demographic is getting ready to retire, and unfortunately the vast majority of their retirement is tied up in wall street through big financial institutions. in other words, the majority of the united states just watched as a quarter of their retirement got tossed out the window, on the brink of retirement. now, at 65 years of age, they can either sell their homes (at record low home values) or find a new job.

and remember: this isn't just US citizens we're talking about. because of Ron Paul's beloved Free Trade, the countries of the world are all tied up in this mess together. the united states has once again become the scurge of the international community.

so how would congress' bailout plan change things? if it's done right, it means that the consequences of our sin will be spread out over us as a nation. it means taxes across the board will go up, and instead of forcing the old to bear the brunt of this collapse, we as a nation will bear the burden together. instead of dumping our toxic debt onto international shoulders, we'll nut-up and take responsibility and ownership of our sin.