Single Gal and the End of the World as We Know It?

Everywhere you look, everything you read, spells out impending doom. Every picture of Wall Street traders shows them beaten down, frustrated and worn. Companies are going under like an old man slipping into a bathtub. Layoffs. Bankruptcy. Takeovers. And then there are the banks.

We were always taught that having a bank account is the single most reliable and safe way to keep your money.  But now, with banks failing and on the verge of failing, does having money in your mattress and overflowing out of piggy banks make more sense? At least you would know you have the money—at this point, what happens if a bank where all your money is housed fails? 

I flash to that scene in It’s a Wonderful Life where George Bailey and his new wife are taking off for their honeymoon and see the Bailey Savings and Loan crowded with people in black trenchcoats and umbrellas—all standing in the rain so they can take their money out of the bank.  And George says over and over: “But you see.  Your money is not here.”

Is that what is going to happen to us? Because it seems that forgetful Uncle Billies and unscrupulous Mr. Potters are who are running our banks, giving out loans to those who can’t possibly pay them, and now they have got us in this pickle, and have no way of getting us out.

All I know is it spells doom and gloom. And I thought we already had our recession after the dot-com bust.  But apparently that was nothing compared to the “worst recession since the Great Depression”—which is what I am hearing over and over like a refrain in church.

I don’t want to be depressed. I don’t want to be bankrupt.  If anything I am angry at the way things are and how no one has any answers.

This election could not come at a better time. People need a leader that can somehow pull out of this doom and gloom because I don’t know how much more of this I can take.

11 Comments

  1. Single Gal,
    You are angry at the way things are.
    I am angry at the way things are.

    I have no answers either but I will suggest that it is foolish for us to expect answers from the very people who got us into this mess in the first place. But that’s the direction we’re headed.

    Too many Americans, including most SJI posters, are very poor at recognizing cause/effect relationships.

    Barney Frank will be re-elected.
    Zoe Lofgren will be re-elected.
    Nancy Pelosi will be re-elected.

    Don’t blame them. Cheating and pandering come naturally to them. They can’t help it.
    Be angry instead at your fellow citizens for voting for these creeps.

  2. We have branches of government that serve at the behest of special interests and highest bidders.

    Now if can just get a fourth branch of government – one that actually represents and serves the people – we’ll be set.

    “If they could vote to keep or replace the entire Congress, 59% of voters would like to throw them all out and start over again. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that just 17% would vote to keep the current legislators in office.

    http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/59_would_vote_to_replace_entire_congress

    Is JMO’s tea party in the offing? 

    Nov. 4 is your chance.

  3. We are on the cusp of massive changes to what we all call the grand old USA. But what will be left?

    H-1Bs, and illegal immigrants.  All the result of the greed of MBAs, and executives in general.

    While a little is fine, more is not always better.

  4. Novice #2—people have decried Congress as an institution for decades, but keep re-electing THEIR Congressperson.  Our only hope is if we could actually have one election where we voted the entire Congress up or down.

  5. “The people will always have the government they deserve.”

    I don’t know where that came from, but I do believe it.

    #1, I agree, but lets not be so partisan… both sides of the isle need to be shown the exit door.

    We are on the cusp of massive changes to what we all call the grand old USA. But what will be left?

  6. Throw them all out? No, I don’t think that’s the answer. If the people in my district are ignorant enough to put Zoe Lofgren in that seat term after term, what makes us think they’ll replace her with anyone better? The people need to wise up. That’s our only hope.

    Sweezy, I didn’t name those 3 by accident.
    This thing was CAUSED by Government pretending that the laws of economics don’t exist and trying to “level the playing field”. This is what the Democratic Party is all about.
    No, let’s get rid of the LOUSY Congressmen & Senators but let’s keep the good ones and let’s not be so intellectually lazy that we don’t do the research necessary to tell the difference.

  7. I think JMO’s on it. 

    If congress is graded by the public as a whole, ie. they all sink and get thrown out of office or swim and get reelected together, you would think that there would be much more cooperation to work together for the common good.

  8. Lie detectors are ineffective on PATHOLOGICAL liars.
    Sarah Palin would get caught but Obama would sail through.
    As George Costanza says, “Remember. It’s not a lie if YOU believe it’s true.”

  9. Unfortunately greed, and excess have not been restricted to Wall Street.  It has been a long time since the Great Depression, so we have learned to dismiss and disrespect the wealth that we have.  We are a generation of the middle class that has squandered our money on designer clothes, fancy cars and way too many overpriced cocktails….Well at least we can be well dressed if we have to stand in a soup line!

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