In the mid 1960's, it was the nonsense of President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society that would end poverty and bring economic justice to America and we all know what a crock of b.s. that was. We have spent some 5 to 6 trillion for the war on poverty, and we still have poverty along with alleged economic disparity with no net gain to show for the investment. Now, in 2008, we have the Great Bailout Society under President George W. Bush. The only difference here is that this bailout is for the rich, not the poor.

With the announcment of a $700 billion bailout plan for Wall Street, my first thought was, it is now official, the United States government has become completely socialist. Should the bailout occur, the tab for bailouts in 2008 would rise to over $1 trillion borrowed dollars. And who is stuck with the bill, the American taxpayer. If we take the figure of 1 trillion and divide it amongst 300 million people, the bill comes to $3333.34 per person. That is to pay for the bailout of the corrupt pirates on Wall Street and the complicit government that allowed it to happen in the first place. You can also count on the bill being about twice to three times as much, down the road, knowing government ineptitude.

This socialist bailout is something I completely disagree with. The only time a bailout plan is acceptable to me is when national security is directly threated. One example was when Lockheed Aircraft Corp was bailed out in 1971 or when Chrysler was bailed out in 1979. The reason why I agree with the Chrysler bailout is that an auto manufacturer could easily be converted to make tanks or assault vehicles for the military, a la World War II. And even then, the bailouts should be minimized with no company executive compensation for being complete failures and a complete repayment to the American people in one form or another.

In addition to the bailout, Senator Christopher Dodd and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, among others, want to ensure foreign banks and securities with the U.S. Treasury, and more borrowed money that will devalue and debase the American dollar even further. Are these people so stupid as to not realize that devaluing the currency will make it more difficult for average Americans to purchase goods and services? The rich can absorb the hit. The average joe and his family cannot. So, how the hell does this really help the average American?

The corruption and conflict of interest here is well beyond any sensible comprehension. Paulson is a former head of Goldmann Sachs, who is right in the middle of this whole crisis, along with Chris Cox, head of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Both of these men should be fired for simple incompetence alone, and investigated for corruption and any other criminal acts.

There are too many events in sequence to simply write the alleged financial crisis off as coincidence or natural market forces. Everything from the Eliott Spitzer scandal, to the busting out of Bear Stearns, to the massive bailouts, points to corruption, fraud, and some type of fixing scheme. Remember, when Spitzer was called out on the hooker thing, Wall St. made sure to stay out of his way because he was a hawk. He has a proven track record of taking Wall St. to task along with corrupt officials. They got him out the way and this chain of events started. It is certainly an interesting confluence of events to say the least.

Now, you may ask the question, since you do not agree with a bailout, what do you suggest? First, I would demand immediate investigations into impropriety and fraud on all the players involved. Since I am certain there is criminality, such as ill-gotten gains, all recouped money would go into a special reinvestment fund to shore up the mortgage and credit markets. Provide that money to the banks to put money back into the credit system without putting the burden on taxpayers. And, of course, send those guilty parties straight to jail and leave them there to rot. I would press legislation to incentivize banks and mortgage companies to modify deals for people who are close to foreclosure, or are currently in foreclosure, but still in their home, by giving them tax breaks. In addition to that, reregulate the banking, credit, and housing markets to a reasonable point where such abuses are minimized, along with banning all gimmick mortgages, such as adjustable rate. It will be based strictly on credit rating, ability to pay, and a 3 % minimum down payment for those with a better credit rating and ability to pay, then sequentially upward to a maximum of %10 down. I would also press for legislation to ban compensation for executives who run a company out of business, whether it be for incompetence or a criminal act. Why do they deserve to be compensated for being failures? I would order the cut off of all foreign aid and reinvest that money back into the credit markets. I would cut out all aid given to illegal immigrants and reinvest that money back into the credit markets. I would also demand that Iraq provide the majority of it's oil to the United States to pay off the war debt to lessen our economic pressures. I would clean house at the Securities and Exchange Commission and put in actual law enforcement officials with no ties to Wall Street. I would also press for legislation to prevent the establishment of overly large financial firms, such as Goldmann Sachs, because they wield too much monopolistic power. The rest will be taken care of by natural market forces of new companies moving in to fill the vacuum. Nature abhors a vacuum.

There is no quick fix to this. It took a while for this mess to develop and will take a while for it to right itself, given the proper oversight and regulation. But to throw hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money at this problem is not the long term fix. It is not even the short term treatment because the problems of this disaster are still in place and have yet to be remedied.

By the way, how can Congress and the President mysteriously come up with $700 billion to bail out Wall St., but not build a proper border defense for $20 billion?

Although, we still have our great society for our great bailouts in the newly christened United Socialist States of America.

All hail the comrade Pirate and Chief and the corrupt comrade Republicrats on Capitol Hill.