Saturday, March 7, 2009

The hope from audacity

If government spending and increasing fees and taxes have you scared, take heart. It seems even some liberal democrats are experiencing sticker shock. Senator Fiengold is among those who can't digest the amount of pork in the omnibus spending bill. The 9,000 earmarks have been excused by the administration and members of Congress because it was written last year. I guess if the robbery was planned in advance, it's okay.

But it's not flying with all members of Congress or the American public and the bill could well be headed for failure. This could be a hopeful sign that the general public is ready to get angry. Angry voters scare politicians and sometimes even force them to do the right thing. "Tea parties" are cropping up all over the country and some wealthier Americans are "going Galt". That's a reference to a character in Ayn Rand's 'Atlas Shrugged' who called a general strike among top producers. In real life, people are intentionally reducing their income to avoid becoming targets of a starving government spending monster.

It's not all about the money. People generally don't like being manipulated and they don't like the idea of working their tails off for "others" (others, by definition being anyone but you).

It may seem like the government is a runaway train when it comes to driving us deeper into debt and recession, but there is still hope. This country has the capacity to turn on a dime. The question is, are people willing to face some pain now, or would they risk putting future generations in an impossible fiscal situation in a pathetic attempt to soften the blow?

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