Yesterday I drove home and was listening to the radio - there wasn't any good music on, I'm sort of tired of all the CDs I have in my car and I didn't want to listen to the account of a car race on the radio. So I tuned into a guy from the Twin Cities and listened to him talk about the economy. He was a liberal or democrat person and he posed the question - If the republicans have an answer to our economic crisis, why aren't they talking about it and what would it be. I was amused for a while, people called in and argued with him, told him tax cuts would work, something about how the bailout plans passed already would fail, blah, blah, blah. The people who called in didn't really answer his question. Most of the callers just wanted to argue and this radio host was up for it.
The point of all this was I don't think there really is an answer to the situation - no matter what either side does the only answer for this country and the world is pain. It's our most effective teacher, it's so simple. The problem is that if you polled every single politician in this country they would all have some idea or hate someone elses' idea to fix all the problems.
The problem in this country is much deeper than money will ever go - it's the lack of consequences that we are willing to bear. Bailing out companies, giving money to every man, woman and child may help to stop this pain from happening, BUT it's our children who are going to have to deal with it. A politician only cares about getting re-elected - what happens next year or the one after. Not about 30 years from now. That's the nature of things and the way they have always been.
Here's where the pumpkin comes into the picture - pumpkins have a about a 3.5 month growing time - they put out vines, they flower, the fruit grows larger, it ripens. Then something curious happens - the plant dies or is killed by the frost. The pumpkin is still good though. Maybe it will even last another 3.5 months if it is stored. Then it starts to rot (or gets eaten or thrown off a parking ramp) - somehow the pumpkin comes to an end. This is all sad and pointless to an observer just watching it. But there are seeds in the pumpkin which formed all along and soon enough they are planted and the whole cycle starts over.
You may be able to draw your own conclusions about where we are in the above process. But this is the process of life and the economy is not immune to growth and death. History is full of inventions that surfaced and weren't useful at the time, but keep coming back in different places and suddenly are the core of a new industry. I'm not going to give examples, but if you can follow this logic a few things come to mind.
So the pumpkin does serve the purpose here - out of the death of a pumpkin comes new life. A car company failing and causing massive unemployment will allow a lot of very smart people who have some very good ideas to be able to take the risk of starting their own company which could be the next GM. The seeds or people that were contained in their comfy shell of a company didn't have to do anything until the old rotted away.
This is true of everything, but our lack of tolerance of short term pain is holding this back. Every time we try to fix or interfere with this we delay the inevitable. Things are going to fail, new things will arise out of that and life will get better and improve.
I feel better getting all this off my chest - I sat and thought about all this while driving and wanted to call the show and felt myself getting more and more angry. The radio host would have likely argued with me too. Since I don't consider myself to be a republican or democrat, he probably wouldn't have had too much to say to me. I'm just amazed that all the people in office now are supposed to be the best and brightest, if they are the best this country can do - we are in for a long decade or more of depression.
The point of all this was I don't think there really is an answer to the situation - no matter what either side does the only answer for this country and the world is pain. It's our most effective teacher, it's so simple. The problem is that if you polled every single politician in this country they would all have some idea or hate someone elses' idea to fix all the problems.
The problem in this country is much deeper than money will ever go - it's the lack of consequences that we are willing to bear. Bailing out companies, giving money to every man, woman and child may help to stop this pain from happening, BUT it's our children who are going to have to deal with it. A politician only cares about getting re-elected - what happens next year or the one after. Not about 30 years from now. That's the nature of things and the way they have always been.
Here's where the pumpkin comes into the picture - pumpkins have a about a 3.5 month growing time - they put out vines, they flower, the fruit grows larger, it ripens. Then something curious happens - the plant dies or is killed by the frost. The pumpkin is still good though. Maybe it will even last another 3.5 months if it is stored. Then it starts to rot (or gets eaten or thrown off a parking ramp) - somehow the pumpkin comes to an end. This is all sad and pointless to an observer just watching it. But there are seeds in the pumpkin which formed all along and soon enough they are planted and the whole cycle starts over.
You may be able to draw your own conclusions about where we are in the above process. But this is the process of life and the economy is not immune to growth and death. History is full of inventions that surfaced and weren't useful at the time, but keep coming back in different places and suddenly are the core of a new industry. I'm not going to give examples, but if you can follow this logic a few things come to mind.
So the pumpkin does serve the purpose here - out of the death of a pumpkin comes new life. A car company failing and causing massive unemployment will allow a lot of very smart people who have some very good ideas to be able to take the risk of starting their own company which could be the next GM. The seeds or people that were contained in their comfy shell of a company didn't have to do anything until the old rotted away.
This is true of everything, but our lack of tolerance of short term pain is holding this back. Every time we try to fix or interfere with this we delay the inevitable. Things are going to fail, new things will arise out of that and life will get better and improve.
I feel better getting all this off my chest - I sat and thought about all this while driving and wanted to call the show and felt myself getting more and more angry. The radio host would have likely argued with me too. Since I don't consider myself to be a republican or democrat, he probably wouldn't have had too much to say to me. I'm just amazed that all the people in office now are supposed to be the best and brightest, if they are the best this country can do - we are in for a long decade or more of depression.
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