Politics

A friend in England wrote to me the other day suggesting that the current recession began quite a long time ago.  I gave it some thought and realized that like WWII, it's really hard to pin point exactly when it started.  Some historians put up a pretty convincing case that it was the signing of the punishing Treaty of Versailles that laid down the path to the invasion of Poland on September 1st, 1939.

I don't like to put forward nonsensical ideas, particularly to people outside the country, so I gave the matter a lot of thought.  After all it was the Reagan administration that allowed large deficits to build up; I well remember the squawks of disapproval at the time.

If I had to say what caused the blight, I would say it was the the housing bubble of lending money to those who could not pay it back. Bush knew about it but could not turn the Dems that ran Congress away from their dream. The left wants everyone to have a house even if they can't afford it, and the right wants to lend them the money if they can turn a profit, and pass the risk on elsewhere - Hey, everybody wins! Don't they?

Politics

I try and keep away from politics in this blog, not wishing to alienate half my audience, but I'm really having a hard time with the TV ads this season.  (Thank Heavens for the mute button!)  It seems to me we have been given very bad choices for the Governor's race.  And frankly I doubt whether either Whitman or Brown can stop the nonsense that is California at the moment.

I really don't care if Whitman hired an illegal alien, or Brown was banging Linda Ronstadt like a screen door in a gale, how on earth are either of them going to stop the rot.  Poor old Arnold had a go early in his term by offering several ballot measures to halt the explosion of benefits.  Sadly, if you give people free stuff they are unlikely to vote for restraint - other people's free stuff OK; but not mine!

It's always easy to play the "soak the rich" card, but the way we're going out here, there won't be any rich people left to soak - they'll all have moved to Nevada, and the White Supremacists will have gone to Idaho.

I am always surprised however at the way people imagine that the same politicians, whom they have elected for the last few decades can be expected to change the things for which they alone have been responsible.   And could they please stop fighting for me, and leave me the hell alone!