As Martin Weiss ( Money and Markets ) writes " Nearly everywhere you look, today ~ you’ll see video and photos of angry taxpayers demanding that Washington stop bankrupting America ... stop throwing our money at millionaire CEOs who destroyed their own companies ... But sadly, many of our leaders will simply ignore this one-day sensation ~ because they know a single day of protest is nowhere near enough to change things "
The great dilemma is this, according to Weiss ~ " The government’s TARP funds to bail out the nation’s banks are nearly exhausted. But, at the same time, bank losses from this debt crisis have doubled from $2 trillion to $4 trillion, according to the IMF.... .Either we will sit idly by as Washington destroys our money and marches us like lemmings off the cliff of monetary insanity … or we will stand up, fight, and protect all the things we’ve worked so hard for ~ our retirement, our home, our income, and the future of our children." http://www.moneyandmarkets.com/major-announcement-33131
Consumers can exercise enormous pressure on this economy by refusing to play Washington's credit expansion game, by downsizing versus purchasing things they don't need, by saving versus spending, by paying off credit card debt and by holding our representatives to true fundamental structural change versus cosmetic change within the existing unregulated system ~ like bringing back Glass-Steagall.The law that placed a barrier between everyday banking, such as lending and deposit-taking, and riskier areas, such as derivatives trading. That law was repealed in 1999 and replaced by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that repealed many key provisions of Glass-Steagall and was midwifed by the notorious Phil Gramm.
I wrote a column on this personal downsizing process two years ago entitled The Joy Of Downsizing in anticipation of today's economic situation ~ and I'm now enjoying a far simpler and healthy lifestyle. http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2007/02/18.html
Let's make this tax day tea party into a full fledged consumer revolt and save the Republic in the process.
Allen L Roland http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/04/15.html
