HALLOWEEN & Pre-Election 2008. Has anything changed?
2008 Blog & Today: (Read then watch video)
I gave up on Halloween costumes and "trick or treating" when my 1965 12 year-old brain told me it was "childish" to hit up homeowners on Christine Ave, Simi Valley, CA. for treats in exchange for playing no "tricks." Yet that is exactly what many supposed leaders of our country and financial institutions have done to stake-holders in the Amercian dream of home ownership for decades... dressed up and played the Halloween games with our future.
How appropriate: Given the momentous "Bailout" (they like the term "Rescue") actions of the present politicos I thought I would share the Wikipedia definition of the Halloween mantra used by children. Here it is:
The "trick" part of "trick or treat" is a threat to play a trick on the "homeowner or his property" if no treat is given. Trick-or-treating is one of the main traditions of Halloween.
It isn't difficult to understand how we got into an economic mess...
"Trick on the homeowner:" Congressional Democrats and Republicans have encouraged the mortgage industry to create "entitlement" mentality to "home ownership" for nearly a generation. Documentation, and traditional qualifying requirements have been virtually suspended compared to past generations of borrowers. Mortgages; the "easy money," became "candy" or treats for "votes."
THE CANDY MAN: Both political parties are to blame; creating a sweet tooth public mentality that all people were "entitled" to home ownership regardless of classic and real ability to pay. Now we are on the verge of economic collapse. Banks sit on non-liquid assets. Banks require liquidity to run, lend, keep the engine of commerce alive. Congress created the problem, and now pat themselves on the back for fixing it? (See Sept. 27th Blog - Saving the Economy.)
New Candy Men with October Surprises? In thirty days we can choose between a war-hero seasoned Senator who claims to be a "maverick" or a freshman "community organizer" Senator who hopes we buy into an emotion filled platitude as a substitute to substance; "change we can believe in." Is this your average election year "October Surprise?" or just a coincidental convergence of justice finally catching up to theft, incompetence, and greed 30 days away from America's national election?
Not sure there are many "treats" out there, but I'm sure there are plenty of "tricks." Be careful. Be thoughtful. Judge character. Shed emotion and toss out reliance on empty "platitudes" of change. Look under the political rug for what has been swept and hidden there. These people running are experienced politicos and we may be choosing for a lesser of two evils during war and economic crisis. People who helped "create" the crisis are not going to bring "change."
Do the math. Do the homework. Your vote is required in 30 days. Obama or McCain, and other candidates will ask, "Trick or treat?"
JMP 2008
TODAY: Halloween 2009 – THE DOG SAYS IT ALL. Watch this:
Showing posts with label Financial crisis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Financial crisis. Show all posts
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Sunday, October 12, 2008
NOTHING COMES FROM NOTHING; The Universal Bankruptcy
The Latin axiom: "Ex Nilhilo Nihil Fit" applies to our current crisis. I'll explain:
CONSUMPTION: All my contacts and friends linked to the financial community agree; we are in for a long cleanup after the meal, because the meal has been a fifty year gorging on credit unlike any period known in human history.
THE MEAL: It's been a long and enjoyable ride since the post WWII families showed us the way of the future; the prosperity and suburban middle class homes, new cars, backyard swimming pools, and entitlements to a higher level of living never enjoyed by the "average American."
I'm not knocking it. My memories of the blue-collar neighborhood I grew up in are wonderful. People worked hard. Few had credit cards in those days; the 1950's and 1960's. They remembered the effects of the Great Depression, debt, and vowed to "own things" when they bought them. All of us worked, mowed lawns, got paper routes, did something to train us in the American work ethic; that "nothing comes from nothing."
Where I'm going, you already are: Wally and the "Beave" demonstrated to the world the ideal American life with June and Ward Cleaver offering us a window into a family world where values counted. No one forgot values, even though the families in Father Knows Best, Dennis the Menace, Leave it to Beaver, The Nelsons, seemed to have it pretty good.
VALUES in a nutshell: Morality was the rule that guided having something of value. If you could afford it, and you could own it (no encumbrances) then you deserved it. It would have been thought immoral (social responsible sort of way) to offer the "Beave" a credit card at 17 or 18 years old when he graduated from High School. It would have been, socially speaking, "bankrupt" for banks to offer strings of credit cards to just about anyone who asked, because the "ability to pay" for things you can't "own" outright was still fresh in the minds of the American, and indeed the world psyche.
"Value" is defined as something of worth and implies clear possession; clear ownership and "title."
EN-TITLE-MENT: Splurging on the desert of credit card consuming, Americans have mortgaged everything. Few "own" anything they use. Even groceries are often purchased on "credit." And the government, banks, stores, and industry have encouraged "ownership" - having possession of "value" - without traditional definitions being applied. "Debt" and "Credit Scores" became our God in whom we trusted. ALL Americans, we have been sold, deserved more "stuff." "Entitled" mentality took fifty years to become "normal," yet having clear "title" always meant REAL VALUE to prior generations. We became a people drunken with "entitlement" to "have" and "get" and strangely believing we "owned" stuff without owning it.
FIFTY YEARS: I've lived long enough to know the difference between "Father Knows Best" values and "government will provide" entitlement values. We are bankrupt as a society, wanting, and crying, and whining that we never have "enough." That we don't have "what the other guy has" therefore it isn't "fair."
I could go on...but you have seen the movie, because you are part of it. My wife and I own very little. We do not live in it, drive it, eat it, wear it, or show it off unless we "paid" for it.
"Goodnight" to desert. Hello basic values of hard work, true value, and real ownership. It will be a tough road ahead as credit card living, and bankruptcy is the next "default" wave to hit the economic shores. But then "Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit, applies: Truely "nothing comes from nothing."
James Michael Pratt
www.jmpratt.com
CONSUMPTION: All my contacts and friends linked to the financial community agree; we are in for a long cleanup after the meal, because the meal has been a fifty year gorging on credit unlike any period known in human history.
THE MEAL: It's been a long and enjoyable ride since the post WWII families showed us the way of the future; the prosperity and suburban middle class homes, new cars, backyard swimming pools, and entitlements to a higher level of living never enjoyed by the "average American."
I'm not knocking it. My memories of the blue-collar neighborhood I grew up in are wonderful. People worked hard. Few had credit cards in those days; the 1950's and 1960's. They remembered the effects of the Great Depression, debt, and vowed to "own things" when they bought them. All of us worked, mowed lawns, got paper routes, did something to train us in the American work ethic; that "nothing comes from nothing."
Where I'm going, you already are: Wally and the "Beave" demonstrated to the world the ideal American life with June and Ward Cleaver offering us a window into a family world where values counted. No one forgot values, even though the families in Father Knows Best, Dennis the Menace, Leave it to Beaver, The Nelsons, seemed to have it pretty good.
VALUES in a nutshell: Morality was the rule that guided having something of value. If you could afford it, and you could own it (no encumbrances) then you deserved it. It would have been thought immoral (social responsible sort of way) to offer the "Beave" a credit card at 17 or 18 years old when he graduated from High School. It would have been, socially speaking, "bankrupt" for banks to offer strings of credit cards to just about anyone who asked, because the "ability to pay" for things you can't "own" outright was still fresh in the minds of the American, and indeed the world psyche.
"Value" is defined as something of worth and implies clear possession; clear ownership and "title."
EN-TITLE-MENT: Splurging on the desert of credit card consuming, Americans have mortgaged everything. Few "own" anything they use. Even groceries are often purchased on "credit." And the government, banks, stores, and industry have encouraged "ownership" - having possession of "value" - without traditional definitions being applied. "Debt" and "Credit Scores" became our God in whom we trusted. ALL Americans, we have been sold, deserved more "stuff." "Entitled" mentality took fifty years to become "normal," yet having clear "title" always meant REAL VALUE to prior generations. We became a people drunken with "entitlement" to "have" and "get" and strangely believing we "owned" stuff without owning it.
FIFTY YEARS: I've lived long enough to know the difference between "Father Knows Best" values and "government will provide" entitlement values. We are bankrupt as a society, wanting, and crying, and whining that we never have "enough." That we don't have "what the other guy has" therefore it isn't "fair."
I could go on...but you have seen the movie, because you are part of it. My wife and I own very little. We do not live in it, drive it, eat it, wear it, or show it off unless we "paid" for it.
"Goodnight" to desert. Hello basic values of hard work, true value, and real ownership. It will be a tough road ahead as credit card living, and bankruptcy is the next "default" wave to hit the economic shores. But then "Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit, applies: Truely "nothing comes from nothing."
James Michael Pratt
www.jmpratt.com
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