Robbing Peter to Pay Paul(son) and Golden Parachutes

By Si Dunn

In just one week, America's Republican-dominated economy has gone from "robust" and "fundamentally sound" to "in imminent danger of collapse" if $700 billion of taxpayer money isn't delivered immediately to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, so he can dole it out to Wall Street, banks, and other financial entitites.

This naked grabbing of money from average Americans' pockets supposedly will help keep the "robust" economy from going bust. But it also will help finance plenty of golden parachutes for the financial executives and leaders who got us into this mess and have been trying to conceal it until just after the end of the Bush Administration.

John McCain is no fan of this proposed bailout. But he can pretty well kiss his election to the White House goodbye. He's Republican, after all, and the Republican Party in general will suffer a very large, and very well-deserved, thumping at the ballot box Nov. 4, in the fallout from this fiasco.

Runaway deregulation plus rampant greed adds up to: (1) financial cycles that swing out of control; and (2) financial bubbles that explode.

The "trickle-down" economics famously championed by the Republicans has never worked. The upper class keeps getting more "upper," while spilling precious few drops of the money that is supposed to dribble down to the middle and lower classes.

Maybe it's time for some "trickle-up" economics, for a change.

To hell with the big financial institutions that lost sight of fiscal reality and got hooked on gambling with their--and our--money. Let them consolidate, downsize or die. Don't give them another dime.

Give most of the $700 billion, instead, to Main Street and small business, the real heart, soul and drivers of the national economy. And set aside some of it to help the thousands of lower-echelon employees in the financial industry who will lose their jobs, pensions and homes as a result of the avarice and selfishness of their corporate executives and the Republican political leaders.

Remind your Senators and Representatives in no uncertain terms: The buck starts here...well away from Wall Street and the Washington Beltway.

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