The Great Bailout Stall, Part VII Taking Responsibility
Topics: Bailout, Financial Crisis, Economy
Getting back to the point I made about investors taking responsibility for their investment decisions, there is one other big thing I learned when I tried to play the Wall Street game. The Wall Street Jungle is infested with a vicious carnivore known as Humanosaurus rex — a ferocious humanoid with a humongous appetite. Humanosaurus rex doesn’t eat your lunch; he eats you. And unlike the dinosaurs of old, he doesn’t leave bones lying around. He swallows them right along with your flesh.
Anyone who believes he can play in the Wall Street Jungle and escape the ravages of Humanosaurus rex is a fool — and you know what they say about a fool and his money. My late friend Richard Ney actually wrote a best-selling book titled The Wall Street Jungle. Until the day he died, he believed that so-called market specialists manipulated stocks at will and, thereby, were able to legally steal from investors.
If you still feel the urge to play the stock market, you might first read Michael Lewis’s 1990 classic Liar’s Poker. In the book, Lewis, who worked for the investment banking firm Salomon Brothers for four years, describes how trickery and deceit are actually rewarded on Wall Street. It’s a real-life version of Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities.
My point is that there are a lot of bad guys in the financial markets, just as there are a lot of bad guys in every other kind of market. And if they commit theft or fraud, they should be criminally prosecuted. But whether a Humanosaurus rex is honest or dishonest is not the issue. All you need to understand is that he will eat you alive.
So … hello? All you need to do is not deal with him! Forget about the big guys in the Wall Street Jungle and focus on taking responsibility for your own business. If you don’t heed my words — and you do get eaten alive — please feel free to picture me saying, “I told you so.”
Notwithstanding the lies that Congress, both presidential candidates, and the president himself are telling you, the bailout scams will not help create jobs. On the contrary, they will further stifle the economy-boosting efforts of America’s true heroes - entrepreneurs and small businesspeople.
Now that it’s clear that the so-called bailouts won’t stop the invisible depression from becoming visible, the Feds are moving on to bigger and better things — all to help Main Street, of course. Enter the latest scheme: the Federal Government “investing” in banks!
As always, the money will come from you, either in the form of increased taxes, invisible taxes (inflation of our fiat currency), and/or borrowing more money from whomever will lend it to them, the interest on which you will be called upon to pay. (Forget about the principal; it can never be repaid.)
And it’s all done in the name of closing the gap between the rich and the poor. Politicians should be forced to take the Hippocratic Oath. The gap between the rich and the poor makes for nice cocktail party talk in San Francisco, but the first responsibility of politicians should be to do no harm. As Nobel Prize novelist and poet Anatole France so rightly pointed out, “Those who have given themselves the most concern about the happiness of peoples have made their neighbors very miserable.”
History tells us that when an egalitarian crusader becomes too powerful, it often leads to a dictatorship that makes everyone (except for insiders) poor. That is why we must be ready to fight back against a possible attempt by B. McBama and his shady friends to establish a dictatorship via the declaration of a state of emergency.
The fact is that we are already in a state of emergency, and the only way out is to throw off the chains of government and let free people and free markets prevail. Capitalism is not a system unto itself. It is simply a freedom - the freedom to trade goods, services, and labor freely with other people and companies.
It’s unfortunate that the Republicans could not come up with a candidate who not only believes in freedom and free markets but could clearly verbalize why they are the best hope for everyone — especially those on the bottom rung of the income ladder. And, most important, someone who would have the courage to take action based on his beliefs.
Alas, it was not meant to be. But if we can hold off a dictatorship until 2012, there is hope that we can at least begin moving in the right direction. No Republican will be willing to adopt a libertarian platform, of course, but I believe there are a few in that wing of the Demopublican Party who might have the courage to at least begin to base some of his/her policies on such a platform.
If we’re lucky enough to make it to another election, keep an eye on the likes of Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, and, above all, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. Easy there — don’t get hysterical on me. I believe these are three people who, while they may have a long way to go philosophically, have some basic libertarian instincts. What they need is to be encouraged to understand that much of the electorate would enthusiastically support their taking a strong libertarian stance.
In other words, they don’t have to be hard-core libertarians at the outset. (Thomas Sowell started out as a communist!) They just have to show that they are willing to move in the direction of more freedom - specifically, that they place a higher priority on liberty than on all other objectives. Which means implementing policies that start to reduce the size of government and get it out of all activities that have nothing to do with protecting the lives and property of its citizens.
As perverse as it may sound, let’s be thankful that the bailout scams occurred, because they brought the ugly truth to light for untold millions of Americans who were sleepwalking into their favorite restaurants four nights a week. Now that they’ll be eating at home more often, they might consider using the extra time to educate themselves about the real causes of America’s collapse — both financial and cultural — and taking responsibility for their own participation in the crisis.
I’m the world’s most cynical optimist. I’m cynical because what I’ve witnessed over the decades has given me good reason to be cynical. The game really is rigged! Above all, it’s rigged by lice-infested politicians who will do anything - anything - to stay in power. They care nothing about the people they claim to be concerned about. They care only for themselves.
But I’m also optimistic, because I know, from my mail and e-mail over the years, that there are millions of people who really do cherish liberty above all other objectives, and who, if armed with the facts, would be willing to fight to the death for the cause of liberty.
To borrow from the title of Jesse Ventura’s book, “Don’t start the revolution without me.” And to you I say: “Be there!”
Robert Ringer is the author of three #1 bestsellers, two of which have been listed by The New York Times among the 15 best-selling motivational books of all time. Robert has appeared on numerous national talk shows, including The Tonight Show and Today. (www.robertringer.com)
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