“United Stupid of America”

“United Stupid of America.” That’s how satirist Bill Maher sums up what’s happening.

The week after the geniuses who lead the United States government shelled out $85 Billion of our money keep AIG alive, the company’s executives spent $440,000 on a weekend retreat at a lavish resort.  American International Group (AIG), the global insurer, also continues to pay $1 million a month to an executive at the center of the company’s failure. 

Not surprisingly, Lynn Turner, a former official at the Securities and Exchange Commission, has told Congress that no one … absolutely no one … knows what’s going on in the collapse of our economy.

Well, that’s not completely true. Clearly, no one in Congress or among the government’s appointees has a clue. But the savvy thieves on Wall Street know how to steal even when our government is broke, the economy is in tatters, and when all of us have been robbed, literally, of our financial stability and nest eggs.

Look … there is really no mystery about what caused the crash of our economy … yes, it is a crash. Over the period of the last decade or so, Americans have been told by members of Congress and, more recently, by the White House, that government regulation is evil, and not good for the country’s economy. During the last eight years, Wall Street has been deregulated and federal enforcement of the rules has been neutralized. As an old friend used to say, the inmates were put in charge of the asylum.

Members of Congress, especially those in powerful positions, have became richer through deals with lobbyists who work for Wall Street greed brokers. There’s no regulation but the top guys on Wall Street mandate the rules. Sorry to break that news to you but Congress acts on behalf of lobbyists whose wealthy clients dictate our country. You and I? Sorry, but we don’t count.

There has perhaps never before been such an era of unbridled greed and corruption on Capital Hill and the U.S. government. It’s not about one party or the other … it is both parties. Honesty, oversight and ethical conduct and behavior in Congress is gone. Our government is broken.

So, when you look at the $85 Billion paid to AIG, and the $700-Billion-that-became-$870-Billion-with-pork-barrel-gifts bailout of Wall Street, members of Congress hurriedly voted what lobbyists wanted.  Hey, I’ve worked in DC and have seen the game in action. In a laughable and certainly predictable move, the House of Representatives voted down and then later approved the bailout so that Congress could rush home to campaign and tell gullible voters what they wanted to hear.

We’ve really got to get smarter in the country – that means you and me – because no one is watching out for our needs in what Maher calls, “the United Stupid of America.”

Filed Under: Featured • Personal notes

Tags: AIG • Bailout • Bill Maher • Gullibility