DEBT, AGAIN - December 17, 2009

Once again the question of debt shows up in the national confrontation and once again it becomes patent that our nation can be induced to shrink from paying our account, or even acknowledging that we must pay it. The national habit of paying with a credit card, not as a way of marshalling the means without carrying around wads of money, comes to the fore. We have seen the banks luring our children into accounts on which they can charge legendary amounts of interest, having committed the scam of admitting them to the vote but actually having made them easy targets of the money-lenders. In fact, we have learned that after the first vote, these children overwhelmingly do not bother to visit the polls, but they can be seduced into spending money they do not have, with no concern about how the accounts will be settled. What is more concerning is how many of the supposedly adults of our nation think that we can mount wars, cut taxes and run on spending sprees in our marts without any idea where the money will come from to free us from the usurers. But a nation that cannot pay for its extravagances and shrinks from the reality of debt is not one that lenders will be willing to entrust with a loan. So the unspoken words in the debate about paying the costs of our high living is that no one who has even a bit more caution than we would be willing to extend credit to us, certainly not in the trillions of dollars. And those of us who have saved for our retirement are sure to see our nest eggs crumble into dust while our government, Dem and Tory, look out for the self-indulgence of the rich, who have arranged not to be bothered carrying any of the load they have managed to inflict on all the rest of us. Those of us who do not have riches, to say nothing of those who have no jobs and no homes and no health, will be forced to bear the load of the banksters and their ilk.