Why I am running for the United States Congress…
When the Bush administration brought forth the Troubled Asset Recovery Program (TARP), I was extremely concerned just as many Americans were. I didn’t feel comfortable with it. I had too many questions for which I heard no answers other than that there were companies too big to fail. That comforted me like fingernails on a chalkboard.
In my mind, if mortgage backed securities were tainted with 10% uncollectable mortgages, why weren’t they worth 90 cents on the dollar? Or if the buyer, thought they were higher risk, they could be bought at 70 or 80 percent of par. In other words, let the system deal with it.
I concede the capital markets had to function. Maybe there were no other options. I wish Milton Friedman had been around to advise us.
Then came the Obama administration, and in my mind, matters have degenerated at an alarming pace. Probably in March the thought came into my head that Washington needed a major dose of citizen perspective. Citizens showed the right instincts. They hunkered down, reduced expenditures and increased savings. The federal government contemplated the opposite. It passed a Stimulus bill to throw vast sums of dollars funded by debt – additional burden on the taxpayer and future generations.
Stimulus dollars were programmed for a meager taxpayer rebate.
But the bulk of the dollars appear to be destined to bail out states like California that have been utterly irresponsible in managing their affairs and to fill the pipeline to auto and other unions supportive to the Obama administration. To me, the scene is analogous to a bank stick up where the robbers give each customer in the teller lines carfare to get home.
Then in June we got a whiff of Health Care Reform. At this point the thought crept into my head that we’ve got to do something, and if there was no one stepping up, then maybe it’s incumbent on me to do it.
