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The Sky is Falling
No, despite what you are all no doubt assuming, the title of this post is not a reference to Tom Brady’s knee injury. If it turns out to be as serious as it looked, and the NFL’s best player is indeed out for several months, then this season is over before it even began. However, I’ll wait for the MRI before I commence panicking.
And no, it’s not a reference to Oldy McOld picking a dangerous lunatic to be his running mate, either. After all, there’s still plenty of time left for the American voter to come to his/her senses. If November 5th dawns with the McCain/Palin ticket running the Formerly Free World, then I’ll shit bricks.
Nope, the real reason my knees are knocking together today is the federal government’s takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. As previously noted, these twin giants collectively control 50% of all the home mortgages in America, and are hemorrhaging money by the trainload. If they were to go under, the entire US economy would collapse like a house of cards in short order. As in, tomorrow.
As for the consequences of the government’s buyout, well, we’ll let the Snarky Penguin handle that one:
Over 9% of U.S. mortgages are either in default or in foreclosure. The U.S. government is taking over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The economy has shed over half a million jobs over the past nine months. Most state and local governments are bankrupt or the closest thing to it. The highway trust fund for repairs to the nation’s crumbling highways and bridges is out of money. The federal government isn’t bankrupt only because it can print money—without the power to print money, there would be no way to pay the bills. But this is driving up the prices of everything to the point where even raw materials are cheaper overseas, meaning that even though the dollar is plummeting like a rock, it is still cheaper to move manufacturing jobs overseas rather than keep them in America—the U.S. has lost 20% of its manufacturing jobs over the last five years.
Meanwhile, this show is debuting on Fox as I write this post. I’d say they’re distracting us with bread and circuses while Rome burns down around us, but the country’s been run by Republicans for eight years, so there’s no more money for bread.
