Did I miss something, or were there hearings on Capitol Hill where the CEOs and Chairmen of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac answered to Congress about the blatant corruption existing in their organiziations since their inception?

Oil companies have to testify before Congress because of “obscene” profits, tobacco companies because of the health risk of their product (that everyone is already well aware of), and baseball players have to testify about steroid use.  But the organization at the very center of one of the most catastrophic financial collapses of the modern age doesn’t have to answer any questions on Capitol Hill?

I must have simply missed it.

Has the world gone topsy turvy? These guys are partisan jerks, but Krugman is right about Paulson’s arrogance.

I received this email from Bobby Jindal while I was waiting for the power to come back on with Ike.

In the coming weeks, you will hear the stories of heroes who built levees while storm waters rose, evacuated patients in the middle of the night, and risked safety to rescue the stranded.  You will hear stories about first responders, members of the National Guard, pastors, and everyday Louisianans who saved lives and cared for the hurting.

You will hear these stories and you will be proud of our state and proud of our people.

Johnny B is back in business.

Jon Cornyn, Kay Bailey Hutchison, John Culberson, pay attention:

Here is the question posed by NPR:

This $700 billion bailout plan, this potential 20-year mess that you’re talking about, comes from a Republican administration, comes from your own party. What’s happened to Republican faith in small government and free markets?

Gingrich:

Well, I think you have a Goldman Sachs chief of staff to the president and the Goldman Sachs secretary of the Treasury. And they convinced the president that the American people ought to send $700 billion to Wall Street, which I think is a very, very bad idea

Newt is right on this one.

With all of the talk of who is to blame, there are a lot of smart people saying what many of us deep inside already know.  None better than Neal Boortz, who is the co-author of the “FairTax” book, explaining in his “talk to me like I’m a 4-yr old” style, how the financial markets got into this mess in the first place:  Political correctness run amok.

Right now this crisis is being sold to the American public by the left as evidence the failure of the free market and capitalism. Not so. What we’re seeing is the inevitable result of political interference in free market economics. Acme bank didn’t want to loan money to Joe Homebuyer because Joe had a spotty job history, owed too much money on his credit cards, and wasn’t all that good at making payments on time. The politicians told Acme Bank to figure out a way to make that loan, because, after all, Joe is a bona-fide minority-American, or forget about opening that new branch office on the Southside. The loan was made under politicial pressure; the loan, with millions like it, failed – and now we are left to enjoy today’s headlines.

Ironically, what has classically scared me about stupid people who don’ t know anything about economics running our economy (by fleecing rich people and making sure companies don’t make too much money), doesn’t scare me QUITE as much as the Government’s insistence that noone should be at risk of losing money.  Combine the two, and you have a managed economy.

Meanwhile Steve Forbes defines another large chunk of the problem:

Not even during the Great Depression did we witness what is now unfolding–a sizable number of big financial institutions going under. What enabled their taking on so much debt and so many questionable assets was, primarily, the easy-money policy of the Federal Reserve. Chairmen Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke created massive amounts of excess liquidity. If the dollar had been kept stable relative to gold, as it was between the end of WWII and the late 1960s, the scale of the bingeing in recent years would have been impossible.

I feel like I’m SMACK DAB in the middle of an Ayn Rand novel.

These are a couple of excellent articles (here and here, registration required and recommended) from Clive Crook at the Financial Times.  He points out how obviously the Liberal Elite and the Democratic party hold in low regard the very people they purportedly are so ardently representing.  A couple of excerpts:

Democrats speak up for the less prosperous; they have well-intentioned policies to help them; they are disturbed by inequality, and want to do something about it. Their concern is real and admirable. The trouble is, they lack respect for the objects of their solicitude. Their sympathy comes mixed with disdain, and even contempt.

Democrats regard their policies as self-evidently in the interests of the US working and middle classes. Yet those wide segments of US society keep helping to elect Republican presidents. How is one to account for this? Are those people idiots? Frankly, yes – or so many liberals are driven to conclude. Either that or bigots, clinging to guns, God and white supremacy; or else pathetic dupes, ever at the disposal of Republican strategists. If they only had the brains to vote in their interests, Democrats think, the party would never be out of power. But again and again, the Republicans tell their lies, and those stupid damned voters buy it.

And…

Efforts to smear the governor proceed at a frantic pace. My guess would be that there are now more journalists on assignment in Alaska than bothered to turn up for the Republican convention in St Paul, sifting through dustbins, interrogating Palin family acquaintances (extra credit for those with a grievance) and subjecting Ms Palin’s expenses claims to a fanatical scrutiny which I dare say their own record-keeping, or that of most senators, might not withstand.

Of course, they will find things. They may even find something important. But the sheer swarming zeal for trivial malfeasance and family embarrassments is rapidly raising the bar for impropriety. I think that many voters – and not just committed Republicans – find this whole spectacle disgusting, so on top of everything else Ms Palin is now getting a sympathy vote.

I, like the author, can’t help but laugh at the trap that the Democrats have walked into here.  It’s very simply a microcosm and expose on their attitudes in general.  It’s particularly amazing to me when I have conversations with supporters of Obama (you know who you are) who accuse McCain and Palin (and all their EVIL minions) of deliberately and consistently manipulating and fooling the American people into following them.  As if their beliefs have absolutely no value in and of themselves, it’s simply the Republican machine grabbing power.  You can’t simply disagree with the Liberal viewpoint, you simply must be too dense and stupid to grasp it.  There’s an astounding sense of intellectual snobbery matched by a decided lack of intellectual depth that continually boggles the mind.

The further irony (as Mr. Crook adeptly points out) is that Obama himself would never abide by this nonsense.  If his latest book is any indication, he seeths at the concept of insulting an entire group of people based on their beliefs.  And even though his campaign has eventually made its way into a predictable and depressing class warfare stump speech, I believe as the author does that his initial reaction to Palin was the right one, and it was a sincere one.  Unfortunately, the undeniable support he receives from the media is not matched by a solid control of it, and he couldn’t stop them from descending on Wasila like a pack of wild Banshees trying to find crazy preachers and 2nd grade classmates of Palin who would talk bad about her.

This is from an email I got from my brother.  It’s an interesting perspective on the whole shelter/entitlement mentality of at least a percentage of those forced to be evacuated for Hurricane Gustave.  I assume it’s a letter to Bill O’Reilly, but am not 100% sure:

Hello Mr. O’Reilly

I am a nurse who has just completed working approximately 120 hours as the clinic director in a Hurricane Gustav evacuation shelter in Shreveport, Louisiana over the last 7 days.  I would love to see someone look at the evacuee situation from a new perspective.  Local and national news channels have covered the evacuation and ‘horrible’ conditions the evacuees had to endure during Hurricane Gustav.

True - some things were not optimal for the evacuation and the shelters need some modification. At any point, does anyone address the responsibility (or irresponsibility) of the evacuees? Does it seem wrong that one would remember their cell phone, charger,cigarettes and lighter but forget their child’s insulin?

Is something amiss when an evacuee gets off the bus, walks immediately to the medical area, and requests immediate free refills on all medicines for which they cannot provide a prescription or current bottle (most of which are narcotics)?

Isn’t the system flawed when an evacuee says they cannot afford a $3 copay for a refill that will be delivered to them in the shelter yet they can take a city-provided bus to Wal-mart, buy 5 bottles of Vodka, and return to consume them secretly in the shelter?

Is it fair to stop performing luggage checks on incoming evacuees so as not to delay the registration process but endanger the volunteer staff and other persons with the very realistic truth of drugs, alcohol and weapons being brought into the shelter?

Am I less than compassionate when it frustrates me to scrub emesis from the floor near a nauseated child while his mother lies nearby, watching me work 26 hours straight, not even raising her head from the pillow to comfort her own son?

Why does it insense me to hear a man say ‘I ain’t goin’ home ’til I get my FEMA check’  when I would love to just go home and see my daughters who I have only seen 3 times this week?

Is the system flawed when the privately insured patient must find a way to get to the pharmacy, fill his prescription and pay his copay while the FEMA declaration allows the uninsured person to acquire free medications under the disaster rules?

Does it seem odd that the nurse volunteering at the shelter is paying for childcare while the evacuee sits on a cot during the day as the shelter provides a ‘day care’?

Have government entitlements created this mentality and am I facilitating it with my work? Will I be a bad person, merciless nurse or poor Christian if I hesitate to work at the next shelter because I have worked for 7 days being called every curse word imaginable, felt threatened and feared for my personal safety in the shelter?

Exhausted and battered but hopefully pithy, Sherri Hagerhjelm, RN

As some of you may know I was in Shreveport, LA, for the hurricane, however I wasn’t witness to any of this. Unfortunately, though, I do not find this sort of report in the least bit surprising.

Here is a little known fact about Sarah Palin I haven’t seen mentioned anywhere else.

Even when approaching the speed of light, Sarah Palin knows exactly the location and momentum with which she is traveling.

Sarah Palin Rumors debunked

Sour Grapes from Anne Kilkenney

This lady is entitled to her opinion, but why did she leave out the most important part…the shenanigans Sarah pulled to become starting point guard in Wasilla!

This is my favorite little known fact about Sarah Palin

The 2008 convention was the most sloppy, unorganized convention I’ve ever seen.

Joe Lieberman was a disaster.  I guess to make Sarah look good by comparison?

I felt bad for Mitt Romney for trying to throw out a low of red meat.  He looked desperate out there.

Mike Huckabee has killer charm on the pulpit podium.  When Sarah mentioned that “Some politicians use ‘change’ to promote their careers, and some leaders, like John McCain use their careers to promote change.”  He mouthed, “That’s a good line”.  This was almost as cute as when Piper licked Trig’s hair.

Guiliani was the perfect warm-up for Palin.  When he shrugged and laughed at Obama’s community organizing, I think he summed up the first impression of millions of Americans.

Michael Steele is quite a capable “official Barack Obama Criticizer”.

Rudy and more importantly Sarah Palin salvaged an otherwise dreary and unorganized convention.  The media is besides themselves because every attempt to malign Palin’s record only highlights Obama’s thin resume.

Is Lindsay Graham the Clay Aiken of the Republican Party, or what?

Tom Ridge is the warm-up?  Yikes.  My wife kept asking ‘Where is Condoleeza Rice’…I think she has a girl crush on Condi.

Mac delivers his speech rather badly, I think.  It may not be his fault, it seems his lung capacity is low, so he pauses a lot, and everyone foolishly applauses every pause.  The Big Mac’s timing is bad and he’s shaken a lot worse than W was in 2004 by the protestors.  W could give a good speech, but he’s horrible in debates.  With McCain, he’s horrible at these speeches but rather good in debates, at least in the ones I’ve seen against GOP contenders.

The backdrop is a nightmare.

Obama’s style and strategy seems a lot like a W from the left…raise a lot of money, run a tight ship.  He orchestrated an audacious convention but couldn’t overcome the party crashing of the Clintons.  W’s 2004 convention was airtight. In spite of itself, the GOP convention was a winner for them because Obama is so hindered by the Clintons.