Borrow, Spend, and Rescue

The senate has passed the bailout bill, and the house is expected it soon. I greet this event with seriously mixed emotions.

I do believe that responsible legislators, should there be any, needed to support quick action, and because the action was quick, and because it was in response to a crisis, it is likely to be much less than perfect. Also, by the time you make all the compromises necessary to pass a bill quickly, the result is going to be substantially less than ideal.

But while it is necessary at this point, this bill also reflects much of the financial mismanagement of which our government is guilty. I do blame both parties on this, though in different ways. (In my oft-repeated phrase, that’s another post.)

The compromise results in borrowing more money, handing out more authority to executive agencies without adequate supervision, and in other measures that will serve to increase the deficit and our growing national debt. It seems that whatever good intentions the legislators start with, every bill ends up with us spending more and going deeper into debt.

As a stop-gap, perhaps $700 billion, along with an extra $100 billion or so in tax cuts will help temporarily. But we cannot go on forever behaving in this fashion. Sometime things have to be paid for. Democrats want the government to do more, and at least they admit it. Republicans talk about smaller government but continually expand it, and also tend strongly to increase executive power.

So while I believe this was necessary as a short term solution, I believe that we, as a nation, should feel like the consumer who has just charged his power bill by maxing out his last credit card–it can’t go on. Something has to give.