Paulson at the Crack of Doom

Hello World Family,
Falcon here...amazed at yet another week of insanity in what has become the Show that Never Ends on the U.S. economy. Hank Paulson is about to address the public again in a few minutes, but I must make a casual observation about his behavior two days ago, and a certain page out of fantasy literature that it reminded me of...

Paulson, Secretary of the U.S. Treasury was given power several weeks ago by Congress to rescue failing financial institutions from themselves by investing $700 Billion in those banks to free up credit and help families keep their homes and avoid foreclosure caused by irresponsible leveraging and unabated greed along with rampant misrepresentation and solid thievery. Endowed with this power, Paulson has now decided that he is not going to do what Congress gave his the power to do: fix the bad debt, get it off the books, and get money moving to the common man once again. He has decided in his great an infinite wisdom that the 'better' plan is give money to banks in an unanswerable fashion and banks are now refusing to share what exactly they will do with the money, saying they were not mandated to reveal how the assets were going to be used.

As Grant would say on Ghosthunters..."What the fetch?!"

I suddenly recalled a passage from Tolkien's "The Return of the King" (a must-read) the third volume in "The Lord of the Rings". The line was spoken by Frodo at literally the Crack of Mount Doom. Standing over fire and flame at a gaping chasm, in the bowels of Sauron's most treasured foundry...tired, beaten, bruised, and battered (think the American taxpayers), Frodo has come far in his journey, but he is momentarily distracted by the will of Sauron in his most powerful place (think Paulson). In this moment, he says...

"I have come, but I choose now not to do what I came to do". I will not do this thing. The Ring is mine!!!"

For some reason, this line jumped into my head when I saw Hank Paulson speaking. He is possessed, I thought. The power has gotten to him, and he has lost his mind. Is his idea better than the original idea? Well, whether it is or not may be moot. The fact is that he is an employee to the American public. He answers to us. He is not omnipotent, and he needs to remember that he is a humble public servant. For a moment, he forgot this fact, and spoke in a rather pedestrian fashion about how he will not apologize for changing his mind. Like I said, Frodo at the Crack of Doom.

As soon as Gollum/Smeagol did his thing, blinded by greed and selfishness, Frodo was fine. He was no longer possessed by Sauron's evil. I am wondering what it will take to get Hank Paulson to remember who he works for, and that the American public has a right to know what is happening to their money...our money, Mr. Paulson!

I know Congress was hard on his Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Kashkari this morning...but I know why they were. There was a classic bait-and-switch employed, and they are not happy. The American public is not happy. The shareholders are not happy. Hmm...arrogance breeds outrage, imagine that?! "The Treasury should not put money into failing institutions", he said. Ah...isn't that why we passed the $700B bill in the first place? Weren't we going to save financial institutions 'too big to fail'? I repeat Grant's question, "What the fetch?"

Paulson is coming on now...I will listen to what he says with great interest, and many around the world will. Everyone should pay attention to what is begin said. Stay informed, Family!

Have a safe and enjoyable weekend!
Peace,
Falcon and Dove