to prevent 'overnight' emergencies of calamitous dimension. in fact, people were warning about this potential disaster years ago. this isn't an overnight emergency, it's a case of your reps and senators playing golf while this financial hiv-aids was chewing through the financial system.

the first thing that needs doing is to fire everyone who was supposed to be minding the shop. start with paulson and bernanke, but don't stop there...

replace those reps and senators that have forgotten why they're there.

read "the decline and fall of the roman empire" and know the future of the usa.

for the last few years, they are derelict in their duty. if they didn't, they are merely incompetent.

or maybe the world is just too complex for oversight, but then we can say to congress, why is it not kept simple?

the american system worked ok when cotton went out and slaves came in. it coped with intrastate deals of salt fish and timber. but times have changed, and the economy has changed, and maybe the character of the people have changed too.

maybe it's time for a new constitution, one whose aim is not to protect the smarties when their deals come unstuck.

y, that's a good plan. we used it in the 1950's, that's how iran was made an ally. yep, "victory in iran". didn't last though. funny how quisling dictators don't seem to last. and when the iranians chucked him out, we got khomeni, instead. all in all, a real triumph in real politik for the cia and the usa.

there is nothing to be done in iraq, except get out. maybe the next time some would-be clauswitz in the whitehouse starts dreaming of immortality, he'll remember iraq, and cool down. probably not though- vietnam doesn't seem to have taught them a thing, either.

america will not escape the fate of past empires, and the costs of empire are already visibly sapping the american economy, while convincing americans their government is contemptible.

you get the government you deserve.

you voted republican, cuz dubya sounded a little like you, ignorant and tongue-twisted, while that dem fella, gore, he sounded like an over-bright nerd, who would probably laugh at you, if he heard you thinking. then there was kerry, in his poncy wind-surfer suit. i mean, no man could vote for him, even if he was a war hero, unlike dubya who defended texas from the air, when he had time..

eight years of bush resulted: iraq ruined, economy looted to the point of collapse, getting into afghanistan again, this time indefinitely, and now you are asked to save the economy instead of those richos who raped it. "not fair!" you cry.

well, it is fair, folks. you handed the keys to the house over to your idiot son, and his weird buddies, and turned on the game. he's burned the house down, folks, and the neighbors houses, and it is your fault. no one cares what happens to you now, we all wish you'd move out of the neighborhood, but would you at least put out the fires before you join the trailer trash?

representative democracy is not.

california has a democratic constitution, with initiative and recall. it works. in fact it works so well that california has been the nation's center in science and technology centered industry and commerce for a long time. they can, and do, fire governors that don't deliver, so people who say dubya has been a cancer on the face of america ought to be saying "it's a shame america doesn't have recall."

the american constitution was a step forward in 1789. but an elected king is still a king,and it's time to take another step forward- to democracy.

democracy doesn't mean every detail must be examined by the electorate, it just means the people have the power to direct their administration by choosing plans, by setting policies, and by having public business done in public, where corruption and incompetence become quickly visible. there is no down-side to democracy, except to crooked or incompetent politicians.

for starters, there would be regulation and oversight of financial affairs.

party rule changes the laws and regulation according to the wishes of the big campaign donors, 'people rule' as democracy is known in english, is much less inclined to hands the keys over to special interest groups.

but if you think america is a democracy, you aren't interested in reality. what do think of the emperor's new clothes?

by pointing to it's own?