In the Great Depression years of the 30's we had a tremendous, you could even call it astronomical, amount of slack in our economy. How much slack? At the end of World War Two our economy was still rising at a rather large rate. ALL other war countries had either reached a plateau (Allies.) or dropped off to almost nothing. (Axis.) We had about 53 percent of GLOBAL GNP then and our economy was still only "warming up." That is amazing. We did this while building our navy to strengths three times that of all other nations' navies COMBINED.

Now for the difference.

Today, we're not trying to better the economy through more production as we did in the 30's. Those days are gone, perhaps permanently. Now we're trying to shore up the economy through spending, the opposite, because we're a nation of consumers and not suppliers.

Remember the fact that we had that huge amount of slack in the economy back then that we do not enjoy now. In fact, we have almost no slack. Our economy is now based on spending and not producing!

That's a _BIG_ difference between the 1930's and the first decade of the 21st century. It's one we would do well to not forget.

Just ask all of these people writing letters to this opinion piece.

This time last year everyone writing letters here was blasting Bush for creating deficits. Today, they're blasting Reagan's, and Bush I and II's deficits--all while praising Obama's comparatively astronomical projected deficit.

hypocrisy? *shrug* You come to expect that here. I guess it all depends on what party is creating the deficits, right? Heh.

I say let's go ahead with this huge amount of spending that is supposed to do us all a lot of good (You all know as well as I do, even if it does do us good none of us will be alive to see it.) and pay for some of it right now.

What I'm talking about is a 10 percent income tax increase across the board. Meaning everyone's taxes go up 10 percent. That will pop the rich more than the poor, right? It will make you all happy!

A $7-8+ ($10?) per gallon federal tax increase on gasoline, not diesel. We pay too much for diesel anyway. Besides, the trucking industry is just too important to us to saddle them with such huge tax liabilities. This increase has an added bonus of having a "green" label. Win-win! This is the one I am most excited about!

Communications tax increases. If you pay $180 a month for your home phone, cell phone and Internet, why not pay $200?

Federal alcohol taxes are way too low. We could raise them 15-20 percent right away and still be lower than Europe's who everyone here loves so much. I can't stress this one enough.

While I'm not a smoker I just can't see messing with smokers further at the present time. Especially in my home state where the draconian taxes and laws remind me of when our fellow Black Americans had their own drinking fountains.

Wait, there's more!

I propose adding a federal tax onto your state vehicle registrations. This money could go DIRECTLY toward highway improvements for those areas of interstate highways which seriously need it. We all live near these areas. A $15 increase in your registration fees would go far to address these issues.

Now it's your turn. Help me out with new tax increases we can have to help pay for this mess we find ourselves in. Any new taxes are open even if we have to subsidize some things for the poor (NOT those on unemployment.)

Then we can get on the phone to our people in the legislature and let them know what we think of this. If we work hard we can perhaps cut this proposed deficit by more than half! Let's hunker down to make this the Socialist country we all dream about at night.

Thanks for your time.

Close down all European bases except for the following (This is purely from a national interest standpoint.):

NAS Sigonella, Aviano Airbase, and one of the bases in Turkey.

I think we could get a 20 percent cut in defense spending right here. Since our defense spending is already way lower than it should be considering Iraq and Afghanistan and the War on Terror, I think this is about the best we can do. Thoughts?

Don't you think it's time our European allies took on some valid part of their own defense? This is costing us a lot of money. They create a 60,000 man Rapid Reaction Force and expect us to play taxi driver? Hell, let them use Lufthansa!

Is it just me or does Prime Minister Obama seem like a country bumpkin who has never been anywhere or seen anyone really important who suddenly finds himself hip deep in royalty and other leaders of the world's countries? It's like he's thinking to himself, "Oh, my gosh! A KING!" *fumble* *stumble* *fall on ass*

Well, enough laughing for a moment. I'm going to get really serious.

I think the man is seriously overloaded and overwhelmed. In other words, I think he is out of his league.

On a lighter note again, this presidency is going to be like sitting in a theater watching "Animal House" for four years. Some really good laughs and then, when it's over, you're going to have to go home and face reality.

Damn, I said the "r-word" there at the end of that last sentence. Forgive me.

By the way, I only made it through about the first four pages of letters because the uncontrollable laughter coming from the chair at my PC made me self-conscious. You people are a hoot in an undeniably pathetic sort of way.

Thank you for being honest, Camille, even though honesty here is a bringer of Salon death threats a la "I'm canceling Salon right now!!"

*Long pause for more belly laughs*

LOL