Oh, the relief of reading such good sense. That whole 'we only use a fraction of our brain,' is just another way to sell you stuff. Baby Einstein, self help, hypnotherapy. It also underpins the myth that there are some people out there so much smarter than the rest of us - Like Lance W. - and therefore deserving of their incredible privileges.

Well actually I DO think there are some people out there so much smarter than the rest of us, but they aint in politics or finance!

And it is also worth noting, for those interested in extended metaphors, that in adition to the spongy, tight-fitting skull, woodpeckers have also evolved an unusually long tongue which actually slips all the way back and around the base of the skull to help cushion it while hammering after food.

Why would Keillor have to invest in that to begin with?

Oh right, he wouldn't. So why is he clucking his tongues going on about how much wiser he is than those(I'm not among them) who did?

I like that. You start out talking about our propensity to get-rich-quick and manage to close with an accurate slam on little georgie.

Plodders and pluggers of the world, I salute you. Keep on showing up on time, doing an honest day's work, eating lunch out of a lunch box and celebratng your tax return with a six pack.Big profits would scare the begeezus out of me and rightly so. I can only think of masses of money in terms of pet toys and a new saddle.

Back when I was a little boy, I remember spending the weeks before Thanksgiving, making Pilgrim hats and Indian headbands out of black and brown construction paper.

10 years after the end of the greatest war, (or, the worst war the world had ever seen), our life was pretty sweet. I don’t know if that was the high point because I was too young, but things had pretty clearly started to go down hill by the time I was in high school. A lot of us experimented with all kinds of diversions to try and not see where we were headed.

It seems to me, we have pretty much reached the bottom now, but I don’t know if everyone would agree. Some of us still seem to be drunk on the idea that we have lost our way as a nation and the only way out is more of what we’ve had for the last 7 years. Fortunately I think most of us realize that its time to get sober.

So my post war generation has seen us go from good to not good at all. Being somewhat of an optimist I will say it’s at least been an education.

This Thanksgiving I am going to try to remember that this is still a great country, and that it will with our help find its way back to the path down which we were so nobly set 231 years ago.

I suspect that it’s out of fashion now but I wonder if the kids still make paper costumes in school?

To everyone, including you Garrison, have a nice Thanksgiving.

Reading Garrison Keillor reminds one of the distinction between the professional writer and the wannabes that at times can be found on Salon. Bravo, Garrison, for summing it all up for us in a gently, compelling way. You made my day.

Sceptical, everyone's childhood is golden. You say that after high school everything seemed to decline? That's biology, baby, not history. My childhood was the Reagan years. Nuclear scares, AIDS, crack, open gang warfare in our cities... ah the golden years, I remember them fondly!

You are certainly right about the current occupant. He has given away the country to big business and those that would take big risks with other people's welfare on stupid, poorly conceived schemes.

However, I have to write in and speak up for the little guy. Its nice to be concerned with those small time investors who lost their savings. (Everyone wants a winter vacation somewhere nice.) But, the real tragedy to me is that lots of good, decent people were talked into mortgages they couldn't afford. Now, they are going to be foreclosed on and/or face bankruptcy. These people will not be having a happy Thanksgiving or holiday season. They thought they had achieved the great American dream and now they are facing shame, debt, court, lawyers, and possible homelessness. Families will be destroyed by this.

I'm just guessing that you bought your house when the market wasn't as obscenely overvalued as it is now.

And I'll bet at that time, banks had the craaazy notion that lending to people who would be able to pay the loans back was how to run a business.

It is possible to be a personal fiscal conservative in this wacky "neoconservative" age. But its a lot harder. Requires guts of steel and a suspicious mind.

Yes, kids still make construction paper hats for Thanksgiving. Just so you know.

Everyone is guilty in this mess. The lenders who through out the rules about what good lending is. The investors who got greedy and wanted more. The realtors who oversold the market and fueled the ponzy scheme by inflating prices. The government for not enforcing the rules on fair lending and disclosures. The media for riding the tide of false market promises. And finally, the borrowers who wanted a home so much, who wanted a piece of wealth, who believed the machine that was aimed at them, aimed to take away their feeble earnings.

I am sure, that Lance was in some way part of the S&L crisis of the 90's. These low life forms, re invented themselves and brought us another disaster. They disregarded all the rules and the snake oil salesmen, the boom and bust merchants, took us down the path of gluttony one more time. Be careful, he will pop up somewhere else and shake the hands of Democratic and Republican Congressmen at Rotary club meetings and still be considered and upstanding American.

At least the mafia had the culture to give us some great movies and tv shows, these guys are just a bunch of criminals of the lowest form. Now they working to figure out how to make money from the carcass that is left.

Thanks for the 29 years of cosnervative economic policies? Has anything wokred?