I can't disagree with the fact that millions of Americans spent more money they had, and that really doesn't help our situation.

Yet I consider it a bit unfair to "blame" a huge population of people, of whom many *literally* did not know better, when there was a tiny population of people who DID know better and were doing everything they could do to encourage bad behavior.

I'm sure there are plenty of folks who were just taking advantage of their ability to get loans that a few years before they would never have been offered. There is corruption inside EVERYONE.

When I place that corruption next to the corruption of a mortgage broker who argues vigorously that a family of four *should* be spending 40% of their income on their mortgage, there appears (to ME) to be different levels of poor conduct.

For a super-simple analogy:

Murder is wrong. Theft is wrong. Although they've both committed crimes, the thief doesn't deserve the same scorn the murderer does.

Where I disagree with you is that I believe "we," like lemmings to the cliff, bought into the endless supply of credit being provided to us. That ponzi scheme eventually collapsed, but instead of paying for it ourselves, now, through lower asset values and stock portfolios and taking the pain to pay for our mistakes, "we" through the federal government are exacerbating its long-term effects by funding the "systemic risk" and keeping the very institutions responsible for the problem afloat.

"We need to realize that we've been paying for our materialistic lifestyles via credit, and accept that as a whole, our standard of living is too high."

I don't think our standard of living is very high, really, considering just how wealthy and powerful the USA *is.*

A tiny number of Americans have a standard of living that is beyond comprehension. A slightly greater number have a very high standard of living. And there's about half of us who are just trudging through a world of cheap plastic toys and dead-end jobs while we struggle to maintain our basic necessities.

What defines "standard of living"? Our ability to add more zeroes at the end of our bank balance? Our possession of larger homes and bigger teevees?

I'd far prefer to look at things like quality of mental and physical health, sense of community and pride in our neighborhoods, respect/tolerance/love for our fellow citizens, and levels of personal satisfaction that come from being able to live a life we BELIEVE IN as individuals.

For 30 years we've been sold the idea that money is what's important, and in my view, individuals have become increasingly miserable as it has gone on.

Time to reverse that trend.

Money is not going to make us happy, especially if the folks who have the money try to keep us at each others' throats.

Overreaction would be setting their Mercedes on fire, covering them with tar and feathers, and then locking them in a dungeon.

Calling them a bunch of thieving irresponsible a**holes is just facing facts.

Thank you. I'll take your word for it and spare myself more envious Cheetah-the-Chimp imitations from the lad.

Unless your point is that you're as bereft of ideas as every other dead-ender in the Republican party.

I'm full of good ideas AND I'm a democrat.

We need to realize that we've been paying for our materialistic lifestyles via credit, and accept that as a whole, our standard of living is too high.

The concept of saving now to spend later is a foreign concept for the majority of the nation. People don't want to save their paycheck for 4 months to buy that flatscreen.. they want it NOW. And even then, they probably couldn't save for that flatscreen for 4 months, because they're car or house payments are too high.

People took out way too much credit to finance their lifestyles. And now people are blaming the rich for the fact THEY spent too much money on material items, assuming they'd always have a job, and their home's value would never decrease.

He just comes here for the attention. Really. Check his letter history.

I'm angry because individuals with no moral sense at all have bankrupted my country with the assistance of a completely out-of-touch and CORRUPT political caste.

"I assume you've also made yourself indispensable by learning skills and providing productivity above and beyond your competitors (wherever they might be)..."

Um. I guess. I mean, I have a job, sure. But my personal belief is that my life is something to be enjoyed and experienced by ME.

I'm not here on this rock to help some rich asshole become even richer. It's not my life-function, and more importantly, it's not my DUTY. I don't owe the capitalists my "cooperation" as they trash our planet.

I partake in this exploitative and evil system simply because I see no acceptable choice. I'd probably have headed for the frontier and self-sufficiency if such an opportunity had existed by the time I showed up here.

But we hit the Pacific over a hundred years ago.

Did you have a point you wanted to make -- aside from you're not HAP-py?

You're just making yourself look silly.

Afraid not, it is the bankster worshipping idiots such as yourself that look silly, and your continued defense of them after the looting of our country makes you look even sillier, as well as just plain stupid.

Get this, the battle is over sweetheart, the Banksters technically lost, but since in our "free market economy" they have all the power they just spun the crisis as "too big to fail", claimed otherwise, and put everyone else on the hook for their flawed economic theories. your beliefs about the economy were 100% wrong and your faith in institutions like the Federal Reserve is what got us where we are today.

As much as it probably pisses you off, the Austrian School is right, you're not, but like all the other smug losers who have been nothing but wrong over the past few years, you mock those that were right, and justify yourself through faith in establishment narratives that reinforce your wrongness for their own benefit.

You might want to take a look at the news from the past year before you mock the people whose analysis turned out to be correct, but I don't expect you to, since mocking the people that correctly predicted our current economic problems after the fact is par the course for those that worship at the altar of the Federal Reserve.