The industry I currently provide services to is banking.
Yeah, absorb that for a moment.
I’m not terribly worried about everything that is going on yet. What worries me is that people are going to panic. It doesn’t help that the media is flashing the word “CRISIS” every five seconds. I really hate the media right now. I didn’t care for them when I had to work with them way back in my law enforcement days and they’ve done nothing to make me feel better about them since.
It seems like we just recovered from the Dot Com Bust and now this? What made the Dot Com Bust so painful though was the constant talk from the media about how bad the economy was. People panicked then and we had this constant cycle of low consumer confidence followed by layoffs as everyone refused to spend money. It was this terribly vicious cycle.
On the flip side I keep hearing about how it will be harder to get credit. Good! There are so many reasons why that is not a bad thing! One of the reasons we’re in this mess is that people are more than happy to borrow today and not worry if they can pay tomorrow. I hope that no matter how bad things get or whether or not the government can “fix” it we can at least learn some valuable lessons from it.
On the other flip side (three sided coin I guess) I am so not impressed with our congress. Nancy Pelosi can blow me, seriously. You give a partisan speech and tick off the people you need to work with them blame them for voting against the bill when the Democrats had 40% of their own membership vote against it as well. That is outstanding “leadership”. I’ve had this perception that the two party system has devolved from being forced to reach compromises to just a bunch of stonewalling and hissy fits until one side gets their way. It’s really sad that they cannot even work together for the good of the American people.
The Democrats cannot ignore their own part in creating this crisis. I love the focus on how the Republicans caused all this, as if the Dems are completely without blame. Do they think no one has Google? Furthermore, if the Republicans, and Democrats, who voted against the bill thought this was a bad plan then what is the alternative? It’s not that I think the bailout bill is a great plan, I simply think that some plan is better than no plan. If you’re intention is to “let the market work it out”, then say so. Honestly, we need to vote out every “professional” politician regardless of party. At the very least, the two day recess they’re taking is just shameful.