Too Big to Fail, which premieres on HBO on May 23, 2011, features a star studded cast recounting the events that led to the financial crisis and bailouts by the U.S. government in 2008. It is a mini-series packed into a 98-minute made-for-television movie where several essential characters are quickly introduced and where finance and economics are casually discussed. It may help if one has a baseline of knowledge about the crisis before watching the movie. If one doesn’t know who Henry Paulson, Ben Bernanke, and Timothy Geithner are or what Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, and AIG are, it may prove slightly difficult to follow.

Although the Director, Curtis Hanson (L.A. Confidential, 8 Mile), was limited to telling a very long and complicated story in a very short amount of time, he was able to skillfully pull it off. Perhaps this is because the screenwriter, Peter Gould (Breaking Bad), deftly adapted Andrew Ross Sorkin’s 2009 prize winning New York Times Bestseller, Too Big to Fail.

The cast was right out of a Robert Altman film, there was a large number of well known actors including William Hurt (Paulson – Sec. Treasury), James Woods (Fuld – Lehman Bros), Paul Giamatti (Bernanke – Chair, Federal Reserve), Bill Pullman (Dimon – JPMorgan Chase), Ed Asner (Buffet – Berkshire Hathaway), Billy Crudup (Geithner – President, Federal Reserve), Matthew Modine (Thain – CIT Group), Tony Shalhoub (Mack – Morgan Stanley), Topher Grace (Wilkinson), Cynthia Nixon (Davis), and many others. They all looked and played their parts very well with the exception that there seemed to be no effort made toward sounding like the people they played. It was difficult to get past the notable voices of the actors. Paul Giamatti sounds like Paul Giamatti and nothing like Ben Bernanke. Hurt sounded nothing like Paulson. Crudup nothing like Geithner. Perfection wasn’t necessary, but it seemed as though there was little to no effort made at all by the actors to at least sound a little more like the real people they were portraying and less like themselves.

The story opens on a  shot of Ronald Reagan. It is news footage of a speech he gives on deregulation. Credits play as we see an image of Clinton signing a piece of legislation as the audio of newsmakers make mention that this is Congress’ bill being singed. Alan Greenspan is seen and states, “Don’t regulate for regulation’s sake,” which is followed by Bush proclaiming everyone should live out the American dream and own their own home. Miscellaneous clips talks of high profits and subprime loans, and then mortgage meltdown and government bailout.

At this point, I am thinking this film is going to be about blame… and that blame is going to be deregulation ushered in by Reagan, the Republican Congress during the Clinton years, Bush 43, and Reagan through Bush’s Federal Reserve appointee, Alan Greenspan.

This prompts me to check the cast and crew to see who they support and if they are bringing their agenda to this story in their hopes to rewrite history and put Republicans in a negative light and Democrats in a positive light before the election in 2012. And, of course, the Director and the Writer are both ardent Obama supporters. All those at HBO support Obama like Co-President Eric Kessler, Co-President Richard Plepler, President of HBO entertainment Sue Naegle, President of HBO Films Len Amato and Executive Producers Paula Weinstein, Carol Fenelon, and Ezra Swerdlow. Even the Cinematographer Kramer Morgenthau and Casting Director Alexa Fogel have contributed to Obama’s 2008 campaign. And the Obama supporting list of actors is long too: Topher Grace, William Hurt, Matthew Modine, Cynthia Nixon, and Amy Carlson. As if that’s not enough, there are many other ardent left-wingers like Paul Giamatti, Bill Pullman, Tony Shalhoub, and Ed Asner.

Then the story opens on James Woods playing Dick Fuld, Chairman and CEO of Lehman Brothers… an ardent Democrat and Obama supporter. James Woods stands out as the political maverick in the cast. In a recent interview with New York Magazine, Woods is quoted as saying, “I’ve always said that the next Obama slogan should be, ‘Barack Obama: Putting America Out of Business,’ because that’s what he’s doing.” So I decided to turn off my bias filter and give this story a chance.

As the story unfolded, I saw that the villains in this film weren’t the Republicans, rather it was a single villain… the total and complete financial collapse of our nation, or as Bernanke puts it, “[replaying] the depression of the 1930s. Only this time… far, far worse.” So, regardless of any one American’s political affiliation watching this film, total and complete financial collapse is an enemy we can all collectively desire to defeat.

The heroes, however, that’s a little more complicated. The actual heroes of the story are Republicans Henry Paulson (Secretary of the Treasury), Ben Bernanke (Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve), and Independent Timothy Geithner (President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York). They artfully maneuver their way through the minefield of economic collapse. Bear Stearns has already collapsed, Lehman Brothers is on the brink, Merrill Lynch next, and with all this going on, AIG – the safety net for all these creditors – was in the process of imploding from its own lack of liquidity and inability to meet its obligations. If AIG falls, all the banks fall. People would pull their money out of their banks and there would be no George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) trying to stop the “run on the bank” by convincing his depositors to take only what they need from his honeymoon stash. America, as we know it, would be in ruins.

Every maneuver in their quest to stabilize the markets is met with unpredictable reactions. Once they believe they’ve averted disaster, the pundits, investors, and citizens react differently than expected. It’s a reminder of Nobel winning economist F.A. Hayek’s precept that, “The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.”

But in the end, as we all know, it was capital injections in the form of a Troubled Asset Relied Plan (TARP) that would “save the day.” In short, the plan would see the U.S. government purchase assets and equity from all financial institutions, even if they didn’t need it, in order to stabilize and strengthen the financial sector. As Bernanke put it, the upside would be stabilizing banks faster, the downside would be nationalizing a few banks. Their plan to soften the blow was that they would force private banks to participate in this plan under law, but that the government would not have a voting interest or the ability to tell the banks how they use the money injected into their coffers… leaving the question to the viewer, “They will lend it out, won’t they?”

But, was TARP the right solution? If one believes it was, then the heroes of this story are without a doubt Republicans Paulson and Bernanke. But, if one believes it wasn’t the right solution, then the Republicans are just kicking the can down the road. Regardless, the story is a quest for a private solution, according to Paulson.

As Republican public relations guru Jim Wilkson (Topher Grace) says at one point, “You just can’t hand the banks massive piles of cash. Nobody’s going to go for it. To the Republicans, it’s nationalization. To the Democrats, it’s a bailout. And the banks are going to go ballistic.”

The story is well crafted and builds suspense out of the unexciting topics of finance and economics. There were parts that bothered me, like making the Republican Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Christopher Cox, look like an immature boob, or Republican presidential candidate Senator McCain look like he is clueless on economic matters contrasted by Senator Obama’s grip on the subject, or simplistically blaming deregulation while omitting the fault of Carter’s Community Reinvestment Act of 1977, or that derivatives and subprime loans were born during Clinton’s presidency, or more importantly that in 2006 Republicans pleaded with the Democratically-controlled Congress to begin taking measures by pulling the reigns back on Fannie and Freddie to mitigate the impending economic disaster.

Those criticisms, however, were offset by so many of the lines delivered by Topher Grace’s character, Jim Wilkson, who best resembled the attitudes and feelings of most Americans during this time. At one point, it is suggested that the government purchases up the toxic assets of the banks, to which he responds, “Ohhh, call it cash for trash,” he also calls nationalization “the N-word” and that it is un-American, and he suggests that the government running the banks would be like the government running the Post Office, which they “run like a dream.” Another character addresses the issue that the government having the ability to dictate compensation would be the biggest “brain drain this country has ever seen.” And House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is characterized as something like the head of the Mafia. Her character comes across as an elitist snob, which I particularly enjoyed.

The movie was a surprise. Although it wasn’t 100 percent balanced, it was enough for this right-winger to actually enjoy it. And the filmmakers did a pretty decent job packing in a lot of characters and a lot of story into a short amount of time. If Obama-loving HBO can pull off the upcoming Sarah Palin story, Game Change, and the Dick Cheney movie, Angler, with the same deftness and fairness, I will be pleasantly surprised.  Better yet… I will be astonished.

It struck me that the words could be an anthem for a new political generation. Of course, they might also be a prescient warning for voters casting ballots on November second.

As Election Day approaches, there is a feeling of excitement among conservatives. Republicans are poised to take control of both houses of Congress. As of this writing, both the Gallup and Rasmussen polls have Republicans holding a commanding double-digit lead among likely voters. There is even speculation that Republicans could win as many as 100 seats in the House of Representatives and 12 seats in the Senate.

Pardon me if, like Chris Matthews, I do not have a tingling sensation running up my leg at the prospect of Republican victory in November. Perhaps I would feel differently if Republicans had done something to earn victory in November. Alas, being the only alternative to an over-reaching, liberal congress and a president who is out of touch (and seemingly in over his head) is no great accomplishment. Yes, Republicans have stood in the way of Democratic hubris, as they should have. They are the opposition party and shouldn’t get brownie points for doing their job.

Certainly, I am not alone in recalling that it was the “me too” Republicans who increased federal regulation of public education, gave us the largest new entitlement program in a generation, failed to reform government entitlements, voted to pass the TARP, and were on the verge of giving us “comprehensive immigration reform” before saner minds steps to the fore. It was a big government president that arrogantly announced that he was abandoning free-market principles in order to save the free-market. Given their recent track record, it is unclear why the political right believes a Republican led Congress will be any more fiscally responsible than the previous Republican led Congress.

Oh, yes, there is the “Pledge to America,” which, of course, will make all the difference. What remains unclear is why there must be an official pledge in order for Republicans to behave like, well, Republicans. Just a few years ago many of these same Republicans were spending money like drunken sailors and spouting the big-government conservative mantra, “Deficits don’t matter!” Now, of course, in large part because of the Tea Party movement, Republicans have found fiscal religion, except that the same folks that brought us big-government conservatism are mostly the same folks behind this years GOP resurgence.

Perhaps the difference this year is the Tea Party; the power and activism of the grass-roots will keep Republicans honest. It may very well be that the Tea Party is the natural response to leftist attempts to transform America. However, I maintain that had Republicans eschewed big-government conservatism in favor of traditional conservatism, there would have been no need for Tea Party activism because President Obama would still be Senator Obama.

Contrary to what the New Left would have us believe, the Tea Party movement is not the white racist rejection of a black president. The Tea Party is a rejection of government over-reaching: bank bailouts, government ownership of automobile companies, government healthcare, government control of school loans, and government attempts to regulate the very air we breathe. The Tea Party movement is the American people shouting, “Enough is enough!” As such, the Tea Party is a terrific gadfly, but as the Obama administration has discovered, there is a difference between community organizing and governing. The Tea Party is not prepared to govern; the Republican Party is. The question is: “Will they?” And if so, “In what manner?”

Sorry, but the cynic in me simply isn’t getting that warm, fuzzy feeling. In my lifetime I have noticed a tendency for politicians of both of the major parties to feed the beast of government rather than slay it. Sure, they talk tough and make promises, but Washington seduces them into engaging in all manner of devilment.

The cynic in me is whispering in my ear that ObamaCare is here to stay. Republicans may tinker with it, snip a few pages here and there to hold up as trophies, but the beast is here to stay. The doubter in me is saying that no matter how many pledges the GOP writes, there will be no meaningful reform of our entitlement system. The beast will demand to be fed tax-dollars and it will get them with a cherry on top. The skeptic in me is certain that in a very short time the public will be treated to “climate legislation.” Sure, there will be a few stalwart conservatives willing to be martyrs for the cause, but they will be shouted down by the “me too” Republicans, who are all too eager to out-Democrat their Democrat colleagues.

So, what is the alternative? I suppose one could pull the lever for Democrats, but that seems an odd choice for a conservative to make. I have long held that to vote for the lesser of two evils, still results in a vote cast for evil. And yet, to vote for a third-party candidate with no chance of winning, only seems to empower the party that I would like to see out of office. It is little wonder that I continually find myself holding my nose, and falling to my knees to pray that “We don’t get fooled again.”

“Set in New York City, … [and] follows Detective Allen Gamble (Will Ferrell), a forensic accountant who’s more interested in paperwork than hitting the streets, and Detective Terry Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg), who has been stuck with Allen as his partner ever since an embarrassing public incident with his quick trigger finger. Allen and Terry idolize the city’s top cops, Danson and Manzetti (Dwayne Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson), but when an opportunity arises for the Other Guys to step up, things don’t quite go as planned.”

No big deal. We see these sorts of cop comedies all the time: Opposite personalities are forced to work together. They constantly clash. They bungle assignments. Then they come to an understanding and manage to save the day.

A sneak peek at the script tells us that there are a few moments that will irk conservatives, including a “hilarious” reminder that we have a “black president” and that it’s time to stop stereotyping, even though there’s no stereotyping involved in the scene. Get it? Ha ha. But that’s all typical for this kind of in-your-face, over-the-top comedy film.

Quick question, though: Who are the villains? Now there’s where things get interesting. Are they Islamic terrorists? Of course not. Sure, jihadists are responsible for much of the carnage we hear about all over the globe (not just the events on 9/11 and further attempts at jihad here in the U.S.), but to liberals, Muslims are considered a protected “minority” (all 1.5 billion of them worldwide) because a Republican president dared to call their bluff and thus they are treated with kid gloves by Hollywood and liberals in general. I’m surprised the bad guy’s name in 1994’s “True Lies” hasn’t been changed in a revision from Salim Abu Aziz to Bill Jones or something similar.

Are they domestic terrorists, a la William Ayers and his sweet little wife Bernardine Dohrn and their merry band of pranksters? Certainly not. People who try to violently subvert the system by bombing government buildings are held in high regard by the left and not to be trivialized by making them cartoonish bad guys in a cop comedy.

Okay, then, how about the old standby villains – Eurotrash terrorists as seen in films like “Die Hard,” “Nighthawks” and just about any Bond film you can mention? Nah. Been there, done that. This is 2010, baby – it’s a new decade in a relatively new century, so we have to keep up with the times. According to the script, the villains in “The Other Guys” are…drum roll please…

Bankers.

Director Adam McKay and Scarf

Yes, bankers. Our brave detectives discover near the end that the villain, Ershon, they’ve been chasing has a sinister relationship with a number of banks who have received bailout funds that are finally showing signs of recovery. And not only has Ershon lost billions of dollars entrusted to him, but it seems that none of the terrible things he’s done are illegal because of a bill passed in 2001 regarding international banking.

Who was president in ‘01? Oh, right. Coincidence? I’ll leave that up to you. THE INHUMANITY!

BUT WAIT…THERE’S MORE. And no, it’s not two Shamwow! for the price of one:

A “strange guy” approaches Detectives Gamble and Hoitz and tells them that Ershon is just a small fish in a big pond. It seems that not only are Ershon and his friends in on the dirty money, but lobbyists will soon descend upon Washington like locusts, making sure that any regulation that could put the brakes on their activities will be stripped out of existence.

LOBBYISTS! HIDE THE CHILDREN! RUN FOR THE HILLS! No, I’m sure they’re not talking about lobbyists for Hollywood, no sirree Bob.

And can you believe it? Derek Jeter, playing Derek Jeter, fits the final piece of the puzzle into place – by telling our heroes that there’s a much bigger fish out there who took billions in TARP funds, won’t give documentation on how he spent the money, and – wait for it – has Blackwater mercenaries protecting his sorry a$$ day in and day out.

I wonder who handles Derek Jeter’s investments? Madonna? Does Will Ferrell keep his millions hidden in a fake soup can in his kitchen cabinet? But more importantly, our eeevil banker has even more eeevil Blackwater security contractors – I mean, mercenaries – protecting his sorry ass. You may not know this, but Blackwater used to have “long ties to the White House and prominent Republicans.” Speaking of Republicans, guess who the Big Villain, Carl Bastion, hangs out with? Get ready for the sucker punch moment:

Dick Cheney.

Yes, Dick Cheney. Detective Gamble then asks his partner to teach him to shoot and fight better. Bwahahaha! Isn’t that funny? Dick Cheney! So not only is Bastion eeevil and has eeevil friends, but eeevil friends who have had hunting “accidents.” Bwahahahaha!

The fact that Cheney is now out of political life and both the White House and Congress are controlled by radical leftist Democrats is irrelevant. Hollywoodists and their liberal pals hate anyone and anything connected to George W. Bush now and forever, and so they must continue to be vilified whenever possible. Besides, why would Hollywoodists risk being the “racists” they call conservatives for daring to mock Obama and his policies? Leave the liberal plantation? Never.

And forget about the fact that films like this get made with lots of money…money that’s not stored under the mattress by the ideologically pure, but invested in and loaned by…BANKS. Heck, bankers are probably a producer’s best friend. But I digress…

I  understand that crooked financiers are a real problem, but they seem an odd choice for bad guy status in what’s supposed to be a comedy. Speaking of dirty money, I wonder when the sequel about crooked Chicago politicians with ties to the mob is coming out. What? That might make the wrong people mad? I see.

Keep in mind that the film is not yet finished. Movie scripts often go through numerous rewrites both before and during production, so the finished product may be somewhat different than the script Big Hollywood received. However, I find it hard to believe that they’d change something as major as – well, how the movie ends. But you never know.

“The Other Guys,” coming soon to a theater near you. Based on what I’ve seen, don’t rush out to see it.

We now have a Sudan Czar. I thought they had their own Czar, but hey, if it helps improve our image in the Arab world I am all for loaning them a Czar or two. We have a Health Czar despite the fact we have a Surgeon General and to be honest I’m not sure who’s in charge of health. You might think a Czar would outrank a general but a number of third-world countries with tons of Generals are run by colonels.

I addition to having a Czar just for Sudan we have an Afghanistan Czar. Isn’t the President afraid that some countries will feel miffed that he didn’t appoint a Czar just for them? I thought we had a whole State Department with Czars called “ambassadors.” We now have a Mideast Peace Czar and a Mideast Policy Czar. At least the Obama administration has a clear understanding that these two things aren’t related.

We have Herb Allison who is the TARP Czar and Earl Devaney the Stimulus Accountability Czar. Apparently Mr. Allison is not a very accountable guy and needs his own Czar to keep him in the straight and narrow. Do they both answer to the Economic Czar?

We have a Weapons Czar and a Weapons of Mass Destruction Czar; I hope that doesn’t lead to weapons envy.

We have a Border Czar, a Terrorism Czar and an Intelligence Czar. What if a terrorist is crossing the border? Who do we call? Come to think of it, why do we even need a terrorist Czar since Janet Napolitano has told us there are no acts of terrorism only “man-created disasters?”

What this country really needs is a Czar Czar — one uber-Czar to keep all the minor Czars from getting out of line. A person who is feared for their hard line principles. A person with a proven record of successfully eliminating government waste and creating economic success. At the same time the Czar Czar should be someone who can understand and relate to the common man and woman.

Yes, I think Sarah Palin would be an excellent Czar Czar. Hopefully, she will be considered for the job in 2012.

God-kings are not new on the stage of human history, nor do they exclusively occupy the dusty corners of the distant past. One need only look to the Japanese worship of Emperor Hirohito during World War II to see that an industrialized, modern country can still vest in its leaders supernatural authority. And there are far more subtle ways of making divinity out of men as well.

The Apostle Paul was warned two-thousand years ago that, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Certainly his intention was to illuminate to the self-righteous that they do not live up to an actual standard of perfection, but perhaps there is more. For as surely as a man might be blind to his own failings, there seems to be some propensity in man to be selectively blind to the failings of others as well. This selective blindness may have many causes and find many expressions.  Some in our society carry cultural guilt and fear of accusations of bigotry that cause them to hold entire social, racial, and religious groups to different standards of judgment than others.  Still, it is the elevation of individuals above common scrutiny that creates idols of men. Whether it is a rock-star or actor, sportsman or elected leader, holding any man above reproach is folly, for in ceding to anyone our power to critique them, we grant them power man was not meant to have.

Now, to some, this double standard of generosity may seem harmless enough.  After all it might be argued that most people are far too judgmental as it is.  However it is no less sinister to apply a positive double-standard than it is a negative one. Both of these biases have the same result on the individual making the unfair judgment – by limiting the individual’s ability to accurately see the humanity of the judged, they falsely color that individual’s understanding of the human condition in general. Just as the thoughtless demonization of any person renders them sub-human to the person making the judgment, and therefore their choices, actions, and motives are no longer subject to the same thoughtful consideration as those of others, Hero-Worship creates a blindness in which it is not necessary to consider the fundamental humanity of the so-called hero, nor is it necessary to emulate their actual virtues or accomplishments. After all, if Hitler is simply the most evil creature to ever live, why question the motives, politics, or persuasions by which his actual, human evil was allowed to thrive? Similarly, if a Martin Luther King, Jr. was simply better than everyone else by design, what point is there in attempting to follow his virtuous lead?

This power that hero-worship imbues in its champions is also a narcotic that dulls the mind of the worshiper, and allows and even promotes abuses by the worshiped.

Clearly, this is the case with the current President of the United States. With so many people seeing President Obama as a super-human, almost religious figure, and placing so many of their hopes on his shoulders, they blind themselves to the reality of the man, both his better qualities as well as his more troubling ones. Any accusation of wrong-doing or hubris is instantly and angrily rejected by the faithful as an attack on a man who is simply above petty criticism. He can do no wrong, and further, no one else can do the good that he might. He is, as Evan Thomas so aptly and honestly put it, “standing above the country, above the world, he’s sort of a God.” There is nothing more dangerous than this kind of isolation of a man from the restraining power of common criticism, especially one who by his office already has so much power over so many and so much. After all, if criticism is suppressed and virtues are seen as intrinsic and not attained or attainable, an elected leader doesn’t actually answer to the will of the people at all, rather, the people exist to validate his will.

For man to truly be free, he must reject elevating any human to super-human stations, reserving such worship exclusively for the truly divine. Christ may be perfect, but President Obama is only a man. A compelling case can be made that George Washington was one of the best men who has ever lived. The Indispensable Man, he twice surrendered his sword, and almost absolute power, to the new country he had bled to create when frankly most people would have preferred he kept it. But this same great man had great failings, not least of which were his somewhat nuanced views on human slavery.

If even a man with the moral fortitude of Washington did not escape the human condition, then what man could? I can say without shame that there is no public figure alive who I hold in higher esteem than I hold George W. Bush. I realize the cultural-correctness barons who have demonized him for the last eight years will recoil at the fact, but I would rather have some BBQ or sit on a fishing boat with 43 than meet a Beatle. He was true to his convictions, and he exuded a grace and good-will to his enemies even when beset on all sides by a recklessly hostile, slandering, hate-filled media and opposition.  President Bush is as close as I have to a hero. But I am not fooled by my affection into believing he was superior to his mold. Despite the public claims of exuding calm, I have little doubt what was going through the president’s mind during those excruciating seven minutes in the school-house in Florida in 2001. Fear. We’re being attacked? Confusion. If we’re being attacked, why aren’t they pulling me out of here? Uncertainty. Am I supposed to be doing something or did I misunderstand? The sort of very human things any of us might have felt in that sort of situation. Would I have preferred that he sprung to his feet, strode to his jet, and took command of the war we did not yet know we were in? Sure. I would rather he hadn’t passed TARP, articulated conservative principles like Reagan, and defended himself against his hate-drunk critics too, but I don’t look for God-like perfection in human beings. Even Presidents. Especially Presidents. I have an actual God for that, so my admiration for Mr. Bush can survive exposure to his actual humanity expressly because it isn’t built on the false premise that he has none. It is respect, not worship, and it is a deep respect.

Because in application, worship is all a man requires to reign as a God. Hold one man to a more generous standard, bind him by a less restrictive set of rules than you do other men, and you give to him transcendent powers no matter what secular name you might call him by. If you make that man-God the leader of a country, then he is a God-King as surely as any who has gone before, and making a God-King of a man only makes slaves of the rest, no matter how he uses his authority or for what. This is what the idea of separation of Church and State was actually meant to protect us from, un-checked executives consolidating personal-religious powers. Let us direct our prayers elsewhere that we might have eyes to see this man as man.

For context, see BlogDeVore.

I decided to stick to direct quotes from the President within the last 18 months. Some I have commented on, the others, as they say at Harvard Law, res ipsa loquitur.    

1)  ”…not because I believe in bigger government — I don’t — not because I’m not mindful of the massive debt we’ve inherited — I am.”   Speech to Congress, February 24, 2009

2) “And that is why I have ordered the closing of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay and will seek swift and certain justice for captured terrorists…” Speech to Congress, February 24, 2009

3) “My administration has also begun to go line by line through the federal budget in order to eliminate wasteful and ineffective programs.” I wonder if the President knows he doesn’t have a line item veto.  

4)  “My immediate task is making sure that the second half of that money, $350 billion, is spent properly. That’s my first job.”  Press conference February 9, 2009, talking about TARP money.

5)  ”It also contains an unprecedented level of transparency and accountability, so that every American will be able to go online and see where and how we’re spending every dime. What it does not contain, however, is a single pet project, not a single earmark, and it has been stripped of the projects members of both parties found most objectionable.” Press conference February 9, 2009  talking about his own economic bill.

6)  “Second is recognition of the limits of the judicial role, an understanding that a judge’s job is to interpret, not make law, to approach decisions without any particular ideology or agenda, but rather a commitment to impartial justice…” I thought about putting this first because he was introducing Sotomayor who is on tape saying judges make policy, among other things.

7) “It’s not just enough to change the players. We’ve gotta change the game.” He has appointed over 150 recycled Clintionistas

8) ”I opposed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. It should be repealed and I will vote for its repeal on the Senate floor. I will also oppose any proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban gays and lesbians from marrying.”  Either this is a lie or his later position where he opposes gay marriage, take your pick for number eight.

9) “I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community.” In reference to Rev. Wright 42 days before he disowned him.

10) “To those Americans whose support I have yet to earn: I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President, too.”

Awhile back I wrote an essay about how the policies of the new administration and comments of leading Democrats had negatively impacted my business. Since my personal economic downturn was directly due to the government I thought I might be able to scam, I’m sorry, receive some TARP money from Uncle Sugar. Twice I wrote to one of my senators, Sherrod Brown (D-OH) requesting a modest bailout. I explain how just a few hundred grand would put me on solid footing and allow me to help stimulate the economy by buying a new pick-up truck and a big screen TV.

Senator Brown ignored my first letter and sent me a form e-mail reply to the second. I may try again but thus far no Tarp money for me. So I am still picking up empty cans, striping copper wire out of abandoned houses, and standing on the corner with my “ I’m like Obama, I just want change!” sign to help make ends meets. I look in the want ads and sometimes I go out and apply for a job as a painter or drywall hanger just to practice my Spanish and see what other jobs are being taken from Americans under the guise that illegals only do jobs Americans don’t want. Does anyone in Washington realize that if we got serious and stopped illegal immigrants from taking jobs from working class Americans our unemployment rate would be zero? Hey, maybe that would stimulate the economy for less than ten gazillion dollars. But I digress.

Today I was watching the news from the G-20 summit which, for awhile, I thought was a new drink from Gatorade, and heard Obama had bought another gaffe gift. He gave the Queen of England an iPod! An iPod? As an Apple stock holder I am happy to get the free plug but an iPod is something you get your son or daughter for their twelfth birthday. I know Mr. Obama has had only limited experience with foreign countries but surely someone on his staff is aware they have electronics stores in London. Seems the Queen already has an iPod but since she is the Queen and has some class she didn’t toss in down on a chair and say in that sarcastic British way, “Another iPod, brilliant!”

This comes on the heels of Barack giving British PM Gordy Brown a stack of DVDs that weren’t the proper format to be played in England. Once again, where is his staff? Didn’t any of them do a year abroad or backpack through Europe in college? These gifts seemed like stuff someone gave him so I suspect Barack may be a re-gifter! It occurs to me that maybe the President needs a personal gift shopper. I know that isn’t a real government position but my wife has always said that the way to get your dream job is to think of something you’d love to do and then go find someone who needs that done! My only previous attempt at this method resulted in a restraining order from Ms. Aniston, but I think I may be on to something here.

Imagine how cool Obama would have looked had he handed the Queen a first edition by Paul Dunbar or W.E.B. Dubois. If he wanted to stay high- tech he could have loaded a Kindle with the works of Maya Angelou and James Baldwin. He is our first African-American President, (in case you hadn’t heard) and a huge Lincoln fan, so maybe his gifts should show a little personality of his own. Here’s an idea, how about handing PM Brown a pen that Lincoln used or a framed Lincoln signature. He’s the British Prime Minister for gosh sake, it’s not like he’ll put it on Ebay.

Mr. Obama, that is my gift, a couple of free ideas, I’ll be happy to do all of your gift shopping but I need a deal. Have a word with Senator Brown and Timmy Geithner, see what you have left in the slush fund and get back to me.

I’ve been out at sea on a working cruise all week and get limited television in my cabin. Two of my five choices are CNN and Fox News so I get my fill of every news cycle, but never more than during this past week when every other talking head on Fox and every single one on CNN was some important Democrat repeating the Obama line of the week: “We have to do something!” Usually this is followed by one of the following sub-talking points:

1) It’s for the children.
2) Irreversible damage will be done to our economy!
3) The world as we know it will end!
4) It’s all Bush’s fault!

I would like to point out to my progressive friends that we already have done something. On his way out the door, The Greatest Democrat President Ever, threw somewhere between 7 and 8 hundred billion dollars down a huge rat hole known as the banking industry. Remember TARP? We had to get that done quickly too. Remember how the world was going to end and if we didn’t do something before such and such a day the damage would be too great and America would have to sell off Montana to the Chinese? John McCain even stopped his campaign for the presidency, which is like saying Elton John came out of the closet: who noticed? Then, right in the middle of the crisis, Congress took a five day break for a Jewish holiday. With no disrespect to my Jewish friends – but if our way of life was at stake the holiday could have waited.

So here we stand on the edge of the same cliff we were standing on in October, and the lemmings, joined by two RINOs from Maine, are ready to flush another trillion or so down the same rat hole with a few billion for roads and bridges and a couple hundred million for a new lawn somewhere in D.C. I didn’t know we had that many road and bridge builders out of work. Every interstate I drive down is lined with orange barrels, and though I see a lot of guys standing around not many seem to be working. Maybe they’re just standing at the ready waiting for the word the money has come in. Maybe the morons in Congress think that a lot of the Wall Street types who lost their gigs are just dying to go out and buy a pair of Dickies coveralls and get into the road building business. Maybe there are a few billion buried in the new bailout bill to retrain all the Ivy Leaguers in the use of a spade and pickaxe.

On the other hand, Wells Fargo has been taken to the woodshed by the media and by Congress for going ahead with their annual rewards trips for their workers. “Shameful!” scream the news readers and talking heads! Really? What about the folks who make a living planning corporate events? What about the caterers, waiters, cooks, truck drivers, hotels workers, stage hands and entertainers? Maybe they’re supposed to go out and join the Ivy Leaguers in shovel-training class.

The problem with bailouts and heroin is exactly the same; they feel good but once you start it’s hard to stop. If AIG, Bank of America, General Motors and a hundred other companies went belly up I know that would be painful but this is the system we believe in. Dinosaurs die and the little tiny creatures get stronger and take over.

What a shame the folks who are running things now weren’t around to bailout United Buggy Whip and Amalgamated Starched Collars at the beginning of the last century.