Bush seems intent on defrauding America

Earlier this week, Bush, through his Treasury Secretary Henry J. Paulson, Jr., and the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, put forth a $700 billion bailout for investors and C.E.O.s o financial industry firms, so far unidentified.

Let’s see what Bush is proposing: Congress “needs” to authorize a staggering $700 billion that will be handed over to Paulson and do that while signing away any authority to question or review anything whatsoever (that’s called oversight) that Paulson decides to do with that money.

Bush’s proposal, as written, also would prevent any court in the land, including the U. S. Supreme Court, from hearing any challenge to Paulson’s decisions.

Bush’s plan is the stuff of dictators.

Apparently, the plan is to turn most of the money over the the Federal Reserve, which then would draw up any ground rules for qualifying for a bailout.

On its face, such a plan is illegal because its a violation of the 1913 charter of the Federal Reserve, which restricts the Fed to regulating only commercial banks, not investment banks (such as Lehman Brothers, Merrill-Lynch and the like), hedge funds, mutual funds, stock brokers, mortgage lenders, stock exchanges or insurance giants.

Beyond the illegality of Bush’s plan, it’s sickening that it’s even proposed at all.

I expect the president of the United States to, first and foremost, protect the people of the country.

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America,” reads the entire preamble to the Constitution.

It’s one sentence that, as President Abraham Lincoln so eloquently stated, spoke of our nation as being “of the people, by the people and for the people.”

It is the people, the body politic, who matter in this country, not financial speculators in home lending.

How could Bush and his crowd have gone so far off the rails? Why aren’t Bush and his people leading the way to protect the people’s interests, rather than Wall Street’s interests?

Think of it, $700 billion––that’s nearly three-quarters of a trillion dollars. That’s more than the country spent on World War Two, the Korean War and Vietnam War combined.

Why, $700 billion would all but pay off the mortgages of everyone being threatened with foreclosure in America.

If that were to happen, the home-lending crisis would be solved with the stroke of a pen.

Such a move would “establish justice, insure domestic tranquility” and “promote the general welfare” of  people. 

The speculators and money lenders and perpetrators of fraud would be left to fend for themselves. They could wallow in their own fouled nests. (Bush and his cronies could join them for all I care.)

It’s no wonder that Bush will be remembered for all time as the worst of the worst presidents of the first 43 to sit in the office.

The obvious fact is that George W. Bush (the lesser) has larceny in his heart. He’s a crook who surrounds himself with crooks and they’re perpetuating a fraud on America.

Yes, George W. Bush (the lesser) must truly be not only an unpleasant man, but also a despicable example of the worst kind of human being America could send to high office. 

Yes, for ol’ fun-loving George and his band of thieves, this is an example of laughing all the way to the bank––with someone else’s money.

© Copyright 2008 by P. A. Triot, which is a pen name for a retired journalist. Reproduce and distribute at will, with proper attribution.