Posting opinions, letters and correspondence from far and wide. Even some to/from my elected representatives.

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

A letter to my Congressman

Dear Congressman Shays,

I received your email this morning regarding the failure of HR 3997. Please find my response below.

The sky is not falling and the "greed of Wall St" is not nearly as systemic nor as widespread as the corruption in Congress has been over the last eight years (eight years that I've witnessed as an immigrant, now proud US citizen). Henry Paulson himself has been predicting calamity. Our President has been chiming in with predictions of dire straits. Nancy Pelosi appears next to Barney Frank and the world as we know it is about to end - apparently. But it won't end, not today, not tomorrow, not even six months from now - if only Congress and the President would allow the free market economy to make the adjustment that it needs to. People are not going to starve because they can't buy a flat screen TV, instead American consumers may actually end up paying off some of their credit card debt. Yes, people will be hurting. Yes, the middle class is in for austere times. No, they are not going to have problems getting their pay check.

But they will if our Government continues to predict doom and gloom. I would suggest that quite a bit of the downward trend in the markets is caused by our elected representatives constant, loud and shrill - doom and gloom. And the people will be hurting even more if a fiscally irresponsible "bail out" gets enacted as law.

You say it was unfortunate that the bill failed to pass the house. There are millions of us that are happy, if not overjoyed that it failed to pass. You say it will be introduced again. I would suggest that millions will make sure that bill doesn't get passed either. You say you are determined to be part of the solution. I say you are making the problem worse with all of this spreading of fear, uncertainty and doubt. You and your brothers in Congress should be ashamed of your shoddy and shabby handling of our economy. And, you are making it worse by proposing tax and spend policies that will hurt the very citizens you are all pretending to help.

You blame Wall St tycoons who have no ability to write or pass laws. How dare you blame them when this mess was created by over regulation and interference with the real estate market place. It is people like Barney Frank that should be asked to resign without pay. People like Chuck Schumer. People you work with. Christopher Dodd as well. Using "Wall St" as a punching back makes for nice political boilerplate but the large constituency of voters are neither naive nor ignorant of the canard that it really is. You mentioned "letting the market do it's wonders" and you're right about that. Let it do its wonders. Our recession will be shorter and less painful if you and your partners in mismanagement in Congress let it work.

The Federal Government does have tools at its disposal that are constitutional and worth doing. You and the Republican party should be advocating the following:

Reduce the capital gains tax (don't give me the "there is no capital gains to tax nonsense").
Move forward with a program of tax reductions for all American tax payers. Reducing taxes will save thousands if not more of hard working Americans from facing foreclosure. It will also help small businesses that are not able to access tighter credit by reducing the cost of doing business.
Provide short term money to stabilise monetary policy. Amazingly, that is exactly what the fed's have been doing and, remarkably, it is helping.
Move forward with fiscal policy reforms. Uh, shut down wasteful Government programs and fast.
Repeal Sarbanes Oxley. This ridiculous regulation helps no one but costs billions.
Wind down Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac within ten years. They are both corrupt, were corrupt and always will be corruptible.

Those are the reforms needed to make real progress to correct the errors of the past. Errors that primarily were caused by certain members of Congress who refused to listen to reliable expert witnesses. Now is the time to show the leadership that will also put you in good stead to get yourself re-elected. The electorate understands the engine and mathematics of our economy and the electorate understands that Congress is currently attempting to avoid the blame and are proposing laws that will only make matters worse. Your email provides proof that you would rather harm our economy rather than take the more difficult path of minimising Government involvement in our economy. Big Government will fail us and it will fail you too.

I urge you to consider alternative fiscally and economically responsible remedies and reconsider your position on this very serious matter.

Best regards,

Mike Hawkins

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