George F. Will: Bailout is your fault, too

Rod,

The problems that have brought us to this point should drive home what true conservatives believe. For years now we have been told that you can have it all. No one should tell you how to live, no one should deny you anything. We have been told it is our birthright to own a home.

While owning a home is a desirable thing, buying and owning a home require a little thing called responsibility. Sadly, during the housing boom that word was sorely missed. The combination of easy money and extremely lax lending standards created a culture where responsibilty was a mere afterthought. I know, I was in the wholesale business and the things that I saw and in a way participated in, now give me more than a pause when I consider things. That being said, it was not the lenders responsibility to pay the loan back. But, it was the lender's responsibility to make ajudgement call on some of these loans and products that were offered. The lenders did not, they thought that by bundling these loans together and selling them as Mortgage Backed Securities, would disperse the risk.

I think the lesson here is that no one can escape responsibility for their actions. Not the borrower who buys a house without proving his income or reserves betting that either they will make more money and their home will appreciate in value. Certainly not the lender or the Wall Street investment banks who thought they could disperse their irresponsible loans around the world. Responsibility is a big hairy B***H and she will get you.

This bailout is nothing short of Wall Street trying to escape responsibilty. Make no mistake, whether this plan is couched as a bailout or rescue, this is an effort to escape responsibilty and the consequences. The proponents say, there is no time to play the moral hazard game, people are losing money on their 401K's, payrolls will not be met, car dealerships will close up, etc, etc. My answer is, "I'm sorry, but too bad.". Do we abandon our standards and values because by standing by those principles, we may lose money? If that is the case then I suggest that you never held those convictions in the first place. It sounded nice. In reality, if you leave your 401K alone it will grow back, the stock market has made money in 100% of every 10 year period of its existence, meaning in the long haul you will make money.

When I hear the proponents make these assertions, I keep hearing in my head the classic by Ted Nugent, " Stranglehold".

Lee Penn @ 4 PM writes:

"But step back and look at the economic circumstances of the lower 75% of the population.

1. It was possible, before the 1960s, to support a family at a middle class standard of living with one wage earner. No longer."

That's not entirely accurate. It depends on what you refer to as "a middle class standard of living". The average house of 2008 is much, much larger than an average house was in 1950, yet there wasn't that much in the way of complaints then about how cramped they were.

"2. Taxes - after the "cuts" - are far above what they were 40-50 years ago. Start with Social Security tax, Medicare tax, property taxes, etc. and go from there."

You put your finger on a large part of the problem here. Virtually ALL of the increase in these taxes has gone for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. In no small part, the modern worker works to pay for the unearned medical care and 25 years of subsidized leisure for his neighbor's parents, who he doesn't even know and whose flow of funds he cannot trace.

Think of it: thanks to withholding of taxes, the increase in said taxes, and the way the "trust funds" are administered, the average worker literally doesn't know what he's doing half the time. (This is called "Absurdist Comedy At Its Very Best".)

"3. After-tax wages for the lower 75% of the population have been stagnant, after inflation, since the mid-1970s. This was a marked change from steady growth after World War II ... and we have never returned to the 1945-1973 growth path."

Thank Teddy Kennedy and his Wonderful Gang of Happy Monkeys (Class of 1965) for the Immigration Reform Act that opened the borders to lots and lots of unskilled Mexican and other workers. Also thank them for OSHA, the Americans With Disabilities Act and all the other laws that were supposed to ring in an era of "social justice" and "civil rights".

"4. Necessary costs: housing, energy, medical care, and education, are far above their levels of 30-50 years ago. Necessary costs ... not luxuries!"

Housing costs have gone up thanks to the preferred tax treatment called the Mortgage Interest Deduction, as well as the property-tax method of financing schools.

Medical care: thank the central government for its takeover of the health care system, beginning in 1943.

Education: thank the Kennedys and their political allies for nice things like the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (which effectively nationalized the education system) and all its myriad mandates. Also thank all those politicians who decided that absolutely EVERYONE had to go to college, and therefore decided to flood the system with all that student-aid money.

Energy: All those rules that prevented building nuclear power plants and offshore drilling HAD to be good for something. Thanks, Greenie-Weenie Whack Jobs !

"5. Compare the debt load of young graduates today to the load that faced their peers in 1958 or 1968."

That's Your Federal Government At Work. Flood the "higher-education" system with money, tell all and sundry that the only way to be is spelled "B.A.", add expensive sports facilities and Financial Aid For Virtually Everyone and watch those tuitions and student-loan debt-levels rise.

If it weren't real, and a real problem, I'd be sitting back and laughing my head off at the flaming absurdity of it all. As it is, it's all I can do to keep a straight face.

Your servant,

Lord Karth

ditto DavidTC on health care market being 'bonded' (ie opposite of free) by the insurers.