What Change?

Why is it that we forget so easily the hard lessons we learned so recently?

Our government officials ran campaigns based on enacting change. They pushed that the administration and conservatives in congress had caused all of our current problems and if they were elected they would bring change to Washington.

Where is that change now?

In early 2000 there was a big push to get more people into homes. Several members of congress (most of which got re-elected) wanted more people to be able to achieve the American dream and so they pushed for lenders to do whatever it took to get people into their homes. The way many lenders were able to finance these loans was based on the assumption that the borrowers would be able to refinance before payments got too large thereby dropping the principle and the payment (theoretically).

Yeah, how did that work out for us?

Now we are back at it. Yesterday Obama announced his housing plan. Basically they are setting it up so that lenders can do what it takes (short term) to get people caught up again and able to make their payments (short term) under the hope that home prices will go up. By the way, it's also interesting to just do some basic math on the numbers he touted in that press conference, I am not a math wiz (ie, I struggled in remedial math for monkeys), but even I could figure out how those numbers don't add up.

Any guesses on how this new plan is likely to work out for us long term?

Personally I think the government walks the line of creating moral hazard with anything they do. Later I'll post my thoughts on the health care industry, but that industry is the prime example of moral hazard. Basically anything that the government does which removes individuals from the basic formula of action = full consequence (good or bad) is a moral hazard. In other words, when the government steps in because they want people to be able to own a home and they make lending easier and payments smaller (short term) than they otherwise would be, it encourages individuals to sign on to purchase something that is out of their ability to pay long-term. Normally the consequence of not making those payments is they lose the home and their credit is destroyed. Now the government wants to step in again and delay that consequence for many (it will help some who are just a little behind and who, if given a little bit, would be able to get back on track). Why do we think that this is change? It seems to me to be more of the same old.

Since when has the government become responsible for removing difficult consequences from individuals? How does it decide which consequences will be removed and which ones won't? If it removes the consequence for one individual, how does that affect others?

These seem to be questions that many of our current representatives don't ask themselves. It seems that many current elected officials want to force everyone to live the middle class dream whether they were poor or upper class and deserving or not.

For this reason, I am hereby starting my campaign.

I am going to begin campaigning as it gets closer to election time to remove everyone but the few true representatives who are in office (I personally think Senator Burr here in NC has done a great job). If we can get rid of everyone who is currently in there and elect people who will actually represent what we the people want and what we value, then I believe we really will see some change.