The End of Unlimited Greed as Policy and Values

What the financial disaster in our country, and then world-wide has shown us is the cost of unlimited greed, and the political support for it.

It isn’t complicated, not really. For years, since the deregulation of banks, oil companies, natural resource harvesting companies, and our political process of supporting the companies and individuals who benefitted from deregulation at all costs, these people have gotten unbelievably wealthy in financial terms. They have garnered the most money they can possibly accumulate, and called it ‘free markets’.

Well, we’re finding out the hard way how ‘un-free’ these markets truly are.

We’ve banked incredible numbers of billions, into the trillions of dollars, on people being able to pay for mortgage loans that everyone knew they never could pay once the balloon adjustments happened. Bankers got wealthy, derivative traders got wealthy, and our financial institutions told us that this is the way to do business.

Now, we are seeing the fruits of our refusal to use common sense in our financial dealings within our country, and around the world.

Of course, there is enough blame to go around, everywhere. We all got caught up in it. But the truth is, that our wealth doesn’t lie in Wall Street, or in Washington, or even in stocks, bonds, derivatives, or bank notes.

Our wealth lies between us. Heart to heart, soul to soul, person to person.

"We" are our wealth, not Wall Street nor Washington.

The end of unlimited greed is now here. It is not a value that holds people, or communities, or families, or even nations in esteem. Greed kills all that it touches by its nature. That’s what’s happening now. We banked on greed, with no regulations on any business venture, and it’s going to cost us dearly to turn this around.

But on the other hand, Mr. Bush and his pals are making out like bandits. So are all the folks who’ve known about the rise and fall of gas prices ahead of time, who’ve been on the money side of this King and his court, and those who’re about to benefit from the billions of bail-out dollars being handed out by Mr. Bush’s hand-picked pal.

Make no mistake about it, those folks will be taken care of by Mr. Bush before he leaves office. That’s what this bail-out is about, in truth. That’s why it was suddenly a major ‘crisis’, that had to be resolved right before the election, right now, by the end of that week, or the whole world would collapse, and once the bottom fell out of the markets, markets that were based on a foundation of thin air, this ‘crisis’ happened regardless of Mr. Bush’s claims otherwise.

This is what Mr. Bush, and all petty tyrants have always done. Declare a crisis, put an immediate time-table on it, and rush a law through Congress allowing himself to declare who will benefit from the borrowed tax money. This has happened all throughout history, once a tyrant gets a hold of a democratic government and shakes the life out of it.

Mr. Bush has lived and died in his actions based in greed. We all know it, we’ve all known it all along. It’s been called other things like ’supporting business’, or ‘global commerce’, but it simply has been greed, feeding his pals’ greed with no-look contracts, feeding his pals’ oil profits, feeding his own administration’s greed for power, destroying and literally looting our country, our treasury, looting our children’s children’s futures with his unlimited greed.

Greed, however, can only go on as long as the people sit back and do nothing about it. Many have tried over the last eight years to speak up, but the machine was too strong. Now, however, it’s over.

With Grace and Providence, perhaps Mr. Obama will be able to stop this horrible policy of greed, turn it around in Washington, and allow a business climate to grow that truly serves us as a people. Heart to heart, soul to soul, person to person. Businesses that empower the nation’s people to serve each other, not just serving those in power, as Mr. Bush has done.

I’m so thankful for the end of greed to come. May we all look to our neighbors, friends, families and communities, and find ways to be of service to each other. And may Mr. Obama see a clear path ahead toward a truly ‘free market’, one that allows for us all to be free, not slaves to unlimited greed.

Our Challenge with Bush’s Crimes: The Power of Accountability Coupled with Forgiveness

There needs to be an accounting for the crimes committed by George Bush, Dick Cheney, and the rest of their gang.

Appointing a Special Prosecutor to investigate these crimes, and to bring these people to justice, is #6 on the list of priorities that folks polled by the Obama Transition Team have declared is important to them.

Congress knuckled under to Bush’s bullying, corruption, and scare tactics. They didn’t hold our integrity as a nation strongly, as they are called to do. So Bush, as all despots will do, ran wild with his unbridled power. Two wars, billions in lost revenues, millions of dead, thousands of Americans dead, billions lost now to his bail-out buddies who stayed loyal to him in the business world, and who knows what else, are the legacy that Bush leaves us as a people.

We have lost a thriving economy. We have lost our future financial security, dumped into Bush’s oil fields and his pals’ pockets. We have lost our ability to look into the future and see where our children’s lives may lead, due to the insanity of his horrible domestic and foreign policies. We have lost our standing in the world as a democratic, fair-minded nation who is willing to help others in need. Instead, we are an indebted nation, with a failed economy based on millions of assets that were loans to people who could never afford the predatory mortgage increases they agreed to. And we are a feared country, a country that other nations do not respect.

In so many ways, Bush has trashed and looted our country, and is still doing so at the end of his reign of terror. 

He deserves to be held accountable for his crimes. Just like any other American would be.

It was so moving, and saddening, and uplifting to see the photos from around the world of ordinary people crying, laughing and celebrating at Barack Obama’s victory speech Election Evening. So many millions seeing the potential of a nation based in liberty, where all people are created equal, and everyone is endowed by her or his Creator with unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Our pursuit as a nation of those tenets led us to Obama’s victory. And now, to the hard work ahead.

As we move to investigate the illegalities of Bush’s crimes against our country and against the world, we have to at the same time hold forgiveness in our hearts for him. Not to let him escape his accountability, because it is his due. But to make sure that we don’t slide into the morass of fear-based and hatred-based politics that he has led us in these past eight years.

His will go down as the worst presidency in our history. The most destructive of our rights, the most disgusting in the depth and breadth of corruption, and the worst in terms of the spirit of who we are as Americans toward each other, and out to the world. We have years of work ahead of us to repair Bush’s damage, and with President Obama leading that repair, I believe that we will do so, in a spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation, of goodwill and welcoming of those different than us, rather than hatred.

It is a challenging skill to both hold someone accountable, and forgive them at the same time. It doesn’t lessen their ability or need to make restitution and to pay for their crimes, and Bush has a mountain of criminal and immoral behavior to account for. What it does to forgive and hold him accountable is to continue a tradition that has been lost here in America under Bush’s horrendous regime: To trust justice to win out, in the end.

It is Bush’s end now. May justice prevail.