In 1985, when I was low man on the totem pole at the Post, I was sent to Seabrook to interview a man who had finally (and belatedly) received a Silver Star from the US Army for his courage at Normandy on D-Day.  The gentleman was in poor health, and had a nurse caring for him, but his mind was as sharp as ever. He recounted to me what had happened that morning in June of 1944:

“By the time we got past the beach, there were only six of us in a group. We kept tossing grenades and climbing, finally getting past the cliffs. We found ourselves in some farmland, divided by ditches. About 100 yards ahead, to our right, was a bunker with a machine gun in it. We knew that bunker had to be taken out.  When some artillery created a momentary diversion, we charged out of the ditch – but at the same time some Germans appeared at our left and opened fire, and some more directly ahead. Suddenly we were surrounded, and out in the open. I saw the corporal in front of me get hit. I grabbed him and started dragging him back to the ditch we had just come out of, but some more Germans had come in there right behind us. There was nowhere for us to go!”

“Wow, what did you do?” I asked. I will never forget what happened next:

His face became strained, and he seemed very uncomfortable. He looked down, and a low-sounding moan came from him. It was an emotional moment, so I kept quiet. Finally, after several minutes, he composed himself and looked up. “I actually shit in my pants.”

“Sir, I can understand how in the middle of a battle, and being shot at, anyone might lose control. It’s nothing to be ashamed of…”

“No, no” he interrupted, “Just now. I’ve just shit in my pants. Call the nurse.”

Yes, the old fellow had dropped a load. I didn’t mention that in my story, but I have never forgotten it.

I guess it proves that veterans are regular people too, even the heroes.

These cards were made by a company called Miller Press in the 80s and 90s, and later by the Superior Card Company.

I like the way they look, and the small printings mean they’re already very rare. But rather than talk about how cool they are, I’m just going to upload some scans. Click to see larger pictures.

Back when Gibson was still a Harlem Globetrotter

George Blanda. Houston later fired him for being too old, and he went on to play 10 more great years for the Oakland Raiders.

According to this card, Durocher wrote hot checks all over St. Paul, then skipped town!

With rookies like these, the Cubbies still couldn't win a pennant.

The dumbest player in history.

Lou Brissie, war hero and pitcher

the Sultan of Swat, circa 1927

the midget ballplayer, Eddie Gaedel

Ray Chapman, only major league player ever killed by a beanball

Card says Mickey Mantle "smokes, drinks, and stays out after curfew..."

George Halas, later a Chicago Bear and NFL Hall Of Famer - started off in baseball with the Yankees

The Tribe paid Satchel $4,500 in 1948. His World Series share was more.

a pre-rookie card of Johnny Bench in Buffalo.

Cochise, the great warrior chief of the Apache

I’ll post some more later, but you get the idea. Are these not the best cards you have ever seen? They are to f**king die for.

Google “Miller Press Baseball Cards” to find people selling them.

PAYDAY BLUES: A rookie player, Charles Lockhart, who had been cut by the team, pulled a pistol on GM Don Klosterman and demanded his pay for the rest of the month. A bystander wrestled the gun from him, but Klosterman paid the player..

TRADED: The team traded a quarterback for….  himself, AND a first round draft pick. Yep, they sent Jacky Lee to Denver for a 1st round pick, and himself after 2 years of “seasoning” in Denver. This has gotta be the strangest trade ever made in pro football.

JUST PLAIN WEIRD: Oilers Head Coach Jerry Glanville used to leave tickets for dead celebrities such as Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, and Rocky Marciano.

TURNOVERS: The Oilers’ first Coach, Lou Rymkus, won the championship. Therefore he was fired. This set the tone for Bud Adams ownership of the team. Coaches would change often. Head Coach Pop Ivy came to work one day, and his secretary handed him his desk drawer. Bud Adams became the “Henry the Eighth of team owners” until he met Bum Phillips. Phillips was an itinerant high school coach who fell into the job and tenaciously held on for years.

THE FICKLE FINGER: In one of Don Meredith’s early TV broadcasts, the Oakland Raiders were beating Houston  34-0 in the 3rd quarter. The fans left in droves. As the TV camera panned the empty stands, they focused on a solitary figure, who saluted a national TV audience with his middle finger. After a pause, Meredith explained: “He’s telling us his team is still #1″.

LOST HALL-OF-FAMERS: The Oilers traded their rights to draft Joe Namath for Jerry Rhome. Who? They could have had  tight end Mike Ditka, but opted for Willard Dewveall instead. They cut future Oakland cornerback Willie Brown. Steve Largent (all-time leading NFL receiver) was waived. They traded Charlie Joiner to the Bengals for no one important. The swapped Ken Houston to the Skins for no one who made a difference. They even got rid of George Blanda, because he was too old. He played great for 9 more years. All of those players are now in the Pro Football Hall Of Fame.

FIGHTS: Owner Bud Adams got into a brawling fistfight with a Houston Post reporter who made fun of his outlandish cowboy outfit at a league meeting. (“Don’t you feel self-conscious showing up for a league business meeting dressed up like a homosexual rodeo clown?” was the likely ignition point.) Management followed up when GM Ladd Herzeg clocked Houston Chronic Reporter Fran Blinebury. Even the players got in on the fisticuffs, with QB Dan Pastorini roughing up a Post reporter on local TV. Herzeg also was arrested for “mooning” a wedding and punching the best man; and lost an unrelated paternity suit.

MOST SACKED QB: Oilers QB Dan Pastorini set records which still stand in each of his first three years. No quarterback was ever sacked more often. The entire offensive line was replaced each of those years. Dan’s ribs were broken a minimum of six times. A special “flak jacket” was constructed for him. He is lucky to be alive today.

THE BEST THING: The best news about the Oilers departure to Tennessee was that Houston sports fans no longer had to have their football hopes funneled through the miserly checkbook of the notoriously greedy Bud Adams. The desire in Houston was for a professional football team, something the Oilers provided only sporadically. The Texans are doing a much better job.

HOWEVER, I STILL MISS THE OILERS: Because there has never been a team with more pure entertainment value and drama going on, even during the off-season.

Sometimes the alcohol might make them friendly, but other times they could sprout horns and turn into devils. There is no way to tell what the booze is going to do.

Trying to “control” a drinking woman is like trying to control an anthill. Once they reach a certain level of inebriation, your life, freedom, and safety may be at risk. When you hook up with an intoxicated person who you don’t know well, be aware of the signs and risks. You have to know AHEAD OF TIME when to cut them off. It’s a science.

The angry stage, aka Almost Sober

Assuming you start buying drinks when they are at the angry stage as shown above, you may or may not see any or all of the following:

"I Feel Dizzy" stage - which according to Quagmire is actually an invitation to get in bed, right?

Crackhouse Detour - In which she says she can go home with you, but first she has to stop by and pay her babysitter a few extra bucks (if you can help out). The babysitter lives in a shitty part of town and is named something like Little Jaymo.

Classic passout, which Quagmire also considers an invitation to the nether regions...

Zombie Mode - they seem conscious, but they're having a blackout, and will remember none of the things they did the next day. Quagmire once again concurs.

And of course the oldest “trick” in the book:

The "I'm Actually A Hooker" Scenario - happens more often than you'd think. She says something like "I'm actually a hooker, and it's going to cost you $50 to get some of this!" What to do? Shut up and pay her. Later, when she needs a ride home, charge her $60. Tell her "I'm Actually A Cab Driver!"

So, go ahead and buy that round of drinks. Just remember that I tried to warn you.

Jamen, Kadie, and Craig with one of several 40+ inch redfish they caught yesterday

3 were caught yesterday afternoon  by some folks next to where we had camped. When I say “we”, I do not have a mouse in my pocket – I refer to the Queen Bitch Of The Word and Lucifer, the Prince of Dogness.

How to get there: Take the ferry from Galveston and go 29 miles until the road curves. Don’t curve – go straight. You are now on the “Lost Highway” – Texas route 87 – abandoned in 1983 after Hurricane Alicia. Theoretically, the Lost Highway goes 30 miles to Sabine Pass, and then you can cross into Louisiana just above Holly Beach. But the last time anybody made it the whole way was 2003 in a 4wd Ford Bronco – it took the guy 8 hours. He brought sheets of plywood to drive on, and had to use them a lot.

I used to drive Route 87 when I was a teenager in West Orange – it was the beach road, We’d cross the ominously steep and narrow “Rainbow Bridge” at Port Arthur, then head south on 87 to High Island. These days it’s a great place to camp.

The first mile or so is mostly fishermen and campers. Once you get out about 2-3 miles, there are more topless sunbathers, gay blades, and beach voyeurs with binoculars making everything somewhat creepy.

However, I have never seen it crowded, since it is so far away from everything. Since Hurricane Ike, it’s virtually deserted down here.

In 2001, there was a huge problem in America’s greatest city. After having emerged from bankruptcy, New York City was faced with a multi-billion dollar crisis. This crisis revolved around real estate in the center of Manhattan Island, the World Trade Center complex.
Owned by the Port Authority, the Trade Center was losing tons of money. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the buildings at the site were filled with deadly asbestos. The towers were structurally unsuited to modern fiber-optic and internet technologies, and burdened with a horrendous and slow elevator system that involved two changes to get to the top, which was impossible to modify. Even removing the asbestos wouldn’t make the site profitable – there were too many other problems.
The Port Authority looked into asbestos removal, and discovered that – due to the exterior frame structure – removing the asbestos was practically impossible. And even if the asbestos could somehow be safely removed, rental income wasn’t going to go up. In fact, the site would have to sit vacant for 2-3 years. They also discovered that it would be impossible to demolish the buildings, because any demolition would release tons of deadly asbestos dust into the most populated part of New York City. No politician on Earth would approve a permit – Manhattan would have to be completely evacuated for weeks at a cost of billions. So it was that Mayor Rudy Guiliani and the City of New York had run out of options. The only thing that could be done was to continue to operate the buildings at a loss. There were no alternatives left on the table.
The World Trade Center also posed a serious problem for the company that manufactured the asbestos. That company was called Harbison-Walker, and it was a subsidiary of Dresser Industries.
Dresser had recently been acquired by Houston-based Hallibuton, through the efforts of Halliburton CEO Dick Cheney. Although Vice President Cheney has been good for Halliburton, his buying of Dresser became a fiscal “turd” in 2002 when Halliburton had to pay $4 billion to settle thousands of asbestos lawsuits. Halliburton was facing a tremendous crisis with the World Trade Center, because there was no legal way to remove the asbestos, which was sitting on top of the most valuable parcel of commercial real estate in the United States.
So it was that the Vice President, Halliburton, and New York City all had a problem. The buildings couldn’t be demolished, the asbestos couldn’t be removed, the WTC was losing money hand-over-fist, and the asbestos lawsuits were coming out of the woodwork.
The Port Authority had tried to sell the site, but no one wanted it. After all, according to all of the experts the site was beyond repair. Only an idiot would buy the site. (Enter “idiot” stage left).
Larry Silverstein is a New York real estate investor and personal friend of three Israeli Prime Ministers.
In 2001, only six weeks before 9-11, Silverstein agreed to buy the World Trade Center property through a 99 year lease that added up to $3.2 billion. This was a ridiculous move on his part, because there was absolutely no way he was going to turn a profit. In fact, the losses from the new acquisition would likely bankrupt Silverstein Properties within a couple of years! People who were close to the deal were thinking Larry had gone off his rocker. Did Larry expect the obsolete structures to last 99 years? No, he did not. In fact, it seems he expected the structures to be destroyed in a terrorist attack. Silverstein’s contract with the Port Authority reportedly included a clause stating that if the buildings were destroyed by an act of terrorism, Silverstein would not have to make any more payments, would own the site “free and clear”, and would be free to collect insurance proceeds from the loss of the buildings! This is not, as you might imagine, a standard clause in any commercial lease. It is in fact unique. Larry then cancelled the existing insurance policies on the site, and reinsured with a different company. The old coverage had excluded acts of terrorism. In the new policies, Silverstein insisted acts of terrorism be covered.
Then, on 9-11, three buildings fell down – looking for all the world just like the controlled demolition of a Las Vegas hotel. And this unprecedented event solved all of the problems!
I know you’re now saying “Yeah, but if the WTC was a controlled demolition, how could anyone have gained access to plant demolitions and bypassed the security guards and systems?”
Less than a week before 9-11, New York newspapers reported a “heightened security alert” at the WTC. Security personnel from Securacom were reportedly “working 12 hour shifts” because of “numerous phone threats” made against the buildings. On September 6th, Securacom removed the bomb-sniffing dogs from the WTC, an action that has never been explained. Securacom, oddly enough, was run at the time by Marvin Bush – the President’s brother. Then, on the weekend before 9-11, September 8-9, the Trade Center underwent a “power-down” ostensibly for a cabling upgrade to improve the WTC’s computer bandwidth. With power off, security cameras and electronic security locks on doors were inoperative, giving teams of “engineers” free access. Abundant vacant office space in both towers may have afforded an opportunity for demolition personnel – posing, perhaps, as contractors – to do preparatory tasks before 9/11.
At least the sons of bitches minimized fatalities. 54,000 people worked in the Twin Towers or were visiting during office hours, and fewer than 2,600 were killed. Because the attacks happened early in the morning, the people who died were generally of three types: First, poor people – most of them black, Hispanic, or recent immigrants – who worked as janitors, handymen, food deliverers, and so on; Second, low-ranking white collar workers: the secretaries and junior managers who had to be in the office before the bosses arrived, and; Third, firefighters, police, and other rescue workers. There were no titans of industry who died there. At the Pentagon there were over 20,000 staff, of whom only 125 were killed. Again, no one of major rank died.
If the hijackers really did all the planning they are said to have done, wouldn’t they have maximized their effort to kill as many Americans as possible? Instead, we see that the attacks actually minimized the loss of lives. The number of Americans killed was pretty close to the number who died in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Speaking of which…
Oddly enough, a group called the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) had issued a report in September of 2000, stating that the only way to get support to “rebuild America’s defenses” would be through “some catastrophic and catalyzing event, like a new Pearl Harbor.”
Who is PNAC? Oh, it’s a group whose members include: Marvin Bush, Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, Richard Perle, Don Rumsfeld, John Bolton, Scooter Libby, William Kristol and other top neoconservatives.
They’re the guys who invented the concepts of “Preemptive War” and “Total Information Awareness”. They also invented the idea of a “new Pearl Harbor”.
After 9-11, defense spending skyrocketed, personal freedoms and rights were infringed upon, torture was approved and institutionalized, and the USA PATRIOT ACT was passed, a document which contains 114 points of synchronicity with the “Enabling Acts” passed by NAZI Germany when Hitler took power. The 9-11 attacks seem to have been the best thing that could have possibly happened for those who espoused the PNAC ideology. It solved their problem too.
PNAC was formed specifically to promote the notion that America, as the world’s only remaining superpower, should “take over the world” using our economic and military strength to usher in a “New American Century” in which the US (and our allies, Israel and Britain) could dominate and subjugate the rest of the world, and control the world’s resources.
But, like cartoon villains who plot world domination, their plans seem to have gone down a shithole. Public support for their agenda is gone, with political support drying up quickly. Their last hope was Hilary, who was on-board. The only thing that can save them now is “a new, new Pearl Harbor” or a “new Dealey Plaza” – something that can either defeat, remove, or co-opt Barack Obama. Otherwise, their agenda will fail. This is of course unacceptable. Failure is not an option in the New World Order spawned by Daddy Bush and his crazy friends. Don’t be surprised if another false-flag operation occurs soon.

seldom have so few done so little for so many...

*I refer to this event as a HOEDOWN – but others feel it was more of a clambake. Wayne Lawrence said it was a blowout, even though it was originally planned as a mere party. J Dot Rivera said it was more like a shindig, while Mrs. Gator said that in her opinion it was a drinkathon. No matter what it was, it was groovy. Thanks to the REAL bands – Red Cap, Jerkwater, Undesided, Night Shade, Full Throttle, and Texas Devils.

The event raised over $2,000 to help rebuild San Leon. Thanks to everyone who braved the weather.

this little bastard needs to get out of the stock market and get a little piggy bank for his chump change.

It is vital to America that the stocks traded on our major exchanges be somewhat safe, with stability in price and yield. Fluctuations on the street over the years have destroyed pensions, large corporations, banks, individuals, and institutions. The stock market has devolved in recent years from a capitol investment industry into a large ring of gamblers. People buy and sell stock – sometimes in the same day. The era of holding stocks for the long haul has vanished. The whole business is full of speculators.

As a result, no large business in America can see any further than their next quarterly report. There is no longer any thought for what will happen five or ten years from now – they live and die by the numbers they must release every 90 days. So they lie. They rob Peter and Paul both. They act like diners at a 3-minute all-you-can-eat buffet. Grab it now, and fuck tomorrow.

As a result, the quoted prices of shares often have no basis in reality. This is a situation that must be fixed. We cannot have a stable nation without a sound dollar and strong markets. Computers are the culprit. These days, people can make trades in seconds. I consider it to be a new disease, E.D.D. (Equity Deficit Disorder) in which investors are constantly jerking their portfolios around like gotdam marionettes.

Here is how to fix the Wall Street system where it will work as it is supposed to in two simple steps:

First: Establish a 12 month minimum hold time on purchased securities. Anyone selling stocks before they have held them for 12 months must pay a 30% penalty. That will stop the speculators – and we all know that before you get in the kitchen to bake bread you have to kill off the roaches. This will make the roaches flee, which will cause a lot of inflated bullshit stocks to fall – and be painful to the less intelligent investors.

Second: Declare all capitol gains and income earned from purchase or sale of stock to be tax exempt AFTER the stock has been held by the purchaser for seven years. This will bring the “good” investors pouring into the market. Stocks that are undervalued will then rise to their proper place.

The results will be a lot of crying from the stock-churning brokers and day trade websites. That fucking baby with the Blackberry will have to rethink his portfolio and fire his gotdam clown. The Scott dude might have to ditch his helicopter and go back to doing fancy yard work. So far so good.

Another result will be that shares of stock will not leap and plunge, panics will never again happen, and the price of a share will have a close relation to the actual value of the underlying company. Pensions, trusts, and corporate investments will be more secure. There will no longer be a significant profit to be made in “pump and dump” schemes, insider deals, and other nefarious trading. The hold requirement will make companies think ahead. They might stop burning up their furniture to stay warm, and the economy might get the breathing room it needs to expand again.

This new stability will also bring the world’s riches to our new stabilized markets, because when it comes to investing large amounts of money, stability is the most valuable consideration.

There are two other paths: Continue as we have been, crash and burn, OR simply declare corporations illegal and dismember them, and eliminate the current financial system.

I would think stability would be in everyone’s best interests with the exception of the speculators who created this mess. Fuck ‘em, they’re toast.

Ahhh, weed. With a name like mine, you can bet I enjoy the buds. But never did I dream that my favorite little plant would save the world. Now, Cannibus Sativa has emerged as the possible solution to what Spiro Agnew might call a plethora of plagues, problems, and plundering perpetrated by plutocratic pecuniary pimpsters.

Marijuana, if legalized, and hemp in general, can fix a lot of problems in America.

Legal Marijuana would cause an immediate and profitable new sector in our economy. Retailers, wholesalers, growers, and manufacturers would all have to be established. About 500,000 new domestic businesses would spring up, each employing an average of ten people. That’s 5 million jobs, which is five-sixths of the people who are unemployed now. This industry would conservatively generate $30 billion in federal taxes each year – enough to bail out the “Big 3″ auto makers.

An entire element of America, potheads, would no longer be criminals – they would be entrepreneurs. The hundreds of thousands of marijuana offenders in jail could be released. This would leave plenty of room in our prisons for sexual predators, murderers, spammers, war criminals, and those who actually are A Menace To Society. This would also move about 5 million Americans from the category of “offenders” into that of “law abiding citizens” (not to mention taxpayers).

Now, this would not happen with medicinal marijuana, and I am not in favor of “medicinal” legalization, because it causes too many problems. First, you can’t have any unless you’re sick. That’s stupid. Second, once you make something a “medicine”, you assure yourself that it is going to be expensive to get, and controlled by the health care and pharmaceuticals industry. Once those guys get it, it will never “go public”. So I am against “medicinal marijuana” for the same reason I would oppose “medicinal booze”.

What I am referring to really would not require a Constitutional Amendment, just a broad interpretation of the 21st Amendment which repealed Prohibition. In fact, if the marijuana were converted into an “intoxicating beverage” it would already be legal under federal law.

The legalization of marijuana would be to President Obama a striking parallel to FDRs restoring the booze during his first term. We would all know that we really are getting “a new deal”. Legalizing weed would tell the world that it really is a new era in the Land of the Free.

The folks who are against legal marijuana are mostly parsimonious, cunning, religiously hypocritical, pompous, and devoid of reason. They are the exact same people who will tell you with a straight face that they believe dinosaurs and humans co-existed, that there used to be giants, and that the sun stood still in the sky for 24 hours so some guys could slaughter some other guys and take away their wives and land.

However, the fucknuts whose great ideas and fine moral values have got us circling the motherfucking drain need to sit this one out. We don’t need your ignorant witchburner opinions right now, we need some gotdam action. Legalize pot. It’s high time.

There is ONE sector of the economy that does not need a bailout - things have never been better for the oil industry.

The economy first started sucking when gas prices started going up. Maybe this fact should provide some clue as to how we navigate out of the current crisis. When gas prices went up, other energy prices followed immediately. Utility bills across America exploded, increasing 200-300%. Because energy prices directly affect any items that are manufactured or transported, this caused many other items to increase in price as well. The resulting pinch has created a sour economy.

People have to pay their electric bill and put gas in their car – so they get behind on their mortgage payments. They also don’t buy a new Ford or Chevy. Companies faced with exploding utility costs tend to close down unprofitable locations and won’t open new businesses because of the high overhead.

Rather than fix the whole problem at the root, Washington seems determined to “bail out” each individual industry that has problems. The reality is, they should look at the one industry that doesn’t need a bailout, that has made record profits every year since 2001 – the energy industry. They have milked the rest of the world dry, and there lies the problem.

The secret to restoring our economy is to make sure that America has cheap energy, and NONE of the problems we now face will exist anymore.

I’m not talking about a giveaway to the oil companies, nor am I talking about nationalizing them. I am talking about simply regulating their prices the same way the USDA controls milk prices and the Public Utilities Commission sets utility rates. Take whatever steps are necessary to create a cheap energy market in the US, and the entire economy will heal itself.

Troubled mortgages? These mortgages aren’t bad because they were given to people who couldn’t afford them, and there was nothing “predatory” in the lending. The reality is, people bought houses, then their utility bills unexpectedly and suddenly went up by hundreds of dollars a month. I bet if the average home buyer was paying $300-$500 less in utility costs each month, he would be making his house payments!

Unemployment? With dramatic long term reductions in energy prices, all types of business will find operating costs lower. This will give them an edge over foreign competitors. This will quickly manifest itself through expansion in manufacturing, transportation, retail, trade, and finance. More jobs in every sector.

Auto makers in a jam? It’s not because Detroit is making bad cars. It’s because the cost of driving them tripled within a few short months. I am sure that if gasoline went back down to pre-Bush levels, Detroit would start selling cars again, even SUVs.

Business layoffs & offshoring? It’s not that companies don’t want to do business in America, it’s that they often can’t afford it. If America has cheap energy, companies will more often stay here and expand. Cheap energy, even if we have to subsidize it, will spur trillions of dollars in growth.

So, how much would it cost to put gasoline back at 99 cents a gallon? Well, it’s already at $1.59 here in Texas. So that means the government would have to “bail out” 60 cents a gallon. But wait, 18 cents of that is Federal tax on gas. That leaves 48 cents. Since the whole country uses 120 billion gallons of gas per year, this would require a commitment of less than $60 billion the first year (plus the $20 billion cost of suspending the gas tax). Total is $80 billion – they’re giving that much to one company, Citibank! For $80 billion, one-tenth of the first Wall Street bailout plan, we could all be paying 99 cents a gallon for gas. For half of that price, $40b, gas could be locked in at $1.25/gal.

The reality is, with less than $200 billion of that bailout money, the US could control the price of crude for the next 2-5 years by purchasing futures (future deliveries) from needy economies at bargain prices right now. They could then set the prices and control deliveries to refineries, which would enable the end price to be under our control.

The Neocons have tried (and failed) to rule the world with guns and bombs, but those methods are no longer effective. Our strength is in our wealth – we are still the world’s richest country. Our money still talks. We can still dominate the world’s energy, and that is more valuable than all other commodities combined right now.

Are you listening? Our government could spend a fraction of the $800+ billion bailout plan and fix all of our economic problems by doing one simple and intelligent thing: Restore domestic energy prices to a sane level. They could (and should) also control prices so that the price of energy does not fluctuate wildly. Gradually increasing prices do not cause catastrophes like the one we currently face – this was caused when energy and transportation costs more than doubled in a few months. A managed approach is needed. And we need to make sure that US energy prices stay below Europe and Asia. This is what kept us on top for the last 60 years. We do NOT need to lower “global” energy prices – we need to lower “domestic” prices. Otherwise we get no traction. In fact, if we can lower our price while increasing costs to our global competition, that would help us create jobs and expand our economy, and seriously put some balls back on the US Dollar.

For far less than we are spending on financial band aids for fat cats, the US economy could zoom into high gear, and quickly. The Govt. would have to simply guarantee a low crude oil price to refiners, which could be done by skillful use of the Strategic Petroleum Reserves.

This would help mortgage holders keep their houses, help banks stay solvent, redeem mortgage-based securities, create millions of new jobs, save our auto (and other manufacturing) industries, encourage business expansion, and provide stability in every area of our economy.

The politicians like to talk about “Main Street” – and this is as Main Street as it gets.

But it probably won’t be done, because, as I stated at the beginning, the experts are just fucking stupid. Or maybe they’re scared. Or maybe they’re just enjoying the benefits of playing Santa Claus to banks, insurance companies, and Wall Street.

So there IS a solution, and it is very simple. Reverse the primary cause of the recession, and the problems will subside. It’s a simple stroke of genius.