Sunday News Programs

Some random thoughts after spending a rare Sunday morning watching the news shows like “Meet the Press”:

A man named Madoff may be going to jail because he made $50 billion of other people’s money disappear. Sounds about right, but what about this? President-elect Obama said in an interview with ABC News that he was told that nobody has been accounting for the $750 billion of our tax money that Congress approved. In other words, money is gone and we have no idea where it went. If Madoff should go to jail for $50 billion, what should happen to people who make $350 billion disappear?

Congress gives $350 billion of our tax money to Wall Street Bankers to keep them solvent and they promptly give out $70 billion as buy-out bonuses to executives. That means that some of the same people who lost their homes because investment firms holding their mortgages refused to refinance ended up giving the same people who took their homes a loan AND a bonus. Who needs the money more than a family who is about to lose their home or a banker looking for a bonus? Why am I remembering the lyrics to Marvin Gaye’s “Inner City Blues” (Makes Me Wanna Holler)?

Seven years ago we were told that we were invading Afghanistan to defeat the Taliban and free Afghanistan from terrorists. Now the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs has told us that we are losing the war to the Taliban and desperately needs more troops. Is Afghanistan going to become Obama’s Iraq (or Viet Nam)?

Why is there ANY debate as to whether or not the Bush Administration should be investigated for any violations of law when the evidence is manifest? They ADMIT to authorizing interrogation of war prisoners that violated existing U.S. and International laws. They ADMIT to warrantless wiretapping of American citizens? Could it be that members of Congress were complicit? Could it be that President-elect Obama can’t prosecute crimes he enabled when he was a member of the Senate (see FISA)? How do we hold any President to any standard of law or conduct when we refuse to hold the Administration responsible for crimes they admit? Bush/Cheney not only broke the law but they are arrogant about it. This is not about the past, it’s about the future.

What are the chances of Justice Dept. lawyers investigating themselves for violating ethical guidelines or the law they committed on orders from Bush/Cheney/Gonzales?