What My Mother Would Tell Obama

Dear Worried American,


As a child of the Great Depression, my mother wasn't able to go to college -- but I swear she was smarter than the educated people who are running the country right now.

And if Mom were alive today, she'd probably give our leaders the same scolding she used to give me: "You have a champagne appetite and a Coca-Cola paycheck."

That was her way of saying that, when you want something you can't afford, you have to work hard and save up for it. But if you try to live beyond your means, you'll end up with nothing but big debts and a bad reputation.

Advice like that used to be common sense, of course. And it still is, among the vast majority of "Main Street" Americans who work hard, pay their mortgages, and rely on themselves -- not government -- to provide for their families and their retirement.

But in what I call the "Wall Street-to-Washington Axis of Power," different rules apply. Your bank is failing because you lent billions to unqualified borrowers? No problem: Here's a multi-billion-dollar bailout to cover your losses -- and to pay yourselves obscene bonuses. Your trillion-dollar budget has no room for a new set of big-government entitlements? No problem: We'll just print a few trillion more dollars -- and worry about inflation later.

That may not be the "change" that many Americans voted for last November -- but it's the change we're all getting. And we're stuck with it for at least a few more years.


Mike Huckabee