a billion dollars later

We are in the home stretch. After raising over a billion dollars -who said there is a financial crisis?- voters will finally cast their ballots. Actually, many already have, so really what November 4 means is that we will finally know who they voted for. But that too we already know, so where is the news? There are more news-men (and women) than news.

It appears Obama will win this "historic" election. What makes it historic is surely the amount of money spent on it. That is $1 billion change you can believe in. Not small change either. As for the other change, we'll wait and see but don't hold your breath. What seems most likely is a lot of quiet backtracking and a ton of well worded and aptly delivered excuses. Why?

Because fundamentally people don't change. What we Americans really want is to keep living it up forever and then some. We want to spend more, burn more gas, buy more items, consume more. What we really want is (much) more of the same. The change has been all around us. The world has changed. The excesses of the past have come back to haunt us. The houses, trucks, boats, vacations, etc. that we could not afford. Now we want to change it all back.

Unfortunately, it is time to pay the piper. Not because of eight years of lack of oversight or trickle down, or anything like it. It is a quarter century or more of living beyond our means that is coming to get us. Twenty five plus years of the "American dream." Consumption that is about to consume us.

Let us go back to $1 gas, back to V8 trucks with leather seats and cup holders,  back to McMansions, back to cruises and other wild vacations. Back to the times of plenty. If only George Bush hadn't destroyed all our fun. But did he? For all the blame and and the low poll numbers, George W. did very little. Even his pal Cheney did very little other than make his friends tons of money, shoot his hunting buddies, drink too much, and fuel his ambitions of Stalin-like world domination. But we knew Stalin, and you Mr. Cheney are no Stalin!

The magic has not ended. Now, Mr. Obama will levy a carbon tax without raising gas prices, get universal health care without raising taxes, fix education so everyone can go to Harvard, give the middle class a break paid for by the very rich -who will probably abscond to the tax havens in the Caribbean or Bermuda- all while fighting what is probably a decade long depression, a quagmire in the Middle East, and  a  few many-trillion-dollar deficits. 

Not that McCain would do any better. He might have been more fun to watch, though. Sadly, what we really should have done is save that billion dollars for the many rainy days ahead.