Have you read about this:

Deep In Debt, NJ Family Robs Bank

To summarize, in an attempt to save the family home, a mother and her 14 year-old twin daughters robbed a bank. They got caught and the mother, her husband, the twins, and an older sibling were arrested.

Okay, now I will be the first to admit that robbing a bank is a bonehead thing to do. But I also have to admit that I can relate from where the desperation that made the idea seem like a good one came from.

Lemme try that again: I can see how desperation made robbing the bank seem like a good idea.

When twin teens rob a bank to help their parents, then there is a big problem. And I'm not sure it starts with the parents.

How many people do you know who are barely hanging on by thier fingernails? How many people do you know have had to go to food banks and sign up for food stamps and welfare because they just could not make ends meet by themselves? How many people do you know have been out of work for a year or more?

This country has big Big BIG problems, and finding the father of two dead Iraqis doesn't even make the top 10. There is no working class anymore. In order for there to be a working class, there have to be people working. And more and more that is not happening.

Plants are closing down, factories are moving to Mexico and overseas, and corporations are "downsizing" (damn I hate that word), but we need to liberate Iraq. Thirty-somethings are competing for minimum wage jobs that high schoolers used to work to save money for college, but the Iraqi's are suffering, so we have to save them. Could someone tell me when we are going to save ourselves?

This is the plan to help the working class that the federal government has come up with: The federal government started sending out the $400 refunds yesterday. WHOOPIE! I know that I am going to be running to my mailbox everyday for the next month just so I can grab up that check and say, "Look what my government did for me!" Yeah, right! We aren't going to see a dime of that money, because we were one the "lucky" ones that feel between the cracks. But even if we were to get it, it really wouldn't change much. So, this is to all those bureaucrats out there who embraced the refunds as a legitimate way of saving the working class and the economy: Giving a working class family $400 is not an incentive, it's not even a reward. It's just giving them back money that they should not have had to pay to begin with. It's like slicing someone's corotid artery (the ones in your neck) and then just before they bleed out, offering them a bandaid. Sure, it will probably soothe your conscience to be able to stand up at their funeral (or bankruptcy court hearing) and say you tried to help them, but you should know that you are destroying this country. You are stepping on the necks of the very people who pay your salaries and put you in office. And, although I cannot speak for everyone, I can tell you this: I might have helped put you in office, but I guarantee that come election time, it is not a mistake I will make again. You really want to help us? Bring back our jobs from India and Indonesia and Mexico. Give us a fighting chance to make a decent living and support our families. All we want is what we have been promised -- a chance at a good life, making an honest wage. I don't think that is too much to ask.


- posted by Kim @ 3:35 AM