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OPINION &EDITORIAL<br />

A4 OCT. 3, 2008<br />

Bankers, bureaucrats<br />

and bailouts ... oh my!<br />

I don’t know about you<br />

folks, but all this sturm and<br />

drang over the Wall Street<br />

bailout has me questioning<br />

the viability of the U.S. federal<br />

government now that it<br />

has abandoned any pretense<br />

of responsibility, accountability<br />

or respectability.<br />

Government is a shell<br />

game — big government<br />

even more so.<br />

We have all heard the<br />

term “Wild Wild West.” Well,<br />

welcome to the “Wild Wild<br />

East,” where laws are manipulated<br />

to maintain order and<br />

bankers are the ones robbing<br />

the bank. Adding to this epic<br />

failure of ethical integrity,<br />

the federal government is<br />

rushing to rescue bad<br />

bankers from the mortgage<br />

mayhem they created.<br />

Lawmakers in Washington<br />

have decided to buy out $700<br />

billion worth of bad debt to<br />

keep lenders from sharing<br />

the fate of the lendees.<br />

Rewarding greed and<br />

graft with more of the same<br />

is hardly in the best interest<br />

of anyone, other than those<br />

involved in the financial mismanagement<br />

that has<br />

brought us to the brink of<br />

economic collapse.<br />

I guess my biggest issue<br />

is that the federal foxes want<br />

the homeless hens to pay for<br />

their pillaging, without any<br />

say in the matter. And when I<br />

say federal foxes, I speak of<br />

both the Republican and<br />

Democratic varieties.<br />

Although I’m not the type<br />

who sees this as a case of<br />

creeping socialism, I do see<br />

this as another example of<br />

the corporate kleptocracy<br />

having its way with<br />

Washington, D.C.<br />

What concerns me most<br />

is the two-tier system of letting<br />

individuals lose everything<br />

to bad loans while corporations<br />

making the bad<br />

loans are protected by the<br />

policymakers who allowed<br />

for the deregulation of the<br />

banking and mortgage industry<br />

in the first place. Why<br />

should taxpayers bail out the<br />

industry that has brought the<br />

American economy to the<br />

brink of recession, depres-<br />

P.O. Box 232550, Encinitas, CA 92023-2550 • 760-436-9737<br />

www.thecoastnews.com • Fax: 760-943-0850<br />

MAKING WAVES IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD<br />

PUBLISHER JIM KYDD<br />

GENERAL MANAGER GLENAS ORCUTT<br />

ACCOUNTING BECKY ROLAND<br />

MANAGING EDITOR LAURIE SUTTON<br />

COMMUNITY NEWS EDITOR JEAN GILLETTE<br />

ASSISTANT EDITOR ERIC MURTAUGH<br />

PRODUCTION MANAGER SANDRA POWERS<br />

GRAPHIC ARTIST PHYLLIS MITCHELL<br />

PRODUCTION EDITOR CHUCK STEINMAN<br />

ADVERTISING SALES TONY BARRYMORE<br />

LINDSEY FLEMMING<br />

CHRIS KYDD<br />

LIONEL TALARO<br />

RECEPTIONIST CHERYL PLONTUS<br />

BOB<br />

NANNINGA<br />

Observations from the Edge<br />

sion and deeper debt?<br />

Call me a fiscal conservative,<br />

but I don’t think the<br />

bailout is anything but a<br />

license to fraud and fail<br />

again. To cover their bad<br />

loans, the federal government<br />

is rewarding the bad<br />

behavior of bankers and<br />

bureaucrats.<br />

Enough is enough.<br />

Gone are the days of lavish<br />

spending, bottomless<br />

credit and “I’ll pay later”<br />

mentality. If there is a lesson<br />

to be learned from this mortgage<br />

mess, it is how to prevent<br />

it from happening again<br />

on a larger scale.<br />

It’s time for state, county<br />

and municipal government<br />

to adapt to leaner and meaner<br />

times, and the best way to<br />

accomplish this goal is<br />

through fiscal restraint and a<br />

clear sense of priorities.<br />

Economic self-sufficiency<br />

should be one of those priorities,<br />

as should resource conservation,<br />

environmental<br />

restoration and lifestyle<br />

preservation. We the people<br />

have to take care of ourselves.<br />

We must move beyond<br />

the philosophy of build, borrow,<br />

bank and bail.<br />

Borrowing from the future<br />

has proven to be a plunderous<br />

blunder. It is proving to<br />

be what will eventually<br />

break the bank once and for<br />

all.<br />

Responsibility, accountability<br />

and respectability are<br />

the changes we need.<br />

Throwing money at a systemic<br />

problem is not change.<br />

Rewarding greed and incompetence<br />

is not change.<br />

It’s time for change.<br />

Bob Nanninga is a freelance writer, producer<br />

and environmental journalist. For more,<br />

go to www.bobservations.com, or e-mail<br />

him at bnanninga@coastnewsgroup.com.<br />

<strong>The</strong> <strong>Coast</strong> <strong>News</strong> is a legally adjudicated newspaper<br />

published weekly on Fridays by <strong>The</strong> <strong>Coast</strong><br />

<strong>News</strong> Group. It is qualified to publish notices<br />

required by law to be published in a newspaper of<br />

general circulation (Case No. 677114).<br />

Subscriptions: 1 year/$35; 6 mos./$26; 3<br />

mos./$21 Send check or money order to: <strong>The</strong> <strong>Coast</strong><br />

<strong>News</strong>, P.O. Box 232550, Encinitas, CA 92023-2550.<br />

In addition to mail subscriptions, more than<br />

30,000 copies are distributed to approximately 700<br />

locations in the beach communities from Oceanside<br />

to Carmel Valley.<br />

<strong>The</strong> advertising deadline is the Monday preceding<br />

the Friday of publication. Editorial deadline<br />

is the Friday proceeding publication.<br />

INDEPENDENT FREE<br />

PAPERS OF AMERICA<br />

By Mary Fleener<br />

GUEST COLUMNIST<br />

<strong>The</strong> first time I wrote about<br />

Toll Road 241, I was proud to be<br />

an American, because it looked<br />

like we were going to prevail, so<br />

naturally, I was feeling patriotic.<br />

Today, I am not so happy. I am<br />

ashamed to be part of the human<br />

race, if the truth be told, and it’s<br />

not because the road might actually<br />

be built, but I am saddened<br />

by the way we, the public, were<br />

treated, and the utter disregard<br />

and disrespect shown by the Del<br />

Mar Fairgrounds, the TCA, (the<br />

crooks that are financing this<br />

boondoggle), and the National<br />

Oceanic and Atmospheric<br />

Administration. After the<br />

<strong>Coast</strong>al Commission voted down<br />

the project, the TCA appealed,<br />

and stated that because of the<br />

“circus like atmosphere” they<br />

wanted to deny the public any<br />

access to their meeting with the<br />

NOAA.<br />

So we got a compromise, if<br />

you want to call it that. We got<br />

treated like cattle. We got treated<br />

like crap. Anyone wishing to<br />

speak had to send a letter via<br />

snail mail, and that didn’t guarantee<br />

you would be chosen to<br />

speak.You could not donate time<br />

to another speaker, and even if<br />

you were a politician, like Pam<br />

Slater (who was in Washington),<br />

you could not have an assistant<br />

Contact a Reporter<br />

CARLSBAD<br />

JEANNIE SPRAGUE-BENTLEY<br />

jsprague-bentley@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

DEL MAR / SOLANA BEACH<br />

BIANCA KAPLANEK<br />

bkaplanek@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

ENCINITAS<br />

WEHTAHNAH TUCKER<br />

wtucker@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

OCEANSIDE<br />

PROMISE YEE<br />

pyee@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

RANCHO SANTA FE<br />

DAVID WIEMERS<br />

dwiemers@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

SAN MARCOS / VISTA<br />

GIDEON MARCUS<br />

gmarcus@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

CRIME / COURTS<br />

RANDY KALP<br />

rkalp@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

Contact the Editor<br />

LAURIE SUTTON<br />

lsutton@coastnewsgroup.com<br />

Views expressed in Opinion &<br />

Editorial do not necessarily reflect the<br />

views of <strong>The</strong> <strong>Coast</strong> <strong>News</strong>.<br />

or representative to speak on<br />

your behalf. That was forbidden.<br />

No, boys and girls, these were the<br />

Feds and they were calling the<br />

shots.<br />

<strong>The</strong> meeting was held in a<br />

huge room with no air conditioning.<br />

You were not allowed to<br />

bring any water into the room.<br />

You could not hold signs over<br />

your head. Unless you were the<br />

media, you weren’t supposed to<br />

take any pictures, and the parking<br />

fee was a whooping $9 per<br />

car.<strong>The</strong> sound system was ridiculous<br />

and it was impossible to<br />

hear what anyone was saying.<br />

When I was in the bathroom I<br />

almost felt like I was in an old<br />

church, the echoing was so bad.<br />

We weren’t supposed to clap. We<br />

weren’t allowed to cheer. I was<br />

asked to sit down several times.<br />

Our only form of expression<br />

and/or protest was to hold our<br />

thumbs up, or down. Quite a few<br />

of us starting waving dollar bills<br />

in the air when appropriate and<br />

one guy showed me how to hold<br />

my money using my middle finger,<br />

which I did with relish and<br />

there wasn’t a damn thing the<br />

security could do about it.<br />

I walked around and took<br />

pictures anyway, and while I was<br />

aiming at the pro toll road people,<br />

who were paid to be there, a<br />

security guy asked me if I was<br />

from the media. I lied and said I<br />

was a freelancer. “Oh, OK”, he<br />

said. However, an hour later,<br />

when he noticed I was taking pictures<br />

of everyone, he asked to see<br />

my media pass.“I don’t have one,<br />

I’m a freelancer, remember?”<br />

I asked. “<strong>The</strong>n you can’t take<br />

any pictures. I don’t make the<br />

rules.”<br />

Two hours into the meeting,<br />

I guess the Feds had enough of<br />

letting us exercising our rights,<br />

and a woman in a black power<br />

suit with a walkie talkie started<br />

making the rounds, checking<br />

everyone out and making people<br />

obey the rules. Of course, I<br />

noticed she only mingled with<br />

the side of the room that had the<br />

potential to become a “circus”<br />

and ignored the other side of the<br />

room — the pro toll road folks in<br />

their ubiquitous orange shirts. It<br />

was a rainbow coalition of security,<br />

I must admit. <strong>The</strong>re were regular<br />

police, sheriffs, the ELITE<br />

THE COAST NEWS<br />

Toll-tally lame meeting at fairgrounds<br />

guys, Del Mar Fairgrounds staff<br />

and who knows how many undercover<br />

agents.<br />

As for the speakers, I will say<br />

this much. <strong>The</strong> pro toll road people<br />

were the best dressed hookers<br />

I’ve seen in a while, oh yes,<br />

indeed. Oh yeah, check this out:<br />

did you know that the toll road<br />

will help National Security? If<br />

we have a catastrophic earthquake,<br />

it’ll come in handy! <strong>The</strong><br />

surf won’t be affected at all; in<br />

fact the waves will be even better!<br />

<strong>The</strong>y’ll be less crowded! Hell,<br />

maybe global warming will get<br />

better because more cars will be<br />

traveling less miles and fewer<br />

emissions will be created! <strong>The</strong><br />

endangered animals will find<br />

new places to live and they’ll be<br />

even happier in their new locale.<br />

<strong>The</strong> birds will be able to migrate<br />

easier because now they’ll have a<br />

nice big freeway to point them to<br />

their destination! Never once did<br />

anyone bother to mention that a<br />

toll road costs money to drive on<br />

each and every time you use it,<br />

but hey, that’s what credit cards<br />

are for, so no biggie.<br />

And then there’s the children.<br />

Think of all the happy kids<br />

that get to drive on the toll road<br />

when they grow up! It’s a winwin,<br />

people. Like one of the signs<br />

outside said, are you willing to<br />

sacrifice your lifestyle because<br />

of all this “disinformation”? Are<br />

you willing to sacrifice your entitled<br />

place on this planet where<br />

you get to consume as much as<br />

you want and use as much as you<br />

desire because that’s the<br />

American way? No way, man! I<br />

want my toll road and I want it<br />

now!<br />

Tell you what, this time the<br />

pro toll roaders were expertly<br />

organized. We, the people<br />

against it, were organized, but we<br />

should’ve had a much stronger<br />

showing this time, and I’m sorry<br />

to have to report this, but, we didn’t.<br />

If Good is to triumph over<br />

Evil, we must make our voices<br />

heard and we must go to the next<br />

meeting and pack the house.<br />

Even if it does mean shelling out<br />

9 bucks for parking.<br />

Mary Fleener is a longtime resident of<br />

Encinitas, a published writer and cartoonist,<br />

and is a board member of the Leucadia<br />

Town Council.

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