DEC '08 - The Nyack Villager

Under exposed
by Shel Haber
The Yellow Stripe in the Road
e yellow stripe painted down the middle
of most roads reminds us that cars to the
left of the stripe stay to the left and cars to
the right stay on the right.
As a community we agreed on these rules of
the road to keep cars moving and avoid headon
collisions. is agreement is a regulation.
ere are other regulations: stop at a red light,
go on green. e first thing you learn as a
new driver is to follow the rules of the road, to
(probably) avoid wrecking your mother’s car.
Back in 1929 banks and Wall Street had no
real regulation, no rules, so when a greedy and
corrupt stock market crashed, it took the rest
of the economy with it. Most banks kept little
cash on hand, speculating on the market
instead. ere was no regulation for insurance
on savings accounts so when Wall Street went
belly-up, the life savings of millions of honest
people went down the drain.
e bank failures of 1929 caused the Great
Depression and led to the closing of countless
good companies large and small. Millions of
jobs were lost.
ere was no social security for the old, no
unemployment insurance for those unable to
find a job. Millions of hard woking people
went on bread lines to void starving. is
went on year after year.
When Franklin Roosevelt
became president
in 1933 we began to
dig ourselves out of the
economic hole.
As a community,
America agreed to regulate
banks and Wall
Street. In Roosevelt's
first hundred days in office, a law was passed
(the GS act) to separate investment banking
from commercial banking. at stopped the
wild Wall Street speculation. Another law was
passed, creating e Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation (FDIC) which insured bank
deposits. en the Roosevelt administration
created social security and unemployment insurance.
ere were many nay sayers who said the new
regulations were unamerican and forecast the
doom of free enterprise. But free enterprise
prospered instead, with fifty years of increasing
good times. ere were small bumps
along the way but the middle class grew continuously
and many more people grew rich.
Beginning in the Reagan years, the men who
ran giant banks wanted much more of the nation’s
wealth and seemed unwilling to share
the good times.
Using their influence and giant campaign
contributions, Wall Street bankers slowly had
laws passed that dismantled the banking laws
and, by 1999, when the Gramm-Leach-Bliley
act passed, many of the 1933 laws were gone
—no more separation of investment banks
(the speculators) and commercial banks
(whom we trust to hold our money). Wild
speculation resumed, converting the US banking
system from a market to a casino.
We American consumers seemed drugged by
I want it ALL, I want it NOW, credit cards
and mortgages. e banks had a great time
offering credit at interest rates that made the
old gangster loan sharks look like the Good
Tooth Fairy,
As it turned out, the banks didn’t actually have
the cash to cover all the loans and mortgages
so they used last month’s payments to cover
next month. When the Wall Street casino ran
out of chips, they called on taxpayers to buy
them new ones. ey had painted out the yellow
stripe on the financial highway and changed
all the lights to green.
On Sept 19, 2008 the Bush adminstration announced
we were on the edge of a financial car
wreck and called on the American taxpayers to
bail out Wall Street or we would have another
Great Depression. If the men who run the
giant banks and Wall Street had been less
greedy, retaining the 1939 rules of the road,
we would not be in this financial trouble and
the banks that went bankrupt would still be in
business.
Now you and I, the taxpayers, have to bail out
the greedy speculators to save the economy.
Again.
Perhaps, now we will paint the yellow stripes
back on the economic highway.
Shel Haber co-publishes The Nyack Villager ✫
e Restoration
Carpenter
by George Maniere
Leaving your home in Winter
It happens every Winter. A family goes away
from home for a few days and, instead of
turning the heat down, they turn it off. During
a cold snap, the temperature inside even
the best insulated house will drop below freezing
when the heat is turned off. e outcome
is predictable, messy and expensive. Standing
water in the pipes can expand up to 10%
when it freezes, bursting the pipes. e house
will likely flood during the coldest time of the
year—a nasty predicament to be in, involving
extensive clean-up and expensive repairs.
Make sure everyone in the house knows the
heat stays on during Winter. Set the thermostat
to 50°—enough to protect what needs
protecting; it won't cost that much to heat an
empty home to minimal temperatures.
Another way to stop pipes from freezing is to
open several faucets and let them
drip very slowly. Moving water
freezes at a lower temperature
than still water—the reason lakes
freeze over while rivers still run.
By keeping the faucet on, you
keep the water moving, preventing
it from freezing. While this
will work, it wastes water and is
expensive. We don’t like the idea
of wasting water.
If, for some reason,you must shut off the heat,
the best strategy is to insulate all the pipes. If
they are below the house and vulnerable to
winds and outdoor temperatures, they must
have a layer of pipe insulation to keep them
protected. is is a really simple solution to a
potential problem that could cost thousands.
Pipe insulation is readily available at any hardware
store. is insulation slips over the pipe
and has a self-sealing tab. All joints in the insulation
should be wrapped in duct tape to
ensure a continuous seal.
A sure-fire way to insure that your home will
not be flooded when you return is to shut off
the water and drain the house.
Open all the faucets. Leave them
open and shut off the water at
the meter. Don’t forget to close
them when you refill the system.
Once the system is refilled, go to
each faucet, remove the aerator
cap and open the faucet until
you have a continuous stream of
water. Now shut off the faucet
and replace the aerator cap. is
idea can eliminate the fear of leaving your
home and could potentially save you thousands
of dollars by preventing pipes from
freezing and bursting.
George Maniere, a carpenter & general contractor,
makes his home in Sparkill. His column returns
to e Nyack Villager afer a long absence.
He encourages readers to call him with questions
on home repair: (845) 613-7737 or cell (845)
656-4022. ✫
VJE
10 The Nyack Villager December, 2008