Winners and losers

So it's Feb 18th, 2009 and President Barack Obama has just stepped to the mic to unveil his foreclosure crisis plan. I spent some time leading up to this moment watching some cable news and absorbing the viewpoints of various political reporters.

They were wondering how the Plan would address various aspects of the "crisis." Within minutes I am fuming and frustated by these guys as they bemoan the "complexity" of this issue. But the trouble is, it's not complex! It's actually very simple.

It's called a housing bubble. Starting a few years back interest rates were low and home prices were sky rocketing. Banks made a lot of risky loans and a lot a people bought homes they could not and would not be able to afford. Well guess what? What goes up must come down. Bubbles burst and good times don't last forever.

So what are we about to get? Artificial solutions designed to prop up home values and keep people in the homes they still can't afford. This won't solve the problem because it can't. In life, people make good decisions and people make bad decisions and if we don't accept the consequences of these actions there can be no resolution.

Obama simply wants to deny and delay the consequences of these horrible decisions.
John F. Kennedy said it best: Life is not fair. And neither is this plan. This will flush more tax payer dollars down the toilet so that people won't have to lose.

And where there are no losers there can be no winners.