When Information becomes Knowledge and Knowledge is Power

Exactly four Tuesdays from today is Election Day. You can still register to vote, if you haven't and/or practice your excuses when you don't. But please, for both our sakes, stay clear of me if you choose not to decide, because you still have made a choice.

That was the commercial, but here's what I've been fretting about for some time. As the oldest child in a large family, fretting is more than a hobby and closer to an art form. If it were to be included in the Summer Olympics, you'd have seen me at the medals podium, worrying about the way the bunting was hanging from the rostrum.

We in the Rose City, many of the almost 37,000 of us, meet on a regular basis in an almost bewildering number of advisories, boards, commissions and committees to seek the betterment of some aspect of where we live. I tend to go to meetings for the crullers and coffee and stay around because I'm intrigued at how 'power' grows from knowing things that others around you do not know and how hard some work to keep others from being in the loop. Maybe it's human nature-I've never seen any of the squirrels I feed display it-but it appears many times, 'for me to look good, you need to look bad.' (with that formula, you just plug in the names or 'values', as my math teachers used to say, into the equation).

We have, as you've realized if you drop into this space on Mondays, City Council meetings every other Monday for the most part. Pretty often, though not always, before the City Council meetings there are 'information meetings' or 'workshops' where, from the ones I've attended, various groups and folks from within and without the City, at their own initiative or at the request of the Council, offer a presentation with additional background and information on a specific topic.

Back in March, I attended a workshop on the the 350th Anniversary of the founding of Norwich and in the months since have attended others to include a discussion the City Council had with the Chief of Police and a presentation by seCTer, both of which concluded with various Council members expressing a desire to continue the discussions but never actually setting a date for that. I remember being socially active when I was a wee slip of a lad and if I had a dime for everyone whom I was 'definitely gonna call' or who was going to call me, I could buy just about anything my heart desires.
Promises cost nothing, except credibility when left unfulfilled.

Not that long ago, I attended/participated in a workshop with the City Council on a draft of a code of Ethics a previous City Council had created a committee to develop. The current council accepted the report as part of a very brief information workshop (with the promise to follow up) in March and directed Corporation Counsel and Human Resources Manager to review and comment upon (I assumed 'and report back' but the Feast of the Assumption is 15 August).

The Council held a (2nd) informational session with the now-disbanded Ethics Review Commission on 15 September and it seemed (from where I sat, in the back near the exit (as always)) the HR Manager had notes but no one had spoken with the now-absent Corporation Counsel because, and here's my issue, there are no official notes of anything that happen in an informational meeting. So a somewhat desultory conversation went on between some on the Council and some on the former Ethics Review Commission. Again, aside from notes any of the alderpersons may have made as individuals, and (of course) my compulsive journal keeping, no record of that workshop exists either.

Meddling busy-body that I am, I sent this to my City Council the following morning.
"Gentlemen,
.... My concern and curiosity are about the informational meetings held on a regular basis before City Council meetings. Nowhere on the City of Norwich's website do I ever learn the subject of these meetings BEFORE they are held, which is disquieting, but not my primary issue. If a topic....is important enough to come before the City Council, it should be important enough to do so before the City Council during an actual Council meeting.

....(A previous) City Council may have felt a less formal opportunity to gain information would be more effective and valuable if a record were not being kept...I appreciate....the idea of trading information for a formal record, except, again, 'if it's important enough to come before the Council, it should be during a Council meeting.' At a City Council meeting, recordings are made, notes are taken, minutes are published, reviewed, corrected, amended, approved and can be reviewed by anyone with a concern.....

...I strongly urge all of you in doing the city's business, to either effectively and efficiently document every information workshop, from promulgation of the topic, the time and the participants, to/through the minutes of actual workshop itself, or restructure City Council meetings to incorporate matters and discussions that are, at this time, off the radar and beyond the scope of the public record. As always, though I often forget to say it, thank you for being who you are, where you are."

We get the government we deserve--sometimes that works to our favor, but we have to work for it to happen and it involves all of us. Head shaking and tsk-tsking doesn't assist what Teddy Roosevelt called 'the man in the arena' who (man and woman), after all, is in the area to help all of us, deserving and undeserving alike.
-bill kenny

Meeting(s) Across the River

It's not a signature work, I guess, and it goes in and out of favor on the song list for live performances with the E Street Band, but it's always been one of my favorite Bruce Springsteen songs, Meeting Across the River (the clip includes the late Danny F and helps me smile, even though, and especially because, it's a Monday).

As it's the first Monday of the month, there's a City Council meeting at 7:30 P. M. in City Hall, with an informational meeting before hand at 6:30. The informational hearing is a request by, among others, the CT Pardon Team to "Think Outside the Box" in how the City of Norwich considers applicants for positions. The City Council meeting agenda is here.

And thanks to Josh and Dee Ann (and others) for keeping the municipal website up in light of the new requirements of Public Act 08-3 that mandated municipal websites have the agenda and minutes of all advisories, boards, commissions and committees, which some local leaders in CT found to be a burden. As I understand the requirementsof the CT Freedom of Information Act, it's always been a requirement that meeting muiuntes be forwarded to the City Clerk in a timely manner, so I'm confused as to what the 'challenge' is now. Strangely, uninformed citizens and residents weren't seen as a problem-but hoping to make them making them less so is. Hmmm.

You'll have to go solo to the City Council meeting tonight. Keith R is across the country. I will be accompanying the love of my life as she gets an MRI. Almost thirty-one years of marriage to a maniac does not leave a person unmarked. Since meeting and marrying in Offenbach, Germany and promising to have and to hold for better and for worse, though not necessarily for 4,200 miles of relocation and transplantation into what (at best) is a different and (at times) hostile culture, it's not often I get to take care of her. We've spent our lives together with her taking care of me. Townsend was right, it's the best I ever had.

Glancing through the council's agenda, I see a petition by residents to stop a sewer line expansion as well as a catch-up initiative to ask the Continuing Legislative Committee on Planning and Development in Hartford to reconsider an action they took some months ago in the absence of any communication from anyone in the City of Norwich.

Interestingly enough, and perhaps not coincidentally, that particular meeting from 10 July, as covered by CT-N, was rebroadcast this past Saturday afternoon on Comcast 14 in Norwich, a/k/a public access (or, as I call it, 'public excess'). In the about twenty five minutes I watched (I joined late) there were eight mentions by both the five (present) members of the sub-committee and the representative of the State's OPM wishing they had some idea of what the leaders in Norwich wanted to do with the developer's application as none of them had heard a word from the city.

I'm not sure the idea of an 'active adult' community for those over 55 (Now, who do we both know who might fit that profile, eh?) that would keep residents of Norwich and the area with houses they no longer need (empty-nesters) here in the city is, per se, not a good idea. It might increase the supply of good housing stock, I know not necessarily a popular idea in an economic downturn but look at what some of our neighbors are paying for the places in which they live and tell me it's not in need of improvement. I'd love to learn more about the developer's scope, approach and intent (and impacts and costs to the city's infrastructure) than I was able to sort out in the half hour or so of what was basically a zoning hearing and variance application.

The first 2nd Congressional District debate, co-sponsored by The Day and the League of Women Voters, is tomorrow night at 6:30 at New London's Garde Arts Center. The debate will be carried live on MYTV 9, the WTNH sister station. It will also be rebroadcast at later dates. There are more folks running than will be on the stage but as R. D. Davies noted 'So you think that you've got ambition. Stop your dreaming and your idle wishing. You're outside and there ain't no admission to our play.' Perhaps the League of Women Voters can start the evening by explaining where ALL the other candidates are. That may take a moment and be worth a laugh. That's another pesky problem in participatory democracy: multiplicity of voices and choices. We all think we want freedom of choice but it turns out we want from freedom from choice. And we're going about getting it with both hands.

I spoke of Housing earlier (a literary device known as foreshadowing by those who enjoyed the works of Thomas Hardy Thomas Wolfe (I, myself was always more partial to the Hardy Boys and Tom Wolfe)) and on Wednesday afternoon at 4:30 P. M. is a meeting of the Housing Authority at 10 Westwood Park.

Also, Wednesday from 6:30 P. M. to 8 in the Kelly Middle School Library is a forum on school bullying policies and prevention efforts. There's a guest speaker and a presentation from someone named "Boggels the Clown" and, without letting the cat out of the bag, in terms of Boggels' possible true identity, I'd be remiss were I to NOT note both Congress and the State Legislature are in recess Wednesday. You do the math, Salt of the Earth.

And in honor of the MLB playoffs, though maybe not, at 6 P. M. in Room 210 of City Hall is a monthly meeting of the Norwich Baseball Stadium Authority-the first one, I think since the San Francisco Giants and the CT Defenders extended their Player Development Agreement for two years. A lot of the Giants' projected 2009 spring training talent has spent time at Dodd Stadium, more of it than some of the fans who gripe about the team, its play, its affiliation and the price of games. I'm not sure what to make of most of those folks; they'd whine if you hanged them with a new rope. Feel free to drive to Pawtucket, Rhode Island, to check out a Paw Sox (Triple A) game or to New Britain, CT, (Double A) and then come talk to me about costs. When they were still children I took both of my kids up to Dodd for ballgames and they, and me and my wife, had a great time, and more often than not, none of us realized if the hometown team had won until we read the paper the next day.

Wednesday is the busiest day of the week as also at 6 P. M. the Greeneville Neighborhood Revitalization Zone Committee will meet at the New Asia Buffet over on Boswell Avenue. If you don't think giving a damn and rolling up a sleeve to lend a hand can make a difference, drive through Greeneville. When I arrived in advance of my family from German almost seventeen years ago, I wouldn't have chosen to live there and judging form the empty storefronts and abandoned houses, I wasn't alone. But those who did live there decided to do what they could to improve what they had, and they have. We are all the better for their efforts.

And, last but not least on Wednesday at 7 P. M. in the Central Fire Station is a meeting of the Public Safety Committee. I attended one of these, though not the last one with the request for the new fire truck, and I'm hoping at this fire house there's a dalmatian and I can get to pet her/him. Kidding aside (I know, 'oh, that's what that was!') this is committee created by the City Council that rolls, fire, police, emergency management, ambulance team members all into one place and offers an insight into how the public safety infrastructure is working and how it can be bettered.

Despite what you may have heard in recent weeks, the Mayor's Economic Round table, announced for this Thursday, on development (and lack thereof) in the Norwichtown Mall, will NOT be held. I suspect the reason for the postponement was it was scheduled on Yom Kippur. Considering that I haven't what, if any, consensus and sense of direction was developed from the previous two sessions on the Norwich Hospital Property (Brewster's Point and lots of other names, come to think of it), it may not be a bad idea to NOT have this session. We are often much better at starting stuff here in the Rose City than in sticking with it and finishing it. Our friends in Preston seem to have a similar problem

Speaking of finishing (I love the way I join all of this stuff together, don't you? I'll take that as a 'yes') Thursday evening at 6 in City Hall is a meeting of the Rehabilitation Review Committee. A walk through Norwich (and many small cities and towns throughout New England) would suggest that this is a target-rich environment for such a committee.

There's probably even more than what I've found going on this week, and I promise to work harder to pass it along. You've got a part, too. If you've gone to a meeting and there's information you'd like your neighbors to know about, I'll share it if you tell me. Heck, it beats making it up (I'm still explaining to people I was joking last week about the presidential candidate who wanted to galvanize babies. I thought that was obviously a goof but I've since learned otherwise. Mencken would be so pleased, but probably wouldn't order the soup, either). Hey, Eddie, can you get us a ride?
-bill kenny

Saint Paul and #43

I had cereal for breakfast this morning. I've eaten Cheerios (I never knew they had another name! The things you read when you haven't got your spoon) my whole life and plan on continuing until breakfast, as the most important meal of the day, is mooted because I've run out of days. I never 'save a penny' and buy the knock-offs as none of the store-brand versions get the taste right. I eat my Cheerios dry as I don't like seeing them as life preservers in a white ocean, bobbing up and down in milk. And by milk I mean whole milk as I don't play the percentages, ever. (And I love that idea-we drink 2% milk because it's heart-smart but eat red meat and more of it than anyone in the history of the planet. Sniff, sniff. I smell a contradiction, do you?)

I was staring at the box in the "Rose City that Doesn't Sleep" (I prefer that slogan to the one currently circulating informally: "Norwich where the cops drive Fords through Dodge City.") There's not a whole lot to do early in the mornings, so I studied the artwork. Across the box's mid-section in a band nearly two and half inches wide (I had a ruler and, yes, I measured) is an announcement I'm holding a "limited edition collectors box" of Bobby Labonte Team 43 driver.

I almost dropped the bowl in my eagerness to get to the computer and check out ebay for the going price for my limited edition collectors box. Hey-I don't know about you, but my stock portfolio took it in the shorts over the last couple of weeks. My new retirement plan is to buy lottery tickets and redeem bottle and can deposits (I'm going with both bottles and cans because my broker told me to diversify). I was hoping I could speed up the retirement calendar so me and the missus could start our move sooner to Florida where we'll catch so much sun we'll look like baseball gloves and we can play checkers until we pass away. (I aced the residency test. I can leave the left blinker on in the car for hours at a time.)

Except it looks like I'll need a whole lot more cans and bottles as the bidding for my limited edition collectors box, including the cereal within, wouldn't cover the cost of mailing it to the winner. Then I remembered about a year or so ago, and it was Cheerios (but Fruity Cheerios), had a die-cast car in the cereal box. It sort of reminded me, as I suspect it was supposed to, of the Matchbox cars we had as kids. Those were made in England, which was very exotic, and the doors would open or the wheels would turn and bounce up and down as if they had shock absorbers. Now they're cranked out by the millions in third world sweat shops just down the street from where the big bucks sneaker companies have built their factories.

That's when I realized growing up is a terrible idea (and why I have fought so long, successfully, to NOT grow up but instead, and sadly, have grown old). Only adults used to eat cereal without toys in the boxes. Remember that? You could get amazing stuff in cereal boxes. Okay, not like we got the Haldron Collider, but still. Can you imagine how cranked Mom would have been if we did? Putting it together at breakfast, seeing if it worked, probably blowing up the whole kitchen and then running to catch the school bus and leaving Mom to clean up the mess. Ahh, those were good times....

Now, no one gets toys-somebody actually put books in a cereal box (!) Why stop there? How about socks or sensible shoes? It's not about the toy or the fun of the toy--it's the unlimited vista of potential when you'd reach down through the cereal to get to the bottom of the box and pull out the plastic package. For a moment your imagination would run riot at what it might be and what you could build. Sure, it snapped together in less than a minute, but that was never the point-it was the allure of the possible not the tyranny of the reality. Who of us didn't study the boxes on the store shelves, not for fiber content or the MDR of Vitamin B, but to imagine the color of the prize inside.

And now? A limited edition collectors box. And we wonder why kids no longer dream. "When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things." Silly Rabbit Saul, it's not just Trix that are for kids.
-bill kenny

Countdown to Ecstasy

Acquaintances ask me if I'm a Republican or Democrat (a question that thirty days from now will have a larger resonance I suspect) and I don't know how to answer. I used to offer I considered myself to be a 'relentless pragmatist' which didn't, and doesn't, sit well with those whose ideology drives their belief and value system instead of vice versa.

I embraced Senator Barack Obama from the day he announced his candidacy-- not merely for what he offered, but for the promise of what he offered (two very different things). I don't regret my enthusiasm then or the cooling of my ardor for him in recent weeks and still think a plethora of voices and choices is a good thing until we become paralyzed by indecision. By the same token, I admire and respect Senator John McCain for his physical heroism and spiritual tenacity. Few on Earth could endure what he has-much less triumph over it.

We have, as I see it early on a Saturday morning exactly a month away from the second most important Presidential election in my lifetime (the first, JFK and RMN happened before I was eight years old and I really didn't grasp it. Not only had we not yet walked on the moon we'd not even escaped the Earth's gravity. It was, indeed, another America), devolved from a political system where 'the idea' was paramount to one where 'the game' became the definer. Did it begin with the "New Nixon" and his Southern Strategy in the late sixties and early Seventies? Did Reagan Republicans collide with Clinton Democrats and produce Newt Gingrich and Bush Père et Fils?

I don't pretend to know enough political science to explore any of that or to even realize it may well be pap. I do remember an American politics where there was dialogue and not diatribe, where reasoned and researched discussion trumped bumper stickers and sound bytes, where we lowered our voices but never our expectations where government was always part of the solution and never the problem, but that America has gone the way of high top sneakers, it seems, and old school is for old fools.

We no longer vote our hopes and dreams but fears and failings, and are then surprised when we're reduced to a choice of cancer or polio. If you wonder who is to blame, look no further than your mirror.
-bill kenny

It's okay, I'm with the Band

An unsolicited plug for a local event: tomorrow night, starting at 6, Norwich Free Academy Wild Cats are hosting the "2008 Classic Band Festival" which, despite the name will NOT include Iron Butterfly or The Grassroots, but kidding aside, is a spectacular event.

My daughter, Michelle, played in the NFA Orchestra for all four years of her attendance at NFA and the last two, she was also in the Wildcats Marching Band. There's something about a young woman in uniform, with a French Horn and the snazzy marching shoes (kidding, kiddo!). Many of the region's high schools and usually a couple of special guests will razzle and dazzle family and friends in competition with grades for musical execution as well as marching and presentation.

My wife and I spent years attending competitions (schools compete in probably a half-dozen or so every season but can only 'exhibit' at their own.) Each school's event is a major fundraiser for many of the activities the students in the music departments are involved in and without putting too fine a point on this, in many instances, make those activities possible. We were fortunate that the NFA-hosted competitions were in Dodd Stadium (the baseball season was over and the lighting in terms of the field was spectacular) which, having sat in bleacher seats at Putnam High School, Fitch and Waterford (to name just three places) was just super. Having concessions and bathrooms (input AND output) really close was also very nice as the crispl Fall evenings start a little earlier and a little colder atop the Norwich Business Park.

The playing field at Dodd was resurfaced a while back and that undertaking forced NFA back to its own field, behind the school on Broadway, which means metal bleachers and a lot of cars from people outside of Norwich wandering the side streets trying to find a place to park without losing sight of the flood lights beyond the Chelsea Parade so they know where the school is.

For a fifty-something year old man, the marching bands remind me that generalizations about generational differences and stereotypes are just that, generalizations. For the most part, if I were on a sidewalk in downtown Norwich (there's an intriguing image!) and saw a group of 'teenagers' walking towards me, I'd probably cross the street not out of physical fear, but just to minimize possible unpleasantness. They would, and could, be oblivious to my existence (the two I helped raise were, for the most part) but I'd still be uneasy. No reason-just My Generation against not-my generation (I've become my own parent).

However, watching about a thousand of these young folks (I'm including the flag people as part of the marching band. Band members often get college music scholarships of some kind. I don't know if that's true of flag folks, though it looks to be hard work and they do lots of it) in the course of three or four hours execute intricate marching maneuvers (I always think of Robert Klein's 'A Tribute to Mayonnaise') while playing instruments (I cannot chew gum much less chew gum AND walk) to a rapturous reception from the stands is good for the spirit.

I suspect there are tickets still available for the show tomorrow night in Norwich, and at the most , they'll be about $8 because that's the going rate for these shows (and for a senior citizen (I know, I'm closing in on the discount, but I'm not there yet) or a student, there's a reduced price), you get to have as much fun as all the other people who've paid to watch the show, though I don't think any of us have anywhere near as much fun as the people on the field. Turns out The Kids Are Alright.
-bill kenny

My Aim is True

In the last couple of days we've had a return of sort of summer in terms of temperatures. We have a tendency to call it "Indian summer" though I wonder what it's called if you're either on the Indian sub-continent or a Native American living here. It's like NY Strip Steak-I went to prep school in NYC (Manhattan, technically, which is what most of us think of when we say 'New York City" (especially if you're eating Pace)) and never once encountered a restaurant that served an item with that name. My German born spouse is still asked by neighbors and acquaintances about "German" food and clothing items that are actually Bavarian and have little to do with the rest of her homeland. Sometimes I suspect people think she only says she's German.

When I meet folks elsewhere and tell them I live in Connecticut, I often see the movie they're making in their heads of the 'other Connecticut', the Gold Coast area along the LI Sound in Fairfield and New Haven Counties. Sort of like a score of years of so ago (score? Welcome to the Abraham Lincoln Impersonation Bake off and I'm your host, Carl Sandberg) when all of Connecticut's areas code for telephones went from one, "203" to two "203" and "860" and those of us in the sticks part of the state wound up with the 'new' area code, like we didn't have enough inferiority complexes at work on this side of the Connecticut River already.

I saw the other day where we Nutmeggers (when in Rome, etc...) are about to get two more area codes though I'm fuzzy on how they will be assigned and if you could end up with a home phone with one area code and a home fax machine with another area code. Assuming, of course, you're a fossil like me and still have what telecom cats and kittens call a 'land line' as opposed to a cell phone. I'm amazed everyone (to include me) has a cell phone but no one wants to have a cell phone tower built near them-but then we whine about the dead zones we sometimes have when using cell phones. Something about complaining, new rope and hanging comes to mind.....

Anyway, as much as I've enjoyed the warm temperatures of recent days, they've come (as they often do) with strong winds, just as the leaves are changing along with heavy rains. The winds take a lot of the colorful leaves with them and the rains seem to reanimate the squadrons of mosquitoes who dive bomb anything moving with a vengeance. I find their aggression astonishing in such a small and pointless insect. (Don't give me the food chain and their role in it argument, please. I've heard it. The birds could learn to eat other things if skeeters disappeared-like NY Strip Steaks, as just one example.) I admit it's hypocritical of me to criticize mosquitoes because I'm a functionality-challenged biped, and have to admit I may be a little jealous they have a 'how stuff works' entry, and I don't because I won't.

There was the one with the hound dog who became the one with the jump suit as well as the one with the ice skates. Oh, I used to be disgusted and now I try to be amused. But since their wings have got rusted, you know, the angels wanna wear my red shoes.
-bill kenny

An Original Idea, albeit NOT mine

Someone shared this with me and as the Wall Street Waltz warmed up in the last days and the dancing grew more intense and the exchange of partners more frenzied I kept coming back to it. Every time I looked at whom in Congress was fashioning 'a rescue plan' with the same White House who told me Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden went shoe-shopping together, all I could think of was how much money all these D. C. bastards and bastardettes had taken in campaign contributions and donations of in-kind services from the very industry they were supposed to be overseeing. Talk about the hunter gets captured by the game. Smokey Bill sure knew what he was writing about even when he didn't.

I have a MasterCard payment that I don't want to have to make. Is it okay if I send it to the Secretary of the Treasury or the Speaker of the House and ask them to add it on to the rescue bill for the billionaire bankers and CEOs? Maybe you have a mortgage payment looming and the cash flow is not conducive? Send it along. A student loan for college--a car payment? Let's stick the grand-kids with the debt (or is it already up to the great grandchildren, at least). By the time they catch on, we'll be dead.

Anyway, someone sent me this last week when all we were looking at was the bailout of AIG who once were a smaller, well-managed company, who became a behemoth built on sand. It is, technically, an original idea, though NOT mine. If you know who came up with it and want to tell me, I'd be grateful-but I'd be more grateful if someone could tell me why this wouldn't work because I don't see the problem with the proposal and I'm becoming more angry by the minute that the gals and guys I elected to keep your eyes on the road, your hands upon the wheel, didn't.

"I'm against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG. Instead, I'm in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a We Deserve It Dividend.

To make the math simple, let's assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S. Citizens 18+. Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man, woman and child. So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up. So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billion that equals $425,000.00.

My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a We Deserve It Dividend. Of course, it would NOT be tax free. So let's assume a tax rate of 30%.

Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes. That sends $25,500,000,000 right back to Uncle Sam. But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket. A husband and wife has $595,000.00. What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?

1. Pay off your mortgage - housing crisis solved.
2. Repay college loans - what a great boost to new grads.
3. Put away money for college - it'll be there.
4. Save in a bank - create money to loan to entrepreneurs.
5. Buy a new car - create jobs.
6. Invest in the market - capital drives growth.
7. Pay for your parent's medical insurance - health care improves.

Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folks who lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company that is cutting back. And of course, for those serving in our Armed Forces.

If we're going to re-distribute wealth let's really do it...instead of trickling out a puny $1000.00 economic incentive that is being proposed by one of our candidates for President. If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every adult U S Citizen 18+!

As for AIG - liquidate it. Sell off its parts. Let American General go back to being American General. Sell off the real estate. Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.

Here's my rationale: We deserve it and AIG doesn't.
Sure it's a crazy idea that can work.
But can you imagine the Coast-To-Coast Block Party!
How do you spell E-c-o-n-o-m-i-c B-o-o-m?

I trust my fellow adult Americans to know how to use the $85 Billion We Deserve It Dividend more than the geniuses at AIG or in Washington DC . And remember, The Family plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because $25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.
Ahhh...I feel so much better getting that off my chest."

This week, from where I sit, we'd need to multiply the dollars ten-fold to stave off ruin or worse, as explained by people who three months ago saw nothing but blue skies and green lights on the financial horizons. And still after we do that and I look at the above proposal again, I cannot see why the idea wouldn't work. As you are, by definition, much smarter than I (except for the part that I write this stuff and you read it), tell me where it's flawed and fated to fail. And if you don't think so, then tell me to whom we should send our letters and email and phone calls in Washington DC to get it enacted. And hurry, that starving CEO covered in his own golden parachute with his begging bowl on the corner has a family too, you know. How much longer can you look away?
-bill kenny