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Congress moved closer today to approving the 700 billion dollar bailout plan proposed by President George W. Bush. Terms of the deal are being tossed around and each side is using the bill as a chance to further their own political agenda.

What’s going on in Washington right now shows just how out of touch our political leaders really are with the people of the United States.

Voters say the number one issue in this election is the economy. Why is this? They want to have more money because a lot of people are struggling. They’re sick of paying $4.00 a gallon at the pump and watching oil companies thrive while the market crashes around them. They’re sick of watching friends and sometimes family struggle with mortgage payments and hearing about the housing crisis. They want to see this country climb its way out of debt and end this recession. What they don’t want is to give away even more of our constitutional rights and fund a second chance for the greedy and corrupt people who screwed this up in the first place.

In a nation of roughly 300 million men, women and children, the bailout averages out to about $2,600 per person (consequently that’s close to the average amount of money each person paid for gas and oil in 2006 and also close to the average tax burden placed on U.S. citizens). It is essentially 12 Bill Gates…es… worth of money they’re proposing.

President Bush lets us know that the world is watching, awaiting our move. He wants us to rush into this solution because apparently the time to act is now.

Remember, there were multiple warnings that this was going to happen and actions were not taken by our government. They ignored the signs and now they want you, the taxpayer, to foot the bill. The Federal Reserve is especially guilty in this process.

For those of you who don’t know about it (I admit I didn’t know that much until I looked into it more a few months ago) the Federal Reserve is an unelected, government-licensed agency that inflates the U.S. economy. They control and regulate inflation by pumping in money to the economy at random points. When the Federal Reserve artificially lowered interest rates major banks and corporations began accepting bad mortgages. This, among other things, led us to the crisis that we are in today.

Now, as the Federal Reserve squeezes as much out of your dollar as they can, they’re also lobbying for Congress to make the taxpayers bail out Wall Street. One of the reasons we got into this problem was because of us pumping in money that wasn’t there. So their solution to the problem is to throw more money at it?

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing twice and expecting different results.

Another problem with the buyout is how much power the Federal Reserve would yield should it be passed. The fact it was put in the buyout that anything the Federal Reserve does is not be able to be reviewed in court is a downright blasphemy. How much trust do you have in this group? How much power should you give them after the mess they’ve already made?

Let’s talk for a second about our National Debt, which stands roughly around $9,785,866,165,910.40.

A good $5,613,059,030,493.40 of that is public debt, while the other $4,172,807,135,417 of it is in intra-governal holdings. Where is most of this debt saddled? Other countries.

“The Chinese government, for example, holds billions of dollars in U.S government bonds,” professor of economics Thomas Grennes said, “They have bought these bonds and, maybe one year from now, the U.S. government has agreed to pay all money, plus 5 percent more.”

Once a bond matures though usually the Chinese re-purchase it, and our debt builds higher as more interest is applied. What happens when the Chinese come knocking for their money back?

The bailout would raise the national debt by roughly $2,000,000,000,000. People, government spending is off the charts. Anyone who thinks bigger government and more spending is the solution to this problem is off of their rocker. We need to take a hard look at our political system and solutions and vastly redesign they way things in Washington are run.

Some senators and representatives are taking a stand against the proposed bailout, on both sides of the party. Good. Great. If Congress really goes through and gives the Federal Reserve this much power, helping out Wall Street at the expense of the American people, it will go to show just how out of touch Washington D.C. is with the rest of America.