I didn't know we had $700bn

Here we have been having a national debate for the past almost 20 years about the cost of universal healthcare - or at least universal access to healthcare. Not to mention the underfunding of Social Security and a revamping of Medicare/Medicaid that is so spectacularly complex that it now encompasses a phenomenon called a "donut". I intend to hang myself before I have to figure that one out. Against the backdrop of these - and other - ongoing national policy debates, the government has to admit that it can come up with $700bn. That's $700,000,000,000. If we have had that kind of money all along, where has the political will been to use it to fix other pressing problems? This post is not an argument against the rescue of the financial system. The proper functioning of the credit markets is crucial to the health of the US economy and each individual citizen. I am just utterly amazed that we can afford it. Every mother who has had to use the emergency room as a primary care facility, every senior who has had to cut back on medication, every long-term unemployed person who has seen his or her benefits run out should be out on the street with a pitchfork and a torch hunting for their Congressman and Senator. For decades we have been told that while healthcare, Social Security and other social programs are indeed crucial and deserving, there just is not the money to fix them. Turns out there was the money to fix them, just not the political will. Now of course the money will not be there because it will be used to shore up the financial system - a necessary and absolutely justified measure - but that is not the point. As an aside, it will be interesting to see if any one in Congress has the chops to lard the bailout bill with pork.