As a nation, are we too generous or just plain stupid?

Here's something to think about: 

(Originally written late 1990s)

We jump to help other countries having most any kind of trouble - always have - regardless of the financial abilities of those countries. 

Yes, we pour billions of relief dollars into countries having problems, regardless of how rich they are.

Has any country ever lifted even a single finger to assist the United States when we are suffering a disaster?  Did any country offer to help when the Midwest was completely flood a few years ago?  Did any foreign aid come to South Florida after hurricane Andrew?--after any hurricane disaster?  How about when California was burning or having mud slides...the earthquakes..?????  

Has any foreign country ever paid back a loan or even the interest?  Has any of those extremely rich countries over their in the Middle East offer to pay down some of our national debt?  Have they done anything in an effort to get fuel prices down to help our financially burdened truckers and families having to buy fuel and heating oil?  Any effort to do anything to help us with fuel costs?  Hell no!  They continue to do everything in their power to keep prices rising.  Yet, where do they go when in trouble.  Are we stupid?  We spend our tax dollars protecting them!  Yes, folks we must be stupid.

What have any of our neighbors south of us done to curb drug traffic headed towards our borders.  How about illegal immigrants?  Nope!, not a thing.  Yet, when they are having financial problems who bails them out?  Yes, stupid us.

I could go on and on, but what's the use.  We are stupid and they are controlling our government with high paid lobbyists and their very good acting job.  NAFTA is a very good example.  The politicians who voted for it later admitted they we scammed, yet they just voted to approve a deal for China that will have the same effect.

Get real people.... our economy isn't doing well because of the NAFTA deal or any other deal, it's the baby-boomers, and it will continue to do well because of their children and so on.  Unless of course Greenspan has his way and stops everything because he'd rather have no growth than any inflation.  Well fact is, there is no growth were there is no inflation.  Greenspan doesn't fill his own gas tank or do his own grocery shopping.  He has no idea how much inflation there really has been.  Inflation is a result of our recent expanding economy.  Our expanding economy is the result of the baby boomers, and our expanding population.  It's not because of our air-head politicians--not any of them--Clinton included.

Let me tell you an economic FACT.  Inflation doesn't hurt the country in which it's happening, except in purchasing imported products.  It actually helps with making our EXPORTS cheaper for foreign buyers.  Our exports go up, our imports go down.  THAT IS GOOD!  That lowers our foreign debt and in turn will lower interest rates.  It has little or no effect on us for the cost of products made or produced here.  Prices go up--salaries go up!  So what!  We use a few more zeros when conducting business.

Here's another economic FACT.  What Greenspan is afraid of is inflation that would drive the dollar down and foreign investors would pull their investments out.  That would cause interest rates to rise in an effort to keep those foreign dollars here.  Well guess what, that sounds like a natural and welcome result.  After all, isn't raising interest rates what Greenspan has been doing?  Yes that's what he's doing and by him doing it instead of the natural market, we're not getting all those other side benefits like higher exports, lower national debt, less imports, more good manufacturing jobs, and on and on?

Joe Bottieri

UPDATE! 3/23/2001

Now that Greenspan has made a terrible mistake of trying to correct an inflation problem caused by conditions outside the US and not correctable by any action within our control, he is now lowering interest rates trying to reverse his error.  Yet, he still hasn't learned that inflation caused by the price of imported products (oil in this case), should not be included in his computations of US inflation rates.  Therefore, unless he gets really aggressive on rate cuts immediately we will suffer for a long time.