The View From ‘Nowhere’

I would've said 'build the bridge, until I read the comments sent by other readers. I have to say, that since Alaska has so few people, a ferry sounds more practical. They aren't obsolete, (many placces still use ferry),
and the cost of upkeep to a bridge (due the extreme weather conditions in Alaska), cpuld be enormous.
Carol Harris, Georgia

The economy is in shambles and a town of 14,000 should get a bridge to an airport in the middle of nowhere? If Alaska needs the bridge let them build it not me. Use some of thier oil/NG revenue and not my taxpayer $$.

comment left by dmitri @ 10/26/2008 2:04:40 AM you stated about California paying more than most states and then went on to talk about Red and Blue states. The last time we equated colors to our states it was the Blue and the Gray states and we were in a Civil War! I for one am sick of the high and mighty attitude of some Californians who think they are better than the rest of the country!!! If you don't want to be part of the greater whole that makes up this country then move!!! Then again a major earthquake, mudslide, or fire hits and you're out looking for those same government entitlements paid by the rest of the country too! Get your head out of the clouds or is it your rear and get real!!!!

People on these bogs are fond of saying that the current economic meltdown was caused by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac underwriting bad mortgages. While Fannie and Freddie obviously are guilty of writing bad mortgages, and worse, guilty of lobbying Congress to allow them to do so with impunity, their actions are just a small piece of the puzzle when it comes to determining who (or what) caused the financial crisis we face today.

In 1929 the stock market crash caused the banks to fail, because the banks were in bed with the stock market. Back then, banks owned investment houses, so when the stock market fell, the banks fell too. This triggered the Great Depression. So in 1933 the Congress wrote laws that regulated banking, making it illegal for banks to own investment companies, mortgage guaranty companies or insurance companies. The idea was to keep key industries separated by a fire wall, so that if one industry failed the whole economy would not go down in flames.

But the Republicans under Bush deregulated the banking industry. Senator Phil Gramm wrote legislation (the Gramm Rudman Act, the Gramm Leach Biley Act, etc.) that stripped away the regulations in the financial and insurance industies. He pushed them through the Republican Congress and they were signed into law by Geo. W. Bush. John McCain voted in favor. Everybody said how great it is to deregulate and create free markets.

Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns and Merrill Lynch each gave over a million dollars to Senator Gramm's re-election campaign.

The economic collapse that happened later was a direct result of the deregulation, and here's how: the banks wrote bad mortgages, then bundled the mortgages into investment vehicles that they sold all over the world, and they even got firms like AIG to insure the investments. It was all a house of cards.

If there had been no deregulation, sure we would have had a bunch of bad mortgages, and the mortgage guaranty and real estate industries would have suffered, but there would not have been a global financial meltdown, since the problem would have been contained in one sector of the economy. You can thank Geo W. Bush, Sen. Phil Gramm and Sen John McCain for the meltdown, since they were strong proponents of deregulation.

Furthermore, although Fannie and Freddie are now holding the bulk of these bad mortgages, Fannie and Freddie did not originally write most of these mortgages. They bought them after the fact, bundled by banks/investment companies. Fannie and Freddie got screwed by the Wall Street fat cats. And so did you, if you pay taxes.

What is Phil Gramm doing today? He works as a lobbyist in Washington, trying to make it legal for the Swiss bank he represents to sell Death Bonds in the United States. Nice guy, Phil Gramm. Incidentally, John McCain has said that he wants to appoint Phil Gramm as Treasury Secretary. Some people just can't learn from their mistakes.

Shut the airport down, problem solved.

To the person saying Ketchikan need a baggage handling system..Wait for Hussien to be elected and becomes the first democrat *Herbert Hover* You will see signs that say CCC and NRA and WPA (thats short for Whistle, Piss, and Argure) Eight guys leaning on shovel handles watching 2 do the work.. The WPA will be responsible for you baggage system, and if your lucky it may work as good as the one at DIA. In Kenyan language thats $ spreading the Wealth around $ Hussein will hold class's on "How to balance the Bags on you head while walking from the Ferry to the airport. Thats called from the "Bottom UP Economy" All you have to do is look South to MMMX and Prosperity flourishes, They just want to come to LAX just to spend that
bottem up money. When on a Geological survey I found a Volcanic Pipe near your area. Get a bridge and I will come up and we can open it up. How's that for Bottom Up? We can borrow some of Hussein CCC workers to man the shovels. While we assume the WPA rolls.