Sep 23 2008
Failure Is Good For The Soul And Other Chances To Learn
I’m pretty put out with the recent rescue of Wall Street. Oh, I know its popular and will be used as an electioneering point by both the Obama camp and the McCain camp. But that is besides the point of this post. You see, I’m a professor sometimes at our University, and I have almost 40 years experience in my chosen profession and I can say beyond a doubt that sometimes the path to amazing success is through total failure.
There are a lot of facts behind the failure of Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, de-regulation, lack of oversight, belief that people who can’t make payments ought to be able to buy a house anyway etc., etc., and etc. That collapse led to a lot of other collapses and so on and Uncle Sugar rushes in to save the bunch. Bollocks says I!
Sometimes I would wish that we would just let folks fail. I’ve had some spectacular failures in my life, and I’ve learned from each and every one of them. Oh, the learning came after beating my self in the head a few times and saying “Why the hell did I do that?” In the long run however, I learned, and that same failure was never repeated again. And so it would have been in this instance. Would it have been hard? Sure! but that is not the point. The point here is that oversight of these two big institutions was lacking while a privileged few raked in the bucks by fudging the books. We all failed when we allowed our hearts (everyone should be able to buy a home) to over rule our heads (”Sir, you make enough for a $40K home, not enough for that $120K home so we have to say no to your application for that $120K home, please call again”)At least that’s the way I see it on this side of the Brazos River!
5 Responses to “Failure Is Good For The Soul And Other Chances To Learn”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Not A Member? Register for Free!
If State’s Rights weren’t playing second fiddle to Federal ones, that might work. I also think greed on the part of loan officers, and the lending institutions that pay their commission had quite a bit to do with people taking on mortgages they couldn’t afford. I don’t want to be held responsible for someone else’s failure, though, and I don’t think you do either. If there was a way to make those responsible BE responsible, I’d be first in line with the tar and feathers.
TD, states rights are embeded in the 10th Amendment. Get out the tar, I’ve got the feathers. Folks like Johnson inflating profits for their own benefit is atrocious. Tar; Feathers; Rail. Some assembly required.
What is the definition of Oligarchy? ~k
khlindsey, that is correct and you win the daily double! ;)
where you at tex?