Like most of us, we have had to get mortgages to buy our series of houses over the years. One mortgage is normal. But occasionally something came up so unexpected and important that we had to take a second mortgage to take care of it. Eventually then we were able to get rid of the second and pay down the first. That is the situation our country is in now. We had money in the bank but suddenly something came up (a terrorist act and two ugly wars), and we had to spend it all and take out a first mortgage with our old enemy, China (who was our justification for the previous war). Talking about water under the bridge is not helpful, so let’s just say that in addition to borrowing from our previous bitter Communist Enemy, we began buying from her all our clothes and having her and others in her neighborhood do the jobs we used to do at home. Now because of this strange and unwise behavior, our citizens have become jobless and homeless and cannot pay their bills and our banks screamed for help and the same people that sent the jobs overseas said “yessir Mr. Banker; would you like almost a trillion dollars to use any way you want?” And they said, “Sure! First we will increase our bonuses and then throw some big parties (er business retreats).” SO, now we are in one of those “unexpected and important situations” (jobless and homeless) where we are going to HAVE to take out a second mortgage. The Senate is arguing what it should be spent for. From my perspective, I say Jobs! Jobs to build everything that needs to be built to get our country back in shape and ready to compete in the world again. If this include all types of Advanced Energy processes and products (solar, wind, wave, etc.), we will be creating three things at once: US jobs, new exportable US technology, AND -of course- a decrease in global warming.
Lets go, America! Take that second mortgage; but in a way that we can begin to pay it off – then start working on the first!