Every morning at 7:15 a.m., as I listen to the Pledge of Allegiance by a group of children in a local school, I am impressed by their sincerity and pride as they recite the words.

I, the cynic that I am, silently whisper, Would that it were true.

In light of the recent events in the stock market I ponder: how could the Ivy League-educated financial wizards not know what was happening? Talk about a Ponzi scheme; theirs was the mother of all Ponzi schemes. Not only did they create it, they bundled it up and sold it to pension funds, stock portfolios, and other financial organizations knowing there was no equity behind the numbers.

Are they being held responsible? No.

We the taxpayers were assured, although we weren't convinced, that infusing the stock market with $780 billion dollars would prevent the Dow from falling to 8,000. The Dow went down to 6,000 and the CEOs took home $4 million dollar bonuses promised in contracts that are no longer viable. The largest stockholders are the taxpayers and they weren't consulted.

The federal government, after bailing out IBM, is standing by while jobs are being outsourced. The overseas employees of IBM were not obligated to pay income tax on their earnings on April 15.

County government is attempting to justify centralization of services as a cost saving measure. History has proven that bigger has never been proven to be better.

Town governments have requested all departments to tighten their belts. A number of departments have already made concessions in their determination of their 2009 budget. Any additional cuts may result in limited services to the taxpayers.

It seems the people that are in no way responsible for the current financial debacle are suffering the consequence of those that knew better actions.

We, the taxpayers, are losing our jobs. We are faced with foreclosure, yet we bailed out the stock market and the banks — Citibank on at least two occasions.

Perhaps I am not cynical — just aware.  Again, I say 'Liberty and Justice for all'…would that it were true.

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