I don't support what caused the bailouts, but I'm not in favor of the Great Depression policies that the fatcats were advocating after their policies created this condition either. In fact I'm looking forward to breaking up the monopolistic hold these financial institutions have on the economy and the stock market. Any institution deemed too big to fail needs to be broken up in the interest of national security. So I give credit to the Obama administration for recouping the majority of the bailout money, while we deduct this from the deficit numbers. And seeing GM add jobs, Ford stock thriving, and consumer confidence gaining, are indicators that the devastion of the GOP economy is waning to some degree( at least until we have to deal with other "legacy" issues)
Food Stamps for all? Who said that? How does that make sense? Please reread my post.
Costs of higher learning..some schools are attacking this problem, because they have old money allowing them to subsidize, but eliminating the 60 billion $ subsidy to the banks in the student-loan program was a great first step, and it allows the government to now offer incentives to students; offering them loans at lower interest rates, or to help offset their debt obligation with service to the country, or becoming teachers. Changes don't happen overnight, but these are some great first steps, that need to go farther, don't you agree?
Paying for entitlements. First you have to consider that Social Security ran a surplus, every fiscal year until this year. Since it is a regressive tax, I say raise the income limits with a gap. Currently, I believe that we pay taxes on Social Security, up to an income of $99K/year. After that threshold, we don't pay additional taxes. So, I don't have an exact number of where it should start, but they could gap the tax burden to skip incomes, let's say, between $99K/year to perhaps $400K/year, and then continue the tax up to a new limit, let's say 2 billion, or some number analytically arrived at. Seems fair to me, I would have preferred the "Lockbox" that Al Gore campaigned for in 2000, but the GOP ridiculed that suggestion, and instead tried (successfully)to cut the benefits of those that paid into SSI for years. How about reducing Medicare costs? There were many ideas on the table, some were great, like allowing people 50 years and older to pay profitably into the Medicare system, while reducing their high healthcare premiums that they currently are paying. But you know what happened when America tried to tackle the healthcare issue. A big paid for lobbyist interest on the Right decided that they would rather complain about things, and organize against solutions, so in the end, we got a compromised healthcare bill, that will help somewhat, but not as much as it could have, had folks on the Right actually been interested in solving the Nation's problems, rather than organizing a mass hysterical wing to promote their political obstruction to solutions. So you see, yes we have ideas, and they seem to work pretty well, but gee, if these ideas are adopted, then because the middle class would benefit for a change, now you get the whiners calling it Socialism, when the Country is no less capitalistic than it has always been the last 100 years.
I think that the upper 1-5% deserve to pay their fair share for a change. They have benefitted from every fiscal policy adopted by this country the last 30 years, and the wealth that was redistributed to them has come at the expense of the rest of the Nation. All taxes are regressive, except for the Income tax, and even that tax, along with corporate taxes, have been drastically reduced, and incentivised against the overall fiscal health and job creating policies of the Nation. In fact this year, there is a 0% estate tax! All this free money to the high end consumers haven't created more investment in this country, but it has created more investment for moving jobs OUT of America. It's a question of priorities, and penalizing society at large, to give more nondistributable welfare to the elite, has proven itself to be against the interests of a healthy economy and Nation.
So what are your solutions?
Market Data 
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