Republicans have placed themselves in an untenable position — it is perfectly acceptable to bailout banks (because we’re [sic] saving the “financial system” doncha know) but it is not okay to bailout the big three auto makers because that’s moral hazard or a handout or socialism or somesuch.

I’m against all bailouts; this is what the bankruptcy laws are for, in the case of banks and auto manufacturers and homeowners. The sooner things fall apart, the sooner they can be put back together. But we don’t live in that world, we live in a world of “do something, and do it now!” A world of “full faith and credit.” Jobs and lives are a stake! So it’s a little late for folks to complain about the rain of pebbles once the boulders started falling. Everyone, or just about everyone, is gonna get a bailout of some kind. Tomorrow will be called upon to rescue today, and then postponed (again) for as long as possible.

We are watching a grand experiment — how long can human beings working together as the state not deal with the consequences of their actions? We, libertarians and Austrians and anarcho-capitalists, should constantly tell the world “tomorrow may indeed come tomorrow; it may also come today.” We should never waiver in this even when it seems tomorrow never comes, when the reckoning is cleverly postponed one more day. We should also prepare the world for life the day after tomorrow. This experiment won’t end well.

My time as a financial reporter in the 1990s taught me a very important thing: a company can lie to its creditors, it can lie to its shareholders, it can lie to the SEC, it can lie to Ron Insana on CNBC, its directors can even lie to themselves, but if it isn’t solvent, no cash on hand and no way of getting any, eventually checks will bounce, and then no matter how clever your lies are, you’re done. The United States gummint’s checks don’t bounce yet, and I don’t know when that will happen, but everything I understand about the world tells me a day is most certain to come when that (or its moral equivalent) will come to pass.

The Best of Charles H. Featherstone