Dear Columbia,

I am angry. Deal with it.

None of you believed me; well, sadly, now that you do, the pleasure I feel tastes of that stuff you burp up when you've eaten too much.

Some say that society's lowest members are its barometer. Well, I suppose I'm society's lowest member because I felt it long before you did.

The fact that a living wage in southern California for a young person was in the realm of $19,440 before taxes in 2004 wasn't an issue to you because you've never lived as a 19-year-old in 2004 California. The idea that the cost of living increases with youth and inexperience at the same time that wages decrease because no one gives a shit about teenage Target workers who've not got a degree was perfectly rational, because your experienced driving record and skilled job with health benefits meant that you did just fine. You try living in Chula Vista and getting to Linda Vista to work every day at 8am sharp by bus to earn $7.50/hr. You try finding a place to sleep for under $600 pcm that's not also got four wheels and fits nicely in a compact parking space.

The fact that it's impossible to live a life of modesty, with a small place near where you work without luxuries like a car never seemed a problem because you could always afford it. The fact that keeping up with the Joneses isn't an option but rather a requirement didn't cross your mind because you never had to try to do otherwise yourself.

You think that health insurance is an option you needn't take out if you can't afford it; well what about those who can't afford not to? Oh, hospital bills are scary. But you know what's even scarier?-- having a medical issue that goes on for months or even years that costs hundreds of dollars a month just to maintain your own life. How would that knowledge affect you? That if you couldn't pay the bills, you might die? Untold numbers of Americans live with that every day. It's not their fault they had health trouble. "...but it's they chose not to have health insurance". Well what if their health insurance refused to pay out? What if the cost of treatment is greater than the maximum covered? What if they're denied coverage due to actually trying to maintain their health by utilising medical services? What if they can't afford an individual plan, but they can't get company coverage because they're worthless... because they can't afford to get skills for a full-time job... because they're having to pay for healthcare in lieu of college? What about the claims of type-1 diabetics that "employers will do everything they [legally] can not to hire you if they find out you have diabetes"? Is that just paranoia?-- or is it company fiscal policy to hire the most cost-effective worker in a world of consumption-driven, deregulated privatised healthcare? How would you deal with being in that situation?

You think the crisis is now; the crisis will be here for a long time. This was 60+ years in the coming, and consequentially won't be finished a week after elections. I was eligible for full federal & state educational funding and it was still cheaper to study in a foreign fucking country that had national healthcare, public transportation, student housing and higher minimum wage and more relaxed hiring standards (probably due to no need to supply private health insurance to full-time workers). Nevertheless I am $100,000+ in debt immune to bankruptcy for a degree which is honestly fucking worthless in what it really taught me to do. I am no more skilled at planning a rota or balancing a budget or doing anything I will probably do than I was before finishing high school-- but oh yeah, everyone worth anything gets a degree so you should too. But I couldn't do a degree in something useful because I had to work during university instead of studying something intensive like radiography or architecture or computer science.

Everyone knows the education bubble: it's more lucrative to be a plumber than to get most degrees. Well it's not that easy to become a plumber either... probably more difficult, because just an equivalent of a degree to plumbing (i.e. a bullshit piece of paper you gave your life without debt away for) isn't enough.

I am in a lifetime of debt for a degree I don't really want which I have nevertheless worked relentlessly for for three years to the point of ill health, working a shit job instead of sleeping just to survive despite my surmounting debt, having virtually no hobbies or social life or anything which gosh might maintain one's well-being in a world where Americans have the worst record for mental health in the developed world and still being thrown into chaos by lending meltdown, the stress of which has made me lose the love of my life, the one thing I've ever had that made me truly happy. As of now I am waiting for my wondrous student loan cheques to be processed before Sallie Mae becomes bankrupt as well, hoping I can at least finish my final year instead of shooting myself in the head.

I'm the lowest rung, but everyone else has to go through the same system. If they're lucky, their parents paid for their education. They're the emancipated ones. The rest, well...

University is not the best time of your life. It is an indoctrination; pounding in that you can never escape the system, life is about work and not fun. Youth, vitality, optimism, ingenuity, confidence, security, adventure, entertainment-- those are all things to be sneered at because they don't mesh well with white picket fences and $2 million homes in La Jolla made of cardboard on the edge of a cliff with an H3 and a Boxter in the drive. I've got the most bleak outlook of the world of anyone on this island, and people on this blighted island have got the bleakest outlook of anyone on this continent. That is an impressive achievement. I've also probably got the highest inverted unsecured debt-to-age ratio of anyone on this continent. Because I'm American. Stereotypes exist for a reason.

Every man is not born equal; everyone does not have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The American Dream is just that. Why am I the luckiest person in the world to be born American? What has America given me? Oh, that's right-- a chance to become a slave just to survive. Give me one good reason why I should pay back my loans: Emancipated Russian serfs had to pay back "debts" for their freedom, but those Russians got angry and so the Tsar got a little afraid. Maybe Russians back then were maybe smarter than Americans are now.

Christians? You're not Christian: I know that America is an abomination to everything the Bible teaches. What about being meek and humble? What about if you've got two coats, you should give one to someone who's got none? What about forgiving unbearable debt? (keep in mind that Jewish law was divided over whether any debt for anything was ever cancellable or not). If America is the most Christian nation then God must be the Antichrist. You're certainly marching to the tune of some other "God".

I've been to the Statue of Liberty and was angered by the sight of it. Fuck you, America.

anyone here still a reagan republican?

if the answer to the above question is "yes", then YOU'RE A FUCKING RETARD.

in case you have been under a rock for the last few days, or too busy paying attention to that ignorant running mate that reminds you of every obnoxious hockey/soccer/abortion-clinic-bombing mother you've ever met, the american economy is finally falling the fuck apart. the house of cards, with cards given clever names such as 'credit default swap,' 'option-ARM,' and 'eviscerate the proletariat' is crumbling, and 2008 is becoming the new 1929. i hate to say we told you so, but

but WE TOLD YOU SO.

so here's the basics of what's up as far as i can ascertain. thanks to decades of deregulation (one of the modern gop's golden calves, along with bastardized christianity and closeted homosexuality), we've stripped away all the fancy rules that we passed post-great-depression to keep our money sound. among the nice little regulations that we stripped away: the glass-steagall act of 1933, which separated consumer banks from investment banks and so forth. i'm no economist, but those who apparently are economists are saying that was a really bad idea. go ahead and thank a republican majority in congress and business-friendly democrat (read: lobbyist crony) bill clinton, who passed the 1999 bill that replaced glass-steagall. if anyone can provide a little more insight, please let me know.

so yeah, a couple of major investment banks of collapsed. merrill lynch is owned by bofa, aig is supposedly owned by you and i, washington mutual is courting suitors, and best of all, morgan stanley wants to sell just under half of itself to CHINA. what's wrong with selling to a chinese business, you say? it's not "a chinese business". it's a sovereign wealth fund. the people's republic of china might buy morgan stanley.

apparently all the rest of this bailout goes to we the people, to the tune of $900b or so. too bad we're already fucking broke. we listened to all of you when you said stupid bullshit like GO SHOPPING OR THE TERRORISTS WIN LULZ and NO SRSLY THE RICH DON'T NEED TO PAY TAXES. guess we'll just put it on the national credit card, right? sure. it's only another NINE HUNDRED BILLION DOLLARS OR SO, bringing our national debt to roughly $10 TRILLION or so. thank god you guys are all watching out for each other with our money, right?

minotauromachy has suggested i write some about how this relates to social security. that'll come later. if you can't tell, i'm a little too freaked out still to write rationally. instead, i'll leave you with this:

"We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah," bin Laden said in the transcript.

He said the mujahedeen fighters did the same thing to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s, "using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers."

"We, alongside the mujahedeen, bled Russia for 10 years until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat," bin Laden said.

He also said al Qaeda has found it "easy for us to provoke and bait this administration."

that's from an osama bin laden tape released FOUR YEARS AGO, to coincide with the last presidential election.

i think bin laden might be winning.