I don't know which is worse, falling stocks or a falling sky, but I tell you what, I can't help but to see history repeating itself.  I mean, with the Dow taking a big plunge I can just see investors taking a plunge right along with it - out of a 25 story window.  So is this $700 billion bailout plan really supposed to work?  And if so, why are the tax payers bearing the brutal responsibility of financing such an innovative idea.  Even though the money is more than likely being printed up, we're still going to have to pay higher taxes.  It seems like when we get into a financial crises, our government has a knack of magically creating monies with the use of some good ole fashioned paper, ink, and some plates.  However, when the mob does it or when "people of special interest" do it, it's illegal.  But the government can do it and it is considered "necessary", therefore okay. Well, at least the mob isn't inadvertently beating tax payers over the head with increased taxes just because they decided to print up a couple-a-million dollars. Our government, on the other hand, will more than likely do just that.  And they don't even have the galls to clue us in.  And are we ever going to come from underneath the shadow of our 7 trillion dollar national debt?  I mean seriously, is it even possible.  7 trillion dollars?  I can barely pronoun it, let alone fathom anyone owing that much.  If I were ever convicted of owing that much money to anyone, I'd plead insanity - because that is an insane amount of money. But, I suppose the urgency of this problem makes it worth fixing - regardless of how it's fixed (even if we have to beg, steal, and borrow) because just by looking back on history, our economic crisis could impact the world.  I know I'm probably preaching to the choir right now.  I mean, everyone knows this, even my seven year old son.  But do we really understand why?  Those are the things that we miss in the news. The answers to the questions "WHY".  They tell us that if our economy folds it would greatly impact the rest of the world.  But why?  How?I mean, when I watch the news I don't want to simply be informed.  I want to be educated.  Don't just tell me something in which I do not know.  Teach me something about that something in which I do not know.   Now from what I gathered about this whole little predicament we're in, in the early 1930s when the stock market crashed in 1929 (dam, sound familiar) which was the dawn of a new age: The Great Depression.  Due to our extensive trade and dealings with other countries, they too felt the sting (hey! sounds like what's going on today!).  So I guess, while the bailout plan is opposed by some, it is better than the alternative.  And that's living in a time where you have no financial security.  We (Americans or Westerners - which ever one makes you feel warm and cuddly) have established a precedence for the kind of lifestyle that is acceptable and desirable.  It seems to be taken from that old Texan saying: "Everything's BIGGER in TEXAS".  And that's true for America when compared to there rest of the world. Houses, cars, jewelry, even Americans are bigger in America.  So are we prepared to give that up?  I Jay Z ready to give up his Lear Jets and vacations to the Virgins?  Is Tom Cruise ready to stop funding Scientology?  You think that Oprah is ready to put her show and her book reading club on hold and come back to Mississippi where her roots are?  Not for a New York Minute. If those people are going to be alright then surly the peons (that would be us common working folk) who fall financially far beneath them will be just fine - because some players in our government don't mind taxing the begezious out of the the richies (that's correct spelling) of the world.  I'm sure we'll be fine.  We will survive.  We will evolve.  We're Americans - rulers of the Universe.