Campaigning

Saturday was spent working on McCain's campaign. As part of our course work here, we are required to spend at least 30 hours between now and November 5 volunteering with a presidential campaign of our choice. It's all part of this campaign notebook we're supposed to compile about all our adventures, opinions, etc. McCain's national campaign headquarters is just over in Arlington, so it's super easy for us to get over there and help out with whatever. We started with the phone banks, making calls to the populace with the goal of asking them a few questions about who they planned to vote for and by what method, what party they affiliated themselves with. Stuff like that. We did that for about an hour then they asked for some people to go with some other staffers and work a booth set up at a street fair. So my friends and I went there, slapped on some stickers and talked it up with people. It was a chill environment with people stopping to rant or pick up bumper stickers. Democratic National Committee people were floating around too. It felt like a sports rivalry seeing them.
Afterward, I patrolled over to Old Town Alexandria to meet up with some Taylor U. people. Since I had some extra time to kill, I went down King Street, which is the main drag for Old Town. It was super rockin. I found this really cool bar which has live bluegrass every Friday and Saturday night. Most of the people who were in there looked to be at least 50 as well (not that that's old, they just weren't my age. You know). It was good to connect with a bunch of TU grads and see what they are up to in life after the rural Indiana community.
Sunday I went to Captial City Church for the second time. The people there are very welcoming and it's great to see a new set of faces who genuinely care.

In other news: as I'm sure you know, the most recent bailout plan failed in the House. Bummer. Not really. It's a shortsighted move to try and prop up those failures. It'll be as painful as all get out letting them go, for there will be repercussions. But is/was it the government's business to get involved with the financing market in the first place? Insuring people's financial ventures, while coming from a sense of goodness, creates the wrong incentive. I think the government has crossed the line, for the role of government in economics should be to oversee the transactions people voluntarily make, not, as Bastiat would say, under the guise of false philanthropy enact legal plunder. Letting banks fail would cleanse the system. But the problem with that would be freeing up the markets enough to let them self correct, which would necessitate a lot of backpedaling on legislation and tax laws. Such a move would also recquire a lot of will power on the part of the people, stemming from a belief that government has little role in market economics, thus preventing politicians from meddling in it for their own political gain. Can we get back to a nation founded on We the people?

Just simple thoughts of mine.