Assuming the answer is knowable, how much, if any, would it have cost us (the taxpayers) had we *not* done this? I’m not implying it would have cost us more, for the simple reason I haven’t the foggiest. That’s why I’m asking — I mean this to be a genuine question from someone (that would be me) who doesn’t have the slightest idea how to figure this stuff out.

IF it would cost us more not to have done this (or to have taken a different route, if any were avialable), then this route seems okay, although it still leaves us holding the bag on part of the bill. If this way cost us more than doing nothing or taking another highway, well, then, this was indeed a mistake. I’ve tended to trust the government on this because of the rather extreme bipartisan nature of its roots, started under Bush and continued under a very different President, Obama. I realize the danger of placing one’s faith in such fashion, but in the absence of having the expertise of approaching it on my own, I can’t think of a better way to decide than to think, “Well, if two guys who would cut each other’s throat in a dark alley, given the chance agree, they must be on to something. I hope.”

Now that the dirty deed is done, I do hope it works and impacts us as little as possible. Counting all my taxes — federal, state, and local — I pay just shy of 40% of my gross income in taxes to over 30 different government entities with taxing authority. And that’s enough. Except I will accept paying more if it is GENUINELY for the greater good. Not because I’m Mr. Goody Two Shoues, but because the greater good is also my good, at least indirectly. Of course, there are limits to my willingness.

I have been trying to follow the CBO’s forecast(s) for budget deficits (and more importantly the debt issuance that results). Presumablly, their forecast included some amount of bailout recovery. Do you believe that their latest deficit forecast includes these projected bailout results?

Were I in your shoes, I’d be much more worried about the threat of inflation devaluing the dollars in your retirement account. It’s just straight impossible to pump as much money as TARP and the StimuTax did/will do into the economy and not experience a drop in the buying power of the dollar. It doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility that we could be not too far away from a 70’s style stagflation, or a 90’s Japan, (especially with energy prices back on the rise), and there’d be much less that the Fed could do about it compared with the risk of a drastic decrease in money supply. It’s really easy for them to print dollars, it’s NOT easy for them to recall dollars from circulation and burn them. They can increase interest rates, but are limited by how much they can do that b/c they don’t want to stifle inter-bank lending and jack up the banking system.