Can You Vote Like a Fifth Grader?

The WSJ has an article this week about some homeowners' feeling that the subprime bail out is "unfair." As in, if you got locked into an ARM and couldn't afford the reset, then you deserve whatever happens to you.

Although the wall between the editorial page and the newsroom is pretty solid at WSJ (and thank God, since I'm pretty sure the desiccated remains of Adam Smith are displayed, relic style, in the former), it's possible that this article represents the rare breach.

After all, the WSJ editorial page feels VERY STRONGLY that there should be NO TAXES EVER, but ESPECIALLY NOT ON RICH PEOPLE. (Their caps. I know, it's weird. And it's only those three phrases, but they allcap 'em every time.) And nothing triggers tax hikes like the government spending money to slow a runaway train aimed right at many thousands of middle class homeowners.

I will, for the moment, ignore the growing evidence that for months, if not not years, unethical mortgage brokers steered customers to subprime mortgages even when the customers qualified for regular loans, or better still, FHA loans, because it was more lucrative for the broker to do so. Let's just skip that part.

Let's go to the part where the government shouldn't help someone else out because it's unfair to you, because you made sure you weren't financially boned.

Since when did being a bratty oldest child become a legitimate political position? And I say that AS a bratty oldest child.

Is this a thing now? Are there going to be political positions based on all our darkest childhood moments? Will presidential candidates scuffle at the debates until a moderator tells them to knock it off -- and even then, maybe Edwards takes one last parting swing at Clinton?

In the same vein, I caught six seconds of an NPR piece which featured a woman saying "I don't want to pay to feed someone else's child breakfast at school every morning."

Right. No, good. Because that free breakfast is the equivalent of the free Clinique gift with purchase -- every kid for miles around is angling wildly for their bowl of Mini Wheats. And who wouldn't? Let's just have kids from low-income homes starve through seven hours of school. Screw lunch. If we're not serving breakfast, why not go whole hog. Fantastic. No absolutely, why feed other people's kids? Let'em starve.

Or better yet, let them drop out in the sixth grade when the frustration of trying to learn on an empty stomach finally becomes too much. Because packs of middle school drop outs roaming neighborhoods does wonders for property values. They're also great for not having your car stolen out of the garage in the middle of the night.

If we're all voting on what we consider fair, then I vote that I shouldn't have to pay for military-dictatorship levels of policing, just because some withered old bag doesn't want her tax dollars to be spent on Cheerios.