“Obama’s administration needs to act quickly to stimulate our ailing economy. One possibility for both stimulating the economy, preventing the collapse of the auto industry, tackling climate change, & promoting oil independence is to offer “cash for clunkers” – drivers could be given vouchers toward the purchase of newer, more fuel-efficient vehicles, with the old vehicles scrapped to get them off the road.”

I think those Brookings dudes may have something here. It certainly sounds like a plan to me; I’ve got an ‘89 I’d trade in for better gas mileage in a heartbeat!

We all know the saying, “What happens here, stays here“, but a more appropriate Vegas slogan should be “Yesterday’s Hottest Real Estate Market, Today’s Foreclosure Poster Child“.

* UPDATE 12/11/08: Las Vegas: The Suicide Capital Of America

The Today Show just aired research they performed with a Main Street family to determine whether store brands were just as good as name brand products.

With help from the mother, they swapped all the packaging of several products so the family members had no idea what was going on for a whole week.

The Result

As I’ve known for years, the store brand products are just as good, and they even saved 25% in the process!

Apparently people think all those supermarkets make those store brand products themselves – duh!

Actually, it’s more like they believe anything they’re told by the boob tube and advertising.

Me? I’ve also muted commercials for years!

Here’s 3 courses of action Congress should take against the auto industry:

1. Transporting Americans is and should be one of the most important functions our government must address. And because we are facing a massive economic, energy and environmental crisis, the new president and Congress must do what FDR did when he was faced with a crisis – order the auto industry to stop building cars and instead build tanks and planes: The Big 3 are, from this point forward, to build only cars that are not primarily dependent on oil and, more importantly to build trains, buses, subways and light rail. This will not only save jobs, but create millions of new ones.

The fact that nobody is talking about all the money being used to bailout XYZ corporations here in the states vs. getting us out of Iraq is just mind-numbing!

OpenCRS lays out the numbers for us:

Congress has approved a total of about $864 billion for military operations, base security, reconstruction, foreign aid, embassy costs, and veterans’ health care for the three operations initiated since the 9/11 attacks:

1. Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) – Afghanistan and other counter terror operations,
2. Operation Noble Eagle (ONE) – providing enhanced security at military bases, and
3. Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF).

Of that total, CRS estimates that:

• Iraq will receive about $657 billion (76%),
• OEF about $173 billion (20%), and

Since I grabbed this “Will Code HTML For Food” image off the internet sometime ago, I can’t remember where it came from, but thanks to John’s Background Switcher, I see it every now and then on my desktop, and right now, it really hits home with a lot of folks.

Thanks to my wife Natalie, luckily I’m not in that dire a strait, but believe me, if it weren’t for her, I’d be a piece of wet toast out in the rain today.

So, to all you people that have a lock solid secure job, congratulations! For those that don’t, be as frugal as possible. Luckily, that’s something I actually am pretty good at.

Multinational Monitor‘ is a bimonthly magazine Ralph Nader founded back in 1980. Although its primary focus is on analysis of corporations, especially in the Third World, Multinational Monitor also publishes articles on labor issues and occupational safety and health, the environment, globalization, privatization, the global economy, the export of hazardous substances, and developing nations.

His “Top Ten Worst Corporations” list names the top ten culprits of “corporate crime, negligence and dastardly behavior” every year.

Here is this year’s list:

1. AIG
2. Cargill
3. Chevron
4. CNPC
5. Constellation Energy
6. Dole
7. General Electric
8. Imperial Sugar
9. Philip Morris International
10. Roche

… and how they made it:

• Improper political influence,
• Deregulation and non-enforcement,
• Short-term thinking,
• Financialization,