Four Score and More

Today’s column will be a potpourri for things that have been circulating around in my old gray matter for the past several days. Such items as Nebraska football, politics and the financial crisis.
First things first and in Nebraska that’s Cornhusker football! Some months ago in this column I had made a prediction of a 7-5 season, realizing that more than seven victories for a new first year coaching staff would be unrealistic. Now I believe that NU is going to have to turn things around in order to become bowl eligible. After watching the Virginia Tech and Missouri disasters, I know that 6-6 will be possible, but we must improve considerably. After all, we face three rated teams during the next seven weeks. Tomorrow it’s those pass-happy Texas Tech players who are ranked 7th in the nation and who have been scoring almost at will. And are a 20-point favorite! So we’ll probably be 3-3 by Saturday night.
We must face number one Oklahoma and 16th ranked Kansas on the first two Saturdays in November. This means that Baylor, Iowa State, K-State and Colorado will be very crucial games. We must be victorious in three of those four games in order to reach the .500 mark! Iowa State and Kansas State will be road affairs, which makes the task even more formidable. There is no question that Nebraska has a good coaching staff and some quality players. All the fans must be patient and expect some defeats before the Pelini system is solidly implemented and the recruits become implanted into that system. And fans must realize that perhaps we don’t yet have the talent or the depth required, but those will come in time.
As my sainted grandfather used to say “You can’t pull a heavy wagon without the right horses”.
Debate
I watched the Tuesday night debate between Obama and McCain. Thought it was quite entertaining, if not bringing forth things which I didn’t know before. They were quite civil as they punched and counterpunched as they explained their positions.
Who won? Can’t decide, so I’ll call it a draw. I don’t believe that it will change many voters’ minds, but some “undecided” might have been somewhat influenced.
I liked the format and thought the moderato did a decent job, although he failed to cut the candidates off several times when their allotted time had expired. Doubt that I would have been so lenient!
Are we broke?
This current financial situation is one of the most severe that I can remember since those horrible days of the Dirty Thirties. When I was in college, I had an advisor named Schmidt, who was an economic professor. He had some pretty solid ideas about finances. This was in the late 1930s. One thing he always emphasized was that you can’t borrow yourself into prosperity. Credit is a wonderful thing, he said, but your borrowing must never exceed the value of your assets. And that is exactly what we have done in the USA. The government as well as individual citizens! Many of the financial institutions were loaning money on housing, beyond the value of the property. That’s an economic no-no and it caught up when things got a little rough. The house of cards came crumbling down and now we’re all the losers. Is it right that everyone must suffer financially to bail out those irresponsible scoundrels on Wall Street? Probably not, but what’s done is done and we will just have to wait for the results of this ungodly bailout!
The national debt is so large that last year each and every American owed $31,000 as his portion of that debt. Now with the bailout, I figure that will have increased to about $34,000!
Now what to do personally is on everyone’s mind. For what it’s worth, here are my suggestions. First, don’t panic... don’t cash in all of your stocks and mutual funds. History has shown that they will recover, although it may take years. As FDR said years ago: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”.
Secondly, live within your income, even if it means tightening the belt a bit and doing without some luxuries. Thirdly, pay down your credit card balances as quickly as possible and save those exorbitant interest charges. Next, pay yourself something each month and put that money into insured investments. And, finally, work extra hard at your job, give your boss that extra mile, because then your job will be more secure, if unemployment raises its ugly head! And it might before the current financial situation improves!