Keep your stocks and sell the president.

WASHINGTON, DC - In a bid to shore up investor confidence in the face of the spiraling market crisis, the Securities and Exchange Commission temporarily banned all short-selling in the shares of 799 financial companies. Short selling is a time-honored method for profiting when a stock drops.
The ban took effect immediately Friday and extends through October 2. The SEC said it might extend the ban - so that it would last for as many as 30 calendar days in total - if it deems that it is necessary.

You remember, several years ago, when the country was in the throes of an energy crisis? The thought-over solution proposed by the Bush administration was to extend Daylight Savings Time an extra six weeks - from March to November, making Standard Time practically non-existant.

Now, with the country in the throes of an economic crisis, the Bush administration's solution was to ban short selling of financial stocks by stock traders.

When a trader shorts a stock, he is aiming to profit from a drop in the stock price. Telling them that they can't do this is the best idea the administration had. It's like when your kid screws up and you send him to his room. You haven't fixed the problem but you've made it impossible for the kid to do anything else.

While you're busy asking yourself how much better off we are energy-wise with an extra two months of DST, ask yourself how much better off we'll be with this latest knee-jerk (emphasis on "jerk") reaction to a growing economic crisis.

When governments run out of ways to tax us they come up with lotteries and legalized gambling. When the people in charge run out of ways to keep unwanted things from happening, they ban the things that people use to profit from it.

Cars are faster - lower the speed limit. People are driving while intoxicated - lower the blood-alcohol limit. We like sports - charge us to watch it on television. We like to talk on the phone while we drive - make it illegal. Stocks are dropping - make the thing that creates profits illegal.

Sometimes government works against the things people enjoy. One of those documents proclaims, "Government by the people, and for the people."

Whatever happened to the people?