[ComfortEagle]

You have some good points. But sometimes, we have to blame ourselves. This country is now the product of greed. Myself included. We have become accustomed to the idea of having the best of things. The banking industry is in such bad shape because people overspent. Instead of buying a $100,000 house, they got a $250,000 house. The banks are also at fault for approving those loans. But this hasn't happened just under the Bush administration, this has been coming for a long time. And Bush did say eight years ago, we need to drill in the US, but tree huggers don't want that to happen. If we had started eight to ten years ago, we wouldn't be in this mess. Gov. Palin wants to drill more in Alaska, tree huggers don't want to. God put coal and oil in the ground for a reason, and that is for our use. But back on the subject of bad times: Have our huge credit card bills come from things we needed or things we just had to have? And yes, things aren't the best right now. I have a small business with 25 employees, and at times we struggle. But the last thing I need right now is higher taxes, or for the coal industry to fall apart. But as far as the college thing, there are enough grants for people to go to college if they cannot afford it. They just have to take the time to fill out the paperwork. And I don't refer to college grants as handouts, I am talking about people who are just too lazy to get a job. Those are the handouts I don't like. I hope every child who wants to go to college gets the opportunity.

I have always said that the credit crisis falls on both parties. If we want to drill, go for it, but at the same time, those things will run out and we need to be putting money into renewable energy sources.

As for college grants, they just aren't around. I know from experience. There were no grants left when I went to the financial aid office. There weren't any available and I was told I could be put on a wait list for a Pell Grant. I have been on that wait list for 4 years now and still haven't gotten the grant. There aren't enough grants to cover the amount of people who want to go to college. Getting student loans was working, but now banks do not want to lend to anybody with any chance of risk at all, especially students. And nowadays, a lot of students are in college for 5 or 6 years. That is not at the fault of the student, but a lot of that blame deserves to go to the universities who have gotten greedy and require an unnecessary amount of required gen. ed. courses. The longer a student is there, the more money the college gets.

Personally, I am considering transferring to Berea College because they are a good school known for their ability to get students financial aid.