Real Estate Investing Looms but OPEC Controls Economic Recovery

Living beyond ones means is not an issue then? Or have I misunderstood something. Isn't it a part of the problem that it is the norm to be heavily in debt? You can finance anything these days. The other day I heard an add mentioning the option to finance your mattress...YOUR MATTRESS!! Where does it end? You can even finance your groceries and gas if you put it on your credit card. So someone can sit around not working, living off of credit, (or on a larger scale, a country can live off of credit, or import way more than they export, writing IOUs to keep living the lifestyle they had dreamed about ever since sitting in front of the TV as a child, watching lifestyles of the rich and famous...hey now we all can have that lifestyle as long as we have a Visa or American Express. Is THIS the American dream???)

Isn't this a large part of the problem?

From time to time we are dealing with financial mess. It doesn’t matter how many payday loans a person took out, it still couldn’t buy this much ego. President Elect Barack Obama’s Cabinet picks are what are being referred to, as they have just been announced, and the critics are wondering just how he’s going to be able to control this group. He says he’s a believer in "strong personalities and strong opinions." Well, he had better be careful about what he wishes for, because he is going to get it. Most of his national security team and economic policy team are all used to being top dogs in their own right. For national security he has Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State, Robert Gates as his Defense Secretary, Vice President Joe Biden, four star Marine General Jim Jones (ret.) as National Security advisor, and four star Gen. David Petraeus as his U.S. Chief of Central Command. His economic team includes: National Economic Council head Larry Summers, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, and former Federal Reserve Chairman Volcker as the lead of his recovery advisory board. His chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, has been described as a "hard charger", which is adding another strong persona into an already impressive cast. This mix could be volatile if Obama is unable to rein them in with a firm hand, and pragmatic head. Regardless, he is certainly to gain a lot of wisdom from this group, and if he wants to build on the Democratic Party’s recent successes, he’s going to have to go toe to toe with the rest of these heavyweights. Click to read more on <a title="What are Payday Loans?" href="http://personalmoneystore.com/moneyblog/what-are-payday-loans-2... Loans</a>.

I am from a rural village in the Northwest Arctic and gas prices are as much as $12.00+ in some of the surrounding villages. I definitely appreciate the lower gas prices here, except when I had to commute 100 miles a day last summer until our house finally closed in August. I was spending $800 a month on gasoline. CRAZY!

I don’t live beyond my means, but I still am eaten alive when it comes to expenses. Fuel prices are still high, and things are being affected by that. Airfare, delivery surcharges, food prices are going up to reflect of "shipping" them. My husband and I do our best to pay each bill off and I am managing to put away money each paycheck and remodel the house we bought from some back in India (it was a foreclosure).

Since the dawn of our existence humans have sought to rule. Biblical wars in the name of God when it was really the control of natural resources. Look at their mission: OPEC's mission is to coordinate and unify the petroleum policies of Member Countries and ensure the stabilization of oil markets in order to secure an efficient, economic and regular supply of petroleum to consumers, a steady income to producers and a fair return on capital to those investing in the petroleum industry.