This country is now officially in a recession, and it's not hard to see that we are playing a very delicate balancing act that could throw our economy into a depression. [ Recently, America's Truck Drivers have rallied, shut down, and protested in an effort to bring diesel fuel prices down, and MANY people that aren't Truckers have joined together and shown their support. Why? Because they realize that not only is the Trucking industry the life blood of this nation, but the higher the cost is to operate a Truck, the higher the cost of retail goods will be.

 

Everything you use, buy, sell, or even own was brought by a truck in one way or another.  Most people realize that the car they drive and the clothes they wear were delivered to the store by a Truck, but did you ever stop to think about the fact the home you live in depended on Trucks to be built? Every piece of lumber, drywall, carpet, etc. in your home was delivered by a Truck.  Even the water you drink flows through pipes and out of a faucet that was delivered by a Truck. Have you or anyone you know every been ill or had to go to the hospital?  You can thank a Trucker for delivering the medication to the pharmacies, and for the building materials used to build the hospitals. 

 

Even the medical supplies at your doctors office was delivered by a Truck. When the operating cost of a Tractor Trailer goes up, everything goes up. We are fighting to get some kind of control over these spiraling costs, and the nation is fighting to keep the cost of gasoline at a reasonable level as well.  The American Trucker has struck the first blow in this battle, and it's time that EVERY AMERICAN citizen join in the fight! There are insiders talking about gasoline prices climbing to $5 and $6 a gallon soon, and there's no telling whether diesel will top out lower or higher than that.  Even the home heating oil many people use is expected to continue climbing. Unless America joins together soon to find immediate solutions, this country could be facing an economic crash of the likes that haven't been seen since the great depression. While few of us are old enough to know what it was like during the great depression that started in 1929, hopefully there are some of us that are smart enough to read about it. While the conditions that turn a mild and short recession or ordinary business cycle into a great depression is a subject of debate and concern, I believe an excerpt from "Beckoning Frontiers" (New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1951) hits the nail on the head regarding what caused the great depression, and what is happening again right now: "Had there been a better distribution of the current income from the national product -- in other words, had there been less savings by business and the higher-income groups and more income in the lower groups -- we should have had far greater stability in our economy.

 

Had the six billion dollars, for instance, that were loaned by corporations and wealthy individuals for stock-market speculation been distributed to the public as lower prices or higher wages and with less profits to the corporations and the well-to-do, it would have prevented or greatly moderated the economic collapse that began at the end of 1929."

 

This was written by Marriner S. Eccles who served as Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Chairman of the Federal Reserve from November, 1934 to February, 1948 when he detailed what he believed caused the Depression in his memoirs. Read that carefully, then consider who the author was, his position in government, and the fact he wrote it AFTER he was no longer in a position of confidiality and was free to disclose his views on the subject. If you look at our current economic situation, it's not hard to see that we are in the same situation now. We are coming up on an election for the president of the United States, and none of the candidates have even touched on the issue of fuel prices, let alone made any promises to bring them under control.  Are they afraid to admit they won't, or even can't do anything? America, it's time we stood together as our forefathers did and demand that drastic changes be made in our government immediately before this country is driven to the point of economic disaster. David Perkins