The $700 trillion Washington bailout has yet to slow, much less correct, the global market meltdown. Now the plan is for the Federal government to directly invest in U.S. banks in another attempt to stem the rolling credit crisis.

Of course, this is a case of the so-called best minds not having a clue as to how to fix a problem. Sadly, it was the wise ones of Washington and Wall Street that first crafted the undoing of our financial system.

Those who believe that government is the solution have once again found a way to force a little socialism into the system. The same people who think that the government, not the individual, is the source of all good have made a power grab so bold as to place the executive branch of the federal government as shylock over the entire banking system.

We are now entering into the poison waters charted by Marx and traveled by every failed socialist state.

We, the American taxpayers, are but pawns in this devil’s bargain.

These latter day cousins of Doctor Faust having made their deal now demand that we the people pay Mephistopheles with our sweat and toil.

The story of Faust is a timeless German legend in which Faust makes a pact with the Devil in exchange for knowledge, ironically in Latin Faustus means “auspicious” or “lucky.”

In the earliest telling of Faust, he is a man forever damned because he prefers human to “divine” knowledge.

Each Faustian story carries a cautionary message that wanting more and more leads to moral decay.

As too much food leads to gluttony, too much greed leads to a panoply of evil.

Often misquoted, the Bible says that, “the LOVE of money is the root of all evil.”

It is not money in and of itself but the love of it. What one loves they can never have enough of, therefore it becomes the object on which life is centered, the ordering principle from which flows all life’s activity.

All Faustian bargains have another thing in common; the maker of the deal is pleased with the bargain because he or she never thinks that the debt will be collected. But, the piper will always demand payment.

Many American’s have been living in what I call “debtor’s euphoria,” a state in which self-delusion causes a reasonable human being into believing that a miracle will come to relieve all their indebtedness. Another symptom is believing that one can borrow their way out of debt. This is a pathology that has time and again caused our national leaders to infuse capitalism with a dose of socialism. This, however, does not cure the problem it only delays the consequences until the next bubble burst.

Here is a bit of shocking news, the American Dream is not a right, it has to be earned, the promise is that you have a right to pursue it. This means that no one is entitled to own a home but everyone is free to work for ownership.

Somehow, as a nation, we have become deluded into believing that credit is the fast track toward prosperity. In fact, debt makes every debtor a slave and the slave is beholden to the owner. Credit card debt is a euphemism for debt slavery. Having everything and having it now is a vice that appeals to our base nature. It is fostered by easy credit which in the end leaves us owned by our things.

Like Faust, we trade all for more and find that all is lost and more is never enough.

We have been hearing a chorus of voices proclaiming a loss of confidence in the market and even the promise of the biggest government intervention in our history cannot restore the panicked investor. So, are we in need of the Tinkerbelle solution? Okay, everyone clap your hands and repeat after me, “I do believe in free markets, I do believe in free markets, I do believe, I do believe.”

That is about as good an answer as we have heard so far.

So, my friends as we pay the price for greed, and the government’s mandating of the American Dream, let me state that for a credit contract your labor will do but for your soul a drop of blood is required. We must be vigilant or the fed will soon demand even that.