Can someone loan me the C for my Redit?

Today President Obama spoke about the easing of the recession. While I have already posted on that topic, I want to talk about credit. A lot of what has happened lately has been blamed on the lack of credit. Credit it seems is the lifeblood of the American economy. Without someone else to pay your bills for you, how could you possibly buy an extra car? Obama explained that credit was needed for the auto industry in order to stir up Americans to buy new cars. Wait... isn't this really the problem with had with housing? People buying things they didn't need and couldn't afford on cheap credit? Instead of patching up the holes in the economy, maybe its time for a restructuring, we seemed to have not learned our lesson from the great depression. Easy credit + to much buying = unattainable growth. Recently I saw a Ford commercial from a local dealer in town. The dealer was offer two forms of payment on new vehicles. The first was a standard loan with interest with a fixed payment over a fixed period. The latter was a lower payment that rose in the future. That sounds awfully familiar. How could that go wrong? Oh wait... housing market. Maybe its time we realized that excessive growth rates are not the way for this country to prosper. Maybe we realize that growth at only a few percentage points a year really is not that bad. Later I want to write a post about the demand of American investors for short term returns. That, however, is another post. Until then all I can do is quote a sign that hangs in a bar in one of my favorite movies The Blues Brother... "Credit Makes Bad Friends"