The Herald Bulletin, Anderson, Indiana

It's Tuesday morning, the day after the bailout was voted down and the stock market stepped out of a perfectly good plane without a parachute.

And I'm as angry as I've ever been in my life.

In this next election, vote no on every incumbent on the ticket. (Well, maybe not Richard Lugar. We like him.) But everyone else? Kick them out. Or at least kick out enough of them so that the others get the message:

Stop the whining and pettiness and playground childishness.

Get over yourselves.

Stop fretting about your re-election.

DO YOUR JOB.

Remember your job? That thing you won in an election? That paycheck you get from the people?

Not from the banks. Not from Wall Street. But from the people.

I believe you took an oath (emphasis mine):

"I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.

It's as if you think this is all an elaborate collegiate debate contest, and the winner gets a "free-ride scholarship." And you're arguing about the rules and how the other team is cheating while the debate hall burns to the ground.

To be fair, the American people deserve a share of the blame. And that is because there are so many of us. Undoubtedly, these corporations are beholden to their stockholders. And who holds a lot of their stock?

The retirement plans of baby boomers.

You know, that glut of people that an impossibly wise woman, Linda Ellerbee, once called "the basketball moving through the snake." The boomers have got to be throwing off the curve on this. Which doesn't help. Finding enough money to retire that many millions of people can't be easy, and might explain the snare of greed that has trapped the system.

Still and all, Congress has to do its job. Unpleasant or not. No one -- the politicians, the business people, the American public -- is going to come out of this smelling like a rose. We all screwed up.

But it is Congress' job to make the first move, to set the tone, to calm fears and smooth out the road.

And that can't happen when Congress itself is acting the fool. Stop flailing around like addled schoolchildren and grow a spine.

You wanted the job. Now do it.