The middle option is flawed--more expensive for taxpayers, more windfalls to speculators--but it's better than the Tim/Larry plan.
Even among those who distrust politicians or are unhappy not to see a more concrete windfall from the January revolution, there is a recognition that the country has already changed tremendously.
The so-called "Oscar bump" can be good for $5 million or $10 million, or even more, a windfall of cash at the box office that rewards those who made good films and ran good campaigns behind them.
The only difference now is that if and when Wall Street guys do come forward to offer a narrow window into their industry's wrongdoing, they can expect a more generous windfall in the form of reliably reduced penalties.
Courage, not authority, is what the three Republican naysayers obviously lack as political operatives from both parties salivate for even more secret windfalls.
"What we see in Silicon Valley is more premeditated windfalls," said Ronald Gong, managing director for family office services at Harris myCFO, a Palo Alto, Calif., financial planning service.
In fact, there's actually research that says we tend to spend a windfall more than once.
But they might consider investing a bit more of their windfall in stabilising Iraq and the broader Middle East, not just in their fabulous pleasure domes.
Indeed, Palin's much ballyhooed confrontations with the oil industry have all been about who should get more of the windfall profits, not how to end our addiction.
They see little reason to make such a sacrifice again.Blowing windfallsSaudi Arabia can survive low prices because, when oil was $100 a barrel, it saved more of the windfall than it spent.
