I am not a politician. I am not an economist. I am a taxpayer who has only been to Washington on sightseeing trips.

I don’t understand. And I believe anyone who claims to understand our current financial circus is not being truthful with himself or others. There are so many data points that simply make no sense.

You’ve heard the phrase, “too big to fail”. It’s used in reference to an entity believed to be so large and necessary that all possible must be be done to ensure its continued “success”. The weekend bailout of Citigroup, Inc. is an example of an action to save a company believed to be “too big” to allow “to fail”.

The Citigroup bailout is reported to be worth $30 Billion. It happened quickly, over the weekend, and didn’t stir up a lot of questions on the national scene. Why not?

Recently, all the big three automakers wanted was $25 Billion. They didn’t get it. Congress held hearings. The CEOs of the auto makers begged. The autoCEOs drove home empty handed.

The chaos that seems rampant in the U.S. may be a consequence of what I believe is a corollary to “too big to fail”.

If you’ve ever interacted with the different departments of an insurance company (I recently talked by phone to more than a dozen employees of my insurance company during a three week period) you begin to wonder if the corollary to “too big to fail” isn’t “too big to succeed.”

What if companies (and economies) become too big to succeed and the manipulative efforts like those being attempted now are doomed to failure.

Politicians proclaim, “I believe in a free economy.” But they don’t. Google the name Bush with the phrase “free economy”. You’ll see that “free economy” has become a political cliche. There is no free economy. A “free economy” implies that those companies which are “too big to succeed” are actually allowed to fail. They would not be bailed out. Instead, perhaps in a future iteration, something better would be given birth.

Nature has an object lesson: no tree grows to the sky.