Dear Senator John McCain,

On Monday, you were quoted saying that the US Economy's fundamentals were strong. This outlandish claim comes on the day after the venerable 158 year-old Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection, a week after the highest unemployment numbers in 5+ years were released (the real unemployment figures are even higher - the numbers don't count another 2 million unemployed people who no longer qualify for unemployment insurance), two days before the Fed bought 80% of AIG, and smack in the middle of the so-called sub-prime debacle spilling over into the global financial markets. The US GDP hasn't contracted yet, but my retirement accounts sure have. And let's not forget, your economic advisers are the guys who wanted to privatize Social Security, placing our retirement savings and financial security in Wall Street's hands. I guess that they're doing that anyway though these "bail-outs" (read: "nationalization of large financial institutions"). But I digress...

Your opinion on the state of the economy would be sadly comedic if you weren't running for president. Instead, I can't help but be reminded of the final scene from Animal House, where Kevin Bacon's character, ROTC commander Chip Diller, frantically cries "Remain calm. All is well!" while he's being trampled in a riot.

I guess that I and my middle-class colleagues making less than $5 million per year just have to sit tight and hope that smart people are solving the problem, because you haven't proposed much in the way of regulation, reform, or anything else to get us out of this mess.

Signed, yet another crybaby in a nation of whiners.