This is the text of an e-mail that I received from General Motors at the end of last week:

We are proud to announce we have repaid our government loan – in full, with interest, five years ahead of the original schedule. We realize we still have more to do. Our goal is to exceed every expectation you’ve set for us. We’re designing, building and selling the best cars and trucks in the world. Like the award-winning Chevy Malibu, the all-new Buick LaCrosse, the versatile Cadillac CTS Sport Wagon and the innovative GMC Terrain, just to name a few. We invite you to learn more about the new GM and join our community, by visiting gm.com.

Now, if I’m not mistaken it has already been proven that while General Motors has paid off its government loan, they paid off those bailout funds with other bailout funds! Now come on, people. Is that really a smart issue to build a marketing campaign around? Even after the most basic of “digging” do you begin to find that General Motors has not, in fact, repaid its commitments to the government.

Talk about bad form on General Motors’ part. Someone should get fired for that advertising campaign and I would strongly suggest that General Motors’ public relations department kick it into high gear to clean this mess up!

My strategy, simply, is to invest in what I know and stick with the basic fundamentals of investing in the stock market. For example, anyone who has been trolling around my network of websites for a while knows that I know a little something about professional wrestling. I’ve been keeping an eye on WWE’s stock performance for years. My study has shown me that the stock, generally, is cyclical around WrestleMania. In other words, the stock usually goes up a little bit around that time of the year and then falls after the show and its hype go away. With that in mind, I bought a bunch of WWE when it was in its lull and then waiting for WrestleMania time to sell. Easy enough, right?

But my strategy hasn’t really been the traditional “buy low, sell high,” rather it has been to take a reasonable amount of risk on those companies which are showing some resilience in the current market like Ford. In December when Ford went to Congress with hat in hand saying that it needed more funds, I wouldn’t invest in the company. But as soon as they came out with projections that showed they could sustain their business without a bailout I put a bunch of money into their stock. The total of my investments in Ford are up 157% as of this writing (and the stock is even down when this post is being written).

I did the same thing with Sirius XM. I know what their product is and enough about their financials to know that this company could be a real threat once it clears up its debt obligations so I invested a ton of money in the stock when it was trading at 14 and 16 cents. The stock now routinely trades in the 40 to 50 cent range and I expect it to trade even higher in the coming months and years. Not a bad deal overall, huh?

But I’m also investing in companies like Barnes & Noble. The difference with Barnes & Noble and the other companies is that I’m not looking so much for an increase in the stock price with this company, but rather I’m looking to acquire their stocks so I can enjoy their quarterly dividend (which, last time around, was a quarter per share). Earning 25% on your investment each quarter is nothing to scoff at – I’ll take it.

I guess the other difference between me and the stereotypical investor is that I’m not dropping huge gobs of money into the market. Where most people think that the typical investor is putting in tens of thousands of dollars, I’m content putting in just a few hundred every few weeks (which has now built me up to a few thousand overall).

I always keep in mind, though, what else I might use that money for instead of investing. For example, if I’m buying $100 worth of Barnes & Noble I might have otherwise used that money for a night out at the bar or a night down in Atlantic City. In the long run, putting the money in the market is a much smarter decision. At least I think so.

This isn’t a suggestion for everyone out there to jump into the market, but I would encourage everyone to give it some thought. If you would otherwise blow the money on useless stuff, then why not?

Sesit suggests the following:

Early last year, Congress passed, and President George W. Bush signed, a $168 billion stimulus bill whose centerpiece was about $100 billion in personal-tax rebates. Only about a third of the rebate checks, which ranged from $300 to more than $1,200 for some families, were spent, Mishel says. Others put the unspent portion as high as 80 percent.

“It was not an effective way to get the economy back on track,” Mishel says,

A survey of people eligible to receive tax rebates of $300 or $600 in 2001 found that only 22 percent of households receiving the money spent it, according to a study by Matthew Shapiro and Joel Slemrod at the University of Michigan.

You can learn a few things from this, some of which we might have already assumed. First, is it a surprise to anyone that nearly 80% of the people who received a check last year put it in the bank and didn’t spend it? Americans are hurting for money. Any middle or lower income family will tell you that they probably used the money they received last spring to either buoy their savings accounts or pay down some of their debts.

By the way, I have to bring up an odd coincidence here. How interesting is it that Americans used the checks to strengthen their savings accounts much like banks used their bailout money to strengthen their balance sheets? The purpose of the checks last spring were to get Americans spending money – it didn’t happen. The purpose of the bailout dollars to the banks was to get them making loans again – it didn’t happen. Just thought I’d point that out.

If you get a chance, I suggest reading Sesit’s op-ed – it’s interesting and presents a more “what do we need now” point of view. For what it’s worth, I think the economy needs many things, but most of all we need a readjustment of costs. Take housing, for example. There are homes on the market that are selling for 20% – 40% below their listing price and they are still too expensive.

The rewards came even at banks where poor results last year foretold the economic crisis that sent them to Washington for a government rescue. Some trimmed their executive compensation due to lagging bank performance, but still forked over multimillion-dollar executive pay packages.

Benefits included cash bonuses, stock options, personal use of company jets and chauffeurs, home security, country club memberships and professional money management, the AP review of federal securities documents found.

The total amount given to nearly 600 executives would cover bailout costs for many of the 116 banks that have so far accepted tax dollars to boost their bottom lines.

Seriously, is anyone surprised by this information? A few months ago I suggested that the bailout would be doomed. Anyone could have seen this coming. Who in their right mind would trust the government with such a gigantic dollar amount? It’s insane. Did everyone forget that this is the government?!

The better way to have used that bailout money would have been to give each American a stipend a la the Bush stimulus check from last spring. Why would this have been a better use of the money? Because regular citizens know where they need financial assistance and how best to spend their tax dollars. When you leave the doling out of $350 billion (only half of the $700 billion bailout has been deployed) to the government, you’re essentially asking for the whole thing to go to shit.

And it has. Great!

Thank God I have an independent mind of my own to make up my own decisions! The amount of bias in the media these days is scary.

Anyway, if you really want to declare a winner last night it might have to be Tom Brokaw. Talk about a guy who managed to annoy almost everyone watching by being the only one who was doing his job correctly! That’s got to be a tough position for someone to be in – the straight man between two candidates for Presidents. And was it just me or did Brokaw look extremely white, pale, and aged?

All in all the debate was more bore than anything else. Neither of these candidates is going to put themselves out there and make a major statement during the debates, though McCain almost did with his statement regarding the Treasury buying up all of the bad mortgage debt out there. I am not a fan of this at all – nor am I a fan of this ridiculous bailout (which has so far led to the market falling further).

The real shame of our times is that neither McCain nor Obama have what it takes to fix the economy, yet these are the two choices that we are given. Third party anyone?

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Capitalism. What a country we live in, huh? You have the opportunity to do anything that you want in America. Some folks are fortunate that they are born into wealthier families and thus they have less financial pressures. Other people are born into highly religious families and they are usually happier and more content. Yet some still are born into poor families with strong family bonds and they learn the power of relationships. We have it all in America including an economy where you can either make it on your own (Bill Gates) or climb up the corporate ladder to find success. That’s what a capitalist system is based on!

But in a capitalist system, you can also fail. There are many reasons for failure, not the least of which is greed, deception, and bad decision-making. Many of the failing financial institutions were marred by these characteristics and – in a capitalist system – this will lead to failure. Whether it’s a loan officer who is closing a loan that he knows is not good for the borrower so he can make some extra income (greed), an internal manager who fudges the numbers so his bosses won’t get mad at him and his division for under-performing (deception), or a company hiring the wrong people to the wrong positions (bad decision-making) – this is what happens in our system!

And in a capitalist system when you fail – YOU FAIL. Imagine if the casinos in Atlantic City and Las Vegas gave you your money back after you blew it throughout the night. Unacceptable.

The Smell Test. I don’t know about you guys, but when I hear that the people who already proved that they are not good at running their organizations will be getting government dollars (i.e. taxpayer dollars) to bail their companies out, that pisses me off. This country was not founded on bailing out greedy scumbags with taxpayer dollars. In fact, you can make a case that taking money from taxpayers and using it for ignoble purposes is what spurred the American Revolution. What the hell am I paying taxes for? To pay the $20 million payout package of the CEO who failed at WaMu?

This bailout idea does not pass the smell test. How can you give money back to the people who squandered it? NO ONE in their right minds would do that! Would you give a murderer a gun while he’s in the courtroom? Good grief!

Consumer Debt. This one pisses me off the most. A portion of this $700 billion is supposed to go towards a housing trust fund to help bailout those mortgagees who are in over their heads. What a crock of shit this one is!

What about those people who have already lost their homes? How are they supposed to be helped from this bailout? They already lost in this game! What about those punks who knowingly went out there and bought up too much house for their income? They are to be rewarded for not living within their means?!? Well what the F is that all about!? Maybe I should go out and buy a million dollar mansion really quick since I know the taxpayers are about ready to pay it off for me.

And why are we only looking at mortgages? I heard a rumor that some of this bailout will be aimed at those with high consumer debt. So if you’ve overextended yourself with credit cards or other loans, you might not have to worry about making the payments! Do student loans fall into that category? I doubt it. What a bunch of bullshit that is??! I go out of my way to spend money on a venture that increases my knowledge and is a proven method of making society “better” (it’s a cost-benefit analysis thing) and yet I’m now being asked to spend MORE money for those who make bad decisions? Are you out of your f’ing mind?!

What if all of us who have ridiculous student loans start bitching and moaning? Will we get a bailout, too?

Artificial Timelines. Why does a bailout bill need to be reached by midnight tonight? Why does something need to be done before the markets open on Monday? This is crazy. The market will do what the market does. Do we really have to take $700 billion in taxpayer dollars and spend it on bailing out the system? NO!

This entire bailout thing is such a complete joke. There is no way to make everyone happy. The real shame, though, is that there are real people in this country who were duped into making the wrong decision and their situations are different. They are being lumped into this bailout mess and it’s not right. Those people who were out there scamming homeowners and new homeowners should be found and prosecuted to the greatest extent possible. It’s a disgrace.