Congress approved a $700 billion bailout last week for the financial wizards on Wall Street who were losing their backsides on bad mortgage investments.

Democrats and Republicans were on board with this bill, even though they knew a majority of Americans were downright angry about spending billions of tax dollars on another bailout.

The previous bailout a few months ago was for $300 billion.

Pretty soon we’ll be talking about real money.

The one big justification for the bailout was that it would help the American economy. I seriously doubt that. I think it helped the wealthy stockholders in the big investment banks on Wall Street. They were the ones who could have lost a great deal if Congress hadn’t bailed out the banks with tax dollars.

The truth is that the American economy is sagging under the financial stress of gasoline and diesel fuel that still cost almost $4 per gallon. The economy is supporting two wars that have cost nearly a trillion dollars to date. Those two factors are crushing the American economy, but no one in Congress or the White House wants to admit it.

Can you imagine Congress rushing to pass a bill that lowers the price of a gallon of regular gasoline or diesel to $2 per gallon and caps it at that price? Or can you imagine Congress launching an investigation into how predatory trading practices on Wall Street may be feeding the high fuel costs at the pump?

Members of Congress don’t care about people having to pay $50 to $100 for a tank of gas or diesel fuel, or the small trucker who has to pay $800 to fill his or her 18-wheeler. Those costs are squeezing the life out of our economy. People have less disposable income to spend. Eighty percent of our economy is consumer spending.

I truthfully haven’t heard anyone currently running for Congress or the presidency give specific answers about the energy crisis. How will the presidential candidates lower gasoline prices?

Excessively high gasoline and diesel prices are raising the cost of doing business across the United States. I recently asked a local air conditioning repairman if the gas prices were hurting him. He said the prices weren’t affecting him because he has built the increases into higher fees. I appreciated his honest answer. What else would you expect him to do, absorb the costs?

High fuel costs are hitting paycheck consumers and fixed income people the worst. The paycheck consumers are those who depend on a paycheck for their survival. Fixed income people are people who depend on Social Security for their survival or have some modest retirement income.

Their checking accounts are shrinking. They are buying less and spending more of their incomes on the absolute necessities of life.

That $700 billion dollar figure is about what we have spent on the Iraq war to date, give or take a few billion. This isn’t play money. You might think it’s the kind of play money you can buy in a toy store, given the way Congress and the President throw it away like it’s worth nothing.

We are approaching the first winter when the record prices for fossil fuels – the $4 variety -- will begin to hit households in the north, in particular. If we have a cold winter, heating a home in the northern states, and here, could be a very big deal. And it could raise gas prices at the pump again. Gasoline for cars and trucks is made from the same oil used to heat many homes.

This all may sound like a lot of whining on my part, but I am beginning to wonder when Congress will take care of the little man. I hear a lot about tax breaks from the two presidential candidates, but those tax breaks won’t amount to a hill of beans. If I get a $1,000 tax break, I still have to spend $5,000 more than I used to on gasoline next year. The tax break won’t help me.

Perhaps they are not explaining their energy plans in a way that I can understand. I think the American economy will continue to struggle unless someone comes up with a plan for considerably less expensive fuel at the pump. If either one of the presidential candidates can explain how they plan to accomplish lower gas prices at the pump they will win my vote on Nov. 4.

But I’m not holding my breath at this point. Both candidates supported the $700 billion bailout of Wall Street investment banks and they haven’t said a word about lowering gasoline prices.

Maybe we do need change.