In the wake of passage by Congress of a $152 billion economic stimulus plan, a guest columnist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer asks:

Is it too much to suggest that consumerism has become a kind of alternative faith, a religion of sorts? Religions are characterized by some vision of a good life, by their rituals and by a particular language. Consumerism seems to be developing all three apace.

Writer Anthony B. Robinson will hear no objection from me. As he observes, Americans have gone from using citizen as our default designation to consumer. And we are taking on our consumer role with religious-like fervor, aided and abetted by a Congress and president that understand the very basis for our economy is consumerism.

So now, because mortgage and finance companies succeeded in gaining more consumers with loans they could neither afford nor sustain, creating the subprime crisis, we have a stimulus package, a kind of consumer Viagra, to get us up and buying again. Is something wrong with this picture?

Yes, Anthony, there is.