I buy expensive suits. They just look cheap on me.

-- Warren Buffett

You know what's wrong with this country?

It's not stock manipulators or Detroit automakers. It's not bailout babies and promise-you-anything politicians.

It's me.

Me, and many like me, who have apparently put our nation, our global economy and even our modern way of life into a recession because we don't like to spend money.

We had a recent front-page story addressing what it called the "New Frugality" -- Americans who don't like to part with their money unless it's necessary.

We're being blamed for not buying stuff and ruining the economy and messing up Wall Street and being unpatriotic, blah, blah, blah.

"I think they're talking about you," said my wife from the kitchen table with the aforementioned article in front of her.

I shrugged and went back to reviewing my collection of grocery store circulars, charting the prices of milk and bread.

It's an old debate at our house.

She'll come home from a sale and announce. "I saved us money! I paid half price and got these two shirts for $20."

"Well," I'll say, clouding over her sunny enthusiasm, "you could have not bought them at all and saved us $20 more."

She just glares, and I know enough not to say anything else.

Now don't get me wrong. I'm not cheap.

Cheap is taking extra sugar packets from McDonald's or checking the break-room vending machine change dispenser for forgotten nickels.

Cheap is turning off the porch lights on Halloween because you don't want to give away candy.

Cheap is skipping lunch at home but going to the grocery store and eating a whole tray of free samples put out by that little old lady who looks like somebody's grandmother.

No, I don't do those things. ... OK, sometimes I check the change tray.

But I am generous to my friends and family. I give appropriately to church. The bills and credit card charges are paid on time. And I give to almost every charity or school program that asks my help.

But.

I still don't like to spend money if I don't have to.

It's pretty obvious, too. My brother once said watching me open my billfold to extract a $20 bill is like "watching a man considering donation of a kidney."

It's a comment that has become sort of a family joke.

I'll let them all have their laugh, but then I tell them I could be worse, Then I share this story.

It seems a small town once had a very wealthy businessman who played by the rules but was known for not taking part in any annual giving campaigns.

One year, a new fundraiser came to town and confidently told his associates that he could make the old businessman change.

He secured an appointment, made an excellent presentation, then waited for the man to whip out his checkbook.

"Young man," the old businessman said after a moment of silence, "were you not aware that my own mother is lying in a lonely hospital bed 100 miles away, awaiting surgery that may save her life?"

"Well, no," said the fundraiser.

"And did you know," asked the businessman, "that my brother and his family of five recently lost everything they had when a hurricane struck their home in Florida?"

"No, sir," the young man said. "I did not know that."

"And did you know that my old family church, founded by my great-grandfather and for many a beacon of hope in my hometown, recently burned to the ground?"

"No," said the young man, quietly looking at the floor.

"That's right," said the old businessman, "it's sad, but true. And if I won't give any of them a check, what makes you think I'll give one to you?"