Yes, 2011 has repeated 2008. The first quarter GDP "growth" was only .4%. The second quarter "growth" was initially set at 1.3%, but that is subject to REVISION. That is at least as bad as the first half of 2008., when the mainstream media and leftist Democrats were pounding the idea that we were in recession. What is the mainstream media saying this time? Right. They OCCASIONALLY put forward the DANGER of a "double dip" recession, without even mentioning the parallel to 2008, and what they--as well as leftist Democrats--were asserting then. Now we already know that the mainstream media, and leftist Democrats, are the worst hypocrites to ever walk the Earth, on two legs or four. Therefore, you might dismiss this as the usual hypocrisy. But hold on.
When did the recession of 2008-2009 BEGI? The OFFICIAL beginning of the recession (according to the organization anointed as the arbiter of such things) was January 1, 2008. In other words, Dick Durbin and the rest could be said to have been RIGHT about the beginning of the 2008 recession, although they actually had us in a recession in 2007. The GDP was GROWING in the first two quarters of 2008, about the SAME as it is now (or less), but the official determination was that we were already in recessioin.
"But, Skip, does not this TALK about a recession again taking hold become a self-fulfilling prophecy? Does it not hurt the economy. Are YOU helping to hurt the economy?"
Of course it hurts. It hurts now, and it hurt in 2008. In fact, it hurt MORE in 2008, becaue it directly led to the PANIC as things started to fall apart. And, in 2008, the MEDIA and DEMOCRATS were HYPING the bad economy every single day. Yes, Republicans are sometimes saying that we are still in a recession, but they do not get the megaphone amplification that the media gave leftist Democrats in 2008. The media amplified every single doomsday statement about the economy in 2008. Today, they are amplifying every POSITIVE thing that happens. Their problem, of course, is that very few positive things are happening. In short, the media was out to GET President Bush in 2008, and they are out to PROP UP Barack Obama in 2011. That really appears to be the only real difference between the two years.
That is the problem (the unrelenting bad news). Yes, it hurts the future economy to make negative comments on the economy. But if you don't face reality, then the situatioin becomes worse. For example, Ben Bernanke (the Worst Failure in the history of world finance) was appointed head of the Federal Reserve in 2006. What did he do for the next two years, as I (for one) was saing that the housing bubble was bursting? He did NOTHING. He fiddled while Rome burned. Yep. I just callled Bernanke Nero, fiddling at the burning of Rome, and I am worried that I am libeling Nero. Ignoring reality does not help you, in the end. Worse, people do NOT believe you. When the government, and the media, deny what everyone knows is happening, our institutions simply lose all credibility. People with even more doosday scenarios than me, and more audience, fill the void and become the people who are listened to (as more apparently honest than the dishhonest media and politicians). At some point, there is a death spiral. And Polyanna words do not help. They cannot help. You have to do something about reality, and not just about perception. "Perception is reality" is a very misleading, and dangerous, concept. It is often true, in some sense, but even more often not the truth that matters.
Could you not point t some data differences between 2011 and 2008, looking beyond GDP? Sure you could. So what? The similarities are more striking. And let us be honest. The "call" on a recession is a HINDSIGHT call. If the economy continues down from here, it will likely be determined that the recession started January 1, 2011, or that the 2008 recession never really ended (with ALL of the "growth" being artificial government "stimulus"). If the economy goes UP from here, this will just be looked at as a temporary lull. That does not change that the situation looks very similar, and that the media (including Fox) is not acknowleding it (because they forget YESTERDAY--especailly if it does not fit their agenda--a quality they have in common with President Obama). And this is my BIG problem with Fox. Far from going a different direction from the mainstream media tgemplate, Fox ordinarily lets the mainstream media frame the way issues are covered. Sure, Fox will tell you more about the conservative/Repupublican position than the rst of the mainstream media, but Fox will NOT break the mold and strike out with the objective truth. The people of Fox are NOT "journalists" seeking truth. Nor are they conservative partisands pushing an MSNBC type agenda. they are people with a cable TV mentality who think they have fund a way to attract an audience by giving you a different, less left, slant than the mainstream media (a slam dunk to accomplish). Fox does NOT take risks, and still aims for mainstream media, "journalism" school approval (which it does not get). You do not get "truth" from Fox, but that is not primariy becausew Fox is "biased". It is because Fox is not even seeking "truth", as no modern "journalist" is. These are also just not very bright people. I think modern "journalism" rots the brain.
Me? I told you the actual truth in 2008, and I am telling it to you now. What did I say i the first half of 2008 (in respnse to this media/leftist drumbeat abut a recession)? I told you that it DIID NOT MATTER whether it was technically a recession or not. And that is what I am telling you now. Say that you stand by the "standard" definitin of a recession as two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. And sy that you have these two scenarios (a word I despise, but useful here):
1. Two consecutive quarters of GDP growth of .4%.
2. Two consecutive quarters of GDP congraction of .4%.
Which economy is better? Remember, these are NOT even EXACT numbers. The first quarter GDP was REVISED from 1.8% growth, or something like that, to .4% growth. Correct answer: Within any reasonable margin of error, the above tow economies are the SAME (as far as growth is concerned). What difference does it make whether yu call it a recession, or don't call it a recessio? No diffrence at all. The economy is NOT GROWING, and that is the situation we are now in. No, it is not clear, as it was not clear on July 1 of 2008, that we are about to again fall off of a cliff. But the economy is NOT GROWING. All of this talk about a "double dip" is just the people on Wall Street, and in the mainstream media, lPROVING that they are the Stupidest People on Earth. Whether you call it a "double dip" or not is irrelevant. The "recovery' has ENDED, and we are backk in the same situation we were in in the first half of 2008. The only questrion is whether we will fall off a cliff again, as we did in 2008, or whether this will only be a temporary setback in the economy (as it COULD have been in 2008, with better people in charge than the people we had from 2006 onward, ncluding the DEMOCRATS controlling the agenda from at least January of 2007 onward). The signs of trouble were evident as early as 2005-2006, and Ben Bernanke and Henry Paulson (for all intents and purposes a Democrat) fiddled while Rome burned.
What to do now? Well, one of my brothers has proposed a MORATORIUM on basically all regulatons and restrictions imposed on businesss since, say, 1976. I am not wild about TEM
But there is no magic bullet. NOTHING will "solve' our present problems right away . We need to get back on the right path as a country--the path of freedom and a free market system in which neither Wall Street nor politicians appear to believe any mroe. Instead, they believe in CENTRAL PLANNING,even though that has bee PROVEN to be a false ido--both in theory and in practice. This means PAIN . I have said we should be REDUCING Federal employee salaries AT LEASE 5%. We should be cutting the spending for NEXT YEAR by 10% Insttead, we are cutting it by....well, NOTHING. We are INCRTEASING spending. Yes, I know about the 21 billion dollar "cut" in deiscretionary spending. But overall spending will RISE. We are not addressing the problem, and we are heading for a NEW entitlement that ALONE will proably bankrupt us (ObamaCare)--if we do not go bankrupt before we even get there. I see some support rising for a 1% REAL CUT in spending every year for six years, where we spend 1% LESS each year ofr about six years overall). Not less than we planned to spend, but less than LAST YEAR. That would be better than the SHAM represented by the debt ceiling "compromise", but might not be good enough.
Yes, We need to learn to "live within our means"--which means to match what we spend with our revenue. If that means NO Medicaid, then that is what it means. If that means NO Medicare Drug Benefit Program (a Bush mistake), that is what it means. If that means NO Department of Educatio, that is what it means If that means NO Amrack, that is what it means. If that means NO subsidies for NPR or rural airporsts, that is what it means. If that means NO high speed rail, then that is what it means. If that means STATES and LOCALITIES have to CHOOSE what money they spend, and where, that is what it means. If that means no farm subsidies, that is what it means. If that means no "green energy" subsidies, that is what it means. If that means CUTTING Congressional pensions, AND Federal employee pensions, that is what it means. Members of Congress, by the way, should just have to "get by" on Social Security. No other pension at all. Maybe a 401(k) type plan, with litttle government payment.
"But Skip, the public won't stand for that kind of thing, and it appears you have not even gotten started on what you are willing to cut. That is impossible. What about the 'rich'?"
Yes, I HAVE just started. NO foreign aid. NO AIDS assistance to Africa. We don't have the money. Save it for when we hwve the money. Military anti-terrorist aid may be necessary. But all other foreign aid needs to go. WE DO NOT HAVE THE MONEY. What is hard to understand about lthat? And we have to ACT like we KNOW that we do not have the money.
70,000 workers on airport projects? Am I the only one that finds lthat appaling? WE DO NOT HAVE THE MONEY. You say that airlines and air travellers are paying for that I hoe so.
Taxes? Self-defeating. Yes, I do favor CLOSING LOOPHOLES (like for Obama's "green energy" obsessioin, as he subsidizes uneconomic businesses who are merely profitting from the American taxpayer). But that should be only as part of a REDUCTION in tax RATES.
Raising tax rates merely HURTS the economy, WITHOUT raising much, if any, revenue. People just avoid the taxes. Nope. The very IDEA of ever more taxes on the "rich" is self-defeating, as it undermines the very concept upon which this country became a great country. No one should pay a RATE of more lthan 25% of their income to the Federal Government. But you can't reduce the rates NOW (as you could have when Obama came into office) without closing loopholes--using "tax expenditures". You CANNOT use those "tax expenditures" to cut the deficit, because you NEED them to cut rates. And, by the way, cutting the home mortgage deductin will complete the DESTRUCTION of the housing industry, which the government has already effectively destroyed (in combination with the economic fasicsts on Wall Street).
you can see why I fully expect to walk away from the Republican Party FOREVER. Is even Michele Bachmann willing to say things like this? Of course not. You may say, if you are a Republican loyalist: "Good riddance". Our party does not need this kind of fanatic. Problem for you, and th econtry: Either you do things like I suggest--get SERIOIUS about limiting government and spending--or the contry as we have known it is doomed. It may already be doomed. Remember, as Will Durant said in "Caesar and Christ": "The Roman Republic was doomed by class warfare.". Rome got Julius Caesar, and the greatest EMPIRE the world has ever known. But freedom and the Republic were gone. We are not that far from something similar, although there is no Julius Caesar on the horizon, and no possibility for an EMPIRE to be FINANCED by an endless expansion (endless for at leat 200-300 years, during the Pax Romana). Yes, the WORLD could collapse. But it is a uch more dangerous world now than then, and even then the collpase of the Roman Empire would bring abut 1,000 years of darkness.
Yes, I have gone beyond the scope of the article. But you have a right to know what I would do about the reality that is out there, since I advise FACING that rality (something our media, the economic fascists on Wall Street, and our politicians seem determined to avoid facing). You may not klike it. I would bet most of the public would not like it--although here I think the public is ahead of the politicians. You could argue about specific things. But I am 100% certain about the appraoch: We have to get SERIOUS about getting back to basics. President Obama, on alternate days, tells you that. Then he ignores himself. "We have to learn to live withoin our means." That is what he says. He does not mean it, as he makes clear the very next day, or even the next paragraph. I mean it. That is my problem with even Michele Bachmann, and she is the best of the current crop. I am morally certain I mean it more than she does, even though she may think she means it. I face reality, and STiLL mean it. I don't think she faces reality. As to most of the rest of our politicians, I know they are not facing eality. As for our mainstream meida, they don't even exist in reality. They exist in a fantasy world of their own making, and they WANT it that way.
P.S. No proofreading or spell checking (bad eyesight). IF I avoided getting my fingers on the wrong keys, and totally garbling the above, you probably regret it. Reality is not pretty. But refusing to face it is fatal. And yes, I understand that TWO realities collide here. There is the reality of the problems we face, and then there is the reality of getting ELECTED if you actually face the other reality and level with the people as to what needs to be done. Our problem is that we do NOT have anyone on the horizon who can merge those two realities. Ronald Reagan came coles to doing so, but we don't have a Ronald Reagan out there that I can see. Too bad. We need him. If I did manage to garble the above so that you cannot understand it, feel lucky. I really do get more pessimistic every day about whether we can avoid a death spiral.
No comments:
Post a Comment