US Economy Soars

[Pangloss]

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=1368518

http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Business/story?id=1364097

 

- Stock market at a 4-year high, approaching 11,000 mark

- Energy prices down 30% (Gas down from avg $3.07 to $2.15)

- Inflation under control

- Fed may not raise interest rates again

- Consumers spending like crazy

- New home starts are somehow STILL up and running (and likely to grow more as we begin to rebuild the gulf coast)

- 215,000 new jobs in November, back up from only 5-digit gains in Sept/Oct due to Katrina losses

- Average hourly earnings up 3.2% (biggest rise since March 2003)

- Overall growth at 4.3% (excellent)

- Christmas start considered "promising" (I think the initial reports said it was down, but the later adjusted figures were better; I still haven't seen a good story on the details of Black Friday weekend based on later adjusted figures)

 

 

A few conclusions on my part:

 

- Yeah, it ain't perfect. What economy has ever been perfect? Even the Clinton bubble and the post-WW2 boom had their negatives. This is a GOOD economy. It *cannot* be characterized as a "bad" economy, no matter how badly Democrats and the Anybody-But-Bush crowd want to do so. It *cannot* logically be done.

 

- If you can't make it in this economy, you can't make it in ANY economy. You are literally worthless. Do something about that instead of asking for a handout and/or b*ching about Bush. Get a job, get an education, do SOMETHING.

 

- Democrats were wrong about the economy. Dead, flat-out wrong. Simply finger-wagglingly in-cor-rect. I voted for ya, John Kerry, but now I sure as shootin' can't figure out why.

 

- The "Bush can't seem to fix gas prices" argument is as dead as those Thanksgiving leftovers in the fridge. No, Bush didn't fix it, but then that wasn't HIS argument, that was DEMOCRATS'. Bush's argument was "hang on and the market will fix itself", which is exactly what happened.

 

 

So stable, strong and vibrant is the economy that our sole concern is now the long-term issue of deficit spending and the national debt. The question now becomes whether the worthless Republicans will stand by their word to reduce spending once the economy came under control. Or will it fall on the worthless Democrats, who more likely want to increase taxes so that even more money can be spent, and the debt continue to go untouched?

 

This is a stunningly similar situation, by the way, to when Republicans had the audacity to complain about the Clinton economy (one of if not the most successful economies in the 20th century) during the 1999/2000 election cycle. And conservatives actually fell for that crap! Are we just going to go through the same nonsense again? I hope not!

[bascule]

A few conclusions on my part:

 

- Yeah' date=' it ain't perfect. What economy has ever been perfect? Even the Clinton bubble and the post-WW2 boom had their negatives. This is a GOOD economy. It *cannot* be characterized as a "bad" economy, no matter how badly Democrats and the Anybody-But-Bush crowd want to do so. It *cannot* logically be done.[/quote']

 

This is an economy fueled by borrowed money, specifically by the most massive foreign debt in American history, which is being used to cover the most massive budget shortfalls we've ever seen. The trade deficit is at an all time high and the value of the dollar in the international marketplace is quite weak.

 

I'm not necessarily saying an economy being propped up by ever accruing debt is a "bad" economy (e.g. New Dealism being used to jumpstart the American economy after the Great Depression), the whole idea of the debt being that it can be repaid over the long term and in order for that to happen the economy must be working well, but I'm sure you saw Greenspan's warning about America's massive budget deficits. Unlike New Dealism, the present aim of reckless defecit spending is not to bolster the long term stability of the economy.

[Pangloss]

I agree with your assessment. We might disagree slightly on the source of the problem (or we might not), but I think your post compliments mine, especially regarding Greenspan's comments.

 

This is really another discussion, but I've kinda come full circle on the New Deal over the years. Dorothy Kearns Goodwin's excellent biography of FDR nudged me in that direction, and in spite of my libertarian leanings I've not seen anything to nudge me back the other way. I think it was the right move at the time, and I also agree with your contrast of the present vs the New Deal.

 

But when all is said and done, I think it speaks *volumes* about the ideology and partisanship of the ABB crowd that the economy is as solid and strong as it is, and yet they refuse to acknowledge the point at all, and in fact claim that the opposite is the case, when it so clearly is not.