2012 = 2006?
It’s not just that you make a mistake; it’s that you cling desperately to that mistake and let it define you.
Katrina revealed George W. Bush’s basic incompetence in a way that 9/11, Afghanistan, and Iraq had not. So he was weak going into the 2006 midterms. There were going to be losses. No one who wasn’t being paid to say otherwise thought there were not going to be some losses.
And you have to assume that some people thought those losses would be smaller: they got rid of “Brownie,” made a lot of noise about “Katrina and Rita,” put Hayley Barbour on television as often as they could, talking about how Mississippi was rebuilt.
Damage control.
The problem was that one failure got people to look at other failures. And the sacrifices didn’t come from there.
After the 2006 election, Donald Rumsfeld resigned. There were rumors it might happen before then, but it didn’t.
A few weeks ago, going into the Wisconsin recall elections, there were rumors that Tim Geithner would resign.
That’s not going to be true now. So Barack Obama is going to go into a re-election campaign running what John Hempton astutely described as “the cravenly pro-finance Obama administration.”
Not pro-economy: that would involve employment and GDP growth, neither of which has been happening for so long that Sensible Centrist Brad DeLong is sounding more and more and more like me.
The center isn’t holding. Every pictures tells the same story.
The refusal to take over the banks is goign to bite the ass on teh antion again. Now we have to bail out BoA once more while at teh same time the administrtion is trying to get State AGs to back down to allow the banks to get off with the robo signign scnadal and the whole MERS mess won’t be cleaned up. Geithern failed as the head of the NY Fed. He was the beat cop who looked the other way as the mob burned down the neighborhood and collected the insurance money and he got promoted to Captain.
Good post, Ken.
If You are looking for current US economic data, here is link
http://www.econoside.com/index.php?cat=1
I agree with MG. You put a little effort into this Ken. Bravo!
I always liked Priscilla Aldens advice from Longfellows “the courtship of Miles Standish”. “Why don’t you speak for your self John” she tells John Alden, when Alden speaks to her of Miles Standish’s desires. Well speak for your self Ken, and leave the pablum of that horrible little reprobate Brad de Long at his own blog.
I too have noticed that Brad is sounding more and more like you.
I tend to agree with Brad2010 more than you and Brad2011. I see if there is clong run convergence.
Succinct and accurate message, Ken, thanks. The September issue of The Atlantic Magazine might interest you for this article re the middle class (I don’t agree with everything in it, and it’s not succinct, but a good read): http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/09/can-the-middle-class-be-saved/8600/
And if a Tea Partier wins an FDR-sized victory in 2012, will they immediately turn around and apply FDR remedies? Or will they stick to their platform and implode the economy another 40%? My guess is that a Perry-Bachmann administration would further implode the economy, then turn to aggressive … er ‘defensive’ … warfare as the only form of Keynesian stimulus they know how to sell. Doesn’t Venezuela need invading? I hear they’ve got oil and a lefty bad-guy in charge.
Seth, I think the TPers would stick to their beliefs, unlike the Dems in 1932. I also believe they would follow something similar to the 1932 platform. I think it is more than safe to say they would not implement FDR remedies.
If you haven’t noticed the Obama/FDR remedies do seem to be having similar results as measured by unemployment. What is it that you think would implode the economy more than it already is imploding?
CoRev,
I like the tricorn hat. It needs to come back.
Which FDR remedies do refer?
The ones in 1933 or the ones in 1937? The social nets or the finacial regulatory systems? Both?
The TPers’ beliefs are tied to billionaires’ dogma (like the serfs poor and the bankers free wheeeling riverboat gamblers), supported by irrational ideas, Calvinsm and no proof of their view of reality.
I Look forward to a Perry ticket.
Obama’s ‘remedies’ bear no resemblance to FDR’s. Nor is Obama imploding the economy. The 40% implosion I was thinking of was the amount that GDP shrank under Hoover. So far, Obama has limited the damage from Bush to something under 10%. It’s just that he hasn’t managed to get any meaningful increase underway.
What would implode the economy further would be the sort of full-on austerity the TP claim to want (albeit mostly without the remotest idea what effect it would have) in which the government really DID dump several hundred thousand more people out of jobs while doing nothing to stimulate private buying.
I think you’re right that the TP would “stick to their guns” — then turn to putting guns in the hands of a lot more new soldiers.
You are absolutly correct. The members of the Tea Party hold their ideology with religious fervor. As seen in the defict show down, that ideology must not be compromised. They would regard that as collaborating with the forces of darkness. Really.