How many can we vote out in the next election? Leading up to the last election is appeared the Tea Party had some chance to win some seats.
Wonder what can be pulled off this next time around. Can America be convinced that we have to get the old politicians out of office.
McCain made it back in - Pelosi keeps making it back in.
Just how many can be thrown out this next time around. I fear most Americans are too stupid to know who to blame.
“Working from Q309, forward, read GDP as follows:
“1.7, 3.8, 3.9, 3.8, 2.5, 2.3 … now here it comes: 0.4 … and then today’s 1.3%.
“I won’t keep you in suspense any more. Here’s my take: MOMENTUM IS BROKEN. A big, ol’ monkey wrench, courtesy of input arising from the change in inventory and Imports. And once momentum stumbles, then H2 growth becomes a wild card, right?”
Is There a Recession in Our Future?
I mentioned a chart from Rich Yamarone, Chief Economist at Bloomberg (who I’m having dinner with next Tuesday in NYC). I previously wrote:
“And the last chart is one I had not seen before, and is interesting. Rich notes that if year-over-year GDP growth dips below 2%, a recession always follows. It is now at 2.3%.”
Growth is clearly decelerating. Look at the growth numbers from the St. Louis Fed website for the last six quarters:
2009-10-01 13019.012
2010-01-01 13138.832
2010-04-01 13194.862
2010-07-01 13278.515
2010-10-01 13380.651
2011-01-01 13444.301
It will be very interesting to see, at the end of the month, what the numbers are for the second quarter. Another quarter like the first quarter and we should either be close to or actually dip below 2%.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-economy-has-hit-stall-speed-2011-7#ixzz1TeQctgVe
And the $4 trillion they are talking about? That is a down payment. We need $10-12 trillion in cuts over ten years, which I explained would put us into a slow-growth-at-best, Muddle Through economy with high unemployment and tough tax policies. I pointedly showed Senator Mike Lee why we could not cut spending too fast (as the Tea Party wants) – unless we want Depression 2.0 and 20% unemployment. It has to be my “glide-path” option. As I said, Lee was taking notes fast and furious. And asking the right questions. I like him. Lieberman was also engaged (I really do like him), and they were all very candid about the political problems they were facing. And it was a very sober group as we ended the meeting. But they all politely thanked me for coming and talking frankly. Even the Dems (I confess I think I know the name of one, but the website picture does not look like him, so I don’t want to get it wrong. But he was impressive with his questions as well.)
I have to tell you, gentle reader, that leaving that meeting I was very sober as well. They made it clear that getting it done is going to be very hard, and it will take real commitment from men and women like them to get us through this. They all noted that their mail was running 100 to 1 against cutting Medicare. Every one of them. They know that they cannot close the deficit gap just with the elimination of the Bush tax cuts. And I think I convinced any who weren’t already, that not getting the deficit under control means Depression 2.0 and a disaster.
The debate in 2012-13 will be, how much Medicare do we want and how do we want to pay for it? Sadly, I think the only way is with a VAT (value-added tax), since less than 50% of citizens pay any income taxes now. Want to run on a program of taxing the “middle class?” Didn’t think so. Want to run on a platform of cutting Medicare? That is not a winner either. We are at an impasse.
We need a massive restructuring of our entire tax code to be more encouraging of creating jobs. But that is another story for another week. It is time to hit the send button.
Rampant voter fraud is a problem. Why else would there be such a backlash against voter ID?