Posted on 06/10/2011 11:54:02 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
President Obama is given to cute vehicular metaphors about the state of the economy. We were "in a ditch," then got out and hit a "bump in the road." This is studiously folksy. It also vastly understates the nature of our situation.
Obama is presiding over an unspooling social catastrophe in the form of unemployment, and especially long-term unemployment. For all those people who are chronically unemployed, it's as if they have been hit by the proverbial car and then backed over by it again and again.
According to The Wall Street Journal, nearly a third of the unemployed -- 4 million people -- have been out of work for more than a year. Almost half of the unemployed have been out of a job for more than six months, a figure higher than during the Great Depression.
They may wonder when it was exactly that we got out of "the ditch."
The statistics tell a dire, but incomplete, story. We were built to work. When we want to and can't, it is an assault on our very personhood. A Rutgers University study of the unemployed a few years ago found, unsurprisingly, "that they experienced anxiety, helplessness, depression, stress and sleeping problems after losing their jobs."
The insidious thing about long-term unemployment is that it builds on itself -- the longer you're without a job, the harder it is to get one. The Bureau of Labor Statistics finds that the chance of someone unemployed for less than five weeks finding a job in the next month is about 30 percent. For someone unemployed 27 weeks or more, it's just 10 percent.
For an economy so famously on the mend that it experienced "recovery summer" last year, the trend has been in the wrong direction....
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Obama may as well pass the torch to another Democrat to run for the White House next year. There’s no way in hell that he’s going to be re-elected with his dismal economic record.
All it takes is the appearance of a turnaround next year and he's set.
This is the Lightsquared fiasco, which portends to obliterate domestic GPS applications, on the basis of wishful thinking and rampant cronyism at the highest levels. I'm still waiting for this to explode. Maybe it won't, maybe we'll all just give up on our GPS devices and throw them in a ditch.
Batten down the hatches.
All indicators point down.
The stimulus is gone and only debt remains.
Chicago thug Obama and his gang of male morons and unqualified short fat and ugly lesbians have jacked our ride.
Obama is driving towards the cliff as fast as he can. We're in back with Obama's homies Eric and that fat lesbian b***** Janet. They both have their guns on us.
We have to come along for the ride. We're not believing what we're seeing. We just hope it will all be over soon and not to painfully.
“Obama may as well pass the torch to another Democrat to run for the White House next year. There’s no way in hell that he’s going to be re-elected with his dismal economic record.”
Your thinking is logical and rational. Obama has demonstrated his thinking is neither logical nor rational. He “thinks” (as do all liberals) with his emotions. His inner guides are telling him he’s fantastic; socialism is the only way to go. Also, he loves playing the role of international demigod. He loves having the Secret Service impose his presence where he himself can’t. (Reagan dominated any room he walked into when he was 25.) Obama will run unless he gets challenged and defeated in the primary. With as much illegal foreign money as he’ll collect, a serious challenge is unlikely.
There is not a single Obama policy that has even the slightest chance of leading to a turnaround.
Don't underestimate the power of human stupidity.
Chicago Tribune says all you ‘crackers’ are wrong about the Obama economy.
chicagotribune.com
Black hopes vs. white anxiety
Clarence Page
6:44 PM CDT, June 10, 2011
Race relations have undergone a curious flip-flop. Polls show blacks feel more optimistic about the nation’s future than whites, despite the Great Recession that’s giving everybody the blues.
Having a black, or, if you prefer, biracial, president explains a lot of that optimism, polls show. But white Americans, particularly working-class whites without a college diploma, have become more gloomy.
Ronald Brownstein, political director and demographic specialist at the National Journal, recently described whites who have less than a four-year college degree as “the most pessimistic and alienated group in American society.”
He cited a March poll by the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Economic Mobility Project in which two-thirds of blacks and Hispanics said they expected to be better off economically in 10 years. So did 55 percent of college-educated whites. But only 44 percent of non-college whites agreed.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/ct-oped-0612-page-20110610,0,2405310,print.column
I wrote "appearance of a turnaround"--something we can have.
He's suppressed the recovery curve from what it should be, but note that with another 12 months on that red curve (count 'em off!), we'll be above where we were when GWB left office.
And then there are the short-term sell-out tricks that can be played, such as giving concessions against the national interests to convince OPEC to open up production temporarily, etc.
Have we Won the Future yet?
Huh? Explain how the hell that's going to happen. Our whole economy is hanging on by a thread. What miracle is going to even give it the "appearance of a turnaround"?
Real people have lost real wealth, or have seen their standard of living drop to levels they never imagined they'd see. Do you honestly think they're going to forget all that pain and suffering in a mere 18 months?
Which is why he and his henchmen continue to double down on policies which are disastrous in the real world. They are abject ideologues, who cannot connect cause to effect.
They're not going to change their way of "thinking", so further damage to our social infrastructure, our economy, and our national security is assured, as long as he remains in office. Obama will cling to his ideological course, even as the sea water begins coming over the gunnels.
Obama will run unless he gets challenged and defeated in the primary. With as much illegal foreign money as he’ll collect, a serious challenge is unlikely.
Which automatically gives the White House to the Republicans next year. Not even a Billion dollar campaign can overcome the pain he's put Americans through during his term.
Obama is Carter II on steroids. People will vote for someone whom they perceive is going to rescue them from their pain and collective nightmares.
Unless we run a milquetoast RINO, a commanding majority of Americans will vote for the Republican, just as they voted for Reagan.
• “Which automatically gives the White House to the Republicans next year. Not even a Billion dollar campaign can overcome the pain he’s put Americans through during his term.”
I wouldn’t say there’s anything “automatic” about it. Money makes a difference because so many people are politically illiterate, or ideologically damaged by the school system. What seems perfectly obvious to conservatives is open for wide interpretation and influence by about 60% of the population. I know otherwise conservative people who have CNN playing in the background and they spout off the damndest propaganda talking points. For example, my own parents tell me that GM and Chrysler have paid back their loans. In reality, the government sold those loans to private financiers at a huge, huge discounts. That’s not the same as paying them back. The taxpayers took it in the rear to the tune of billions, but the “news” reports the propaganda and otherwise reasonable people believe it. If Obama goes into the campaign with a 2 or 3 or 4 to 1 advantage in money he may very well get reelected.
No. They still remember that the plunge occurred under George W. Bush, even more than 18 months later.
>>Real people have lost real wealth, or have seen their standard of living drop to levels they never imagined they’d see
Real people don’t matter anymore. All that matters is the entitlement class, the ultra-wealthy, and celebrities and they’re all democrats.
The real people just get told to “tighten their belts” another notch and if they complain, they’re racist or are too stupid to understand economics (depending on who is telling them to tighten the belt).
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.