Wednesday, July 8, 2009

The Real Recession (As Opposed to The One The Media Tried to Whip Up for Six Years)

It may take awhile to get back to normal economically. Even the Washington Post has admitted this week that the “Stimulus” is not working. Unfortunately, the knee jerk reaction by some politicians is to start demanding a second “Stimulus” bill.

I think the better reaction would be to pass a bill making it a felony for any Congressional Clown to vote on a bill he has not read. If anyone had bothered to read it before passing the blasted thing, they would have understood that is was nothing more than a conglomeration of Democrat pet projects cobbled together with no real regard for stimulating the economy.

Unemployment continues to rise everywhere except Washington, DC. The official figure, based on people filing for unemployment checks, is 9.5%. According to a Wall Street Journal article last week, the real unemployment figure may be closer to 16.9%. That percentage also includes those who no longer receive unemployment checks, either because they accepted part time jobs in lieu of full time work or gotten out of the job market all together.

Then there is an insightful article in yesterday’s American Thinker about the states with big deficits. When the talk centers on mere numbers, the figures vaguely seem bad, but when taken as a percentage of state budgets, one gets a much better understanding of the crisis. For example, California’s deficit of $53,700,000,000 represents 58% of its budget. According to AT, the reason for the deficits is that tax revenues are down. In fact, tax revenues have dropped more than they did during the Great Depression.

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