This Is Their Finest Hour

[The Whiskey Priest]

The nation is in hock up to its eyeballs, the nation’s bank account is as empty as Coulter’s head, one of our major cities is missing, they have broke our army, the boarders are more porous than Frist's blind trust, the courts are going to be overloaded with cases of involving corrupt republican politicians, the republicans have declared the constitution nothing more than silly old laws, good paying jobs are as scarce as information on Cheney’s energy task force, and on and on it goes….

Tonight, the best the republicans can do is tell us we need to save for our health care…hell, the economic shape we are in it is hard to save for tomorrow's gasoline which we need to get to our job at wal-mart.

Yes, this is their finest hour.

[savemefromdumbya]

1. People don't realize what a mess this country is in

I would say 80% haven't a clue about the economy

[RaleighNCDUer]

2. Why would they have a clue? The admin and the media keep

saying we're doing great, the DOW is up, blah blah blah, and they look at their own finances and think it's just them.

It isn't just them. It's all of us.

Teens, who have not entered the job market, remain unemployed because adults have taken the teen jobs - working fast food, bagging at grocery stores, tearing tickets at the local ciniplex. The result? Official unemployment figures are adjusted downward.

Unemployed persons who have run through their unemployment have abandoned their mortgages and moved in with relatives, scraping by on temp jobs. Result? Official unemployment figures are adjusted downward.

Older workers are pressured into early retirement so that younger, less expensive workers can replace them - but those older workers can't really make it on the retirement they have so they take part-time jobs away from teenagers, keeping them from entering the job market, and we're back at unemployment figures. adjusted downward.

If the real unemployment was counted, it would be closer to 10% than 5%, and much of the job creation is in low-paying service jobs, not the higher wage manufacturing and technical fields that we are losing.

But in our insular lives, we see only us, and each wonders "where did I go wrong, that I can't make it in a booming economy?"

There's the news out the other day that 1/3 of the largest job markets showed 'negative growth' in wages -- but that's nowhere near the whole story. Wages are naturally higher in the largest job markets. So if there is negative wage growth in 1/3 of the largest job markets, what does it look like for the smaller, less flexible job markets? Those where a single factory or mill makes up half the local employment?

Whew. I'm tired. Rant over.

[importDavid]

3. DOW is up? Ha!

Over 5 years in office... and the DOW has only been over 11000 for 17 days... and even at the highest it's EVER been under shrub (5/21/2001 - 11337.92) it's STILL 385 points below Clinton's high of 11722.98.

For the past two years it's bounced up and down from 10000 - 10900... that's STAGNANT growth... I prefer to think that the market is in the starting blocks... waiting for a Democratic administration to take over.

[catmandu57]

4. The stock market is not the economy

and the economy is not the stock market. look at how it swings upwards on bad news, layoffs, closings, the market rides up against all logic.
The stock market is nothing more than a casino hence the term playing the market.
I believe they've shot their wad as well, they've reached a pinnacle and it's all downhill from here. I wish it had happened sooner, but I'll take what I can get.