February 13, 2013 - 8:29 am
I enjoy and depend on Jim Pethokoukis and on the Zero Hedge guys, but it’s gotten to the point where I can’t visit either blog without first experiencing a small sense of doom. OK, maybe not so small. So with that, here’s the latest from Pethokoukis.
Sarbanes-Oxley, massives deficits, and reckless spending under Bush. ObamaCare, Dodd-Frank, even more massive deficits, and even more reckless spending under Obama have pretty nicely choked off entrepreneurship in this country.
That’s fine if you’re already wired in, if you’re already too big to fail. Besides, who needs some young upstart upsetting all your fancy apple carts?
And if you think that might be a feature of the new system rather than a bug, I’d say you might be onto something.
Just a note to point out (yes, you mentioned it) that the start of the fall in the curve pretty much coincided with the end of Clinton and start of GWBush.
One of the things I despise most about the Democrats is forcing me to vote for George W. Bush. Twice.
Another way of looking at it is that the peak conincided with gridlock government. (And yes, I will give Clinton his due on that, as well as Gingrich.) Unfortunately, we can’t go back to gridlock government now because freezing current spending levels won’t work now like it did in 1996. The system is now rigged so that spending will continue to rise exponentially until radical action is taken to stop it, or until the system collapses.
Stephen, Stephen.
The DOW is at 14K with big promises from all the money managers to move much, much higher. Fidelity even called me last week and told me how foolish it was to move my 401k to 85% cash. No worries, man. Blast off!
Obama and the FED have got a handle on this and I have complete confidence in the political and financial leadership of our country. We can just buy our own debt and print our own money when the need arises – like monthly.
Remember man. The DOW is at 14,000 and that makes everything really special.
We’re much too big to fail (cough cough).
PRINT MOAR MONIES!
I notice, just from looking at the chart (i.e., not clicking through to read the linked item, where I’m sure it is discussed thoroughly), that the change of direction during the Bush recession is to reduce the rate of decline. The change of direction during the Obama recession is to increase it.
But Bush was obviously a much worse president tha the little god-king, and is single-handedly responsible for everything bad that’s happened — it must be true because the little god-king says so.
They don’t like small businesses. Too many necks to wring. And some of those small business guys actually have ethics.