Speaking Too Soon

Nothing is planned
By the sea and the sand
--The Who

From the deck of an aircraft carreir a few weeks after the Iraqi War commenced, President Bush famously proclaimed the battle over. We're still at it seven yrs later.

Today, from his perch one year after the first massive stimulus bill was enacted, President Obama proclaimed that a Second Great Depression has been averted and jobs have been saved.

History, of course, has yet to gauge how premature Mr Obama's remarks are.

Inquiring minds should be asking how a massive spending and debt program solves a spending and debt problem. Rather than averting a crisis, it seems highly probable that such actions extend the period of economic malaise, and intensify the decline that will occur when government intervention is no longer capable of temporarily stemming the tide.