GayPatriot

The Internet home for American gay conservatives.

The Obama Stock Market Crash

by

If you thought your personal financial situation was bad in November, 2008….. you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.  Obamanomics is killing our future already!

Michelle Malkin:  On Nov. 4, after Barack Obama clinched the White House, the market closed at 9,625.28.

In mid-morning trading today, the day President Obama signs his massive Generational Theft Act into law and a day before he unveils a massive new mortgage entitlement, the Dow dropped to to 7,606.53.

Now, imagine if President Bush had presided over a 2,000-point stock market tumble in the same time period — during the first few months of his presidency.

REUTERS:  DOW HITS 10-YEAR LOW

Here’s what today alone looks like on the Dow Jones (via Drudge)

HopeandChange??   YIKES!

I’m stocking up on essentials…

UPDATE: Oh yeah, and have you noticed that gas at the pump costs more now than when President Bush left office?

So prices at the pump will probably keep going up no matter what happens to the benchmark price of crude oil.

“We’re going definitely over $2, and I bet we’ll hit $2.50 before spring,” said Tom Kloza, publisher and chief oil analyst at Oil Price Information Service. “This is going to be an unusual year.”

On the last day of 2008, gas went for $1.62 on average, according to the auto club AAA, the Oil Price Information Service and Wright Express, a company that tracks transportation data.

Why is that?  Read the article. (h/t – Instapundit)

Help fight Obamanomics.  Buy a bumper sticker!

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

UPDATE (from Dan):  To those critics who claim that Obama can’t possibly “own” the decline in the stock market sincehis election, recall that these indices are a kind of futures market, with investors buying in (or selling as the case may be) based on how they believe the economy will do.  Note how on Election Day 2004, the markets tooka tumble when it looked like John Kerry would win.  And how they rebounded when it turned out he did not.

So, in the wake of the Democrat’s elections, investors were taking their cues from what he said and whom he appointed.

Comments

  1. Gas prices will continue to rise as long as Obama’s folks push the alternative energy button –driving up corn prices because of ethanol, driving up all fossil fuel because of anticipatory pricing in the marketplace.

    The simple truth is that a Green Alternative Enegry Program like Obama’s can’t succeed unless fossil fuel prices return to higher pricing and make the investment in alternate energy appear attractive. It’s why CleanCoal ain’t happening. It’s why new offshore drilling is dead. It’s why shale extraction won’t be expanded. It’s why nuke has been nuked. The GreenLobby can’t succeed with low fossil fiel pricing.

  2. No President, neither Bush nor Obama, has much to do with the price of gas in the short- to medium-term. In the long-term, of course, Democrats have a lot to do with it as they have long been trying to kill oil. But that’s long-term. It affects the average price of gas over a period of years, let’s say. As to the stock market downturn: That, too, will turn around – in nominal terms – next year at the latest, and perhaps in as little as a couple of months.

    Still, Bruce, your points are well taken in 2 ways:

    1) Even if it is a bit short-sighted to blame gas and stock fluctuations on Obama, it’s sure what the lefties did to Bush. Good to give them a taste of their own medicine.
    2) Obama is, in fact, following objectively bad economic policies as we speak. The capital markets are “pricing in” that.

  3. I noticed the price of gasoline began to increase at about the same time Obama’s Interior Secretary shutdown the oil and gas leases on shale deposits in Utah and Colorado and reinstated bans on offshore drilling.

  4. But V, oil didn’t go up – as discussed in one of Bruce’s links. One would expect the Obammunist policies you mention to affect spot oil & oil futures first, then its products such as gas. It hasn’t. In the short run, i.e., right now, crude oil is down. That’s because of the lack of demand for it. There are short-term, industry-specific reasons why gas would go up even though its largest cost component, oil, is down. We will see bad effects from the Obammunist policies you mention, further down the road – like when China leads the eventual world economic recovery, and oil goes up and we can’t pay for it because our economy is still tanked.

  5. And you know if McCain had been elected and the stock market had continued to tank the way it is now, the DNCMSN would find some way to pin the blame on him.

    But because we’ve got Count Chocula in office, he gets a pass.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  6. One might go back six months further and trace the stock market loss which became worse as Obama took the lead from Clinton, and than McCain. Once the polls showed Obama a winner the markets tanked more, but the decline is linear with Obama’s rise to the Presidency. The economic fear caused by Obama is real for those of us who actually pay taxes.
    How can capitalism and work ethic live through the Obama presidency?

  7. “Now, imagine if President Bush had presided over a 2,000-point stock market tumble in the same time period — during the first few months of his presidency.”

    As opposed to the 6,000 point drop that actually occurred during his presidency?

  9. Are you trying to undermine the conservative movement or something? This is the most intellectually incoherent article on the economy I have read in a long time. You think it is enough simply to hurl insults at Obama – that that alone is going to revive the right?

    And then you have commenters like this:
    “But because we’ve got Count Chocula in office,”

    Seriously, is this some DNC site out to make Republicans look like racist ignorant morons?

  10. Like Malkin, you seem to think Obama actually took office in November. Hint: he took office less than a month ago.

    So to correct for, you know, facts, Obama has actually “presided over” this much of a difference:

    January 20, 2009 – $7,949
    February 17, 2009 (1:58 pm EST) – $7,589

  11. #9 – JoeCitizen, welcome to the wonderful world of satire. If you recall, the moniker that Slick Willie earned following the passage of his own (non-)stimulus package was “Count Taxula” and his faithful sidekick Algore.

    Well, now that The Snob has gotten his own porkulus package through Congress with only 3 GOP votes in the entire legislature (not to mention 11 Dems against it), he is now officially “Count Chocula.”

    I was going to use “Blacula” but it has already been taken by Hollywood.

    Here’s a dollar. Go buy a clue.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  12. #7 – Tracy, that drop was caused by a little something known as 9/11. All the world’s markets were volatile at that time in history. But guess what? The stock market rose again after that.

    Try again.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  13. #6 – “How can capitalism and work ethic live through the Obama presidency?”

    They can’t, Suzette – that’s why socialism always fails. People like The Snob and his ilk believe that the reason socialism doesn’t work is because the right people haven’t been put in charge of it.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  15. #10: “Like Malkin, you seem to think Obama actually took office in November. Hint: he took office less than a month ago.”

    Not from the way you and your ilk (along with the syncophants in the DNC-MSM) were acting after Election Day. I seem to recall numerous chats, postings and even “hard” news stories from PMSNBC suggesting that Bush step down in November so that The Snob could take over.

    (Peter’s aside: I know, “hard news” and PMSNBC as it relates to SnObama is an oxymoron – unless it’s Chris Matthews with a woodie. But I digress.)

    And what about that cute little sign that Count Chocula made up called “The Office of the President-Elect?” Hint: no other president had such a thing as blatantly egotistical as that piece of signage present at what seemed to be their daily news conference. Ever.

    Keep feeling smug, sunshine. You’ll be crying at midterms.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  17. When I tried to explain to my left friends that the recession at the very beginning of Bush’s presidency couldnt’ be his fault, because he had hardly been in office and there is nothing any president could even do that would cause one, they ignored me.
    But now that Obama is in office, everything bad is because of the President before him.

    Personally, beyond the futures argument which applies to the stock market (also look at commodities: gold has shot up in the past month), I see nothing that any president could do to cause or worsen a recession in one month. So they are right about that, but then back when it was Bush they were arguing it was Bush’s fault.

    Funny how that works.

    I guess that’s like the whole argument against extraordinary rendition, and massive deficite spending, it’s not bad, it’s bad when it’s done by a Republican.

  19. I’m wondering, as a gay conservative (Bruce) do you oppose gay marriage? Not that it doesn’t take all kinds but as a gay man myself; I find this site and its tincture somewhat, okay very at odds with itself. Please excuse the OT and I also believe that anyone who links to a Malkin xeno-vaginal rant with some sincere desire to actually heed her hyperthyroidisms has got real issues and is most likely a sociopath. I’ll be gone now! Good luck with this!

  20. We are in this mess because of socialism, which can be broadly defined as making economic decisions on political rather than free market basis.

    Before government in the form of Fannie, Freddie, and Barney got involved, banks loaned money to people who were creditworthy, and charged higher interest rates to those who were at higher risk of not paying back loans. This is how the free market works.

    Here is how socialistic government screwed it up: The government demanded that loan decisions be made on a political basis: that certain people would, because of political considerations, be loaned money they otherwise would not qualify for under terms they otherwise would not qualify for. The stick was the threat of government sanctions if banks did not comply, the carrot was an implicit promise to socialize the risks of making the loans through government support.

    The government distorted the market by explicitly encouraging bad loans to be made, and by implicitly reducing the risks of those loans. The market responded to these distortions by making tons of bad loans. This was not sustainable. Anyone could have seen it, but because economic decisions were being made with an eye toward political outcomes, no one was courageous enough to stop it.

    Hence, here we are.

  21. To those who think US presidents don’t affect the price of gas, I’m reminded of the fatal mistake of the ostrich in adopting the head-in-the-sand defense techique. It might be nice to think those things are only influenced by markets and beyond presidential influence, but it’d be foolish.

    Presidents do –without a doubt– affect the pricing of oil and gas at the pumps, short-, medium- and long-terms. Every pump. Every station. Every gallon. They can immediately affect the price whenever tacking on federal excise and other taxes at the pump -which Obama will be doing b4 we close 2009.

    I’m recalling the days of JimmineyCricketCarter and that President’s contribution to the rise of the OPEC cartel (no, he didn’t cause it but his actions in the Middle East helped advance and centralize the power of OPEC), his contribution to the shortened supplies of refined and crude oil because of his Energy Policies, his adverse effect on nondistributed supplies of heating oil and propane because of the new limits on the use of oil in commerical energy generation, a similar affect on foreign commercial lubricants and industrial diesel oil… yet we had tons of natural gas and coal… and domestic oil supplies to offset OPEC’s influence on the price of a gallon of gas in America… as well as with other petrol products.

    Presidents do make a huge difference in the short- and medium-termed pricing and supply of oil. Nixon’s lack of leadership capacity after Watergate caused OPEC to stir to life. Carter’s lack of leadership and poor policy proposals caused OPEC to strengthen and forced the price of crude up. Within 1.5 yrs, Reagan had ripped out the solar panels on the WH, told Americans to get back work and redeemed the American Promise, broke the back of inflation and put OPEC in a nice, tight squeeze with a strong dollar.

    It might be nice to think that Presidents don’t have that effect on short-term pricing, but they do. Price isn’t always related to production or capacity or reserves… sometimes it is related to nothing more than political influences and speculation in the marketplace. How many times did we hear from the Left that their claim of W’s threat to invade Iran pushed up gas and oil prices? How often do gas price hikes get excused by offering “Middle East tensions” as the key influence… especially if the press thinks the Prez isn’t doing it quite bloody right?

    I’d like to think that Presidents don’t affect the price of oil or the stock market or consumer confidence, but I gave up the Ostrich Approach to Good Govt the same day I stopped waiting for the Easter Bunny.

  22. BTW, JimmineyCricket’s own Energy 1st Czar –James Schlesinger– speaking to the NYTimes in July ’79, at the height of the Carter Oil Crisis, said “There’d be no gas lines if there were no price and allocation controls”.

    The oil crunch that summer led to gas line riots in Levittown, the Malaise Speech, a round of price hikes from OPEC, Iran’s reduction in oil production by 2m barrels/yr, etc. In fact, the influence of Carter on gas prices was so bad that even Speaker Tip ONeill, fearful of a anti-Democrat backlash by voters, said “The members of the House don’t pay any attention to him (Carter).”

    Ouch.

  23. #19 – “Malkin xeno-vaginal rant?”

    So what would we call your screed? And aren’t you just the least bit hypocritical about condemning someone for something you take for granted?

    Try again.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  28. I see that Bruce now more or less admits that Obama actually hasn’t “presided” over the stock market performance since November. I guess that’s a bit of an improvement over Malkin’s utter stupidity.

    Now, he just has to pull a theory out of his nether regions in order to make Obama somehow responsible for the performance of the stock market when he had absolutely no power over the economy whatsoever. Forget what all the financial experts were saying about the effects of the failure of Lehman Bros, AIG, etc., the merger of major banks, the uncertainty of the fate of many other financial institutions, the arguments over TARP….no, it was Obama.

    Say Bruce, Obama was alive in 2007, when the current recession began. Are you sure you can’t find a way to extrapolate backward and blame that on him too?

    You do realize you’re being laughed at all over the Internet, don’t you?

  29. To those who think US presidents don’t affect the price of gas

    I wonder who that could be?

    I mean, at #2 and #4, I explicitly acknowledged how US Presidents affect the price of gas. Their policies affect, as I put it, “the average price of gas over a period of years.” I sure hope – but, from sad past experience, I do not really expect – that certain commentors bother to actually read others’ comments, before responding. Rather than, say, inventing straw men and bashing those.

    I’m recalling the days of JimmineyCricketCarter and that President’s contribution to the rise of the OPEC cartel (no, he didn’t cause it but his actions in the Middle East helped advance and centralize the power of OPEC)

    OPEC was already powerful when Carter got into office. When was their one big oil embargo, was it…um… 1973-74? Carter did act badly in the Middle East and give way too much encouragement to the Islamists in other ways, of course.

    Nixon’s lack of leadership capacity after Watergate caused OPEC to stir to life.

    Again… you’re off on the timing there, MM. The famous “Arab Oil Embargo” (you can google it) started Oct 17, 1973. The Watergate investigations were moving along by then, but it would be a little too early, time-line-wise, to call it “Nixon’s lack of leadership capacity -after- Watergate”.

    It might be nice to think that Presidents don’t have that effect on short-term pricing, but they do.

    Alrighty, then. What has Obama done, short-term, to raise gasoline prices in a world of ***falling*** crude oil prices?

    Remember – I’ve already acknowledged the real damage that Democratic policies have done and will continue to do, long-term.

    How many times did we hear from the Left that their claim of W’s threat to invade Iran pushed up gas and oil prices? How often do gas price hikes get excused by offering “Middle East tensions” as the key influence

    Yeah, but that doesn’t mean what we’re hearing is right. I mean – you’re quoting the Left, now, as evidence of something? LOL. And note that in the episodes to which you refer, oil and gas prices move up together. At present, crude oil prices have actually been falling. No, the link Bruce provides is a better explanation of why gas prices have been rising. And, the explanation happens to not have anything to do with Obama’s *short-term* actions. It says:

    “Right now, in an unusual market trend, West Texas crude is selling for much less than inferior grades of crude from other places around the world. A severe economic downturn has left U.S. storage facilities brimming with it, sending prices for the premium crude to five-year lows. But it is the overseas crude that goes into most of the gas made in the United States. So prices at the pump will probably keep going up no matter what happens to the benchmark price of crude oil…

    “Brent North Sea crude, which feeds some East Coast refineries — and therefore winds up at many gas pumps around America — now costs about $7 more per barrel than the West Texas crude. Deutsche Bank analysts say the trend should continue.

    “Historically, West Texas International crude has cost more. So nobody bothered building the necessary pipelines to carry it beyond the nearby refineries… Now that the premium oil is suddenly very inexpensive, refiners elsewhere can’t get their hands on it.”

    OK? Now, of course it remains true that Obama is following terrible policies and much higher oil and gas prices are in our future. As I’ve said. Obama’s policies are wrong and awful, we can agree on that.

  30. the argument in this post is so tenuous it borders on absurdity. you commit the logical fallacy of assuming that correlation means causation. layoffs, declining profits and decreased manufacturing figures are more plausibly the causes of the stock market’s current nosedive.

    as for gas, prices tend to rise in the spring and summer. i’m not sure that’s news, or that it can reasonably be attributed to obama. and the article you linked seems to make an argument in favor of the stimulus. oil companies are decreasing production because consumers–who are anxious about layoffs–aren’t buying gas. this has the effect of increasing prices at the pump. to the extent the stimulus results in job creation or job security, consumers will start buying more gas. stimulating demand will drive down the price of gas.

    the article also sheds an interesting light on “drill baby drill”. we need to drill offshore, so the argument goes, in order to increase the supply of oil and drive down the cost of energy. but supply isn’t the problem here, at least according to the article.

  31. BTW, JimmineyCricket’s own Energy 1st Czar –James Schlesinger– speaking to the NYTimes in July ‘79, at the height of the Carter Oil Crisis, said “There’d be no gas lines if there were no price and allocation controls”.

    Now that is true. What Presidents and Congresses can do, or have done, to affect the short-term price of anything is to impose price controls, ban distribution, impose taxes, etc.

  33. Oh and Bruce, your idea that the .52 % downturn in October 2004 (a “tumble” in your words) indicated that investors were nervous about a possible Kerry win is pretty much exactly the opposite of what financial experts said. Quite the contrary, it seems to say more about the incumbent:

    According to a recent study by the Hirsch Organization, publishers of the Stock Trader’s Almanac, if the Dow loses more than 0.5 percent of its value in the month of October before Election Day, then an incumbent president is going to lose his job. The Dow fell 0.52 percent in October.

    This predictor has been true without exception from 1904 to the present, according to Jeffrey Hirsch, editor of the Stock Trader’s Almanac and president of the Hirsch Organization.

    CNN

    And by the way, the market “rebounded” (again your term) BEFORE the election.

  34. Interestingly, notice the trends: the high in October 2007, then, soon after, Obama became the front runner for the Democrats, adding to the problems of the housing burst. By the time time Barry had become the Dem contender, the Dow was down over 20%. And now look where it is, particularly after he became the nominee and won the election.

    Consider the major dip in the market from Sept 2008 through election day, when Obama was fully in the lead, was gaining more and more states, and looked to win. Roughly 11,500 to about 9,000.

    Bush took over with the market in a down swing, had 9/11 to deal with, and took it to record highs. I wonder how low Barry can bring it?

    Humorously, about the only company in the positive today was the Left’s pet peeve, Wal Mart.

  37. The market falls because Obama gets out of bed? Is this the logic conservative commentators like to use to explain the market to the world?

    The crash occurred well before the election and certainly not today. The title of the blog was worthy of making it to the front page of Google “Stock Market” – so kudos there.

    However, a little education might help here. I’ll start with a chart because pictures show things better than words

    http://blog.fallondpicks.com/uploaded_images/SPWEEKFeb7-791859.png

    The cause of the market crash was the credit crisis; not the stimulus plan. The crash kicked off in earnest when the last vestige of support from the post-September 11th rally in 2001 was breached in June 2008. This breach turned into a rout in September – well before any election. It was the economic meltdown which was the eventual nail in the coffin of McCain’s election hopes. Funny that just as the market really *did* crash Sarah Palin appeared on the scene. Hmmmm… I wonder why the people would have needed a comical distraction?

    The crisis created by Greenspan in a political environment which was under 100% Republican control. There is no doubt on who’s watch this mess was created.

    The stimulus plan may yet prove a bust but if you are somehow equating the effective sideways market we have experienced since the election to a “crash” then you have a lot to learn.

    Of course, all of this will fall on deaf ears to your readers who (based on the comments) seem happy to blame Obama for every big mess Bush left behind. But I would like to add my blog is recommended as one of 7 investing blogs in the Forbes Best-of-Web series; and one could not accuse Forbes of been anyway liberal.

    DJF

  39. What confuses me is I thought Obama was the change, the different one, he was going to solve all the evil things. How is it that he isn’t? I feel lied to. He preached bipartisianship. Lie. He said the pork bill was critical to avert a catastrophe, and after it passed Congress….he went on vacation for 4 days and took Michelle to a tony dinner in Chicago. He lied about the catastrophe. I thought Obama was the change. He promised Caterpiller would rehire workers if the pork bill was passed. The CEO said Obama lied. I feel betrayed and abused. Tonight I hear Ill Democrat Sen Burris is being investigated by the Feds. How come only the black guy gets investigated? Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Di Fi gave away secrets the other day….guess because she’s white, it’s okay now?

  41. To be fair, we can’t lay all this on Barry.

    Bush and Congress have been laying rail for this train wreck for years. The economy is just too big to turn on a dime. Blaming this on Barry is like blaming the 81-82 recession on Reagan.

    That being said, Barry and Congress are pushing this train down the hill as fast as they can.

    Question: from an economic standpoint, are we headed towards socialism or fascism? Socialism is ownership by “the community”.

    It seems like the gummint wants to tell the private sector how to operate.

  43. O my the gas price is going up. I’ts Bush and his oil buddies. I’m sorry that’s right he’s not the presdient no more. Could it be that we can’t drill now that dems are in control that’s what me voted for right. Dam you pay for the 5$ gas. I say drill here drill now. That’s how we tell the mideast to stick their oil. Do you think if we would have drilled 10 years agoe we would be still looking for ways to bridge to other means of engery. No and these dictators would have less to hold over our heads

  44. If the liberals can maintain that Bush was responsible for the post tech bubble recession, an imaginary “surplus” and that Clinton was responsible for NOTHING once he left office, I think it’s completely reasonable to assert that Chairman Obama is responsible for this mess.

    Also, he signed his name to it today so he owns it lock, stock and barrel. Or in liberal pussy terms: granola, soy and edemame.

  45. Gas prices are up because refiners have lowered production due to falling demand (in order to boost prices). Refineries don’t have to run wide open.

    There is a glut of crude on the market. There are loaded tankers at sea waiting for prices to rise. Adding oil production here (a good idea) wouldn’t lower fuel prices.

  46. I really wish Obama would hurry up and repeal the 22nd Amendment (with an executive order, of course). We could then stop having these petty arguments about which President is responsible for our nation’s ills.

    1) Jawboning alone (Fed and President) can cause markets/prices/speculation to significantly fluctuate within 5 minutes. Obama has been consistently negative about the economy, repeating that it’s going to get worse before it gets better. How can this do anything but drag the economy? Bush and the GOP cannot be blamed for something so ignorant as Obama’s publicly covering his ass in order to 1) be correct if the market continues to slide or be positively surprised if it quickly rebounds; 2) reap the future political benefits of an upward market cycle (even though his recent spending binge makes that less inevitable).

    2) Our current volatility is, I assume, in part due to technology because trading can be done instantaneously in response to such information. The days of steady, reliable, aggregate market changes are over.

  47. #45 – Iggy, please brush up on your civics lessons before making such an ignorant comment.

    Amendments to the Constitution cannot be done by “executive order,” not even repealing them. For instance the 18th Amendment (Prohibition) was passed but it took the 22nd Amendment to repeal it.

    Instead, the legislation must pass a 2/3 vote in both houses of Congress and 3/4 of all states need to ratify it. It does not in any way go to the White House at any time during the ratification process.

    Try again.

    Regards,
    Peter H.

  48. I am calling my Investors in the morning and asking for my money. I will be happier with it in my mattress than in the national toilet. I feel like an ostrich but I don’t know how far off I am in wanting to be safe. Do I really need to keep the faith or can I ditch now?

  49. This is The Obama Bust.

    Pull up a graph of the Dow Jones Industrial Average from May 6, 2008 to Nov. 20, 2008, and note the following dates of Barack Obama’s ascension: May 6 (he took the permanent delegate lead in the Democratic primary over Hillary Clinton), Sept. 19 (took permanent lead in national presidential polls over John McCain), Oct. 12 (divulged his “spread the wealth around” socialist agenda to “Joe the Plumber”), and Nov. 4 (Election Day).

    Over that period, the Dow Jones lost 42% of its value. The loss after May 6 was gradual (-1,633 points in 4.5 months) as his primary victory became apparent in a Democratic year (Bush was unpopular.) The loss after Sept. 19 was steeper (-2,937 points over 3 weeks) because McCain was the final roadblock. Unlike in the primary, after Sept. 19 no one stood between Obama and the presidency.

    However, the day after “Joe the Plumber,” the market jumped 937 points, on the optimism that the revelation of his socialist agenda might still lead to his undoing (+1,174 points over 3 weeks.) And, of course, the market tanked after Nov. 4, when he was elected (-2,073 points over 2 weeks.)

    From May 6 (13,021) to Nov. 20 (7,552) = -5,469 drop.

    Obama caused this recession. He owns it. It’s his.

    And now he tells us that he is going to spend our way out of poverty with his 2009 Death To America Drunken Sailor Spendathon. Just like a family in debt would buy a Ferrari, a vacation to Ibiza, a set of Gucci luggage, a pedigree dog, and a new flat screen tv, to spend their way out of poverty too.

    Therefore, when he emphasizes how much the economy has been ruined, he’s talking about how much he ruined it.

    It’s The Obama Bust.

  50. 1) Jawboning alone (Fed and President) can cause markets/prices/speculation to significantly fluctuate within 5 minutes

    Alrighty, then. Kindly explain what Obama has been doing to jawbone the price of gas *up*, in a world of falling or at least zone-traded crude oil prices. (Crude oil did go up today, I believe.)

    Obama has been consistently negative about the economy, repeating that it’s going to get worse before it gets better. How can this do anything but drag the economy?

    Mmmm, no, that’s not it. That should jawbone gas prices downward (i.e., bad picture on the demand side).

    Amendments to the Constitution cannot be done by “executive order,”

    Peter, with the greatest respect and friendship, I am gonna slightly defend Iggy on that one; I believe he intended sarcasm.

  52. Iggy’s a strange one, Peter. I have seen him spout Democratic talking points on Iraq, say, so I know where you’d have the idea he’s a leftist. On economic issues, though, I’ve seen comments from him that are hard-core free market. At different times I’ve also seen him argue smartly… and argue stupidly. So it varies.

  53. I mean, I never know which is coming next. On that level, he can sometimes be fun. I don’t respect his “Professor Quibbles-Bore” mode, where he’s engaged me by offering a misinterpretation of my words and then expecting me to own his misinterpretation, but that’s a story for another time.

  55. Oh no! the sky is falling! aghhh… Honestly, who cares let it fall.. Oh guess what.. One day we all die too.. Oh no! Holy Christ we die? aghhhhh… oh my God.. we are going to die.. Oh no what can I do to avert this impending disaster upon my tent.. Mmmmmm.. oh yeah.. man made economics… That fixes everything.. Throw some money at it.. Oh the labor … nahhhh.. those little laborers are not worth anything even though they make the world turn..