Day 3594: What's Depressing About the American Mid-Terms…

Wednesday:

…is hearing some Tea Party Wing-Nut exclaiming that:

"it's time for a bit less Big Government; it's time to cut the deficit; it's time to cut taxes for small businesses"

…and thinking, isn't that COALITION policy, these days?

Sigh.

The reports of the US Mid-Terms, (including his own!) all say that President Barry O has taken a SHELLACKING in these elections, which is harsh for a man who wasn't even standing and whose popularity remains more than double that of the only Replutocrat anyone has even heard of. (Oh you know – the OTHER one who isn't a WITCH.)

The FIRST thing to remember after this result is that actually it was NOT the President but CONGRESS who got a KICKING from the electorate, and that is because CONGRESS was who they blamed for the ongoing crisis.

(So if the crisis is STILL ongoing in two years, then the now-Replutocrat Congress may find it's THEM that gets a kicking AGAIN!)

The SECOND thing to remember is that for the last two years, Barry O has had almost as much OBSTRUCTIONIST behaviour from his own Dumbocrat party as he has from the toy-from-pram-flinging brigade opposite. NOW he's got to find a way to work with the Replutocrats but the same is true for them – they've got to find a way to work with HIM.

And if they DO work together, he looks like a MASTER POLITICIAN like Mr President Billary-Hillary. And if they DON'T work together, then THEY end up looking like a bunch of spoilsport rich SOBs (Son of… OBamas…. Obviously).


Meanwhile, as Americaland embarks on a second round of Quantum of Easing, people ask: "is this throwing good money after bad?"

No of course not! It is throwing IMAGINARY money after bad!

But it IS a fascinating TEST CASE, as President Barry O continues, at least for the moment, to try fiscal STIMULUS compared to Great Britain activating AUSTERITY.

Americaland and Great Britain are not DIRECTLY comparable, even if their economy WASN'T hugely greater than ours (US GDP is more than FIVE TIMES greater than UK GDP). Their unemployment is higher than our (10% as opposed to 7%); they're more reliant on a manufacturing sector in decline than we are (ours is already declined); and most of all their housing sector is mired in deep, deep do-do because of the sub-prime mortgaging fiasco.

These are the things that Barry O is blamed for, because it is HARD when the unemployment rate is 10% to see that the stimulus saved you from an unemployment rate of 20%.

Little pause to remember that, once Mr Dr Vince had guided them into it, Hard Labour's economic stimulus WAS right… AT THE TIME. Big question is whether that time has PASSED.

For Americaland, the engine of the economy STILL isn't firing properly – and that's a big risk for ALL of us. So we better hope that Barry O and the Congress can get their acts together!
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