State of the US economy
With the resignation of Admiral Fallon, some people have become worried that America will attack Iran. However, I am sitting here in Tokyo, on the TV news, the yen has dropped below 100 yen to a dollar for the first time in 12 years, and is still in free fall. The last I looked, oil was $109.92. And that shows no sign of getting cheaper. And then there is the sub prime loan mess.
I do think that the Bushies really believed they could win the Iraq war, and cheap Iraqi oil would have offset this. Real work, such as developing a non oil transport system, for example electric rail, was not even considered. Well, now we are about to pay for the fantasy.
As far as another Middle Eastern war though, this economic crisis may make another war impossible.
The only good news that I can see is, John McCain’s only message seems to be that America must stay in Iraq 100 years. When American’s are going bankrupt, and cannot afford to put food on the table or gas to go to work, 100 more years of war may not look attractive.
Posted: March 13th, 2008 under Economics.
Comments: 3
Comments
Comment from Nosebetter
Time: March 13, 2008, 9:32 am
I don’t think we need to be in Iraq for the next 100 years, but it is far down the list of reasons for the sad state of our economy. How long has it been since we had two recessions under one POTUS? The “fundamentals” have not been sound for any period of time during this presidency. Our Idiot in Chief was correct when he cut taxes and increased spending to boost the economy during the first recession, but both measures should have been temporary. I remember mentioning at the time that this would come back to bite us when we needed to boost the economy again during the next recession. Well, we’re there, and it has.
We’ll eventually get a band aid on this (but not before the problem deepens) and continue to make our economic fundementals even worse because making the rich even richer is the mandate that drives our economic policies under both republicans and democrats.
The three major flaws in our economic policies are our trade policies, our spending policies, and our tax policies.
Comment from timr
Time: March 13, 2008, 9:49 am
On Fallon, latest news is that his retirement had nothing to do with his opinions on Iran, but rather with the length of the “pause” on drawdowns in Iraq. He thought there should only be a short pause, while Gen Patraeus wanted a long pause. Well guess who the real fair haired boy in the WH is. Not the pentagon, where he is considered by many to be one of the “perfumed princes”, not a real warfighter
Comment from Max
Time: March 13, 2008, 4:12 pm
Well Tim, the WH is so desperate for anything that might just be called “success” in Iraq. Gen. Petraeus was lucky to have the Mosul area in the initial invasion which was rather quiet. And he said some common sense things about counter insurgency.
HELLO boys and girls, did we have to forget EVERY lesson from Vietnam, paid for with so much blood?
In any case, Mosul is now just as bad as the rest of Iraq, so that success was fleeting. And his comments have not always positive about the surge. The man that concerns me is Gen Ordierno, his deputy in Iraq. He is one of these guys that keeps saying that Iran is behind all our troubles in Iraq. He bothers me very much.
But just maybe we are on the back of the tiger now, and cannot get off.
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