Everyone's Entitled to Their Opinion As Long As They Agree With Me
I was asked the following question by a reader named "antibush" over at Robyn's site:
Hondo - what is your opinion of the current recession and what caused it. And, regardless of that, what do you think the GOP is currently doing to help the economy?
The following was my response:
I believe that the seeds of what our economy has become were planted during the Reagan administration. Since then, no administration has really done anything to change the situation. The gap between the "haves" and the "have nots" continues to widen and the middle class, to the extent it still exists, is being marginalized politically and economically by both of the major parties. The economy is more controlled by the Federal Reserve than anything else right now and the stock market is nothing more than an exercise in mass psychology. As far as what can be done about it, hell, I don't know.
The Gentle Reader, as Miss Manners would say, then proceeded to take me to task:
Hondoi [sic] - lets stop this finger pointing or credit taking on behalf of both parties, because each of us can talk blue in the face and regurjitate facts from various sources. Rather, lets focus on what the GOP is doing *NOW* to try and help the bleak situation in our economy. Lets be honest about it to - just because stock prices aren't taking and quite honestly, using DJIA as an indicator, is slowing growing again. Even the a&p 500 is at decent levels. This of course does no good for those out of work. So the true test of a strong economy, the real inidcator is the unemployment rate. We are at 6.4 and rising. Again, what is the GOP doing to try and help create jobs or at the very least, stop the bleeding? (And the so called "tax breaks" don't count - $600 doesn't cover even half of most mortgages these days).
I didn't get to respond to antibush, since Robyn closed the comments for that post, as is her right to do. First of all, we'll get along much better if you can spell my name correctly. My only question to antibush is what the fuck hell do you want from me? All I did was answer your question. I wasn't looking for an argument and I wasn't indicating any support for President Bush's economic policies. What's the matter, I didn't kiss Clinton's ass for creating a bunch of jobs in the food service industry? (you want fries with that ma'am?) If anything, I was hard on this whole supply side economic theory which George Bush, Sr. refered to as voodoo economics and David Stockman, Reagan's budget director, admitted to be "a Trojan horse to bring down the top [tax] rate" for the wealthy. Apparently antibush has some issues of his own to deal with. Here's my only piece of advice to him/her: Don't ask the fucking damn question if you don't want to hear the fucking damn answer!
Selah.
File under Rants and Raves.
11:19:04 PM 
