"Slouching (even faster) towards Gomorrah" ...

[dogtag]

Whether Trump can win a second term is not as certain as it was
at the year's beginning, and whether the Senate can remain Republican
is also iffy. Let's not forget that voters tend to vote pocketbook matters
and pocketbooks have suffered a devastating blow due to this virus
lockdown. That, for which Trump will be blamed by the democrats and
their sycophant media no matter what, plus the continuous attack by
the same bunch for the past three years is certain to take a toll. What
horrors would await us if these two losses came to pass is something
I don't want to think about. A Biden or a Michelle or a Sanders in the
White House, Pelosi running the House and Schumer the Senate would
be the ultimate nightmare Robert Bork might have had in mind.

[togor]

Well there's always the afterlife.

[Roadkingtrax]

Well there's always the afterlife.

Some sooner than others. Maybe they can report back to us how much it sucks after they have settled in?

[dryheat]

I thought they had cured that but who knows if everything disintegrates. People are funny. Just because it happened on Trumps watch he gets a little blame. That the rule. But playing witch doctor with his various wrong medical suggestions doesn't help. What if he gets re-elected and really gets weird? I like everything he stands for but I'm not crazy about him. I'd still take him even if he is the crazy old guy next door over any of the liberals.

[Sandpebble]

Whether Trump can win a second term is not as certain as it was
at the year's beginning, and whether the Senate can remain Republican
is also iffy. Let's not forget that voters tend to vote pocketbook matters
and pocketbooks have suffered a devastating blow due to this virus
lockdown. That, for which Trump will be blamed by the democrats and
their sycophant media no matter what, plus the continuous attack by
the same bunch for the past three years is certain to take a toll. What
horrors would await us if these two losses came to pass is something
I don't want to think about. A Biden or a Michelle or a Sanders in the
White House, Pelosi running the House and Schumer the Senate would
be the ultimate nightmare Robert Bork might have had in mind.

Well DT.... fair is fair .... I mean you keep blaming Obama for the last stock crash and that happened before he was even elected

If the present economy was so strong then it wouldn't have folded in three weeks

[Vern Humphrey]

I thought they had cured that but who knows if everything disintegrates. People are funny. Just because it happened on Trumps watch he gets a little blame. That the rule. But playing witch doctor with his various wrong medical suggestions doesn't help. What if he gets re-elected and really gets weird? I like everything he stands for but I'm not crazy about him. I'd still take him even if he is the crazy old guy next door over any of the liberals.

Unfortunately, the crazy old guy next door is the liberals' nominee -- and fully supported by the liberals on this forum.

[togor]

The crazy old guy arg has lost some of it's snap of late. Sunlight and disinfectant will do that.

The Democrats want to max out the government response to Covid, the GOP wants to underbid it. The distinction is pretty clear. Who is closer to being right? That is who the voters will reward.

Reagents for example are a bottleneck worldwide. Labs are reluctant to increase production capacity because they're concerned they won't recoup costs. What we need is the reagent equivalent of the Dodge Chicago Engine Plant. But the administration doesn't want to go there. But the thing is....excess reagent capacity would be a wonderful problem to have. Who wouldn't want to buy from the Americans instead of the Chinese? Just one example of the lack of imagination that plagues the current administration.

[barretcreek]

The point of prolonged lock downs is to inflict as much pain on the economy as possible, especially small business which tends to vote conservative. May work, may backfire. A few articles have said there are folks who find they are making more on unemployment than working, which is easy to understand with service industry low wage jobs. Squeaky is telling people 'don't go back to working 70 hours a week'.

[togor]

The point of prolonged lock downs is to inflict as much pain on the economy as possible, especially small business which tends to vote conservative. May work, may backfire. A few articles have said there are folks who find they are making more on unemployment than working, which is easy to understand with service industry low wage jobs. Squeaky is telling people 'don't go back to working 70 hours a week'.

You don't believe that. The point of lockdowns is to buy time for testing, treatment, mobilization, etc., instead of letting the virus burn unimpeded.

Of course if the dreamed-of response is to just piss away whatever time the shutdown buys, then I suppose yeah, it represents a needless infliction of pain.

But consider the meat plants. Nobody shut them down proactively. They closed because they couldn't function with an epidemic burning through them.

[clintonhater]

If the present economy was so strong then it wouldn't have folded in three weeks

An explosion in unemployment faster than occurred in 1929? Present level of unemployment wasn't reached during the Great Depression for about one year.

[clintonhater]

Who wouldn't want to buy from the Americans instead of the Chinese?

Most of the world, because the Chinese price would be so much lower. How to make the US price competitive? Subsidies would be the only way--the same way China protects its own industries.

[togor]

There are lots of ways one could measure the strength of the economy.

A good one IMO would have been the savings rate for working people--how many paychecks ahead they were. Or for that matter, companies. As it happens business and workers both carrying a huge amount of debt. Government too, printing money to cover massive deficits or issuing bonds like crazy.

From that perspective I saw an economy on a sugar (or cocaine or meth) high. To say this virus comes at a bad time that way is the understatement of understatements. There's going to be a lot of bad paper to unwind.

- - - Updated - - -

Most of the world, because the Chinese price would be so much lower. How to make the US price competitive? Subsidies would be the only way--the same way China protects its own industries.

Price isn't everything.

[98src]

The economy didn't fold.......the liberal media and government did.

[dryheat]

There are lots of ways one could measure the strength of the economy.

A good one IMO would have been the savings rate for working people--how many paychecks ahead they were. Or for that matter, companies. As it happens business and workers both carrying a huge amount of debt. Government too, printing money to cover massive deficits or issuing bonds like crazy.

From that perspective I saw an economy on a sugar (or cocaine or meth) high. To say this virus comes at a bad time that way is the understatement of understatements. There's going to be a lot of bad paper to unwind.

- - - Updated - - -



Price isn't everything.

I like that one(the price isn't everything part). But people are people. That's why there's Harbour Freight and the 99 cent store.

[dryheat]

An explosion in unemployment faster than occurred in 1929? Present level of unemployment wasn't reached during the Great Depression for about one year.

It was 1929. They were still using the telegraph in places. Leagues ahead of smoke signals.