Paul Krugman: From Hype to Fear

[cal04]

The unemployment report on Friday was brutally bad. Unemployment rose in December, while job creation was minimal — and it’s highly likely, for technical reasons, that the job number will be revised down, showing an actual decline in employment.

It’s the latest piece of bad news about an economy in which the employment situation has actually been deteriorating for the past year. It’s no longer possible to hope that the effects of the housing slump will remain “contained,” as one of 2007’s buzzwords had it. The levees have been breached, and the repercussions of the housing crisis are spreading across the economy as a whole.

It’s not certain, even now, that we’ll have a formal recession, although given the news on Friday you have to say that the odds are that we will. But what is clear is that 2008 will be a troubled year for the U.S. economy — and that as a result, the overall economic record of the Bush years will have been dreary at best: two and a half years of slumping employment, three and a half years of good but not great growth, and two more years of renewed economic distress.

The November election will take place against that background of economic distress, which ought to be good news for candidates running on a platform of change.

But the opponents of change, those who want to keep the Bush legacy intact, are not without resources. In fact, they’ve already made their standard pivot when things turn bad — the pivot from hype to fear. And in case you haven’t noticed, they’re very, very good at the fear thing.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/07/opinion/07krugman.html?hp

[Adsos Letter]

1. Excellent article by Krugman, once again.

The Dems have to find a way to make the economy, and the underlying issues of taxation, a number-one subject of discussion without starting a stampede for the doors.

The question for all of our candidates is: How to drive the discussion?

[nyc83]

6. spot on question

but the answer is not easy. edwards is trying, but he just come across as too combative to a lot of people, even those who his message is aimed at.

[Adsos Letter]

7. and when Senator Clinton raises it, as in the latest debate...

she gets accused of cynical "fear-mongering"...

[OHdem10]

2. Krugman is right on:

I watched the GOP debate last evening and they had a forum on Fox this
evening.

When I ask myself after the debate, what is their theme or focus.
In both instances. War, War, Islamic extremists, Global Gihad
Taxcuts and Cutting spending.

In the debates they got testy with each other, but in the forum
they all maintained their composure. I have to style wise
there were not bad.

These people just do not get it. The unthinkable has happened
A Member of their base, Huckabee proclaiming and extensive Populist
Message has risen up and seems to be set to take off like meteor.
This is the first time in a long long long time that I can remember
care of the poor, Health Care, Infrastructure Repair, If we build
a fence along the border--use American Workers and American Materials.
This is a message--this is not some Baptist Minister protesting Abortions
and trying make sure Gays do not get married. This is a man who also
knows the Working Class andPoor needs are not being met and he is
challenging his party.

I do not know what goes on in private in the Republican Party.
These guys sat their talking about we must noft let the Bush
taxcuts (for the rich) expire. That Jihad Cost money. I believe
the middle class Fundies and Evangelicals have seen the light.
The old game ==give them a few crumbs. but make sure the Country
Club set get taxcuts during a war--is about to over.

Yes, the Debate was fear. Oh My Gosh, Tammy Bruce was on there
to spread the fear. GHina and Russia are coming after us and
we will need a Muscular Foreign Policy and Guilliani to deal
with this frightening world.

[flashl]

3. Tools of control and Manufactured Consent = hype and fear

Millions of Americans are living in a recession that started before the offically declared recession in Mar 2001 and they are not suppose to know it, until todays pundits offically declare it?

The Emperor has no clothes.

[BridgeTheGap]

4. Exactly - why do we have to work 2-3 jobs just to survive?

We're being treated like peons - plain and simple. Somebody needs to do something and that "somebody" is us!

[Joe Bacon]

5. Something has sure gone wrong

Here I am a 52 year old, remembering growing up in Ambridge PA in the 60s. Back then, my Dad only had to work one 8-hour shift in the mill, Mom didn't have to work and Dad made enough to buy a house, car and keep food on the table. Back in the 60s, if you were lucky enough to get in a mill at 18 and work 40 years straight you could get out at 58 with a decent pension and health care.

All that died right after Reagan got in and "free trade" was implemented. In 1983, all the mills in Western PA shut down for good. Folks who were a year or 2 away from a pension got screwed. THen 2 years ago, folks who retired from J & L or American Bridge before the Reagan Fuckup had their health benefits terminated and their pensions cut by 2/3.

Now if you play by the rules you get screwed. Those who don't play by the rules and lie, cheat and steal are the ones who really get ahead, and the bigger liar you are, the more you rise in this economy. The more you fuck up the bigger your corporate bonus is and an even bigger corporation will let you drive them into the ground as well.

In Japan, if a corporate executive fucks up, that executive takes responsibility and resigns. Here, the same thing is handsomely rewarded.

What we need to do is link corporate executive pay to performance. If a Corporate executive drives a company into the ground they should get not one penny as a bonus. I would be willing to let them have a payout equivalent to the Social Security Wage cap, but not one penny more. If a corporation tries to give a failing executive a bonus, it should be taxed at 100% above the Social Security Wage Cap.

[flashl]

9. The pensions being cut is another shoe thats about to drop.

There were reports a week ago, about pension shortfalls. The scandals that keep surfacing from putting pensions in derivatives started after Raygun.

[truth2power]

8. Here's a link where you don't have to register...

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/01/07/6215/