It's official. The US is in a recession and has been since December. The price of oil slides below 50 dollars a barrel. Stocks sell off, giving back about half of last week's gains. Analysis from Jon Najarian, CNBS contributor and founder of optionmonster.com, John Kilduff, VP at MF Global, Dr. Irwin Kellner, chief economist at Marketwatch.
What a revelation! That is essentially the same news (and information) I've been providing you for the past three years.
Backing up this realization is the economic forecast (still to be completely published) I made of the Employment Industry for this year. Pieces of that forecast managed to make it to the light of the Internet in February at sites such as HR.com, Associated Content.com, OnRec.com, Entrances Forum, and a few other places. The full forecast can be found on the Executive Recruiting Entrances in the Articles section. Watch for the links to go live on this four-part discussion. (Yes, blantant advertising and self promotion.)
KNX 1070 radio news is my sole source of entertainment these days. Therefore, it is also my sole source of audio news. The way they handled why there's been such American oblivion during this time was journalistically professional. They provided snippets of President Bush's statements to the nation over the course of selected time periods throughout these past 12 (to 15) months. At each juncture, Bush says we are doing fine and are not in an economic recession. The nation is economically sound and there is no reason to fear.
Can anyone recall the press conference Bush gave in March 2007? Bush made a statement about the strength of the nation as well as the ability of Americans to avail theirselves of going anywhere they wanted. One of the reporters interrupted the President to ask whether he was aware that gasoline was then nearly $3 per gallon. The President was not aware. In fact, he demanded to know who had put out such information as it simply was not true. Gasoline, on average, was about $2.50 per gallon. This past March Bush was still not willing to admit that gasoline prices were over $3 per gallon and prohibitive to those who are unemployed and seeking work. It was too costly to go to work!
This makes a strong statement about the type and style of leadership under which this nation has struggeled and strived for the past eight years. What's troubling is that as a nation, no one took steps to more than urge our national top employee to take a more cautious and informed look at the situation. No one insisted on better measures to pull things into safer waters. And finally, no one during any of these eight long and arduous years ever took steps to remove the leader who was methodically taking us to the last two inches of the edge of the precipice on which we hang.
It is now time for us to review history. We need to examine the many programs developed by the despised president of the 1930s and replicate some of the infusion methods used then. It is time to look at the person standing before you who wants to work, not the race, gender, sexual preference, neighborhood. Yes, it's definitely prudent to take into consideration education and intelligence. They should be considered in a fair and prudent manner, not with the historic bias that has led us in the past. As I said, it's more than time to look at the person standing before us and consider how many of the tasks that need to be performed, how many of the decisions that need knowledge, experience, and prudence can be performed by that person at an economic price -- that returns value and well being.
But then this reasoning is putting the cart before the horse. I've managed to move from the fact that the weather is a 10-hour hail storm to talking about how to rebuild our house. Time to sit down and catch my breath and thoughts for a moment.
But take heart, my dear readers. It was definitely not your imagination. We are truely in a recession (at best) but we've been in an economic depression for at least one year.
