On the other hand … or is it Hoof?

In what is undoubtedly good news, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis (Dept. of Commerce) has announced that REAL GDP grew by approximately 3.5% in the third quarter of 2009. That is up from the second quarter growth of .7%. It appears that the economy may be rebounding from the so-called “Great [...]

All Hail the Corporatist in Chief

Any one who thinks the Democratic Party or the Democratic President represent the interests of the little guy in this country can’t be reading any newspapers. I’ve always thought that the Republican Party overly favored big business and was out to set up monopolies for all its cronies. It’s hard to believe anyone [...]

Did he come to bury or praise Suppy-Side Economics?

Bruce Bartlett has just released a new book–and a mea culpa of sorts– for supply side economics (SSE). As an ex-aide to the late Jack Kemp and author of a book on Reaganomics, Bartlett’s got an interesting perspective from having a seat near the table. He also takes a few undeserved potshots [...]

Death by Bubble

Economist Andy Xie says Lehman Brothers died in vain and that it’s just a matter of time before we get hit by another deadly bubble. His guest post at Caijing Magazine is just so dead on that you must go read it.
There has been plenty to learn from last year’s miserable economy [...]

Who Holds Wall Street Accountable?

If your answer included any of number regulators or congress with its oversight duties or the traditional media with its watchdog of the public duties sorta answer, that would be a wrong answer. There were so many articles today about past and present Wall Street tomfoolery that I almost forgot [...]

Some times being Right doesn’t always make you Feel Good

You may remember back in January that I was not happy and very outspoken about the size of the Obama Stimulus plan. I was not impressed by the content or with the mix between tax cuts and direct government spending. You may recall that the Blue Dogs interminable resistance to do anything that might [...]

It’s still about the Jobs!

I keep repeating this like a mantra, but an economy that relies on households buying 70% of it’s production, and households that rely on wages for 67% of their income, is not going to get healthy until it creates more jobs. That’s why Robert Riech, Paul Krugman, and this Cajun Country Economist are still [...]

Our Dysfunctional Government

I used to tell my students down here in New Orleans how smoothly things ran in Minneapolis compared to here until that Interstate Bridge fell into the river. Then I realized we were just the canary in the coal mine.
Still, it’s really hard to describe the degree of dysfunction surrounding all levels of government down [...]

Support your new Alphabet Soup Agency

A central component of the Obama administration’s Wall Street reform policy is creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA). He mentioned it earlier this week in his speech as well as today in his radio address. The banks are not happy about the agency. I thought I’d spend some [...]

Incoherency is not an Asset

I’m not sure what happened to Dr. Paul Krugman that fateful night of dinner at the White House, but I’d like the shrill one back now. Was it something in the food? Was it something in the conversation? Who knows? But in as much a Buddhist can offer a Jewish guy [...]