I am taking this opportunity to say goodbye to President George W. Bush. Sure, like you I have seen him lampooned a million times in every conceivable way. It wasn’t always like this, it’s strange how short our memories are, like the incoming President Barack Obama, George W. had a popularity rating of over 80%.
The perception of the outgoing President is that he was a total idiot who couldn’t walk and talk. Interesting that those who know him paint a totally different and contradictory picture. I don’t have personal knowledge of the man, a great many of whose policies I don’t like or simply abhor. But I don’t think he is a fool and I don’t believe he had been foolish, any more than most of his predecessors.
Moreover I am prepared to take bets that long-term history is going to be a great deal kinder to his stint in office than predecessors like Clinton, Carter or many others.
Obviously speaking in public was painful to George W. and any of us listening to his tortured syntax and garbled grammar, but that didn’t mean he was stupid any more than Barack being a brilliant orator will make him a great President.
I instinctively hate big business being in any way involved in government at any level, whatever the rationale, and I especially find some of the big American corporations genuinely terrifying harbingers of some dreadful corporate world and these people appeared to have their hooks into George, but I don’t think these same corporations are strangers to anyone who has previously inhabited the White House. I would love to see Barack create some distance between himself and those insider interests.
Bush didn’t seem to handle emergencies well but then again, do you remember Clinton or Nixon facing emergencies, they tried to lie their way out of their problems. Carter, probably the President with the highest IQ of the lot didn’t have a clue how to handle the Iranian hostage situation and is still making lame excuses for his lamentable choices. Perhaps no one forgives Bush for the War on Terror, which I believe was and still is necessary, even if it has been disastrously handled in many ways.
The truth is that President Clinton is fondly remembered for his time in office because people felt prosperous whereas they despise President Clinton because the economy is collapsing around their ears, the people are terrified for their future, and they’re looking for someone to blame and Wall St is just too alien and anonymous to understand let alone attack. We’re left with the outgoing President to despise and blame and although we’re all culpable to a lesser or greater extent the real culprits live in the City of London and New York’s Wall St.
Like the comedians who found Bush ideal lampoon material I will miss this misunderstood President for his apparent humanity and despite his frailties. I hope President Obama will be nothing like him as times have certainly moved on, and we need a very different type of man for the uncertain future we all face.
In the meantime I thank the outgoing President for trying his best, which at times was good enough, and for his very obvious attempts to do the right thing. I hope he has a long and healthy retirement and gains satisfaction from his successor’s achievements. I hope and believe he will.
Monday, January 19, 2009
ScaryTimes
Today there will be two blog articles, this one about domestic matters, and the other to say goodbye to President George W. Bush.
We are all very concerned about the government and its latest bail out of the banks in the UK. Today’s figures are just so astronomical they could choke our economy for a couple of generations to come if this doesn’t work. We are now entering the realm of fantasy fiscal policy, which has been trodden before, in Weimar Germany and more recently in Zimbabwe.
The solution being sought involves in our government in theory creating a bank for toxic debt. This central clearing house will deal with all the bad or suspect debts floating in the banking system, and now to be guaranteed by us, the taxpayers. This is a black hole that could bury us; it is extremely treacherous territory from which there might be no escape. Our government doesn’t actually know how big this risk is, no one seems able to do so.
Add to this the tactic of simply printing more money to meet potentially unending obligations and we could yet face the day when wheelbarrow manufacture might be the boom business of the new decade, simply because we would need some means of wheeled transport to carry our worthless money in if the pound continues to implode.
You can already feel the affect of this decrease in comparative value when you travel to the USA or Europe and realize that your pound has dropped about 25% in value in a relatively short period of time. We need to see the economy stabilize and the government’s latest measure take effect or we are in huge trouble. Even if they do become instantly effective, and I doubt that, there is still no light at the end of this particular tunnel.
I’m sorry if I am confirming the pundits naming of this date as the most pessimistic and downbeat date on the annual calendar but we have to face the future with pragmatism and that tells us that our Prime Minister did what he had to a few weeks ago as he probably had no alternative other than to watch our banks topple like a row of dominoes and – it simply wasn’t effective and it hasn’t worked in broader terms. Our banks are still not liquid enough and are still not lending to the small and medium sized businesses or solid citizens, as they must if we are to financially survive.
Although today's bail out is larger in both size and ambition I don’t trust the banks to take a view bigger than their own boardrooms and next shareholder event. They are going to have to be dragged screaming to do what’s right by the government or they will simply not comply.
The scariest thing I have recently witnessed was President George W. Bush as he calmly made arrangements with the American legislature for the next $350 billion of public money to be downloaded to the boys from Wall St. When he was asked how we were going with the previous £350 billion, provided less than a month ago, he smiled and said, “That’s already been spent.”
This money isn’t endless and we need to see some positive signs from our banking system or we are falling into the biggest financial hole in history. We need to start handing out the shovels and digging!
We are all very concerned about the government and its latest bail out of the banks in the UK. Today’s figures are just so astronomical they could choke our economy for a couple of generations to come if this doesn’t work. We are now entering the realm of fantasy fiscal policy, which has been trodden before, in Weimar Germany and more recently in Zimbabwe.
The solution being sought involves in our government in theory creating a bank for toxic debt. This central clearing house will deal with all the bad or suspect debts floating in the banking system, and now to be guaranteed by us, the taxpayers. This is a black hole that could bury us; it is extremely treacherous territory from which there might be no escape. Our government doesn’t actually know how big this risk is, no one seems able to do so.
Add to this the tactic of simply printing more money to meet potentially unending obligations and we could yet face the day when wheelbarrow manufacture might be the boom business of the new decade, simply because we would need some means of wheeled transport to carry our worthless money in if the pound continues to implode.
You can already feel the affect of this decrease in comparative value when you travel to the USA or Europe and realize that your pound has dropped about 25% in value in a relatively short period of time. We need to see the economy stabilize and the government’s latest measure take effect or we are in huge trouble. Even if they do become instantly effective, and I doubt that, there is still no light at the end of this particular tunnel.
I’m sorry if I am confirming the pundits naming of this date as the most pessimistic and downbeat date on the annual calendar but we have to face the future with pragmatism and that tells us that our Prime Minister did what he had to a few weeks ago as he probably had no alternative other than to watch our banks topple like a row of dominoes and – it simply wasn’t effective and it hasn’t worked in broader terms. Our banks are still not liquid enough and are still not lending to the small and medium sized businesses or solid citizens, as they must if we are to financially survive.
Although today's bail out is larger in both size and ambition I don’t trust the banks to take a view bigger than their own boardrooms and next shareholder event. They are going to have to be dragged screaming to do what’s right by the government or they will simply not comply.
The scariest thing I have recently witnessed was President George W. Bush as he calmly made arrangements with the American legislature for the next $350 billion of public money to be downloaded to the boys from Wall St. When he was asked how we were going with the previous £350 billion, provided less than a month ago, he smiled and said, “That’s already been spent.”
This money isn’t endless and we need to see some positive signs from our banking system or we are falling into the biggest financial hole in history. We need to start handing out the shovels and digging!
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