[fhayek]

That's just it. I figured that even an idiot would make the economy appear to be improving by pumping several trillion extra (i.e. borrowed) dollars into the economy. Buy things, build things, spur manufacturing. A fifth grader could have done it. Of course, you would still be mortgaging the future, but you should have been able to make today look better. But the boy genius paid bonuses, bailed out failing industries, secured union pensions, kept bloated public payrolls intact. In short, nothing new was produced. Payoffs, laundering, bailouts, call them what you will, but they did nothing but enshrine wasteful and inefficient economic practices. Nevertheless, the MSM is there looking for the most microscopic signs of economic growth.

[kearnyirish2]

“I figured that even an idiot would make the economy appear to be improving by pumping several trillion extra (i.e. borrowed) dollars into the economy. Buy things, build things, spur manufacturing.”

It is actually harder to do then you think; the reason the media can’t fool anyone that things are better is because the result of the printing/borrowing of trillions is the inflation that is visible to everyone who spends money. The high gas, grocery, even stock prices are caused by the devaluation of the dollar; the media is instead desperately trying to trot out alternative explanations. Tension in the Middle East is blamed for gas prices, though this certainly is nothing new; stock prices going up is heralded as a sign of an improving economy instead of a weaker dollar, and any natural event that can fit into our food chain is being used to explain high food prices.

Average Americans won’t be so easily deceived this time around; most of us are worse off than four years ago and we know it.