Posted on 02/16/2012 5:37:03 PM PST by Libloather
Obama’s phony recovery
By Dick Morris - 02/14/12 06:11 PM ET
President Obama, faced with no recovery from the recession as he enters an election year, has come up with a handy political gimmick: Fake the statistics.
The economic data that portend recovery are totally and completely inventions of Obama’s political operation. The reality is that no recovery is taking place!
Economist James Fitzgibbon, of the Highlander Fund, explains how cooked the economic statistics on which the president bases his claims of recovery really are.
Begin with “gains” in the stock market. Fitzgibbon explains that they are no indication of changes in the public mood because the public isn’t doing the investing anymore. He notes that HFT (high frequency trade computers) now “account for 80 percent [of the market’s] daily business. No one else is left because they lost their money in 2008 and the public has fled the market … Total NYSE volume is 67 percent lower on average than in 2008. Volume is 29 percent lower this year compared to 2011. The prices [have] no serious meaning.”
Have consumers, as alleged, started borrowing again? Not really. Fitzgibbon explains that “credit use has surged only because the Obama administration changed the student loan program to a direct program and those loans are now counted as part of this metric. It is not comparable to anything prior to 2011.” And, he adds ominously, “massive credit card use as measured against actual verifiable sales shows the increase is in borrowed funds to pay for food! Not my idea of a healthy sign.”
How about lower unemployment figures? Fitzgibbon says they are a “joke.” He says that the Bureau of Labor Statistics has “completely changed the … metrics as of January 2012. None of the current percentages are relatable to anything prior to 2012!” He points out that the January unemployment data are heavily adjusted for “seasonal variations.” He notes that “the actual data [show that the economy] lost 2.7 million jobs in January.” And that’s just the numerator. For the denominator — the number of people in the workforce — the data “also shows about 1.2 million people magically left the workforce.” He says one has to go back to the early 1980s to see labor force participation as low as it is now.
Auto sales? He says “auto sales are when the manufacturer dumps cars and trucks on a dealer. Inventory stuffing! It has no relationship to actual sales to a consumer. Thanks to Obama, GM dealers are drowning in product no one wants to buy. It is a meaningless data point. Only dealer-to-consumer data is useful. It is not showing any growth at all.”
Housing? He says positive news in this sector is unreliable. “The raw data we get shows it is worse than last year and in some regions [the] worst ever since the ’60s.”
So it appears that Obama’s reelection strategy hinges on asking people to believe the data he puts before them rather than the evidence of their own eyes. It won’t work.
Any economic recovery is only publicly noticed eight to 12 quarters after it has taken place. Ask George H.W. Bush, who lost the 1992 election despite very positive economic news at the end of his term. Or ask Clinton, who lost Congress despite two years of favorable job-creation numbers. It takes awhile for the good economic news to sink in. And, when there is no good news, just faked government propaganda, it takes even longer to sink in!
People will understand that Obama’s data are a lie. The economy is not some abstract issue. Real people do not depend on changes in the unemployment-rate data to gauge their mood. They are more interested in whether they can get good jobs themselves. Obama’s attempt to rig the statistics won’t work. Indeed, it is a pathetic attempt.
From the article
“So it appears that Obama’s reelection strategy hinges on asking people to believe the data he puts before them rather than the evidence of their own eyes. It won’t work.”
Morris forgets he is talking about a Whitney Houston, Micheal Jackson culture
If they continue to "enable" the current "emperor" by going along with his fairy tale "recovery," then all the so-called "progressives" are assuring that their grandchildren's children will live under oppression and tyranny.
Once, in America, lived an enlightened generation who dreamed of liberty, individual opportunity, prosperity and plenty, where their posterity could enjoy "the Blessings of Liberty" under their own Constitutionally-limited government.
Their work lasted for more than 200 years. . . . and then came "the emperor with no clothes" and his willing entourage of enablers.
vs Bernake
Mon, Feb 13 2012
Bernanke Not Fooled by Recent Unemployment Gains
http://www.fxstreet.com/fundamental/analysis-reports/market-pulse-fx/2012/02/13/02/
In his testimony before the Senate Budget Committee last week, Bernanke said that even with an improving outlook, the U.S. economy will grow at a “sluggish” rate for the remainder of the year.
The job numbers are up but the tax revenues from those jobs are down. So the jobs suck and are part time and temp jobs. Again the tax revenues are going down, so the economy is getting worse.
The majority will believe anything spoon fed to them over the network “News”. Only a small minority of Americans do any research into facts about the economy, politics, etc...
Bread (food stamps, welfare, govt handouts), and circuses (reality shows, talent shows, sports, etc...), and a complicit media will win Zero another 4 years ... count on it.
Actually, they are declining, which surprises me.
Actually, they are increasing, which surprises me.
Actually, they are increasing, which surprises me.
The numbers I saw stated that Obama has actually cut more taxes than Bush, and that the tax revenues have been on a steady decline due to that and the declining economy. How do your numbers look?
Also interesting is the fact that Obama tax cuts have been more spread out over all the tax brackets (that actually pay) and that the Bush tax cuts helped the rich in greater proportion, but some economists think that these cuts helped the economy more because the rich spent more instead of putting their money into tax shelters.
The top 10% pay 70% of the taxes. Half of tax filers pay no tax. And the government will have to raise taxes even if a conservative takes the White House because revenues are way too low.
QE3 is coming mid-2012 as the economy will be slow again. Bernanke has made the comment that he is not impressed by the recovery and that the economy will be slow, which is the big clue. There will be a Great Depression in about 2-3 years after the latest printing of money to induce inflation in order to stave off the coming deflation. The next market bust will be in retirement savings. Plan accordingly. Buy annuities (like what happened in the 30s) when the T-bonds interest rates reach 4%. Also stop stocking up on gold like an idiot and put your money into cold hard cash. The FED will not be able to do a QE4 as this will be just too much. Watch how the bond market is in southern Europe at this time. This is how the US market will act when deflation hits.
Social Security is dead meat. Over $60 trillion of baby-boomer entitlements will go unpaid. It is the real crisis even more than the national debt that the US will deal with and that Paul Ryan is trying to bring attention to.
Again a Great Depression is on its way in less than 5 years perhaps and we will have the deflation that the FED has been putting off for years. The deleveraging of the huge private debt is causing deflation. Get ready.
Bingo. Go around the web and look at the comments section.
We are finished as a nation w 50% being not only stupid, but dangerously uninformed and brainwashed.
Don’t be fooled by internet comments.
Most of the “doers” aren’t commenting on internet forums, they’re out making a living.
Yes the Baraqqi coalition folks are prominent on the net, but are over-represented. Just like viewers of daytime tv. That’s why all the commercials on Jerry Springer are for bankruptcy and Social Sec disability lawyers.
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