economy | Multiple Enthusiasms

Tag: economy

January 26, 2009

Just four days after GM received a $5 billion dollar loan as a bailout from the federal government, the company announced today it would lay off 2,000 workers and slow production across nine plants.

I hate to say that it seems as always that the rich get richer while the poor get laid off, because that’s way more cynical than I generally tend toward, but, well, it really does seem that way, lately.

But I don’t know; you’d think maybe GM would use some of those workers it’s laying off to work on fuel/energy efficiency standards Obama is targeting.

It’s kind of a shame Obama can’t just step in and say, “Guys, we just gave you $5 billion. You’re not slowing production or laying anyone off. What you’re going to do is give free cars to all the customers your banks/dealerships are denying new car loans to.”

January 19, 2009

As suggested by Paul Krugman in a letter to Rolling Stone (which, I realize, doesn’t actually sound that interesting, but hey, I’m taking a class on economics):

What Obama Must Do : Rolling Stone.

October 9, 2008

I wish I could talk about the economy with more knowledge, but I admit up front I cannot. I’m actually looking forward to the next week or two, when my business class transitions from marketing to economics; I’m not sure it’s the sort of economics the country is having trouble with (I sense not so much), but even still I figure there will be connections I can make between the two.

I once read a magazine article about the stock market. I can’t remember which magazine published it, but Rolling Stone is my first guess. The article was about a coming market related to either bulls or bears, whichever is worse, and it parsed the market itself as a sort of nebulous popularity contest. It vaguely connected being a popular stock like Apple or Google or Microsoft (though this was in the days before Google, I believe) to being the popular kid in school, and made the analogy that such popularity was a sort of currency, which was why people traded and bartered it. Why people believed that something so ethereal as a small stake in a zero and a one could be worth actual cash money.

I remember enjoying the article immensely even if I didn’t really understand it. Like I’ve never understood economics, and like I certainly don’t understand what’s going on right now. I guess maybe I really am Joe Sixpack even though my drink of choice is a Smirnoff mixer or a nice glass of wine. But when I open up Yahoo! and its finance page tells me every damned time that the Dow has dropped another twenty points since the last time it piddled itself, and I know that’s bad. I know, vaguely, what it means that it dropped in points, but in real world terms?

September 24, 2008

I caught this article on Yahoo! concerning Barack Obama’s response to John McCain’s suggesting we postpone the presidential debate to, you know, focus on the economy.

That response? Here:

It’s my belief that this is exactly the time when the American people need to hear from the person who, in approximately 40 days, will be responsible for dealing with this mess.

My response was a little more abstract. It was:

“McCain wants to postpone the debate? You don’t say…”

Because, since the beginning, I’ve thought the debates would be one of the deciding factors in this election. Much like historians sometimes cite the very first televised presidential debates, back in 1960, between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon.

September 18, 2008

So, like I blogged about earlier, the American economy is basically in the toilet, and to quote Roger Clyne, “Everything’s going down, flowin’ counterclockwise.” Regardless of direction, the fact remains that, besides the bailouts of AIG, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac, I’ve heard today that both Washington Mutual and Morgan Stanley are initiating sales of themselves (I know a couple of people who work for Morgan Stanley, and wish them the best).

New York/Manhattan is, obviously the epicenter of the financial industry. When the Dow sinks, it sank first in Manhattan.

Manhattan is also pretty much the epicenter of the publishing industry. And given that the financial climate is what it is, one would think that the publishing industry is every bit as concerned about its own welfare as financial sectors are concerned about their own.

And one might not be wrong.

For example, one of the regular publishing/agenting blogs I read is maintained by Lori Perkins, of the Lori Perkins Agency. Lori is extraordinarily well known in the publishing industry and has quite the agenting reputation. She is renowned and respected. This is her blog. I like reading her blog.

September 3, 2008

Apparently, the selfsame self-righteous people who worked themselves all atwitter that Bill Clinton got a blowjob once (and investigated said act for, what, two years, and then impeached him for it) and basically ran poor John Edwards out of town are summoning every ounce of their moral outrage and righteous indignation now, because how dare anyone talk about Sarah Palin’s family. Most seem to miss the point that the speculation about who Trig Palin’s mother is was never about Bristol Palin but rather about Sarah; it was never so much speculation that the kid belonged to Bristol as it was that he might not belong to Sarah.

Oh, cesspool, they say! Outrageous rumormongering!

These, of course, are the same people that frothed at the mouth that Bill Clinton might have done pot, but never batted an eye that Bush had DUIs out the wazoo.

We should be looking at policy, they say.

So fine.

Let’s. Straight from the horse’s mouth.

Palin on healthcare: “Take personal responsibility for personal health and all areas.”

Palin on the environment: opposed protection for salmon, wants to sue US government to stop listing the polar bear as endangered, encourages timber, mining, and drilling.

Palin on energy: global warming not manmade. Supports off-shore drilling.

Palin on education: teach creationism alongside evolution in schools. Let parents opt out of school books they find offensive. Teach abstinence, not sexuality/reproduction. Inspired a librarian to resign after the librarian refused to help Palin ban books, including works by Heller, Huxley, King, Rowling, and Shakespeare. That’s right: Sarah Palin wanted to ban Shakespeare.

Palin on civil rights: supports preservation of definition of “marriage” as between man and women. Okay to deny benefits to homosexual couples. Oh, and let’s not forget: anti-women’s rights. “Pro-life,” except, of course, when it comes to the death penalty.

Palin on Budget: entered Wasilla with balanced budget, left the town with more than $20 million in longterm debt.

Palin on Foreign Policy and Immigration: oh, wait. No real policies recorded for that yet. Her son’s in Iraq, though, and everyone knows McCain wants bomb-bomb-bomb, bomb-bomb Iran.

(source: On The Issues)

Forget the kids: does Sarah Palin really sound to you like the type of candidate America needs? I swear it’s like McCain chose a female mini-Me who couldn’t possibly be any more ignorant concerning any other issue around. There is not a single policy for which either Palin or McCain stand that could possibly justify anyone calling either a “maverick.”

And you know, just once, I’d like Barack Obama to show up to a speech in a kilt, because it seems all the damned PUMA people want is a candidate in a skirt.

Multiple Enthusiasms

Infinite jest. Excellent fancy. Flashes of merriment.

Tag: economy