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Cartoony Politics in Canada
Being President 101
Failure To Blow Election Stuns Democratic Party Faithful Mourn End To Losing Tradition
Hope Is On The Way
The Future Is Upon Us
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If The Shoe Fits Hurl It
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Out With The Old
Remember The Empty Chairs At Holiday Tables
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The Gaza Rules
Harper's Weekly
The Mortgage Thieves Return
Bringing A Bit Of Fairness To The American Workplace
Bye-Bye 2008: Things I Want To Forget
The Fierce Urgency Of Now
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The Perils And Joys Of Self-Esteem
The Future Of Civilization
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Moral Clarity In Gaza
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Talking About Sex-Ed That Works
The Time Is Now
Et Al Ad Nauseam: 2008 And All That
The Generational Theft Act Of 2009
Pay Rod Gives Democrats Fits With Senate Choice
'Tis The Season To Be Jolly. Or At least Try
Gaza: The Dove'S War
Hamas Rockets Blew Away Gaza Opportunity
Season's Readings
Old Acquaintances
A Social Trauma For Obama: Youth Crime
Sensitivity And 'Gran Torino'
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Red Ink Did Me Good
Barack in Limbo
A Hard Year Ahead
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Eric Holder And All Political Prisoners
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A Clean Start
Year-End Odds And Ends
Team Obama Dabbles In Drama
The Gamble in Gaza -- Interview With Aaron David Miller
Cal Thomas-Bonus
A Respite From Reality
One Nation, One People-God Bless Us Everyone
Dr. Leavitt's Scary Diagnosis
Teaching Economics
Richardson's Exit And The Vetting Process



Kondracke180.jpg
'Keynsian Moment' Needed To Fight 'Great
Recession'
Morton Kondracke 11/14/2008
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No one's yet named the economic crisis we're in. It's developed beyond the financial markets, so "the Panic of '08" won't do.

Optimistically, I suggest "the Great Recession." That's optimistic because, while this recession is likely to be the longest, deepest and most global since the Great Depression, we can and should escape having to use the "D" word.

How long? How deep? And what should we be doing about it?

An emerging consensus among conservative and liberal economists seems to indicate that we'll experience negative growth -- 2 percent to 4 percent -- through 2009 and into 2010. And unemployment will rise past 10 percent.

They suggest it will match or exceed the highest unemployment rate since World War II, 10.8 percent, in December 1982. In the Depression, it rose to 25 percent in 1932.

As to what to do, former Clinton White House domestic policy adviser William Galston, now at the Brookings Institution, observed that "this is a classic Keynsian moment," and pointed to a remarkable exchange that took place on PBS's "Newshour with Jim Lehrer" on Monday.

Liberal economist Alan Blinder of Princeton, an adviser to both Clinton and President-elect Barack Obama and conservative
Martin Feldstein of Harvard, an adviser to President Ronald Reagan and Sen. John McCain, agreed: There's got to be a lot of government spending.

"You need to boost spending in the economy," said Blinder. "It almost doesn't matter what kind of spending, but we'd like it to not to be wasteful spending, something that's valuable in its own right."

He added that the government also needed to support "people that are going to be losing their jobs, their homes, their health care benefits and other things that go with job displacement, because there's going to be a lot of it."

And Feldstein responded: "Well, I think Alan Blinder was right on. I think the plan has to be big, it has to be quick, and it has to be focused on creating employment."

Feldstein recommended against tax rebates for individuals, which was tried earlier this year and led to no lasting employment gains.

"I think the key thing is stuff like equipment. There's a lot of equipment in public institutions, both federal and state that could be renewed and replaced," he said, including military equipment.

Blinder said he'd be skeptical about massive infrastructure spending because it could not be spent quickly.

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Downhill
By Petar Pismestrovic - Kleine Zeitung, Austria * Posted 11/14/2008 12:00:00 AM
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