Last time I was optimistic was in 2007, right before everything blew up. I'll even openly admit, my optimism was born of ignorance as to the extent of the danger and corruption within the global financial system. I wasn't even that pessimistic in early 2009. I figured the ship would right itself and that Obama had it well in hand.
Then I started getting educated on the reasons for the economic meltdown and my optimism was completely shattered. Once I thoroughly understood what happened, I watched to see if we actually would fix anything. The answer is that we have not. Even worse, we have allowed the same problems to metastasize into a full blown cancer of the global financial structure. Not only that, but there are so many looming points of failure around the world, from China to Euro debt, to the US debt bubble, to outright fraud continuing to be committed and no one prosecuted, that taken all together, the risks are extremely high that we see another major blow up in the next 6-12 months. And when it blows up again, it will be worse than in 2008 and more prolonged. Why? Because we never fixed the root causes of the last blow up.
I'll be optimistic again when the debt is written down and the companies that are bankrupt are allowed to seek bankruptcy restructuring, as well as when the major criminals are punished, and the Fed resumes more responsible long term growth policies. Suffice it to say we have a long way to go before I'm optimistic again. |
