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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: unclewest who wrote (904)	5/11/2003 8:15:30 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Respond to of 794221

UncleWest, it was a terrific economy with a bubble on top. Two things can happen at once. Actually, billions of things happen at once and few things have single-variable causation. The bubble went into overdrive with the Biotelecosmictechdot.com margin-powered hysteria of the last 3 years of the 20th century. Underlying that was a very excellent economic powerhouse of global reach. The destruction of wealth effect, introduction of poverty effect, firing, bankruptcy and dislocation of those few years is still being wrung out of the system. It is a long and sometimes tragic business. Overlaid with the 911 attacks and subsequent dislocations, it was made worse. Clinton made some good decisions. He's a smart guy. He squeezed the welfare budgets. He rescued Mexico. He sensibly gave the crowds something to have fun with [Monica]. When he was elected, I didn't think much of him. But he improved. While he can't claim full credit for the wonderful 1990s, GeorgeW can't be held fully liable for the mess since Y2K. But, you know where the buck stops. The person who is in charge when things go good or bad is responsible, whether they have full control or not. 911 happened on George II's watch. If he had been tuned to the situation, Atta and co would have been nailed beforehand. There were lots of clues. So did the main part of the post Y2K crunch happen on George II's watch though it was well underway before he took office and stopping that runaway locomotive would have been like doing wheelies with USS Enterprise. Big stuff doesn't turn on a dime. But the buck stops at the White House Oval Office desk. That's what happens in the big jobs. Fairly or unfairly. Bringing back Bill and Hillary to the White House in 2004 might be no bad thing. It would certainly give the crowds some amusement and the Clinton haters something to get their teeth into. Life's a giggle, not to mention a very strange place at times, Mqurice

To: unclewest who wrote (904)	5/11/2003 8:47:20 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 794221

Was it a terrific economy or was it an artificial bubble economy? You cannot have it both ways. Actually, you can and we did. We had a near perfect economy for much of the 90s. And a stock market that rode it for a while, then took off in some sort of psychological nirvana, broke done (98), then hit the nirvana bit again. Nirvana isn't reality, so we all paid a price. We are all, except for the Clinton haters of the world, still trying to figure out what created the bubble and then maintained it for a while. My own very preliminary take, and certainly, even if I consider those reasons strong ones in a year or so, only one of many, is as I posted earlier--breaking the barriers between banking and research and known accounting rules flaws. No doubt, some of the reason was the bubble itself. Once one takes off, apparently, it generates some of its own momentum. I think the issue about the bubble is how to handle the after effects. And that hasn't been handled well at all. The Bush folk are burdened with a philosophy of government which says it is the problem rather than the solution. So, as the bubble disappears even further and the economy drifts and drifts, they have no answer, save cut back on government. Because, in some nefarious and completely unlabled sense, it's the problem.