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

To: John Carragher who wrote (19542)	12/12/2003 8:58:54 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 793955

Friday, December 12, 2003EconoPundit's Theorem #14q In The Corner Jonah Goldberg asks: Isn't it possible that the stiffing of Germany, France and Russia is simply prelude to Jim Baker's Iraqi debt-cancellation world tour? It just seems so obvious to me now. He wanted some leverage and to send these countries a signal that we could play hardball before he left. It's fine with me as a policy or as a negotiating ploy. I mean if I hear the EUniks say this decision was 'unhelpful' one more time, I'm gonna go nuts. Look at France last year, or this year, for a definition of 'unhelpful.' And, in an apparently unrelated story, Haliburton has allegedly been overcharging for gasoline transported from Kuwait to Iraq. We'd like to use these as a platform for launching EconoPundit's new theorem, which is also so obvious it fits the old "the last thing a fish would discover is water" model. EconoPundit Theorem #14q: COMPARED WITH THEIR REPUBLICAN COUNTERPARTS SUPPORTERS OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY ARE EXTREMELY EMOTIONAL ABOUT VIRTUALLY EVERYTHING. There's upcoming confirmation in two ways. First, EconoPundit predicts Democrats will get so worked up about gas overcharging -- some claiming it's the central issue of the decade -- they'll go into deep depressive retreat when they realize such allegations and subsequent adjustments are all perfectly normal in war zone situations. Second, when Baker and Bush compromise on the war contracts, Republican supporters (many of whom are kinda worked up right now) will pretty much shrug everything off as normal. No depressive tailspin here. The difference is easy to explain. To Republicans, politics and markets always work to mediate between differing definitions of "perfection." To them, compromise between individuals and interest groups is part of the normal way of things. But to Democrats -- those heroic descendants of Jean Jacques Rousseau -- perfection is right out there, real, always to be fought for with (remember JFK?) vigor! Compromise? That's for Republicans -- you know, the ones who don't have real values! Link posted by Steve Antler : 6:18 AM Thursday, December 11, 20032004: "Best in Twenty Years" The Conference Board (which charges money for what we do here for free) is now issuing revised forecasts more optimistic than those released by Yale University's Ray Fair last October. (The Yale forecasts' assumptions included the tax cut and Iraq spending, but not the prescription drug benefit; this accounts for the less optimistic results, I think.) According to the Conference Board, next year 2004 will, from the viewpoint of strict economics, be the best in the last twenty years: Revising its year-end economic forecast sharply upward, The Conference Board today projected that real GDP growth will hit 5.7% next year, making 2004 the best year economically in the last 20 years...While the U.S. economy is expected to generate more than one million new jobs next year, the unemployment rate will edge down only slightly, averaging 5.6% in 2004. Interesting how they can't seem to get the unemployment rate down much below 5.5% either. I will soon re-run the Yale model with the prescription drug benefit included to see whether Fairmodel duplicates the Conference Board's results. Stay tuned for further details. econopundit.com