Appearing Sunday on the last broadcast of CNN's Late Edition, Vice President Dick Cheney defended the administration's handling of the recession and argued that its premature to call it the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. "I can't say that. I don't think we know that yet. I think certainly if you look at some earlier periods in our history, I remember back in the late '70s when we had a high rate of inflation, stagflation in effect and a high rate of unemployment," Cheney said. He added, "We've had some difficult times. Is it the worst since World War II? I can't say that. I don't believe the data shows that yet but it is clearly a serious recession."
Late 1970’s? Oh – another dig at President Carter. Of course, the unemployment rate during his tenure never reached the 9% hit during May 1975. Of course, that was during Ford’s tenure when Cheney was chief of staff. And we certainly have not reached the 10.8% unemployment rate that we saw during the end of 1982. But Cheney can’t criticize Saint Reagan – can he?
I certainly hope we don’t reach 11% unemployment but only a Pollyanna would predict that we will not exceed the unemployment rate during Carter’s tenure. Of course, the rightwing will likely try to pin this recession on President Obama somehow. After all – the Bush-Cheney Administration was not responsible for anything that has happened over the past 8 years.
are those unemployment numbers calculated the same way?
ReplyDelete"and this recession has only had a few trillion dollars shoveled at it through the fed and out many doors at the treasury. i can think of worse things bill clinton did on the oval office desk.
ReplyDelete"i'll be in my hole. somebody wake me when we nationalize the finance industry or something."
"the Bush-Cheney Administration was not responsible for anything that has happened over the past 8 years." You didn't expect CEOs to do any actual work, did you ?
ReplyDeleteThe way it's going, it won't be a surprise if the unemployment rate dips to an all time high by the middle of 2009. These are really turbulent times and everyone seems waiting for something to happen. Obama's planned economic stimulus gives hope but it remains to be seen how quick that is going to steady the slump. When analyzing the current economic chaos, open discussions and participatory forums play their part in providing insight and workable solutions. I saw a similar idea here http://www.thresheronline.com/ that promises to contribute much.
ReplyDeleteBush-Cheney is responsible for this troubled situation. The same topic is discussing over on the ThresherBlog:http://thresheronline.com
ReplyDeleteBillCinSD said...
ReplyDelete"are those unemployment numbers calculated the same way?"
I'd guess that current numbers understate the problem quite a bit more.
-Barry