Well, we are doubling down on some crazy stuff this week. A look at the number of extra-constitutional decrees from the Oval Office is interesting. One positive note, President Biden seems to be able to perform on camera, which is an improvement from his description by opponents as being in cognitive decline. Of course, the things he has done do not seem to have much to do with him, personally. Except the power of the pen.

I had a couple discussions with financial advisors this week, trying to figure out the best approach to deal with what is to come. A lot of it seems to be about all that money floating around. Say what you want about Mr. Trump, his de-regulation approach to the economy loosened strictures on business, lowered unemployment generally to something below what we used to call “full employment,” and avoided siding with the Iranians in their desire to become a nuclear-capable Shia force in the Middle East.

We understand now that capability could be coming in months. I have no idea why we have abandoned energy independence to rely on a supply of oil from that troubled region. Climate? A good cause, of course. The experts are telling us that record cool temperatures in the tropics this week is a function of “Global Warming”, a term that has been superseded in favor of “Climate Change,” since it can do whatever the politicians want. We used to call it “weather.”

That joins the litany of things I do not understand, though I remember 2009 pretty well. We had encouraged- directed, is a better word- that banks lend cash to people who had no real means of paying it back. We called it the Housing Bubble then, though many learned folks changed that to describe it as a “correction.” That is not what I called it when the value of my little condo at Big Pink sank $100K over a couple months.

There is a trillion dollars worth of aid still sloshing around from the COVID bills of last year, so far unspent. Remember when that numeric value was something unusual? There is another $1.9 Trillion in the latest relief bill, one which will pay some of the currently unemployed more money to stay that way rather than go back to work. Some of the programs mentioned include forgiveness of debts including college bills up to fifty grand, and continuing payments from the treasury- i.e. “us”- for all sorts of things that make it more advantageous to stay unemployed than go back to work.

Spending couple trillion dollars on imaginary infrastructure projects- “high speed rail?”- reminds me a bit of the “shovel ready” jobs that didn’t exist the last time. Like telling the pipeline workers in Pennsylvania to take imaginary Green jobs that exist mostly in China.

This is not a discussion about a crisis in 1929. This is a set of initiatives that did not work in 2009, and yet we are going to do again, only much bigger.

Sorry to mark the mid-week with that sort of pessimism. Our leadership is convinced it will work, and are prepared to print their way out of the pandemic. This is going to be a real show of epic proportions. Keep the seatbelt fastened, and watch the spectacle! Historic times have results that are spectacular!

Copyright 2021 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com