Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Hope and Change

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is down over two thousand points since Barack Obama was elected (from 9,617 to 7.553). I don’t know if this is a contra-indication to “hope and change” or possibly a reaction to the doom and gloom forecasts of Obama and the Democrat party. But it clearly is in spite of the fire-hose of money that is being spewed around ($700 billion of TARP funds, $20 billion to the auto industry, $787 billion in the recent Stimulus Bill to be signed into law today, AND over a trillion dollars of federal guarantees to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, Citicorp, Bank of America and other distressed financial companies.)

Why has this seeming disconnect occurred? Perhaps, because of the constant drumbeat of pessimistic pronouncements coming from the incoming administration. This morning, one talking head on “Morning Joe” suggested that maybe Obama had overdone this negative sell as a way of pushing through his stimulus bill. If this was the cynical case, then maybe our President, now that he has gotten what he wanted and with his marvelous rhetorical talent, could please talk us back out of this hole?

1 comment:

George W. Potts said...

I have to add the following stat that I heard today ... the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 40% since the Dems took over Congress on Jan. 20th, 2007.
Soon this will begin to sink in ... as Bush basing becomes passe.