Well, the stock markets dove again today as more "bad" economic news came out. Again, it was news that owes its existence more to psychology than to actual economic fundamentals. Although, that is not quite correct. Economics is not (for all its practitioners try to make it out to be) a hard science: It is, more than anything else, smoke and mirrors, but let's not open that can of worms right now.

The can of worms I want to open is that which belongs to our "glorious leader", President Sonny-boy. I understand that he is not the brightest bulb on the tree, but I wonder if he can say "Hoover". I wonder if (in the dark of the night) he thinks about the possible comparisons that may be drawn between himself and Mr. Hoover. George Bush spent a good four years (Clinton's second term) telling the country that we should be afraid of the prosperity we were enjoying and that it was bound to end badly...and soon. Well, he got his wish -- only now he is finding that it is not as easy to rebuild the economy that he spent four years trying to trash.

Now, before people start screaming about how it is the greedy corporate executives (Enron, Worldcom, Adelphia etc.) who are to blame, I would point out that most of what they are in trouble for (other than Adlephia, which is a special case) occured in the past two years. If the economy hadn't taken a sudden turn down, Worldcom and Enron would probably still be sailing along building the Brave New World. Sure, what they did was wrong, but they did it more out of desperation and the hope that things would turn around before their house of cards got caught in the downdraft. Note that borth Enron and Worldcom depended upon their stock carrying a high valuation so that it could be used as a form of currency to fund their operations. When the declining market took their stock down, management became more and more desperate to find a way to last until the market turned...which they fully expected it to do. After all, weren't the fundamentals that fueled the original strong economy still there?

Well, yes they were! And, for that matter, they still are. What we have is an economic downturn that was manufactured almost completely out of thin air. Some day this will be a textbook case of mass psychology and manipulation of society via mass media. And it can all be laid at the feet of the conservatives.