When the Recession's on the Democrats' Watch
someone needs to have a clue
Dp you realize how rare it is for a recession to occur on the Democrats' watch?
2008: Great Recession was on President Bush's Watch. Cause: blowup of Dem cheap mortgage policy.
2000: Tech Bubble broke in 2000 but wasn't felt until 2001, on President Bush's watch. Cause: probably excess enthusiasm from tax rate cuts plus the easing of credit in the 1998 Russian bond default.
1990: Recession took place on President Bush I's watch. "Worst economy in last 50 years," said Candidate Clinton.
1980: Stagflation on President Carter's watch but recession on President Reagan's watch. Somebody had to curb 10-20 percent inflation.
1969: Recession on Nixon's watch. Hangover from LBJ's double wars: on poverty and Vietnam.
But I think we are staring at a recession that will be 100 percent on Biden's watch. And do you know what I think? I think that nobody in the Democratic Party has a clue about what to do. Because the Democratic Party agenda is always a new round of spending that they advertise as a boost the economy, but which really boosts Democratic constituencies and voters.
There has never been a time in my adult life where Democrats have authoried a policy that would curb the loot and plunder getting shoveled out to their supporters.
But the current economic nightmare has many authors:
President Trump jawboning the Fed not to raise interest rates in the fall of 2019.
The administrative state's lockdown policy response to COVID.
The Fed's print-money response to COVID.
The reluctance of the administrative state to end lockdowns and travel restrictions.
The Biden administration's belief that Obama didn't stimulate enough in 2009.
The Green New Deal policy of shutting down fossil fuel exploration and use.
The Fed's delay in returning to a post-COVID monetary policy.
Yeah. All in all, I'd say that the combination of all these economic errors is not going to be any fun.
But here's my point, going back to the list of recessions in my adult lifetime. In none of these recessions were the Democrats in charge while the thing was developing. In almost all cases, Republicans were the ones having to take the unpopular policy decisions needed to fight inflation or curb an excessive boom.
Obviously, President Biden is the last person you would choose to be president in such a time. Heres's a guy that sat around in the Senate for 50 years and never did anything serious in his life. Plus, his administration is staffed by a bunch of DEI appointments chosen for their race or gender or sexual orientation rather than for their competence in rallying an army on a stricken field.
It's easy to say that it serves them right. But, of course, it isn't the ruling class that suffers during inflation and recession. It's ordinary people, especially the lower class people I call Subordinates.
And it's easy to tell ordinary people that it serves them right for voting for Democrats. But our society basically teaches everyone that Democrats are the people that care about people like them; that's what Curtis Yarvin's Cathedral is all about. You have to be an ornery old cuss to break with The Narrative handed down from on high at the altar of the Cathedral.
But someone is going to have to come up with the ideas and the policies and the intestinal fortitude to lead us out of this mess with the least suffering for the American people. And I don't see that leader coming out of the Democratic Party.
Put it this way. If someone asked you to name the go-to guy in the Democratic Party that everyone regards as a safe hand on the economic tiller, what name would you come up with?
I rest my case.