Reply #60: What Am I, Some Kind of Moron? (Mogambo)

[54anickel]

http://news.goldseek.com/RichardDaughty/1171468981.php

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-- Mike Whitney writing at ichblog.eu estimates that the housing market falling is "cutting off the additional $825 billion of cash which was extracted from home-equity just last year." This has GOT to be very, very bad news (VVBN), as not spending $825 billion is (gulp!) not spending 7% of GDP! For crying out loud! We're freaking doomed!


Probably noticing that my face is turning blue and I am frantically clutching my stricken chest at this news, Mr. Whitney apparently thought it was a good time to change the mood. In that regard, he opted for the "performance arts" line of analogy, and immediately demonstrated his vast knowledge of the theatre by remarking about "The Blanche Dubois economy", which refers to a vapid, mindless, clueless, child-like character in a play/movie called "A Streetcar Named Desire", who famously said that she was "dependent on the kindness of strangers."


That's America in a nutshell, Bubba! We're dependent on strangers, who have no reason to love us, loaning us money so that we can keep shopping and building bigger governments so that more people can be "dependent on the kindness of governments!" Hahaha! That ought to last a long time! Hahaha!

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-- Larry from MoneyandMarkets.com newsletter says he "tore apart the government’s 2006 financial statements", and here’s what he found: "The actual annual federal deficit for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2006 was $4.6 trillion, up from $3.5 trillion a year ago. That’s an astounding $1.1 trillion increase, or a 31.4% jump in the deficit." Yow! This is not to mention that it is more than a third of GDP!

As for the budget (a cash-accounting format), he notes that "The actual deficit is nearly nineteen times larger than the reported $248 billion deficit."

And lastly, but certainly not least, the accrual-system of accounting shows that "Total federal obligations at year-end were $54.6 trillion, up from $50 trillion in 2005 ... $46.4 trillion in 2004 ... and $32.7 trillion in 2002."

Did I say "We're freaking doomed!" in the last ten minutes? If not, insert said comment here. Maybe with an exclamation point or two to add the emphasis it deserves!

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