So we've been in a recession for a year but they just announced it yesterday?

[Philosoraptor]

So have they been hiding this fact from us? Is that similar to lying, or is that mere obfuscation? I read yesterday that the economic experts say we are officially in a recession, but then said we've been in one since December of 07. What the hell?

Now they have me wondering if we are maybe currently in a DEPRESSION but they are not going to announce it till next year at this time. Whatever you want to call it, its all bad, and they've been delaying the truth from us. We certainly wouldn't want a medical expert or doctor to delay bad news for a year, when it's too late to do anything about it.

Maybe we've also had a victory in Iraq but they were waiting a year to announce it. Or maybe we are in another war already but they are waiting a year to announce it. Maybe aliens have landed from outer space but they are waiting a year to officially announce it.

When something is going terribly wrong in America, I'd like to hear about it, right away, not next fucking year. What the hell is going on? It's like being cheated on by your spouse for a year only to find out about it a year too late. I call bullshit.

[ColbertWatcher]

1. Yes, a week after Obama announced his economic team.

The GOP consider it their "gift" to his administration.

[Philosoraptor]

2. And they WILL put all the blame for it on Barack.

[ColbertWatcher]

6. They've already started. Bastards. n/t

[indepat]

15. And the Clenis

:P

[HamdenRice]

3. While the Bush admin is known for lying, economic stats have always taken a while

to be collected, analyzed and corrected by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Generally, IIRC, in the past, even under relatively more honest administrations, it takes about a quarter to gather stats, so we generally only know we are in a recession about 3 months after it starts. Then as more stats come in, previous stats get revised, so it's not unusual for the Bureau to revise growth estimates for the year prior.

[Philosoraptor]

4. & the issue is always confused with the use of lots of big numbers

[maseman]

5. Essentially it is not tin-foil time

No one was surprised yestreday when the recession was announced. But there are certain measures that must happen before it is officially declared a recession. Much data takes awhile to come to fruition and unfortunately recessions most of the time are not realized until we are well into one. Yes I know DUers were saying it a long time ago but again there are certain data points that must be met to declare when and how deep a recession is.

[Lochloosa]

10. Agree. And the problem with this recession is it's usually over when the numbers come in.

We can't even see the light at the end of the tunnel on this one.

[barbtries]

7. in ten years

they'll call it the gwbush depression of the first decade of the 21st century. it's easy to see why they lie. words mean a lot; they have power of their own. i'd also prefer the truth, but that's why i live on democratic underground.

[dbt]

8. The gubmint cooked the books and TV lied to us all.

Dunno why that should piss me off so badly, but it DOES. Months on end, the well-groomed airheads at the anchor desks have been blathering away: "Are we in a recession?" "Is the economy on the verge of a recession?" "It's too soon to say" "Yes, No, Maybe."

What a steaming load of horseshit it's all been--and the fuckers are STILL lying! Anybody down here in the Vanishing Middle Class can tell you the recession's been going on a LOT longer than a year.

:grr:

[indepat]

17. Heard junior with my own ears say it's not a recession, but a slowdown

:P

[malaise]

9. Eight years of lies

corruption, genocide, criminality, evil, wickedness, ignorance, bluster, fear, folly, foolishness, fuckery! Did I omit anything? :D Lock up these fuckers.

[indepat]

18. Sanctity, reichousness, duplicity, disingenuousness, mendacity just to name

a few. :P

[malaise]

20. LOL

:hi:

[unblock]

11. strictly speaking, they didn't say we still ARE in a recession. only that it began in december 2007

nber does not attempt to be very current with their determinations. they wait for "final" economic statistics and a clear trend.

all they said was that december 2007 was the peak month and that the contraction began then.

they will be similarly slow to recognize when we're out of the recession, so strictily speaking, as far as nber is concerned, we could have recovered from the recession a few months ago (ha!) and they wouldn't say anything about that for several more months.

they aim to be correct, not quick.

[earth mom]

12. I bet most DUers believe that it's really the Great Depression 2. nt

[Vinca]

13. A person might be suspicious given an election going on. nt

[Festivito]

14. When Republicans changed recession definition....

... they only calculated back to just before the great depression. They made no statement on what a Depression is. Wouldn't even calculate it.

Of course, they only changed the definition in order to claim that Clinton left them a recession. A faked claim.

Originally, recession was coined so that people would have a word other than Depression to describe the bust in boom and bust cycles.

Michigan knew it was here. Nobody was buying cars. They stopped. The numbers looked good because the banks were making a bubble. It made Michigan look bad. The money was going to the top rich and they can only drive one car at a time. The rest of the car buyers were gone.

The conventional wisdom is that by saying we are in recession/depression we make it worse. So, they wait to announce it. Except, of course, when a Clinton is involved.

[Lifetimedem]

16. my thoughts exactly

For a year they have told us "the fundamentals of the economy are sound" "We are not in a "recession"

The public has believed we were in a recession..NOW the experts have finally figured it out.

I think they withheld that info because they thought it would hurt the republicans in the campaign..

[formercia]

19. Actually, the recession began in the middle of Oct. '07

If you look at the Dow historical chart for the period, you can see it plain as day. Some time next year, they will tell us we have been in a depression since sometime this Fall.

You can overlay all of the charts and they correlate pretty well.

[MiniMe]

21. They had to wait until after the election to protect McCain

It almost worked until they couldn't hide it any more. Look what the announcement did to the stock market today.

[slipslidingaway]

22. On the recession, from September 2007...

Links posted here...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=327&topic_id=787&mesg_id=787

"...For now, many expecting the US to bypass an official recession point to payroll strength as a key rationale for this viewpoint supportive of consumer spending. But the facts show us that tried and true leading indicators of payroll trends are pointing in exactly the opposite direction of strength. For now, the year over year rate of change in payroll growth is below the lows seen in the mid-cycle economic slowdowns of the mid 1980’s and 1990’s. Historical precedent is telling us to be very suspect of those expecting US payroll growth to remain strong. These folks are guessing and hoping. We’ll leave you with one last question. If indeed US payroll employment growth slows meaningfully ahead, as we expect as per the collective message of current data, can we really believe the consumer spending and credit acceleration dependent US economy won’t blink? Stop listening to the talking heads and other assorted Street fortunetellers guessing about the direction of the US economy ahead and the potential for recession, and start looking at the factual data right in front of our faces."


----And from August 2007----

"...Although we believe each individual chart tells its own story, our main point in this discussion is that collectively, these relationships represent multi-year or multi-decade trend breaks for now. They are now occurring in simultaneous fashion. Just a coincidence? We think not..."

[Philosoraptor]

23. All of their confusing rhetoric is designed to hide the actual truth

[slipslidingaway]

24. That is just their style of writing and yes many times it takes

another read, not only for all the information presented, but also for their style of writing.

IMO they do an excellent job in connecting facts and drawing conclusions long before the ideas are presented in the mainstream media.

At least for me their monthly articles have been a must read for the past eight years.


Not too confusing, from February 2000...

http://contraryinvestor.com/moarchive2000/mo020800.htm

...Jomolungma...is the Tibetan name for Everest. Among the sherpas, it is spoken with respect for the mountain God. Do investors of today have sincere respect for "the mountain"? They long to experience the exhilaration of completing ever-higher peaks, but do they have the courage to turn back 100 feet before the summit even if they fully recognize an oncoming storm which would threaten their safety? Are they cognizant of the bottleneck at the Hillary Step which can cost them precious time in the descent? Everest is a place where a miscalculation in hours can cost a life. Experience and humility are the keys to mountaineering success. Although not quite as dramatic, a miscalculation in risk while ascending and descending the financial mountain can also be quite costly. As in climbing, long term investment success is ultimately measured and determined by experience and humility.


"...The Cisco Kid...We guess CSCO's market cap having increased about $60-70 billion over the last month or so was just a warm up. It summarily tacked on another $20 billion in after hours antics after reporting one penny better than almighty expectations. Think about this. The collective market cap of MSFT, CSCO and GE now approximates roughly $1.5 trillion - about 10% of the entire value of the total equity market. Like we said, the Hillary Step will ultimately be unforgiving. Completely unforgiving. Better enjoy the ascent happy shareholders, because you definitely aren't coming down...alive."

[leftofthedial]

25. the bush cabal has used economic statistics as propaganda tools from the start

they have lied about all of it.

[Philosoraptor]

26. ..............