Filed under: Bad news, Rumors, Management, Rants and raves, Market matters, Scandals, Economic data, Politics, Headline news, Recession
There has been so much crap thrown around about whether WE ARE in a full blown recession OR NOT that all the speak, is just that — a lot of speak. Long time investors know well that if there is anybody left that thinks we’re not in a recession than we’ve not reached final capitulation.
If we do not reach this level of pain, then we cannot get superior. Admitting the problem is a major path to recovery. That is true for an alcoholic and our ailing economy. As long as the alcoholic keeps saying they have the ability to handle the problem, its not going away.
Our economy is drunk and falling over. You can call our current economic crises a “rose” for all I care, and for those that want to wait for the classic two quarters of negative growth to appear you can consider yourself followers not leaders. Leaders take action and try to avoid a crises. Followers, wait until there is a crises… and historians document and report on the difference between the two.
I myself have written that we may not have a recession, however, that is not going to prevent me from understanding and admitting that we may have all the symptoms and be suffering. We may be like the burly fighter in the final rounds of a heavy wait fight. We’re done, but we just have not bothered to fall down. Everyone can see it. The referee can call a technical knock-out (TKO) without witnessing a total collapse.
President Bush who spoke on the subject again today tried to be very reassuring and calm the markets. He wants to get the message out that he and his fellow cohorts in Washington D.C. are taking the matter seriously. I think historians are not going to be portraying him as the leader he thinks he’s. To be that leader he has to capitulate and use the recession word, which I’ll now codename “rose”.
So Dub-ya, start throwing roses, and the rest of us will give the all clear sign with a wink and a nod and maybe believe that better times are ahead. But for now we don’t.
The car industry doesn’t. The construction industry doesn’t. The financial industry doesn’t. The airline industry doesn’t. The investment world doesn’t. The retail industry doesn’t. The financial analysts and legislatures of each Say in the Union (and most major cities) don’t and the falling dollar is the sign post.
Mr. President, I respectfully submit that you’re going to be the one to call the bottom. When you clearly state we are in a recession then Wall Street will ring the all clear bell. It’s time to call an economic TKO.
Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money.
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