BUSH BABBLE

tonight the president of the united states will make a prime-time speech to the world in order to reassure all interested observers that, despite the seemingly unending news of terror bombings and economic malaise, everything is under control and is going according to plan. not many people know what that plan is, but its going according to it. with all his popularity and money from fund raising, it would seem that he has a firm grip on the white house through 2008 so this speech is sort of a reminder of how well things are going, or will be going shortly.

the president is in a full court press to keep business rolling along and to squelch discontent with the war just enough to obscure the facts of what is really going on and just how dangerous each of these two policy initiatives have become not only to the US and the world, but to his stay in the white house.

this week, instead of firing elaine chou, the secretary of labor, for her lousy job of creating jobs, not that its her fault, but that has never stopped bush from firing a cabinet member, he hired a deputy secretary of labor to preside over new job creation. nice public relations move but probably won't creat any new jobs, except for the job of deputy labor secretary. one down 1,999,999 to go! well its a start anyway.

in addition, president bush sent john snow over to china, the next great economic super power, in order to convince the chinese government that allowing their currency to float, read 'drop in value', would help them to be even more economically powerful. i'm not sure why the chinese would want to listen to secretary snow when he is clueless about foriegn exchange policy, but i will assume that he went with enough academic and economic data to prove the point and ask them, read 'beg them', to consider helping the US out of its financial problems. because of course, that would undoubtledly help the chinese. for the past few years they haven't seemed to need our help so why will they concede now? can you say "protectionism"? the truth is, snow brought with him a message of "tariffs till you drop" if you don't do what we want.

both of these recent moves were made out of desperation rather than strength, no matter how the administration couches them. both moves will probably be ineffective at achieving their stated goals, but they may stem some of the criticism being levied at the administration for their handling of the economy.

facts are facts, and here is one. corporations will not start hiring workers, or for that matter stop firing workers, until the economy is clearly and sustainably growing without all the help from government overspending and historically low interest rates. and china will not do what washington wants, because they never have and don't need to in order to prosper. remember tieneman square, that was supposed to change things in china. fast forward to tady, and basically, nothing has changed except the way we percieve it. that fact is we need china's cheap labor and sourcing in order to maintain our standard of living. kind of like we need illegal immigrants to build houses and do manual labor that americans will not do. and we don't have the ability to change a country that has 1 billion people and is still communist.

the bottom line here is that the president will babble on about how strong our nation is and how fundamentally sound our consumer based economy continues to be. especially due to his tax cuts and economic policy. he will reiterate that we will not leave iraq until we democratize it, no matter the cost militarily, financially or in human life, because it is a worthy cause. and becaus ehe says so. he will reassure the country that good times are upon us and that we have exited a bleak period of time and sunny skies are here to stay. just as long as I get re-elected and am at the helm of the country. can you say 'titanic'? the speech will be a great way to start off the 2004 election campaign.

god bless america...we are going to need all the blessings we can get!

have a grateful day!

larry