dr payne

Here we have the doctor, preparing to perform one of his frequent prostate exams on the American public. This will undoubtedly end with the advice that we really ought to be feeling good, because our recent troubles are definitely over, and a full recovery is in progress.

To be perfectly fair, it wasn't Uncle Dr. Larry who authored the nonsensical happy chatter that follows, but the Reuters syndicate. I merely found it on Dr. Larry's home web site, CNBC, so I'm perpetrating a little guilt by association here.

The unsigned Reuters story reports that "Initial claims for state unemployment insurance declined to a seasonally adjusted 530,000 in the week ending Sept. 19 from a revised 551,000 in the previous week. Analysts polled by Reuters were expecting claims to rise to 550,000 from a previously reported 545,000." Then comes the astonishing conclusion: "U.S. stock futures moved slightly higher on additional evidence the economy is pulling out of a severe recession."

I don't know how any sane observer could possibly conclude that "the economy is pulling out" of its ongoing disaster simply because things are not getting worse as quickly as they were a few months ago.

All throughout the corporate-owned Wall Street cheerleader media, and on a daily basis "no longer in free fall" is conflated with "recovery." This is no different from claiming a terminal patient is recovering when the rate at which he is dying slows down.

Try as they might to sell this phony "recovery," Wall Street cannot hide the simple facts: many more people are still losing jobs than finding jobs, more properties are being foreclosed upon than sold, and banks are not lending money to anyone who actually needs it. These ludicrous claims remind me of a conversation between Alice and the Red Queen in chapter two of "Through the Looking Glass." This was early in the story, and Alice was still orienting herself to her new surroundings, felt lost, and was saying, "I thought I'd try and find my way to the top of that hill -- "

"When you say 'hill,'" the Queen interrupted, "I could show you hills, in comparison with which you'd call that a valley."

"No, I shouldn't," said Alice, surprised into contradicting her at last: "a hill can't be a valley, you know. That would be nonsense --"

The Red Queen shook her head. "You may call it 'nonsense' if you like," she said, "but I've heard nonsense, compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!"

As an example of what the Red Queen was talking about, consider the claim that over half a million new jobless claims last week, because the number was slightly less than what was posted the week before, and slightly lower than what was anticipated, is evidence of a "recovery."