AlterNet: All the Talk of a Depression Is ... Depressing

[marmar]

All the Talk of a Depression Is ... Depressing

By Danny Schechter, AlterNet. Posted November 26, 2008.

The Democrats have always sung "happy days are here again," but it doesn't seem to be the right song for these hard times.



In this Thanksgiving week, a majority, perhaps, of all Americans will give thanks not only for a bountiful table but for a transition of power in which so much hope is invested.

As the new Administration translates its campaign's lofty vision of change into a new team and concrete plans, we find that the new change-makers are largely a throw back to the old centrist Clinton Administration that took its marching orders from the corporate interests funding the Democratic Leadership Conference.

Barack Obama is now calling for a major stimulus and job creation effort but outlining it and getting it done will be quite different and difficult. Creating two and a half million new jobs by 2011 is a good goal but seems far off in a country where official unemployment now stands at ten million and so many need relief now. Ditto for debt relief, a topic no one is even talking about.

In the interim, as the snows come and the season turns colder, many a family will face an uncomfortable choice: "heat or eat." This could be the worst shopping season ever. 36 Million families have or are close to maxing out their credit cards.

The Democrats have always sung "happy days are here again" but it doesn't seem to be the right song for these hard times. It's taken a full year for the punditocracy to even accept that we are in a recession. Last November, the economists at investment banks (that no longer exist in their old form) had proclaimed the recession, "the R word, " was already here. The press held off with constant references to a "possible recession" or the government is trying to "stave off a recession."

Part of the confusion can be attributed to how recessions are defined. The Oakland Tribune looked into this and concluded,

The truth is, nobody knows. The responsibility for declaring the stages of the business cycle is informally held by that most dreaded of concepts -- a committee of economists. The Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research uses several economic indicators, including personal income, unemployment, industrial production and sales and manufacturing volume, to determine the health of the economy. It's not true that they declare a recession if economic growth is negative for two quarters in a row. If it were that simple, we wouldn't need a committee.

If you want to know about the state of the economy in real time, you can't rely on the NBER. ...........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/workplace/108510/all_the_talk_of_a_depression_is_..._depressing/

[dipsydoodle]

1. And pessimism sustains depressions

whereas optimism kick starts the way back to normal.

[marmar]

2. Problem is "normal" has to change.....

....."Normal" as it's been since Reagan is unrealistic and unsustainable.

[Lost4words]

5. not optimism alone my friend.

its good help is on the way (maybe) but many of us are bobbing up and down in the frigged water with little more than a life preserver that will only keep our bodies afloat after we sucome to hypothermia prior to the arrival of the rescue. No jobs, no manufacturing, no technology, global climate change. But there seems to be a never ending stream of folks who have not felt the true impact of this diaster who still have work and savings and health care who say put on a happy face, think positive.

If you can say such a statement then you must have been spared most of the hardships facing millions of us today.

I glad for you though, Keep your heart up, sing a happy tune, Happy Days are here again. But keep an eye open for those who cannot feed their family unless they mug you in a mall parking lot. I suggest you do not resist and gladly hand over your cash, odds are he wont be a junkie but a parent with kids to feed.

The people who used to give to food banks are now in line for food, which tells me that the majority of charitable donations came from the middle class not the wealthy and thats why food bank shelves are empty.

Faith in my fellow man, hell what I have seen for 50+ years is the American mantra "I got mine, to hell with you"

There will be no quick fix.

8643

[Lost4words]

7. optimist falls from a 40 story bldg, at floor 10 he says so far so good,

but it is a better default attitude.

[Javaman]

8. jesus, I'm glad you're not my neighbor...

I read several of your other posts and frankly, you scare me.

you are now blocked.

[enid602]

3. credit cards

36 million families close to maxed out on their credit cards. That´s depressing.

[corpseratemedia]

4. the consumerist culture we've been overwhelmed with

these past few decades (I believe) shuts down people's emotions..go shopping, make what you buy your identity, this way of being took over our collective (Western then global) persona - a person doesn't have to deal with negative feelings or reality on the consumer treadmill.

It's come to the point where if you offer a a critique of our culture, you're "bitter."

Reality is finally settling in. Goods are becoming just that...stuff extracted at the cost of the planet, or our wages, etc.  Survival is starting to matter. Personal survival and the struggle between unlimited economic growth/survival of the planet. 

Those 20 points made in the article..we've been taken for the financial ride of our lives.

It's ok to feel depressed and angry that we've been taken so many ways. It's ok to tell the truth and to learn to live with the uncomfortable feelings reality causes us to feel. How do you learn, how can you make good decisions, always living in a blissful consumerist haze?

We were robbed blind living in our optimistic bubble.

[Lost4words]

6. Spot On!! corpseratemedia! Good reply, nt