Finally! The Moment We've All Been Waiting For By: Mark W Adams

The Recession Is Here! The Recession Is Here!

Now maybe instead of endlessly listening to the doom-sayers predicting the imminent collapse of our financial institutions and discussing how deep and how long the coming catastrophic economic downturn will be as we teeter on the brink of ruin -- they can start with the happy talk of Teh Awesome recovery and how much better things will be ... reeeeel soon.

A growing number of top economists believe that the U.S. economy has now toppled into recession. Alarm bells were set off Tuesday by a grim report on service businesses, which make up the majority of the U.S. economy.

The Institute of Supply Management said that activity in the service sector declined for the first time in nearly five years. This report also indicated that employers are cutting staff.

Now they push the panic button?!? Now that all the decent jobs have been outsourced and the unions are a shadow of their former selves, you know that we're in trouble when cash flow has ground down to the point where we can't afford to wait on each other.

Come on, the Service Employee's Union is now the largest and most influential Union when it comes to endorsement headlines? WTF happened to the clout of the manufacturing guys, the Steel and Iron Workers, the UAB, the frickin' Teamsters? They were the forces to be appeased not that long ago. Now it's "big" news that the Painters endorsed the Huckster. Not to disparage the Painters Union, good folks all. But seriously, am I supposed to be impressed?

Ya gotta make stuff. That's the economic engine of an industrialized nation. What this current episode of chickens coming home to roost indicates is that the era of post-ndustrialized America is now fully in play. Everybody is servicing everybody else and nobody is making anything of value that originates the wealth we pass around to each other for doing stuff for the next guy.

In fact, all that we're witnessing is the perpetual motion machine wearing down through inertia -- a machine that was switched off in the late 70's and early 80's with the American steel industry disintegration and has slowly worked it's agony throughout the economy as manufacturing jobs have been outsourced over the last decade.

Finally, deregulation and indifference by a ruling class that treats globalization and the free market as a religion instead of an economic theory has trickled it's malignant magic right down though to the folk who clean up everybody else's messes, drive the buses, care for the sick and disabled, sell shoes, build, finance and sell houses, and flip burgers.

The survey covers the retail, transportation and health care industries as well as hard hit areas such as finance, real estate and construction.

Some economists argued that the normally low-profile ISM services reading, coupled with the government's report Friday showing the first monthly net loss in jobs in more than four years, is proof that recession is now a reality.

Of course, the cure for this is the same thing we saw when the economy was humming and the Club For Greed insisted that starving the beast was only "fair" -- that you should get "your money" back. Huzzah! Tax cuts for the wealthy, naturally. The elixir that treats all ailments -- just like snake-oil and a stiff shot of scotch (preferably Johnny Walker Blue -- the choice of Enron executives everywhere).

Say what you want about Mike Huckabee and his goofy ideas, but his break with supply-sider doctrine is outstanding. The Fed is still in the grip of Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman mythology that tinkering with the money supply and playing with the Laffer Curve is the extent of proper government interference with the private sector.

Rand's "Objectivism" is merely raw selfish greed and hedonistic misogyny supercharged with a thesaurus yet this delusion of a failed screenwriter is the basis of the dominant fiscal policy of our nation -- supply-side (voodoo) economics. The fact that John McCain counts Trickle Down Guru Jack Kemp as an adviser tells you all you need to know about his fiscal conservative orthodoxy. McCain is just as nutty as the rest of them, The Blimpster included.

Put people to work. That'll fix a lot that's wrong. Adding some lanes to I-95 is a great thing to do -- lousy idea to campaign on, however. But Huck is a hick, after all.

More of the same is why we're in this mess.