One Economy for All

The Republicans have had control of two branches of government for almost six years now. The third branch fell to their control a couple of years ago. With the help of an extremely complicit and fawning Democratic minority, they have broken nearly everything they’ve touched. There is no need to reiterate the issues—suffice it to say that people are not happy. Bush’s approval ratings are between 35% and 40%, whereas those for the Congress lay between 15% and 20%. You don’t get numbers like that by doing a bang-up job.

With nary a last straw left to grasp at, Republicans and their dutiful slaves in the fourth estate are left with messages like the following one about the economy.

DOW hits 12,000

It’s hilarious. The Democrats, who, truth to tell, have only hit their stride of late in campaigning about pedophilia, which even they can come out clearly against, are depicted complaining about the economy. Bush is shown riding the Dow[1] as it shoots for the stars. I believe that Walt Handelsman is going for a clear “in your face” by Bush here, using the recent rise in stock prices in one 30 company index to prove that he’s god’s gift to fiscal management.

Since the Dow is higher than ever before, it’s clearly a feather in Bush’s cap. That most of the participants in the economy have the lowest buying power in decades, have the lowest real wages in history and would be jobless in record numbers if the administration counted people that have been out of a job so long that they stopped looking for one, can’t be laid at Bush’s feet. The serendipitous rise of a few stocks, whose increase in value benefits only a very thin sliver of Americans weighs much more heavily and proves that Bush is doing a good job, in the one respect that matters: making rich people richer. A rising tide lifts all yachts, after all.