Many people were relieved when they saw how mild the 2001 recession was—in fact it didn’t even technically count as a recession since there were not two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP—although 3 out of 5 quarters after the second quarter of 2000 saw a falling GDP. Of course, given how lousy the labor market has been since then most people still feel that the economic downturn was a lot sharper than those numbers would indicate, and that the following expansion was a lot slower than the ofiicial numbers would indicate.
The Mises Institute receives correspondence from all over the world, many letters per day, and this one struck me as particularly inspiring:
The husband of an acquaintance has been sentenced to 18 months in federal prison on a guily plea of importing endangered orchid species. Although this has been unfolding for months, I just found out last night. The whole affair was very well summarized by the pollenatrix back in a
The most excellent financial contrarian, Bill Fleckenstein, and his “Fleckisms.” (”Bubblevision” has always been my favorite.) :
An unbelievable quote from an inflationist/Bubblemaniac/Greenspanite/Wall Street Talking Head.....says James Cramer:
Now that Bush has been reelected, and has comfortable majorities in both the House and Senate, we will have at least a two-year unambiguous test of Republican fiscal policies. My prediction? Massive spending and massive deficits. After all, that’s what Republican presidents do, if history is any guide.
Consider the myriad internal contradictions embedded in this URL: www.freedom.gov. Compare to Mises:
A relatively new product, GloTell, is now available to farmers and chemical plants, whose anhydrous ammonia tanks are sometimes raided by theives.
