Stupid Comparison of the Day (Complete with Economic Hogwash)

       Cognitive dissonance (or rank economic ignorance) is at work when Orange Blatherskite simultaneously claims he is master of a booming economy, and says that the Federal Reserve needs to cut interest rates.  If the economy were actually doing well, basic economics says that interest rates should go up.  Some point to the decreasing value of the stock market.  The stock market rose to such heights only because lowered interest rates killed the bond market.  
           Everything above is obvious to anyone who actually understands economics.  The President apparently said that he didn't know who the bigger enemy to our economy was--the Chairman of the Fed or Chinese President Eleven.   Huh?  The President thinks the Chinese are such an imminent threat that he destroys American commodity exports a la Jimmy Carter to "fight" them, and now he implies that the Chairman of the Fed is worse than the dictator of a Communist regime?  This moment of stupidity was brought to you by the letters "O" and "B."

Modern Day Biddle

Back in the 1830's the government still hadn't gotten into the business of regulating the economy. One of the first attempts at this was the Bank of the United States, bane of the plutophobic Andrew Jackson. When Jackson denied the bank's utility, and took measures to kill it, the head of the bank, Nicolas Biddle, decided to prove the bank's importance by calling in loans to hurt the United States economy. Biddle started a panic, and, sure enough, Biddle hurt the economy. Historians have long judged Biddle to be something of a traitor, and Estase feels that history will take a similar view of Bela Pelosi. Pelosi flexed her political muscle by making a speech denouncing the rescue plan for the financial system. Just as with Biddle, it worked. Also like Biddle, Pelosi couldn't have cared less about the fact that the economy was going down the tubes Wednesday. She could have used her power to prevent the stock market hit that wiped out people's savings, but she decided to delay the rescue plan that was so important, and so urgently needed. Bela Pelosi acted like a spoiled brat, not a responsible statesman. If things get worse, Americans should know who to blame.

Economic Recovery

"Those who have much, need much; and, on the contrary, those who limit their possessions to their natural needs, rather than to their excessive ambitions, need very little. "

Boethius
The Consolation of Philosophy

(Green trans.)
Book Two, Prose Five

Every Trifling Thing

Should the government interfere with commerce, as is depicted in this quote about the expansive government of pre-revolution France?

In other countries trade supports the state; in this the state must support trade: every trifling thing here requires the hand of government.

Lt. Colonel Alexander Jardine, quoted in John Lough's France on the Eve of Revolution