Has President Bush, Secretary Paulson, Chairman Bernanke, or Speaker Pelosi taken a single action or spoken a single phrase during the past month to inspire confidence in their ability–not to solve the problem–but to simply comprehend it and characterize it?
By “it,” of course, we mean the current liquidity crisis facing certain institutions that seem to have lax boards and managements that encouraged excessive risking-taking behavior that led to over-concentrations of holdings in certain (nearly worthless) asset classes.
Perhaps, that question is too harsh; so, we shall ask a different one. Has President Bush, Secretary Paulson, Chairman Bernanke, or Speaker Pelosi taken a single action or spoken a single phrase that has mitigated, rather than exacerbated, the current crisis?
As regular readers know, we often urge those with decision-making authority to take a shortened version of the Hippocratic Oath and pledge to “do no harm.” Today we go beyond that and recommend: just shut up!
Of the most recognizable national politicians–sorry most House members–the most intelligent quote that we heard was from John McCain in an Obama, anti-McCain ad. It’s the one with the bad cover of Sam Cooke’s “Wonderful World” with the lyrics “don’t know much about…”
In the quote, McCain admits to not knowing much about economics. If he and the other national politicians could remain that humble and thoughtful during the crisis, there is much less chance that they would exacerbate it and create a real panic. (Clearly, a former “community-organizer” would have a better grasp of subtle economic issues and concepts and thus be able to provide such insights as–and we paraphrase–we’ll solve the problem with common sense solutions and, as a bonus for the envious and spiteful, we’ll screw the rich while we’re at it. (Regular readers will recall our use of italics to denote sarcarm.))
