My financial advisers said this to me last Tuesday: “Your perspective on the future is just short of Armageddon.” This is lecture number three from this wizard of a most prestigious institution. Once, again he read my the party line: you don’t try to time the market, you just do portfolio adjustment. I said OK, we go through the few remaining equities we still have since we started bailing in March, and you give me a compelling argument to keep each one. We may have kept one or two, and I’m sorry we did that. So, right or wrong, I’m not part of the trillion dollar loss in the market today.
As I watch the news tonight, I’m hearing the same things I said last Tuesday. I started this Blog in early 2008 because I truly believed this country was in big trouble. You can toggle back and read earlier entries and see I’ve been on this path for months.
We are done. We are going through the grinder. My parents talked a lot about the Great Depression. None of it was good. It stays with you for your entire life. You don’t make rash financial decisions because you fear it may come again. It’s here.
You had better take it seriously. There is no leadership in Washington to turn this around.
Here’s what comes next. More banks fail. Inflation is going to hit hard. Loans will not be available. Not for business, not for you. Jobs will go away. Maybe yours, maybe your kids. People will reel it in. Businesses will fail. Retail sales for Christmas will be the lowest since the Great Depression. All retailers will suffer. Discretionary spending will stop. Banks will play hardball on credit card debt.
Here’s how uninformed most of the people in this country are about this. Obama gets a lift on the economy. People actually believe that taxing more and spending more is the better solution to this mess. If this happens it is going to go faster and deeper. Somehow the facts need to be put out and understood.
I’m not sure how we get through this. I’m not offering any advice since I have no experience base to offer.
I just know this. If you didn’t believe me for the past 9 months that your grandchildren will have a lower standard of living than their parents I’ll bet it makes sense now.
Want to see the problem, just watch for the next few days and weeks. Senator Kerry on O’Reilly last night said this is a bail out George Bush bill. All Democrats will blame Republicans for this. All Republicans will blame Democrats. Parochial politics will never be worse. The November election is at stake.
