Thread: Obama Speech at Georgetown

Anyone listen to it?

A few things I noticed -

When trying to "clearly" explain the causes of the current financial crisis Obama stated it was a, “perfect storm of irresponsibility and poor decision-making stretched from Wall Street to Washington to Main Street.”
He blamed the banks and Wall Street for high risk housing loans, but at (the same time conveniently omitted the role government played in causing the banks to make those loans.

Obama said, "History has shown repeatedly that when nations do not take early and aggressive action to get credit flowing again, they have crises that last years and years instead of months and months -- years of low growth, years of low job creation, years of low investment, all of which cost these nations far more than a course of bold, upfront action"

According to "The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics" (Great Depression: The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics | Library of Economics and Liberty):

" Interestingly, given the importance of the Great Depression in the development of economic thinking and economic policy, economists do not completely agree on what caused it. Recent research by Peter Temin, Barry Eichengreen, David Glasner, Ben Bernanke, and others has led to an emerging consensus on why the contraction began in 1928 and 1929. There is less agreement on why the contraction phase was longer and more severe in some countries and why the depression lasted so long in some countries, particularly the United States."

According to two UCLA economists (FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate / UCLA Newsroom): the Great Depression was prolonged by seven years due to Roosevelt's New Deal policies.

So where does Obama get this "history has shown repeatedly" garbage?

He also said that economists on the left and right agree, “The last thing a government should do in the middle of a recession is cut back on spending” (The Gaggle : More on the Obama Speech: Did He Just Say Entitlement Reform?)

Of course some economists agree, but I'm sure there are plenty that disagree.

He then made a comment regarding families cutting back on spending. That if all families stopped spending it would hurt the economy. But when, in fact, would All families stop spending? Never.

But of course Obama uses that false premise to again promote government spending, or priming the pump (as Keynes called it). And prime the pump with what? Money that those families would have used to spend themselves had government not taxed it out of them.

But of course Obama knows better than American families how and where to spend their money.

Anyone else have observations?