Thank you, oh masters of the obvious

Vice President Elect Biden said Friday that the economy is in danger of "absolutely tanking." President Elect Obama further said that it will take years in recovering, and that government action must be bold and swift to prevent it from taking longer. People are blaming President Bush for failed policies that attempted to place anyone who applied for a mortgage into a house, no matter whether they qualified or not.

To Vice President Elect Biden: well, duh. Where have you been? The economy has been "absolutely tanking" for a few months, now. I guess you were too busy on the campaign trail with President Elect Obama to see the truth behind the poisonous rhetoric you were spewing.

To President Elect Obama: yes, it's going to get worse before it gets better. Yes, it will take years. And yes, the government must act boldly and swiftly to prevent it from becoming worse than it might, or taking longer than it should; HOWEVER, the swift, bold action you've already articulated was the same swift, bold action that prolonged the Great Depression in the 1930s! The action that the government should be taking is to lower taxes, on individual income, on businesses, and on capital gains. Along with that, the government should force the breakup of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Sallie Mae (student loans), and all of the banks that mergered to become "too big to fail." Remember the cliche about all your eggs in one basket.

To those blaming President Bush for the mess: yes, there should have been more oversight. However, "oversight" doesn't mean "regulations" that choke the business model, merely preventing Clinton alumni from looting the mortgage giants that the government created and turned loose. And speaking of the Clintons, it was their policies, not Bush's, that pushed banks into sub-prime lending. It was their administration that disastrously expanded the Fair Housing Act to force the issue with threats of prosecution of racism.

Granted, the Fair Housing Act was expanded with the best of intentions, and no one expected banks to charge leg-breaker interest, but you know what they say about good intentions.