Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Perfect Storm Recession

I like Obama's title of the current recession: The Perfect Storm Recession.

Let's write it into textbooks immediately. Seems fitting as so many elements contributed to this massive shift and downfall. It also seems fitting as this recession looks and feels so different from anything my generation, and the generation before mine, has experienced. It's a bank recession, a housing recession, a technology recession, a job-loss recession, a global recession, and a normal cyclical recession (as many economists predicted one coming towards the end of 2007/beginning of 2008 [boy, were they good!]). Usually only one or two of these elements come into play when a recession hits for 5-12 months. This one has been going strong for 17 months and it will take at least another 3 (by its confusing, convoluted definition) to come out of it, with a probability of about 6 months. That makes it the longest since WWII (as I'm sure you've heard constantly), and if it lasts for 9 more months, it will be longer than the WWII recession; and without argument it is certainly the deepest since The Great Depression.

He said in his speech today that what he would say would be prose, not poetry, which is clever and profound at once. Some have called him the most poetic President in a long time, while others contend he is only 'words' and little 'correct action,' I suppose much like they would interpret poetry to be. But poetry is greater and requires eloquence, imagination, intelligence and risk--a lot of which appears in prose, but with a distinct difference. In prose, you can bumble some of your words, elaborate where desired, and go into detail and explanation, where in poetry you must be succinct, connotative and metaphorical. The majority of his ideal and speeches have been poetic, and this was truly more prosy. I'm sure it answered a lot of his critics' demand that he elaborate and explain though, but of course, not bumble. And if you comprehend my metaphor, you know how I feel about it all.

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