In your opinion, Is the recession REALLY over??? I mean . . . . . really?!?

You are correct, but when the 'bank' has one of the largest standing armies on the planet debt collection takes on a whole other dimension.

It would be an ugly situation, no doubt. But, nobody wants it to come to that, So, there's plenty of room for negotiation.

Yep, right up to the point when the landing craft are sitting off the west coast........

A consequence neither side would want. At that point, you're on the brink of mutually assured destruction.

I'm not trying to say "Make us pay". As you point out, they're some pretty tough customers. So are we. If the two of us went all out, any survivors would consider us both insane for letting it get to that level.

I'm saying that at a certain point the leverage reverses, or at least evens out. At that point, it makes sense to come to the table and negotiate because you both face either military or economic destruction if you don't.

I'm reading some of your other posts, and you seem like a pretty reasonable person, hope i'm not coming across as challenging China to "make us pay".

Thanks, I try to be reasonable - LOL. I'm well acquainted with the doctrine of MAD, I'm an old Cold War bubblehead (submariner).

China is maneuvering to become the next world super power. The one thing they lacked was a blue-water Navy to project power anywhere on the globe. They have since rectified this. There are also 1.3 billion of them to our 330 million. They have a combined military numbering 4.5 million.

What China is engaged in with us is economic and cyber warfare. Collapsing our economy is exactly what they'd like to do. They want to knock us off the top of the mountain, game. set, match.

Thank you for your service.

Yeah China is going to be tough. They are very disciplined, hard working and cunning. We've become a culture of quick fixes, fads and getting paid without providing any value. We're in for a rough ride.

You're welcome, was my pleasure.

You are absolutely correct. It's going to be a tough row to hoe.

I'm with you, China is digging this new capitalistic life style.

Funny how they're socialist and becoming more capitalist and we're heading in the opposite direction.

Isn't that the truth. The world is saying the same thing...what the hell is the US doing? We were in Brazil not too long ago and as much as they have been a socialist country they are now in a capitalists economic explosion.
I'll state the obvious, this idiot socialistic Muslim two bit community dis-organizer needs to get kicked out of this country once and for all.
Jimmy Carter was a communist sympathizer and even he looks smart and loyal compared to this idiot.

I don't know if this is true or not. But, I read an article yesterday saying that Obama plans to focus on CLIMATE CHANGE as the major focus of his second term. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE say that in a major, televised speech. That would lead to the biggest landslide since Carter.

Why would I not be surprised, I hope he gets Al Whore to stand next to him when he announces this. I'm sure he will claim his statement and find to be another historical moment to go down in his personal book of fame.

Higher food prices, and harder to find jobs...

Its still in motion and cannot be innoculated againt those economic forces at play in Europe. Many people avoiding a responsible action, and some of the in part resposible for the collapse (Banking/Corporate), and their subservients convincingly want to crash this country. How do you get people to focus on the cause and effect and put politics aside?

if we can elect a new president one that understands business and how economics really work then maybe we will have a chance to get out of it .

Not judging by the want ads in MY newspaper (scarcity of offerings for jobs).

Other than self-serving statistical manipulation emanating from the White House, there is no evidence that the recession ever ended.

The longest recession since the Great Depression.

And the deepest as well.

Not even close.

just look at the unemployed rate but not the one on the books since that one is inaccurate because people had already exhausted their benefits and some got jobs but they are considered to under-employed

Fallen Recession need not mean a total end. Always have some space, so less time is used to from the percentage remained the same.

Far from it.

Nice picture, but that has not happened yet, but will and when it does expect to hear them say we have exited the contracting economy due to the effects of hyper inflation.

I'm sure the Progressives have an excuse ready.

I think some places are doing better than others.

The economy is deeper in the tank than The Golden Child or Reid or Hatchet Face Pelosi or anyone in DC will admit. Fire all there asses in Nov. Ever ydamn one of them OUT!

With unemployment and the dow where it is there is no way the recession ever ended.

Sound economic theory marks one of the characteristics of a recession - or depression - as widespread rates of private-sector entrepreneurial failure.

To appreciate the characteristics of our present recession/depression, examine the number of industrial and commercial properties (emphasis on the immediately obvious "dead mall" phenomenon) and it's obvious that were we in any kind of real productive-sector growth these properties would be leased by operating businesses, and there would be market conditions pressing for new construction.

Instead, we've got precisely the opposite effects observed. The U.S. economy is still in contraction, and there's no sign even that said contraction has "hit bottom," much less reversed.

And with our banksters heavily leveraged in the European clusterpuck, things WILL get worse. In very short order.

Free market economists have read this pathology correctly, and the lamestream "Liberal" media are lying through their teeth.

So what else is new?

How can it be? Unemployment, foreclosures....

I had to laugh through my tears when I heard that a couple of years ago...you've got to be kidding! That kind of math only works on paper. Get out and see how the real world is not making it!

No the recession is not over as a matter of fact we are in a depression and no matter what the press say's, it is getting worse. Anybody who thinks it is better is out of touch with reality.

We already have been in a DEPRESSION. But since so very, very, very many people seem to keep wanting to call it a 'Recession' anyway (usually characterized by jobs receding rather than disappearing outright, while a Depression being characterized by NO GROWTH IN JOBS AND ENTIRE JOBS AND EVEN INDUSTRIES GOING BELLY UP), then no. HELL NO, it isn't over.

I've said this before, and I am going to say it again, when even the SEASONAL OPPORTUNITIES DISAPPEAR, you know it is extremely nasty out there. At that point, you'd best just not even waste your time looking anymore. In fact, I had to stop looking for the real (year-round) jobs in 2010. And that's been the predicament out where I live since 2011 with the Seasonal stuff being hacked to nothing and it won't be any different this Winter either. Nothing. Zilch. Squat. Finished.

So again, people, let's call it what it's been the last at least two years: DEPRESSION.

Not at all. Having lived through the depression and many political climates, I am convinced that Obama and the Liberal machine are intent on the destruction of what is the greatest country on earth.

Not as long as Obummer is in office !!

Changing the conductor is really not going to fix anything either as the policies of G. dubya have been mirrored in the Obama Administration... the real problem began in the Clinton Admin, and allowed to persist in the Dubya and Obama Admins, and the true effects are now just coming to manifest in a way that will make the 2008 collapse look like a day in the park.

I agree it started with Clinton. Bill and Hillary ! Probably one of the main problems was NAFTA !

NAFTA started with Newt, and was signed by Clinton, and the real hole in the manufacturing boat was the GATB. which was bipartisan... The crazy part about the legislation (including the repeal of Glass Steagull) was to allow banks to invest directly into the world markets and bypass the commercial and private consumer demand, thus eliminating the creation of the domestic money supply for the economic model that had existed from the late 1930's... The irony is that our monetary system was based upon the system of the Babylonians, and the engineers of our current monetary system have disregarded several important system rules for the Fiat money system and have almost certainly doomed the monetary system through their silly avarice and ignorance.