Is the past prelude? Here’s a comparison of job losses in all the post-WW2 recessions. Note how bad the slope is for the current recession. Be careful though, these are absolute numbers and not relative to population.
And here is the change in consumer spending over the past 50 years smoothed to six months — meaning some bad months have gotten smoothed over with the surrounding better months. Is this really the only the second time it’s gone negative in five decades? And that first time was only barely negative.
Author: peteware
The White House fights back
Barack Obama has an op-ed in the Washington Post
starts to fight back at the short sighted, self-serving views that the Republicans have been using the past two weeks.
The Action Americans Need:
In recent days, there have been misguided criticisms of this plan that echo the failed theories that helped lead us into this crisis — the notion that tax cuts alone will solve all our problems; that we can meet our enormous tests with half-steps and piecemeal measures; that we can ignore fundamental challenges such as energy independence and the high cost of health care and still expect our economy and our country to thrive.
I reject these theories, and so did the American people when they went to the polls in November and voted resoundingly for change. They know that we have tried it those ways for too long. And because we have, our health-care costs still rise faster than inflation. Our dependence on foreign oil still threatens our economy and our security. Our children still study in schools that put them at a disadvantage. We’ve seen the tragic consequences when our bridges crumble and our levees fail.
I particularly liked the modest identification at the end of the article:
The writer is president of the United States.
Roubini: more bad news
- Global, synchronized, recession.
- Recession continues through 2009 with weak, 1%, growth in 2010.
- Unemployment at 9% in 2010. Job losses easily at 500k/month through 2009 and may be worse. Stimulus may lower that to 200k/month.
- $1.8 trillion loss for banks; need another $1.4 trillion for banks to recover.
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Top 3 banks in US are technically insolvent. Nationalization only reasonable approach. Re-privatize them in 2-3 years. Otherwise, end up with zombie banks like Japan: a decade of stagnation.
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Deficits this year: 2 trillion; next year 1.5 trillion.
The world is getting better one step at a time
It’s William Kristol’s last op-ed in the NY Times — ending one year of the worst written columns in NY Times history. Or as Political Animal “His columns combined the three worst qualities a columnist can have: Kristol’s work was wrong, predictable, and boring.”
From Will Obama Save Liberalism?:
This is William Kristol’s last column.
Editing
I re-edited a bunch of posts to fix the stripped out angle bracket. Interesting writing.
Warren Buffett and Obama
Here is Warren Buffett interview by Tom Brokaw on Dateline NBC. Buffett is very positive on Obama’s leadership. (7 min):
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Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Interactive map of Gaza fighting
This is a great map from the Wall St Journal about the fighting in Gaza. Click on the image below to go to the interactive map. Once there, you can click on the calendar for day to day events.
From 
:
Inaugural Parties in NY
Some parties in NY to celebrate the inaugural
The Living Liberally Inaugural Ball. Sunday, January 18th - 8pm Rush - 6th Avenue @ 16th Street
Date: from 1/19/2009 7:00 pm to 1/20/2009 1:00 am (Eastern Time)
Fixing libxml2, php, WordPress, and the missing angle brackets
Someone posted a temporary fix for WordPress that takes the raw xml and replaces the offending entities with characters. He found three places. The fix looks like:
//xmllib 2.7.0 -2.7.2 stripping leading angle brackets bug patch
if(LIBXML_DOTTED_VERSION == '2.7.0' ||
LIBXML_DOTTED_VERSION == '2.7.1' ||
LIBXML_DOTTED_VERSION == '2.7.2') {
$xml =str_replace("<","<",$xml );
$xml =str_replace(">",">",$xml );
$xml =str_replace("&","&",$xml );
}
//end Fix
xml_parse($parser, $xml);
Seeing a Virus in Three Dimensions
Sometimes my jaw just drops when I read about scientific advances. If the reporter understood this and I understood the reporter they are using a magnetic field causing protons to vibrate which is then measured with a tiny scale.
What makes me astounded is how quickly we are reaching into the molecular level. 15 years ago this was just some wild eyed, theoretical paper.
From A Breakthrough in Imaging – Seeing a Virus in Three Dimensions:
Magnetic resonance force microscopy employs an ultrasmall cantilever arm as a platform for specimens that are then moved in and out of proximity to a tiny magnet. At extremely low temperatures the researchers are able to measure the effect of a magnetic field on the protons in the hydrogen atoms found in the virus.
By repeatedly flipping the magnetic field, the researchers are able to cause a minute vibration in the cantilever arm which can then be measured by a laser beam. By moving the virus through the magnetic field it is possible to build up a 3-D image from many two-dimensional samples.
Pete Ware 