Are We In A Recession?

Are we in a recession? That question reminds me of the punch line to the the question: "What is the difference between ignorance and apathy?" - " I don't know and I don't care". 

The reason that I don't know is that economists, who are the ones who come up with these terms, don't agree on what defines a recession. In most cases they assign the label to a time period retroactively. One definition that you hear a lot about is two consecutive quarters of negative Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth. It's the definition that the party that's out of power (currently the Republicans) likes to use because it's easy to point at and say "Look, those idiots in charge have got us into a recession!". The problem with that definition is that hardly any economists use it. Mainly because, by itself, it doesn't really give us a clear picture of what is going on. The more popular, and more nuanced and therefore more vague and hard to pin down definition is "a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales." There's a lot of moving parts that could contribute to the big economic picture. It's not one moment in time that can be pointed at as "THAT'S the recession". 

So are we in a recession? I stand by "I don't know and I don't care". "I don't know" because the definition is so nebulous and "I don't care" for more complex reasons.

The state of the amorphous monster known as The Economy is going to affect different demographics in different ways. The stock market was setting new records every week for several years, but for the most part this had no effect upon the average American. This year it slid down a little a had investors sweating - but did that same average American notice? I'd wager not. The unemployment rate is another measure of economic health; the rate has been ridiculously low the last few years, but if the majority of the employed are working multiple jobs to get by, the news isn't so good. Wages are going up, but so are prices. Whether we are in good economic times or not is an individual thing. It's also highly subjective. Studies have been done that indicate that most people believe that the economy is bad even when they personally are doing well!

How you look at current economic conditions is going to be colored by your partisan leanings. Of course if you didn't vote for the party that's currently in power you're going to focus on inflation, in particular gas and grocery prices; if you're a supporter of the incumbent administration your focus will be on continued low unemployment, continued record job creation, as well as record corporate and retail sales and profits.  

Parties in power claim credit when things are going well and make excuses when things are going poorly; parties out of power point the finger of blame when things are going badly and defect attention some other thing when the economy is doing well. So how things going now? Some good, some bad. Just like always.

Kyle Rittenhouse & Fearing for One's Life

Kyle Rittenhouse was on trial for murder. He killed two people and seriously wounded a third. 

According to trial testimony, the first person that Rittenhouse killed was Joseph Rosenbaum. I've heard various versions of what happened between Rittenhouse and Rosenbaum, and various descriptions of Rosenbaum as a troublemaker. But trial testimony established that Rittenhouse shot Rosenbaum four times after Rosenbaum lunged at him. 

The jury decided, as the defense claims, that Rittenhouse fired in self defense. I am unfamiliar with the specifics of Wisconsin law, although I am reasonably sure they don't have a version of a "Stand Your Ground" statute, so it's wasn't a sure thing either way. But is it self defense if you purposely put yourself in a position to provoke people to anger by walking around with a loaded weapon that you are prepared to use against people who are damaging property? Emotions were running hot in Kenosha and he inserted himself right into the middle of it. And "inserted" is the right word. This wasn't his city, it wasn't even his state. He got his mother to drive him across state lines and pick up his illegally obtained weapon because he was looking for trouble. And he found it. Trouble didn't find him. He actively sought out a dangerous situation and shot an unarmed man who he thought endangered him. Then he killed Anthony Huber, who was trying to detail and disarm him, who was also unarmed. Finally he shot and maimed Gaige Grosskreutz, who was armed and trying to stop him. The only reason he was able to shoot the Grosskreutz was that he was unable to pull the trigger and potentially kill Rittenhouse. 

The Kenosha Police Department wasn't on trial, yet their actions were as much to blame for the shootings as is Kyle Rittenhouse. Why, when arresting people for curfew violations, and knowing that the anger was just ready to bubble over into violence, did they allow openly armed vigilantes to roam the streets? And not only allow it, but encourage it?  

Rittenhouse got off. In my opinion it was overly broad self defense statutes that allowed his claim of self defense to stand. They're not much different in Wisconsin than anywhere else, but for the most part a claim that someone "feared for their life" is taken at face value. In the case of the first person that he shot, Rittenhouse claimed he was afraid that he would be killed by his own gun, that he testified that Rosenbaum was trying to take from him. In the case of his murder of Huber, he was apparently deathly afraid of a skateboard. He seemed to be completely unaware that he was being "attacked" because he had just KILLED SOMEONE! 

After the acquittal, instead of breathing a sigh of relief that he wouldn't be going to prison, he has become the darling of the gun lovers in the NRA and the Republican Party, spouting pro-gun rhetoric via his Twitter account and encouraging his supporters to justify his murder and maiming spree by pointing out the arrest history of his victims. 

The NRA crowd and its hangers-on don't see the inherent problem with this no-questions-asked "feared for my life" defense. Cops have been using it for as long as there have been cops, but now you start to see videos of aggressive, armed individuals screaming "I feel threatened" at people armed only with words. I'm not advocating unprovoked violence, but wouldn't a natural extension of this belief be for protestors to just proactively shoot any right wing counter-protester? 

After the Rittenhouse verdict, I'd certainly fear for my life if I saw any of those armed assholes at a protest.

Russia, Russia, Russia

One of the pro-Trump/Republican talking points is to point to the investigation into the 2016 Trump Campaign's connections to Russia as a hoax. They act and talk as if were a proven fact that there was no "collusion" between individuals connected to Russian State Security and the Trump for President organization. They further deride any investigation into Trump's finances, his support for the January 6th attack on the Capitol or any other investigation as "just another 'Russia, Russia, Russia' hoax". In the main they have been pretty successful. Definitely Trump acolytes and other rightists are convinced that Trump was exonerated and that the investigation by Mueller was uncovered no "collusion". But I'd bet that many who have no love for Trump also believe that Mueller's investigation, if not providing a total exoneration, at least uncovered no questionable or unethical actions. But Mueller's report concluded no such thing.

I don't know who among my circle of family, friends and acquaintances has read the Mueller Report. I did. 

To be clear, what the Mueller Report doesn't allege, is that Russia, to use the popular Trumpist term, "rigged" the election, changed any votes, suborned any election officials or otherwise caused fraudulent ballots to be submitted. What it does conclude is that Russian Intelligence was using social media to spread false information about Trump's opponent former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. It also came to the conclusion that Russia hacked into various computer systems, including that of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and provided hacked emails from the DNC to Wikileaks, which subsequently leaked them. Mueller's investigation also revealed that several Trump campaign officials were in illegal contact with the Russian government, and that others met with a Russian operative for the express purpose of digging up dirt on Clinton. Several Trump campaign staffers were indicted and convicted of various Russia-related crimes - pardoned by Trump after his election. Mueller was very clear that many of Trump's actions, before and after his inauguration,  met the legal definition of obstruction of justice. 

There was no indictment of Trump for two reasons:

1. The actions of Trump and his campaign did not rise to the legal definition of conspiracy
2. The Department of Justice adhered to a long-established policy stating that they could not (or would not) seek to indict a sitting president. 

That's it. Despite the way the word "collusion" was thrown about by the media and by the general public, there is no such crime as "collusion". Criminal conspiracy is a crime, but it is very hard to prove. The key component in a conspiracy charge is that there has to be coordination between or among the parties. Despite attempts by the Russians to coordinate, Trump's people were either too incompetent or too lazy to do so, although it was clear that they were quite happy to accept all the help that the Russians were giving.  

Don't be fooled by the gaslighting. The Russians worked hard to discredit Clinton and support Trump. Trump gladly accepted the help. Trump obstructed the investigation. 

Not a hoax.