Barack Obama makes being President look almost easy. At least, he has masterful control in his press conferences. It’s been more than a decade since I was willing to watch a Presidential press conference – since before January, 1997. Now, I can sit through one all the way without ever feeling embarrassed. His ease is based on two simple monosyllabic pointers: “Look”, and “So”.
Obama uses “Look” to start a sentence when he feels a need to counter a point with emphasis, but without raising hackles. As he showed in one answer this evening, he is quite willing and able to give a short, pithy response when he needs to provide an abrupt put down. Asked why he took several days to express his anger over the AIG bonuses he said, simply, “I like to know what I’m talking about before I speak.”
But more often, he would start to give a professorial answer to a question, on, say, the value of the new Treasury Department plan to create a market for depressed mortgage-backed securities (I’d be depressed, too, if I was told I was worthless!) Then, as he realised he was about to argue his point and create division, he would preface the next sentence with, “Look, … ”, pause a beat for emphasis, make a slight hand gesture, frown a little, and then explain why he felt he was right, without ever needing to actively acknowledge an opposing view.
“So” is used as a preface to a conclusion. When he says that you know he’s getting back to his primary talking point. Which tonight was: “Our budget will create the foundation for long-term growth through reduction in health care costs, creating new industries and reduce foreign energy dependence through clean energy programs, enhance the educational opportunities for our youth, and improve our economy through serious efforts to reduce the deficit.” He must have said a variation on those four talking point at least ten times in 50 minutes. The man can stay on message, that’s for sure.
All this talk of “the deficit” takes me back to the mid eighties, when taxes on the wealthy had been reduced, but new revenue had not yet come pouring in. The public became very confused about the difference between the “deficit” and the “debt”. Why could one go up at the same time the other was going down? Obama’s political opponents are starting to play the same game. The answer, of course, is simple: the deficit is the annual excess of federal government expenditures over the revenues received. The debt is the total accumulation of those deficits over time, minus any surpluses which have occurred.
The macroeconomics of an entire nation, or even the world, are blurry at best to me. Technically, there must be a reasonable balance among inflation, population growth, productivity, growth in the money supply, tax rates, and governmental revenue and expenditures. That’s seven variables, all of which will affect the debt. The whole reason for worrying about the debt is whether it will overpower the ability of the nation to pay it off on an ongoing basis over time. Companies use a measure, the “debt/equity” ratio, to assess whether they are on financially sound footing. A debt of greater than 50% of the organization’s assets is often an alarm bell for a floundering firm.
Treating the country as a company, one that wants to stay in business for generations, requires a similar assessment. But what are our assets? Obama knows the only thing of value, in the end, is our people, and what they can produce, what each can do that others will find of value, worth purchasing. Hence his emphasis on education, affordable health care, and lower cost energy (the fundamental commodity inputs to a modern economy.)
I’ll leave it to professional economists to play with the complicated equations that predict whether we have a sustainable or unsustainable economy over time. For me the issues are simpler: will my retirement be comfortable, and will my children have rewarding lives? From September through mid-March, I was deeply worried about both. Over the past 10 days, there are signs that, just as in every other episode like this during my lifetime, there is a brighter future ahead.
Two things have helped me tilt towards optimism. First, I reflected back on the period 1979 to 1983, when we had a double dip recession, with inflation and unemployment both peaking over 10%, a great wrenching debate over how to run our government and its effect on the economy (anyone remember David Stockman?). The biggest issue then seemed to be energy prices increasing eight fold over a decade due to OPEC’s initial efforts at price gouging for oil.
Anyway, during those years Cheryl and I managed to: get married, buy one house and build another, start a family with two kids, each find a stable job, and generally start up the ladder of economic and social stability and success. I remember the time as one of frugality, not wanting to buy anything unless it had some utility. The first frivolous purchase I made was a cassette tape deck (component) player for my stereo system. I didn’t “need” it, as I already had a portable tape player I could jury rig into my system, but I wanted something … easier. So I bought it, for a couple hundred dollars, and told myself that it was just as one-time purchase. This was in the summer of 1983. Then, in August, the stock market started to rise, and I forgot all about frugality, until October of 2008.
So, one thing I have realised is that in a time which was measurably just as bad or worse as now, we (my family) still managed to move forward and make it into a better future, doing all the usual things people do with their lives.
The second spark of optimism comes from several glimmers of increased activity on many fronts. The stock market seems to have bottomed out. Housing starts are moving up again, both locally and nationally. More women are showing up at our offices pregnant than in the past few years. And my kids all seem happy – I guess you’re not SUPPOSED to be rich in your teens and 20s!
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Back to the grind: recent workouts include: 76 miles/ 4:45 hours bike ride on Saturday (followed by a 30 minute run), and 13 miles for a long run on Sunday (preceded by 50 minutes of swimming), in 1 hour and 55 minutes, at the end of the longest training week so far. Swim and run times, and bike power levels are the same or better than this time last year. This coming week, intended to be a recovery week, will actually be the first week of my first Ironman Build block – I switch this week’s recovery to next week, to use that down time as a mini-taper for the California Half Ironman down in Oceanside Saturday April 4th. Secretly (I guess no longer so secretly) I hope to win, or at least be top three in that event, and maybe get close to a personal best for me, or even a course record. PB would be below 5 hours, 9 minutes; record would be 5:07. If I can do the race, minus transition times, in 5 hours, I would be ecstatic. I think I am on track for a 34:xx minute swim, a 2 hour and 41 minute bike, and a 1:47:xx run. If I can hit those times, I will be on target in my training, and optimistic for this year’s big races.
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Today’s digitized vinyl: An obscure Righteous Brothers album from 1974, called “Give It To The People”, from which I only recorded two songs; and the 1984 superstar charity effort organized by Michael Jackson and Lionel Ritchie, “We Are The World”. I wonder how many African kids fed from that effort were given a chance to grow up and have a life?