Archive for May 4th, 2012

Sarkozy Is Toast

Friday, May 4th, 2012

Despite all the usual conventional wisdom about “narrowing leads”, the fact is that French President Sarkozy, certainly the worst French leader since Petain, will lose by at least 5 points in the election’s second round.

And this is indeed a great result for Europe, because it means the French may decide not to continue being Angela Merkel’s lap dog.

What’s needed now is a clear statement from Hollande that France will back a stronger ECB as lender of last resort, a higher inflation rate, and an increase in stimulus spending by Northern Europe.

Gorilla says: “A fudge may still be on offer, but it has fewer nuts, so the austerity allergy may at last be propagated!”

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Another Very Bad Jobs Report

Friday, May 4th, 2012

The US economy’s barely adding enough jobs to keep up with population growth.

Everyone will cheer about the headline unemployment rate dropping to 8.1%, but that’s utter nonsense. The rate’s dropping because many people have dropped out of the labor force altogether.

The employment/population ratio remains below 60%, which is a disaster.

And of course nothing will be done, this being an election year, and one political party having abandoned all pretense of compromise for the past 4 years.

Gorilla says: “Barack better get on with Plan D, otherwise D’s will get killed when the economy tanks further!”

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