US Election

The picture says it all really (it is genuine – taken post debate after John McCain left the stage the wrong way and had to double-back quickly).

Obviously the collapse of the economy has been a gift to the Obama camp shifting focus away from the one area where McCain and the Republicans were strong -- foreign policy.

Of course the polls are all over -- can Obama really be pulling ahead in places like West Virginia and North Dakota -- and the actual result is likely to be closer than the 10-14% the latest national polls are showing. But aside a major gaffe or a terrorist attack I really can't see McCain coming back.

Of course in many parts of the world with age comes great wisdom and deference. However in the debates and on the stump McCain just look so old compared to the youthful glow and charisma of Obama.

Throw into the equation a whole host of gaffes and well...

However the one thing that has stood out to me in the past couple of months is just how cool and calm Obama looks. He acts presidential... his presence reassures. If a crisis struck you can imagine him responding calmly, weighing the options before acting. as for old John McC and the Pit-bull, well do we want a hot-headed erratic in a time of global crisis?

Anyway if, to coin an old adage, a week is a long time in politics, then 19 days is an eternity.

Oh and back to the economy for a moment.... it seems all those bankers and traders around the world just aren't wishing hard enough... remember you have to believe in fairies for Tinkerbell to come back to life!!

Tinkerbell Economics?

Interesting Question from a friend of mine today in a Facebook group I manage as part of my teaching.

"I'm confused, sir, Mr Teacher, sir, if the British Government has injected £400bn into the banking system because it's in difficulty because the banks aren't lending to each other and they're not lending to businesses and aren't lending to individual people, but the British Government didn't have £400bn to do this, so has had to borrow the £400bn, my question is this - Who lent the British Government £400bn?"

I had my students try to answer this... the only clue I gave them was Tinkerbell. In the end they got it... confidence

In Peter Pan -- Tinkerbell is dying because people no longer believe in fairies... but she will survive if enough people believe in fairies. In the play (not the book) Peter asks all the children to shout "I believe in fairies," to bring her back from the dead.

And so to Tinkerbell Economics -- if we all start beleiving in the markets again then like Tinkerbell it will all work again.

To which one student said " So the worst thing we can do is stop spending?" Answer -- of course... keep spending and consumer confidence can be restored. Stop spending and the deflationary impact of the crisis on growth will be exacerbated and magnified.

Sound implausibly simple?

This was in Newsweek:

"It's all about confidence, stupid. Every financial system depends on trust. People have to believe that the institutions they deal with (their "counterparties") will perform as expected. We are in a full-blown crisis because investors and financial managers—the people who run banks, investment banks, hedge funds, insurance companies—have lost that trust. Banks recoil from lending to each other; investors retreat. The ultimate horror is a financial panic; everyone wants to sell and no one wants to buy. Paulson's plan—still lacking essential details—aims to avoid that calamity." (Tinkerbell Economics)

http://www.newsweek.com/id/160098

Enough doom and gloom

Every day seems to bring news of the biggest fall on the stock market since the Jurassic era. I wonder how much all this reporting of doom and gloom by the media is actually responsible for investors and savers panicking? The BBC for example precedes any story it has now on the 'credit crunch' by a backdrop of share prices in the red and a graph with the trend going south at an alarming rate.

So enough already -- time we all started to be more positive about life, the universe and everything... and to demonstrate the fallability of the media here are some clangers and wonderful mis-prints/typos:

“A rocket will never be able to leave the Earth’s atmosphere.” — New York Times, 1936

“Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality in 10 years.” -– Alex Lewyt, president of vacuum cleaner company Lewyt Corp., in the New York Times in 1955

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." -- Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." -- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962.

"With over 50 foreign cars already on sale here, the Japanese auto industry isn't likely to carve out a big slice of the U.S. market." -- Business Week, August 2, 1968

Misprints

People in Preston ward are invited to a meeting at 7.15pm tonight in St Mary's Church Hall, Brighton, to meet councillors and beat police officers. (Evening Argus)

The skeleton was believed to be that of a Saxon worrier. (Express and Echo)

The strike leaders had called a meeting that was to have been held in a bra near the factory, but it was too small to hold them all. (South London Press)

One man was admitted to hospital suffering from buns. (Bristol Gazette)

Police in Hawick yesterday called off a search for a 20-year-old man who is believed to have frowned after falling into the swollen River Teviot. (The Scotsman)

The first aid treatment for a broken rib is to apply a tight bandage after you have made your patient expire. (Manchester Evening News)