Call me jaded but…
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=or0eZYbvHiU[/youtube]This seems like a hell of a time to alleviate concerns about money….
Obama made the announcement Wednesday in Chicago at a morning news conference in which he tried to reassure Americans that “help is on the way” for the economy.
“I was elected with the charge of getting this economy back in shape,” Obama said Wednesday. “We are going to implement starting Day One when I come into office.“
No offense big guy, but Black Friday is in 2 days and I smell Walmart lobbyists in that statement. There is no way in hell we can afford to have a bad Christmas and they know it. So, everyone relax, go spend your money, everything is going to be just fine. Look how well it is going already. SPEND, SPEND, SPEND…Help is on the way.
You’re jaded.
Damn, libgeek. You beat me to the punch. DV you are definitely jaded and reading into the statement the wrong way. He is basically saying that the do-nothing crap of a president that we currently have is useless and then when he gets into office he will actually work towards improving the economy with useful and well-reasoned ideas. I don’t think he truly believes that consumer spending can be the basis of the economy any more but it does have a part to play. He believes in having a job and being able to earn a living wage while also having decent and affordable healthcare.
Blinders are on my man, blinders.
The guy is saying everything is ok, don’t worry. Oh, hey look, black friday is in 2 days, what a shocker..I didn’t realize that. So again everything is going to be ok, “trust me”….
not buying it, nope, no way. NOT buying my HDTV either. no way
What is his plan?
After years of having a President “warn” about a terrorist attack whenever his approval ratings dipped below a certain point, its nice to have someone reassuring us. Lets say things get really bad, is that $800 you were going to spend Black Friday going to do anything when US currency is worth less than the paper its printed on? Let’s not be silly, if things go so bad that shopping on Black Friday screws us, we’re screwed either way.
spoken like a Best Buy manager
Oh heck every Black Friday they say is “disappointing”…why should this year be any different.
Right, because you’d prefer people panic?
BTW, you do realize that there are thousands of students in this country who make most of their money for the next 6 months over holiday break?
I’m not sure what that means. I’m supposed to spend my money when we are in a recession/depression not seen in this country since the great depression all because a not yet president says it will be ok and college kids need beer money?
How do you get a call to spend money out of that? It certainly is not like the BushCo call for people to shop after 9/11.
The Obama people are doing alot of high visibility reassurance to try to signal to the markets that some policy competence is coming. They certainly aren’t getting that out of Paulson and Bush. Retailers already know that this holiday season is toast.
And, while I’m at it, one of the reasons people aren’t telling you it is safe to shop is because this is expected to last some time AND all of that shopping is part of how we got here.
How do you get a call to spend money out of that?
Because I’m not blind just because he is Obama he is still a politician lest we forget. Timing is everything Cass. These next 30 days are HUGE to our country and people tightening up NOW is the worst possible time for it to happen.
Do you have any idea how many billions of Dollars of inventory people like Walmart are sitting on? (i know you do by the way)
They don’t know this season is (completely) toast until people shop. Every year they talk about declining sales and until we start seeing numbers we never fully know.
A President telling everyone that things are going to be fine 2 days before black friday does a HELL of a lot to peoples psychy’s…
Our government has spent 8 trillion dollars to keep THE ENTIRE WORLDS ECONOMY FROM COLLAPSING! And here is a guy that isn’t president for 60 days telling me, “It’s cool, relax, we got this”
nope, don’t think so.
Well, you can believe what you want but that message wasn’t pitched at you, the shopper. As hard as that might be to believe. The other thing to know is that all retailers everywhere know this season is dead. Those that could, started clawing back orders this summer. See these charts? The retail market is already in collapse, just like all of the other markets. No one is expecting you to spend money (but they hope you will) , and this data isn’t expected to get much better. (I was just in Borders and could not believe how much stuff was on sale already) Heck, there are plenty of stores that are closing between now and January, to boot.
This is part of the reason why folks are talking about this recession being very long and very deep. There isn’t a horizon to see yet and no one serious about this economy is looking for a last minute recovery of the retail sector before Christmas.
Ummm. It isn’t just that it’s 2 days before black Friday. It is also the 3 months between election and assumption of power and the beginnings of a huge recession.
I suppose in Viti-world, the President-elect is supposed to say things like, “things suck and they are going to get suckier.”
Also, remember that if everyone did stop buying, we would all be toast.
I am not spending anything this Black Friday, actually, I have a 20 hour shift planned.
My wife, by the way, is planning to hit up the Black Friday shopping because she thinks that there will be deal beyond imagination because of the bad economy.
I know she is not the only sheep in the flock.
OK, so there’s actually more context here to the Obama comment this AM. He’s being asked a question by the NYDN reporter — “…Mr. President-elect, as we all know we’re — as we all know, we’re two — two days away from the biggest shopping day of the year, and a lot of retailers are worrying that this year it could be a disaster that this economy can ill afford. Do you — do you have any shopping advice for nervous consumers? And are you planning to hit the malls yourself on Friday? ”
And this is the response:
“Well, we are going to do some — some Christmas shopping. And Malia and Sasha have already put their list together. It’s mostly for Santa. They send their letter every year. But — but we may do some extra shopping as well. ”
“Look, I think families understandably are nervous and concerned about their economic situation. We’ve seen job loss. We’ve seen flatlining wages and incomes. The economic statistics have been bad, and people are watching television and understandably are nervous about their future.
“There is no doubt that during tough economic times family budgets are going to be pinched. I think it is important for the American people, though, to have confidence that we’ve gone through recessions before, we’ve gone through difficult times before, that my administration intends to get this economy back on track, that we are going to create 2.5 million jobs over the next two years, that our future is bright if we make good decisions.
“And what we don’t want to do is get caught up in a spiral where people pull back from the economy, businesses then pull back, jobs are reduced and we get into a downward spiral.
“What we want to do is to be sober, to be clear, to recognize that we’ve got some real adjustments that have to be made. That’s true in individual businesses, it’s true in terms of individual family budgets, it’s also true for the economy as a whole.
“But we continue to have the best workers in the world, we continue to have the most innovation in the world, we continue to be in possession of extraordinary resources that if we harness properly will get this economy moving over the next couple of years, but also over the next two decades or three decades.
“So people should understand that help is on the way.”
So the message is to keep in mind the current conditions and shop responsibly, it looks to me.
To whoever DV is today –
WalMart is actually one of the few retailers that is going to come out of this holiday season doing more than just OK. It doesn’t need any help. When you can do one-stop shopping at your local SuperCenter for iPods, DVDs, toys, toilet paper, trash bags, fresh produce and TV dinners, why shop anywhere else?
It’s the specialty retailers – jewelers, higher-end clothing stores, shoe stores, electronics retailers – that are going to suffer the most.
I’m sure as hell not going to be spending anywhere NEAR $800 this Christmas. Mostly homemade gifts and photos.
how clever, Markel spelled backwards.
if it’s good enough for kavips, it’s good enough for a wannabeviti!
DQ – Do you understand how a negative information can effect peoples’ behavior – and that peoples’ behavior determines the economic future?
What SHOULD the president elect say, ‘We’re f#*cked? So put your worthless cash in your mattress” ?
Further, FDR’s fireside chats were calculated to rebuild peoples’ confidence, by talking about what the government was doing. That doesn’t mean FDR didn’t describe the problems honestly. It means his real message was the future solutions.