[sailaway21]

Rick's victory celebration consists of an attempted thesis on how a few oil rich countries can stop all trade with the US. The fact that the US does not buy Iranian crude directly should have already shown him the fungible nature of money and of oil itself. The money and oil just flow in a slightly different, more convoluted, direction. If you don't know the meaning of the word fungible and it's applicability to economics I'd be looking for a refund from whatever community college you got your econ. classes from.

We've got too many houses and not enough oil. So What? The market is addressing both issues quite effectively. The only glitch is that your politicians refuse to let the market work. In a normal world, without undue political influence, every Tom, Dick, and Harry oil company with a drilling machine would be drilling for oil right now-the price demands it. But Bill Clinton and, more recently, the Congress have determined that drilling on a percent of a percent of ANWR, and other places, is unallowable. had we been drilling there 10 years ago we'd have a nice addition to the world's crude supplies and be seeing significantly lower prices. Yeah, I know, those pesky matters of capitalism and economics intrude once again. It's easier to blame Exxon/Mobil.

If you slept through econ but remained awake for history you'd know that oil goes through a similar cycle about every 25-30 years or so. In times like these, with record profits to be made, oil companies are usually drilling, over-drilling in fact. Once those wells come on line there is usually an over supply of oil for quite some time resulting in price stability, much like we've seen since the last energy crisis of the late seventies.

Unemployment and other indicators remain solid and if there is a recession, we may have already been through it. That will not do much to disuade the president and the Congress, with the help of Mr. Bernake-who should know better, to try a stimulus plan. Of course none of them have the stomach for a major tax cut which would provide some real sustainable long term stimilus, and increase government revenues, I might add. We'll now go through, once again, the ardous process of trying to send money to people who don't pay taxes in the first place.

Having shown the economic acumen similar to that possessed by the average used car dealer, Rick now thinks that ignoring Ben Stein is the route to go. Ben is probably no more often right than any other economist and is unusually willing to admit it. He's also familiar with how a society can actually talk itself into a recession, something Rick's rhetoric seems designed to do. Since Ben Stein already has a PhD in economics and Rick has an under utilized real estate license, it would probably make far more sense for Rick to stifle himself and perhaps consider some continuing ed. at a more reliable institution.

I must admit though, I really enjoyed the part where he was explaining how China and Iran were going to put the kibosh on the world's largest economy. China really wants to flex it's economic muscle. You betcha. Fortunately there are probably Chinese who've already considered the implications of having no one to sell their goods to. They didn't sleep through econ. 101.