The Summer of Our Discontent

What has happened to the economic recovery ?

How did the easy and seemingly pleasant and uneventful spring devolve into the plunging stock market and volatile mix of  bad economic news from around the globe ?

At the beginning of summer everything about our lives in Boston appeared to be under control against a broadening, gloomier outlook predicting the stage set for weaker economic times facing the nation and all the nations of the world .

For the past ten days we have been living out the prophecy set by the Congress, whose endless wrangling over whether or not to allow the US to default on its financial obligations has led to a crisis in confidence which in itself has removed any good feeling about the economic future of the nation.

Wherever we live we are spooked by the disarray in world money markets.

The mindless rioting and violence in a half dozen cities in Great Britain has called attention to the changes in society that are causing so many younger people to riot for the sake of rioting.

It can happen here and it might.

The dramatic and extraordinary ups and downs of the stock market alone seem to point to something being fundamentally flawed. Are we heading in the wrong direction ?

The answer is yes.

Jobs must be created. Falling housing prices must be reversed. Hope must replace all the doubt swirling around.

Is the United States done ?

The answer is no.

Next summer we will likely look back upon this tumultuous time and sigh with relief that we finally got our act together – that the politicians got down to the business of doing what is necessary rather than to put it off.

Perhaps we will be at least a half year into taking the bitter medicine required to cure the US of unsustainable money needs dragging us down. The president, the Congress and the American people need to lead and to be led and to make real time sacrifices.

If we unite and do this as a people, we survive, we prosper and once again stand as the example to the world as its continuing paramount economic miracle .