Build Date: Thu Apr 3 02:30:14 2025 UTC
If you find yourself smoking through a hole in your neck, it's time to quit.
-- Bill Hicks
Bush Announces Economic Stimulus Plan, Stock Markets Plunge
2008-01-21 21:55:26
On Friday President Bush announced an economic stimulus plan. The plan was short on details, vague on implementation, fuzzy about who would be helped, but sharply targeted when it came to how many taxpayer dollars should be spent -- about one percent of the nation's GDP -- somewhere between $140 and $150 billion dollars.
The world's stock markets reacted on Monday by plunging in the largest single-day drop since 9/11. The New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ did not plunge because they were closed for Martin Luther King's birthday, but currently the Dow Jones (DJIA) futures market shows an expected 546 point drop by the time trading ends on Tuesday. It's going to be a volatile week on Wall Street this week and a rough ride for the world economy.
This leads me to wonder... since the stock markets dive when Bush announces a plan to help the economy, and the world now expects anything our President plans or does to turn into a gigantic clusterfuck, is there any way that he could use the perception of his own ineptitude to his (and the world's) advantage? What else could happen during the last year of the Bizarro Bush presidency, where whatever the president says causes the opposite to happen?
Bush announces that a settlement between the Israelis and the Palestineans is impossible, and lists the reasons why the fighting in the middle east must continue. Once all sides hear Bush state that he thinks that their war will be on-going and endless, they'll start trying to figure out where his logic is flawed, then they'll find a path to a peaceful settlement and all fighting will end in mere weeks.
Bush praises totalitarian regimes, calls Fidel Castro "one cool cat". Bush stops the double-talk about how America supports democracy, and lets it be known that we only support democracy in strategically insignificant countries. Once the dictators of the world hear that Bush is on their side, they'll panic, knowing that they're doomed, step aside, and free and fair elections can begin.
Bush declares that climate change is a fraud and CO2 emissions are good for the oil industry. That should convince any skeptics that still think that there's no such thing as climate change to change their minds. With the last of the doubters convinced that climate change is real, we can start making progress and fixing the problems that cause climate change.
Bush holds a press conference to tell everyone that General Motors is an excellent company in great financial shape. This won't actually help the world, but I hope to make a small fortune by shorting the stock.
Unfortunately, rather than do any of these things, I suspect that in the coming year Bush will announce additional plans to fix the economy, declare that he supports the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, that he wants to find peaceful solutions to the world's problems, and that he will work to support human rights and free and fair elections throughout the world.
We are so fucked.
T O P S T O R I E S
California Glory Hole attracts huge crowds
A glory hole at Napa's Lake Berryessa is drawing huge crowds. According to Chris Lee, the general manager for the Solano County Water Agency, the glory hole hasn't been active since 2019, and only restarted operations on Feb 4. (More...)
Republican State Senator busted after soliciting a teenage girl
Republican State Senator Justin Eichorn of Minnesota was arrested for soliciting a teen girl on Monday just hours after he introduced a bill proposing "Trump derangement syndrome" (TDS) as a form of mental illness. (More...)
Parents claim measles is not that bad after having only one child die
The parents of a Texas girl who died from the measles are defending their decision not to vaccinate their daughter. "She says they would still say 'Don't do the shots,'" an unidentified translator for the parents said. "They think it’s not as bad as the media is making it out to be." (More...)
Delusional rich man tries to fire town staff
"I'm mayor now" said write-in mayoral candidate and founder of Pirate’s Booty Snacks Robert Ehrlich after losing the election for Mayor of Sea Cliff, NY. Then he tried to take over the Village Hall and fire everyone. (More...)
Musk claims Xitter security is staffed by idiots
Earlier this month Xitter experienced a massive outage. In an interview, Musk told Fox Business that he believes the attack came from "IP addresses originating in the Ukraine area." (More...)
The Future Ain't What It Used To Be
Ideas have taken horrifying shape and rooted into our modern reality. (More...)
C L A S S I C P I G D O G
A Day in the Life of a Beverotologist
It was starting to look like a very boring Saturday, trapped as I was in the suburban wastelands of the outer Bay Area, so I called my Able Assistant (AA) and proposed that we perform some Spocktail field tests. For some time I've been working on creating the quintessential cinematic beverage and even tho' SMRL does most of its testing during nocturnal hours, this seemed an opportune time to roll up the sleeves of our labcoats and get some science done. While the beverotology creation tested this day (The Neurotoxin) must be deemed a success, this article focuses more the journey of the experimenters, rather then the science of beverotology. (More...)
During a magnificent sunny day in a fast receding autumn, the Spock Science Monitor reporters once again blew the playa dust off of their computers and covered the 2002 Burning Man Decompression – held every year just east of Portola Hill in beautiful San Francisco. Both an afternoon and evening issues were released to the unsuspecting crowd of freaks attempting to in some small way experience the euphoria of the playa – if but for a brief afternoon far from the desolation of Northern Nevada. (More...)
It was early in May last year when I first heard about Spock Mountain Research Labs. I was working on a story about a Hungarian scientist's new approach to nucleopeptide synthesis when I got a call from my friend Albert. (More...)
The quest for knowledge never ends at the super top secret Spock Mountain Laboratory, although it is frequently interrupted by beverage breaks. Recently, a team of crack ethnomixologists returned from a dangerous expedition to the frozen expanse of Canada with the much sought recipe for a Spocktail that is destined to replace blunt force head trauma as the major cause of brain damage in the civilized world. (More...)
Skunk School -- Learn Why Not To Keep Skunks As Pets
There is an alarming trend in pet purchasing habits this fall. People inspired by the WWII film, "Life is Beautiful" -- the one with that annoying Italian guy -- are buying descented skunks by the millions. (More...)