What's the Magician's Other Hand Doing While we're All Watching the War?

[azion]

Originally posted by Whit
     On the subject of things that happened, remember OPEC? It was towards the election time that they began restricting sales to drive up prices. My memory is a little fuzzy on the details but I remember maybe four or five economists on NPR saying that every time oil prices have shot up it's hurt the economy greatly. I remember gas prices hitting $1.70 or so per gallon of regular around here not long after that. I think I even heard Alan Greenspan giving warnings of this nature. Yet, that's the one thing I never heard Bush making a lot of noise about. I've heard 9/11 blamed a lot, and a few other things, but not the oil situation. Am I the only one that thinks it's odd that these guy's say the economy is going to tank, give a reason for it, it does tank and nobody on the Hill seems to notice they said anything? Did I miss it?
     Also I understand the opposite is true, cheap oil gives immediate boosts to our economy. I've said elsewhere that the cheap oil we get from Iraq after the war will do wonders for the economy. And I think Bush will credit his tax breaks. Am I running with conspiracy theory of the week or does this make sense?

It makers perfect sense. Indeed, I've had a similar theory for quite a while. To wit:

The political memory of the American public goes back roughly 2 years- that is, if something happened more than 2 years ago, voters don't usually consider it at the polling place.

King George I made the mistake of not getting the bad economic news over with early in his term, and having the war end more than 2 years before the '92 election. Hence, when the election came, peoples' political memories said nothing about the war victory (during and after the war, Bush I's approval rating was through the roof), but lots about the current recession.

King George II is trying to follow precisely the opposite strategy that his father followed. He's hoping that this economic bust ends before the election, and that the war is fresh in voters' minds.

Of course, if he doesn't like the election results, he'll just ask the Supreme Court to help again,
Z