Recession? Who Said Anything About a Recession?

You know, it’s bad enough that in their desperation to get the Republicans out of the White House, the American media is trumpeting the worst economic meltdown since the Great Depression… while the actual numbers indicate higher employment than the Clinton Years and a surprisingly robust economy considering that is happening in the real estate sector as a result of the ARM crisis and the global devaluation of the American Dollar.

But now Canadian media, because we have a Conservative minority and the Liberals desperately want an election, rather than framing themselves as hypocrites, disagreeing with every government motion then abstaining to vote, the media are digging up every conceivable scrap of dirt to slander the Conservatives.

Look at the Bernier fiasco.  We have Gilles Duceppe looking like a pawn, and what are the real charges?  That a cabinet minister had the bad taste to date someone who had formerly gone out with a rough character.  Note he isn’t married to her, he dated her.   And she didn’t marry the rough character, she just went out with him for a while.  It seems to me that if I found out that my girlfriend used to go out with a Hell’s Angel, I would probably question her taste.  It might even lead to my ending the relationship.  Does this mean that I have necessarily done business, or have any sort of allegiance to said ex of my ex?  This is why the media refused to air the story for so long – it is a non-story.

But I digress.  What really set me off this morning is a bit of ludicrousness from Saskatoon.  Yes, that Saskatoon, that is growing faster than any other city in the country right now.  That Saskatoon that since unseating the NDP has seen the province’s first net growth from other provinces in decades.  That Saskatoon that is reaping record profits from mining, ethanol farming, and now a massive oil discovery in the southern part of the province.

But let’s look at the story itself.  A POLL of… who?  Oh right, citizens of Canada.  On what they KNOW or what they THINK?  What they think, right.  They THINK that we’re heading for a recession.  Why?  Probably because the media is telling them over and over again we MIGHT be heading for a recession, since the USA MAY be going into a recession, despite the fact that they haven’t come within a country mile of of the classic definition of a recession from professional economists.  What proof do they have?  Well, Ontario has faced a lot of closures and slowsdowns in the auto sector… but strangely, their unemployment rate is not growing significantly.  Alberta isn’t as white-hot as they were a year ago, so now they are only red-hot.  Out here in BC, there have been massive problems for the lumber industry, yet the heart of lumbering in Prince George has seen housing prices double in the last 2 or 3 years.  The Okanagan continues to boom because that’s where Albertans are buying vacation property.  And the Lower Mainland?  Well, people haven’t stopped moving in and jobs are still plentiful if a little underpaid given the cost of living.

So which provinces are exactly suffering and dragging us into recession?  Beats me.

But the authority the paper cites is the people.  The people who don’t have economics degrees, the people who don’t have their finger on the pulse of other provinces, or even their own cities generally.  No, all they know is the media keeps digging out “people” who speculate we MAY be going into a recession.

But like the gossip wheel, when one person whispers into your ear, when you pass it on, it gets worse each time.

The media whispers, “we may be going into a recession.”

Then the polling company calls and asks, “Do you fear a recession?”

The citizens say “Yes” because they have heard we may be going into a recession.

The media reports, “Economy recession-bound, latest poll indicates”

So now we are going into a recession.

I can’t wait for these clowns to go out of business, if this is what passes for journalism nowadays.