Our Economic Kabuki Show Continues

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Well, it looks like Macroeconomic Advisors was right:

The American economy slowed to a crawl in the first quarter, but economists are hopeful that the setback will be temporary. Total output grew at an annual pace of 1.8 percent from January through March, the Commerce Department said Thursday, after having expanded at an annual rate of 3.1 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010.

It’s a little hard to know what to say about this aside from the usual: our big problem right now is sluggish growth and high unemployment, but no one seems to care about that anymore. It’s all inflation and deficits and the weak dollar. Paul Krugman will undoubtedly write a few blistering columns about this, everyone will shrug because it’s just Krugman being Krugman, and then we’ll go back to our usual right-wing kabuki show over inflation and deficits and the weak dollar.

And growth will remain lousy and unemployment will stay high and we’ll all pretend there was nothing we could have done about it.

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BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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