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Henry Paulson's parsing of whether the Government's response to the state of the US economy is either an "emergency" or an "urgent need" makes little difference, and begs the question: why has the White House and the Congress been so remote from the situation of ordinary Americans, and especially the middle and working classes?
Take for example the following definition of an emergency from the Free Online Dictionary:
Main Entry: emer·gen·cy
Function: noun
Pronunciation: i-'m&r-j&nt-se
Inflected Form(s): plural -cies
Usage: often attributive
1 : an unforeseen combination of circumstances or the resulting state that calls for immediate action
2 : an urgent need for assistance or relief emergency after the flood>
Function: noun
Pronunciation: i-'m&r-j&nt-se
Inflected Form(s): plural -cies
Usage: often attributive
1 : an unforeseen combination of circumstances or the resulting state that calls for immediate action
2 : an urgent need for assistance or relief emergency after the flood>
Emergencies call for preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation. So far the Government and corporate sectors seemed woefully unprepared in terms of preparedness. Reasonable regulation of the mortgage and credit markets may have averted the current crisis.
That said, the government and corporate response may best be described as sluggish. One wonders just what the administration and federal legislature hope to recover, if anything. Clearly, the so-called stimulus response being proposed by both is far too late and shallow to recover lost homes and shattered dreams.
The only question we are then left with is to what extent any stimulus will mitigate the damage already afflicted.
