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The Katrina panacea. Just as 9-11 was used as the universal solvent for all the Bush administration problems, so too will Katrina serve a newfound purpose as the cure-all for the Bushies' every other failure, particularly in the fiscal and economic arenas.

Writing from the other side of the ideological levee, so concluded Alan Abelson in Barron's (sub. req'd.):

But the real good this especially ill wind may blow Mr. Greenspan and Mr. Bush, along with the frantically bullish contingent on the Street, is that it provides them with perfect cover for just about anything that goes wrong. Should housing, which is already starting to show signs of serious fatigue, roll over, why Mr. Greenspan can cite Katrina's unsettling influence on energy costs and the resultant undermining of sentiment in general and that of would-be home buyers in particular.

If those already towering twin deficits continue to grow to the sky, putting the nation at even more financial risk, why, Mr. Bush is sure to label Katrina the culprit.

And if the economy, which despite reasonably good job numbers in August is beginning to slow, a trend that can only worsen with skyscraping energy costs and the attendant slide in consumer sentiment, Katrina will get the all's-well chorus off the hook.

In the same vein, bulls on the stock market, with its heavy speculative lacing and exceedingly rich valuations, will shrug philosophically as they explain that even the most perceptive souls like themselves couldn't possibly have been expected to foresee a freak of nature like Katrina and it's baleful effect on investor psyches.

In sum, never before will a hurricane have done so much to bail out so many people.

How like the Bushes to bail themselves out, again and again, at the expense of the poor.

{ 1:44 PM }

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