Silent Recession

Once again Tim Ionono has some of the better economics-for-Joe-Average commentary going on anywhere, complete with lots of colorful charts. Today he talks about the today’s GDP numbers. For those of you who are perhaps a little fuzzy on GDP — Gross Domestic Product — you can learn a bit about it here, and why it’s important here. The Short version is that “it’s a summary of how the economy is doing, based on who is spending what and whether the money stays here or is spent on imported goods.”

Even though we managed to pull out a positive number for this report — 0.6% — Forbes quotes various economists as saying there were unpleasant surprises, and “There is no real positive news to cull from this report.” Even before the report came out, the Chief Economist of the National Association of Home Builders was quoted as saying we have an even chance of sliding into an economic “red zone”, with “further deterioration of labor market conditions”, “substantial reductions in home sales”, and “turmoil” in the stock markets and the credit markets. Credit markets would be shorthand for bonds, loans, and mortgages. Even the FDIC is starting to plan ahead for bank closure strike teams. Excuse me while I bite back a comment about them not getting the memo from the Bush Administration that everything is fine, as long as we mail everybody a check.

Add to this the gold markets appearing to anticipate stagflation, American households cutting spending because of rising gas costs — consumer spending is more than 2/3 of GDP — and the Dollar being near a record low against the Euro, and you can see where there might be a problem. Or in econospeak: “There are concerns going forward.”

But back to Tim Iocono. His graphs are telling, particularly the second one where it is clear that spending is off on all levels and private domestic investment tanked. Of course anyone who has been seeking a business loan could have told you that. Despite the fact that the official definition of a recession is ” A period of general economic decline; specifically, a decline in GDP for two or more consecutive quarters,” Tim ends with this sentence:

It is widely believed that the economy has already entered a recession.

Could it be that I am not the only one who thinks that GDP has been manipulated? Anybody who buys things knows that prices have gone up in ways that are not accounted for in the official inflation numbers: perhaps GDP is kept artificially high transparently through the manipulation of inflation data?

It makes you wonder.

Cross-posted at The Moderate Voice.

Again?

Today, for the second time this week, hard-hitting financial news site TheStreet.com has substituted opinionated pabulum for the informative journalism they normally serve. Let’s see if anyone notices!

I have been a reader of TheStreet.com for a decade. I’ve exchanged email with Jim Cramer and Herb Greenberg. Herb Greenberg once quoted me online. Over the years, I have pointed my readers to a number of really good articles on TheStreet.com They do good journalism with a minimum of spin… normally.

This week has been a bit of a departure.

I called foul — fowl? — on their piece the other day about how we can pretend to solve under-funding at the USDA inspection program by choosing to buy 25% of our food purchases from local sources. Today we have more garbage to take out at TheStreet.com.

I refer to an item entitled 10 Biggest Bonehead Moves at Airport Security. Among the proposed offensive faux pas are “Forgetting That Your Baby Is a Suspect as Well”, “Leaving Your X-Rays at the Doctor’s Office”, and “Dressing Like a Rapper (If You’re Not a Rapper)”. How clever, dear! Did you think of those all by yourself? Because goodness knows it would be racist to even imagine Gangstalicious and Thugnificent pose any security risk whatsoever. Excuse me, I think I’m having an overdose of snark. I think a more apt title, considering the content and tone, would be “10 Security Theatre Motions You Need to Shut Up and Do so I Can Get My Much More Important Self to the Gate.” Do you suppose that’s the rejected title?

Now make no mistake: like most people, when I am in the airport security line it is because I have to get somewhere; if I didn’t have to get somewhere, I might protest the asinine security procedures that protect nobody; then again if I didn’t have to get somewhere I would not be there at all. I suppose I would feel better about this article if she had referenced and endorsed a program like this recently announced pilot program that lets travelers choose a security line based on how comfortable they are with the screening process. This is even doubly so since TheStreet.com has more assorted professionals as readers, and they are apt to be generally more savvy fliers than many people. They generally don’t need to be told to take off their belt buckles and shoes.

I think it’s time for a certain financial news site to re-examine its editorial policies.

In closing: Top 15 misconceptions about evolution; some actual financial news on the erosion of wages; speaking of economics, Erza points us to the top 100 economics blogs; States act to prevent insurance companies from further screwing us; Zoinks, we’re still dribbling details about Cheney’s secret energy task force; in the real world contraceptives still prevent abortion; shunting medical costs onto consumers is actually counterproductive; look for the Union Label if you like decent wages; don’t you need a coffee making robot?; two strange computer accessories from Japan that I can’t decide if they are useful or silly; it apparently takes the Spanish to make solar energy in Arizona; speaking of Arizona, how about that Rick Renzi?; and last but not least, when credit cards attack.

The Folgers Crystals of News

If you were to randomly come across a commentary entitled “Stop Supporting a Tainted Food Supply,” where would you suppose you were? Alternet? PETA? Some random editorial that happened to get picked up by Buzzflash?

How about financial news site TheStreet.com?

After giving us the quickie-version of the latest massive meat recall — which the USDA says shouldn’t concern us because most of the meat has already been eaten and what we don’t know can’t hurt us — the author tells us:

I’m taking a stand and putting my money where my mouth is — literally. My five-person family consumes about $1,300 of food per month — $15,600 per year — including the meals we eat at home and at restaurants. I can easily divert at least a quarter of that money to farmers and meat producers in my own community.

Now, just as a point of curiosity, how is that going to help? Even if we go out on a limb and assume that her community has farmers and meat producers that sell locally, what guaranty does the author have that locally produced food is free of the problems of corporate farming? Just because it’s local doesn’t mean that the animals have been humanely treated, or that the vegetables are free from contaminants, or that any of it has been handled in a sanitary fashion. Even the most vile of factory farms and slaughterhouses are “local” to somebody.

Ah, now here’s someone who has a grip on the problem: the Faithful Penguin points out the false premise that “the markets are a regular libertarian paradise of goodwill and bonhomie where no capitalist would dare engage in shoddy or dangerous practices because the market would ‘self-regulate;’ therefore, no rational businessman would take those risks as they’d be run out of business.” In fact, he reminds us that the current regulations — the ones that have been systematically undermined since the Reagan Administration — were passed into law in 1906, after “Upton Sinclair published The Jungle. Written to awaken the consciousness of America to the plight of immigrant workers, the horrific and dangerous conditions in Chicago’s slaughterhouses were exposed, causing the public to worry about its own health.”

In the end, that is what regulation is supposed to do: protect us from the excesses of unbridled corporatism. Some people say regulation costs jobs. I say deregulation has cost a lot of jobs in such diverse areas as air travel (bankrupt airlines), telecommunications (bankrupt providers like WorldCom), energy (bankrupt and corrupt companies like Enron), and food production (family farms). Sure, some regulation goes overboard, and some other regulation is actually a gift to the industry being “regulated,” but a whole lot of it is reaction to somebody somewhere saying “there oughta be a law.”

In closing: stock market danger; sign this stack of papers, including the one that lets your tax preparer sell your returns; make your own ginger beer; Iron Chef or Not Iron Chef; I’m late to the coverage, so I’ll let Jill say “duh” on late diagnosis of cancer; Duhpartment of Research tells us men can live longer by “abstaining from smoking, weight management, blood pressure control, regular exercise and avoiding diabetes” (anybody know how to avoid diabetes? “weight management”, “regular exercise”, and have the right relatives!); the “education gap” and social mobility; awesomely elegant wrapping; why doesn’t the border fence go across the golf course?; Word to Mrs. Clinton, it’s not that you’re a woman, it’s that you’re you!; thanks to Pharyngula for pointing out 41 hilarious science experiments; and strange economic portents, economic indicators will no longer be published due to budget constraints, and the attack of the expanding dollar menu.

Cross-posted at The Moderate Voice.

Diary of the Shorties

Senate Traitors need to watch their backs: Here’s a handy pocket reference from Defective Yeti.

On Manufacturing: a lengthy piece from the EPI, and another one from the CSM.

About Freaking Time: The House of Representatives has voted on contempt charges for two Bush Administration officials who have demonstrated contempt for the Constitution and the House of Representatives.

Ever wondered what it would take to shock Henry Kissinger? Apparently it takes an offer of thousands, no wait make that millions of Chinese women. Now we know.

Apparently the “Two Americas” theme is extensible: Here we see that there are “two Americas” in the housing market too. Does Mr. Edwards get a cut for his intellectual property?

This should scare the snot out of you: The BondDad lays out for you why a credit crunch isn’t just bad, but downright disastrous for our economy. Oh, and the Feds overruled State laws that would have cut down on the predatory lending problem.  And what if the new stimulus bill actually caused hyperinflation?

Slow and Steady: CNN brings us yet another diet success story.

“Huh, judging from the outcry maybe this wasn’t such a good idea”: Blue Cross decides maybe getting doctors to snitch on their patients and then dumping patients who actually needed medical care was unwise.

Keep shouting about Socialized Medicine and somehow it loses its punch: Couldn’t have anything to do with that Blue Cross debacle. People who survive cancer only to outlive their health insurance coverage. Or the increasing number of baby boomers who are looking at the Medicare they will be getting in a couple years and thinking it’s better than what they have now. But socialized medicine isn’t as scary sounding as it used to be. Here’s some more reading.

The Straight Poop on the Snoops: The ArchCrone tells you everything you need to know about the current FISA situation. Don’t blink, it could change any time now.

Well at this rate we will at least go broke a little slower: It seems that in 2007, the trade deficit shrank for the first time since 2001.  We still import more things than we export, and export more money than we import.

Just how big a problem does Countrywide have: Over 7 out of every 100 mortgages they have is overdue.

Keep repeating, “The Saudis Are Our Friends”: particularly when they use the threat of terror attacks for extortion to prevent investigation of certain arms deals.

I worry that this will result in normal people being forcibly institutionalized: The NIU gunman was insane.  He stopped taking the medication that made him functional, drove over 100 miles to a different college town to (legally!) buy his guns, and made a second trip to pick them up after the mandatory waiting period before doing what he did.  Insane people don’t see the world the way you and I do. Sad but true.  But how do you make somebody take the medications that make them “not insane”? And — unless you can prove they are a danger to others — is it ethical to do so?  I don’t pretend to know the answers;  nevertheless my thoughts for peace go to the families effected by this tragedy.

And Finally: MTV has officially been running pretty much anything but “Music Television” for 18 years.

Have a great weekend, folks.

Better Living Through Chemistry

I have some new cookbooks.

Specifically I have some new vegetarian cookbooks. I am not a full vegetarian, but I do try to make healthy food for my family. And “healthy” means plenty of veggies. Furthermore, meatless dishes are often (but not always!) higher nutrition for lower calories, and very budget friendly as well.

One of the new books is How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. One feature I love is that vegan, fast, or make-ahead recipes are clearly marked. Frankly, this is an improvement over the original How to Cook Everything, and I hope future editions of that book will utilize similar markings. One thing you will not find in HtCEV is a lot of recipes that use fake meat. Sure, there are tofu recipes and seitan recipes, and 10 pages on making your own veggie “burgers”, including adaptations for “meat”loaves and “meat”balls. And sure, there are recipes that use alternative-but-still-natural sweeteners such as agave nectar or maple syrup. But no Gimme Lean, no Liquid Amino Acids, no TVP, no Tofurky, no Quorn, no Morningstar Farms, no Boca Burgers, no Gardenburgers, no frozen meatless beef/chicken/pork substitute patties, in fact nothing that should be capitalized or have a trademark symbol.

By contrast, I have another new cookbook that features only vegan recipes — for those who aren’t in the know, vegans not only don’t eat any sort of meat or fish, they don’t eat any animal-produced products (dairy, eggs, honey) either. You might think this is very limiting in a world where meat and eggs and dairy products are everywhere, even on our salads (mmGorgonzola). It is certainly challenging, and requires some thinking ahead. If you want to read more about that, I humbly refer you to Veggie Going Vegan and Fat Free Vegan.

Anyway, this cookbook talks seriously about eating healthy food: why the chemicals in coffee are bad for you; why refined sugar is bad for you but artificial low-calorie sweeteners are worse, and a new study supports that fact (ok, ok, giving up my Diet Coke, *sigh*); be selective about your grains, avoid ones that have “white” in the name, and why; the chemicals that go into modern farming of meat; it goes on. I really like the frank and irreverent tone of the book. I may not agree with everything they say — for example my experience with potato products is that they tend to make me gain more weight than white rice — but they do try to back up their opinions.

And then — 8 paragraphs away from a sentence summarizing the various drugs, pesticides, steroids, and hormones that end up in farmed meat and meat products — they point out that section of the grocery store dedicated to overpriced, frozen wad, chemistry sets known as fake meat. Sure, they admit that these products should only be eaten in moderation, and that they only sort of taste like meat. Oh, and that humble readers such as myself should make up their own minds.

The chemicals in dairy products? Bad! The chemicals that turn rice and soy into something that taste like dairy products? Inexplicably good! Eggs? Bad! Egg Beaters? Still bad! Vegan egg replacer made with starch and cellulose through some super-secret chemical process? Somehow good!

Listen, I am willing to concede that a diet of cheeseburgers is probably not good for you. But I have this strange feeling that switching to a diet of fake burger patties with fake cheese on a whole wheat bun isn’t much better for you. If you honestly can’t handle life without burgers, that’s ok. Really it is. Maybe a vegan lifestyle isn’t for you.

But you’ll just have to trust me that there are better things you can be putting in your mouth: for half the price of a box of frozen-burgerish-substance, you can make your own delicious meat substitute (and I bet you already have most of the ingredients in your pantry); you could be eating soba noodles in peanut sauce; you could be enjoying roasted veggies — you can figure out how to hack up some veggies and stick them in a hot oven for an hour, right?; you can make sloppy pinto-joes (sorry my recipe is simpler than any I see online) or black bean soup; just yesterday I had a lovely hummus and falafel platter for lunch; and we haven’t even touched on “exotic” ingredients like seitan and tempeh. Frankly, looking beyond a hunk of meat opens a freaking huge culinary world. After all, several cultures developed their own independent vegetarian cuisines in the complete absence of the latest scientific information on amino acids. There’s a lot of delicious and nutritious food out there. Why waste time, money, and calories on chemistry sets?

In closing: America Says Thanks for the gift card, I used it to buy “pasta sauce, diapers, [and] laundry detergent“; America Also Says the recession is already here; it’s one thing to walk away from the house, it’s another thing to walk away from the student loans, and America is doing both; at least we have homes to walk away from, one in six Iraqis don’t; Dear Hillary, grow up and smell the democracy; collegiate bloggers should read this now; deja vu; CNN shows their priorities by asking “So when are my shows coming back?“; another take on kids still don’t have employers; since the tourists are just here for the dollars, let’s not annoy them; somehow killing one out of five people doesn’t sound like a “peace” plan; Senate Traitors; and everything you will ever need to know about mattresses. Oh, and happy 200th birthday of Abe Lincoln.

Shorties Behind You

But we need those guest workers! The EPI on the unfortunately enduring problem of long-term unemployment.

Which one of those Canadians wears the beret? Many thanks to The Crone Speaks’s Sunny 66 for pointing us to Mythbusting Canadian Health Care. It’s part one, so keep an eye out for part two!

I also have a side-business selling tiger-repellent rocks. Carry one of these rocks anywhere in the United States, and you won’t see any tigers outside a zoo, guaranteed! No? Well D-Ed Reckoning has a nice item on Poverty and Education.

ShortWoman agreeing with the Cato Institute is normally a sign of impending calamity. Oh well, make sure your disaster supplies are in order, because they are the real Straight Talk Express when it comes to John McCain.

Things I’ve learned from Japanese grammar. When you don’t know how to pronounce something, start by not emphasizing any syllables. Putting “yo” at the end of a sentence is a perfectly good way to add emphasis and point out new information. Listen to everything before you decide you know what’s going on. And little details make a big difference in what something means. Here’s a site that those studying Japanese might enjoy.

Look before you Leap. Wired tells us Three Smart Things You Should Know About Leap Year.

Laptop security ends at the security checkpoint. Seriously. Don’t bother taking your portable computer overseas.

Keeping an eye on this one. The (new) 3 Rs.

Help handicapped children and get rid of wrinkles all at once. Did you know that Botox can help some kids get out of wheelchairs? Well, that is if they have a certain kind of cerebral palsy. And it does take five to fifteen times the amount of Botox it would take to get rid of the “number 11” between your eyes. And unfortunately, there are a very small number of kids who have had bad reactions recently.

Excuse me, does anyone here speak Kudlow? Heh.

Deja Vu. Petite Sophisticate is closing. Again. Maybe if they actually sold petite clothing at reasonable prices they would do better. As opposed to “slightly smaller than regular sized” clothing at “really too damn expensive” prices.

Herding Cats. Running an orchestra. Pretty much the same thing.

If you were expecting me to say something about the so-called stimulus package, The Crone pretty much said what needed saying.

And that’s it for the day. Have a great weekend. Stay warm!

Tagged, BAD, and other loose ends

Well, Dyre42 of Dyre Portents has been so *ahem* kind as to tag me with the following meme:

So here’s the rules of the Meme:

1. Pick up the nearest book ( of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

Boy is he gonna be sorry he did that.

From page 123 of the nearest book:

Kekkon suru, vb. get married.

Kekkyoku, adv. eventually.

Kemui, kemutai, adj. 1. smoky. 2. ill at ease.

Not as fun as Dyre’s selection, now is it? My apologies that the kanji didn’t come out right; WordPress doesn’t seem to like Asian characters. I hereby tag The Archcrone, Brilliant Jill, Maya’s Granny (who I know has really interesting books!), Elisa Camahort, and — the only guy on the list — JurassicPork .

And that list brings me to the next item on today’s agenda, Blogroll Amnesty Day.

There seem to be conflicting reports on where this tradition comes from, but Skippy takes credit, explaining:

[A]ny blog that has linked to skippy and has not received a reciprocal blogroll link will now be included on our roll! all you have to do is notify us in our comments section or email us, and we will happily include you! that will show those big shot elitists too good for the little guy blogs! ha!

I for one am also using it as a blogroll cleaning day. In addition to inviting new blogroll members, I will be cleaning out oldies but no-longer-goodies (as much as I hate to admit that Fafblog! is never coming back. *sniff*). There are also a couple of urls to update, such as noting Expert Ezra‘s full-time migration to a new site. After my little cleanup, the next order of business will be to add some of the things I have started reading regularly. This includes Dyre (who tagged me) and several of the people I just tagged. Other new entries in my blogroll include AmericaBlog, SharkFu (many thanks to Maya’s Granny, without whom I would never have even thought to read her), BuzzFlash, Cogitamus (Ezra’s former posse; it’s Latin for “we think”), Donklephant, Carrie’s Nation, the BondDad, Confessions of a Community College Dean, Hello Kitty Hell, GamePolitics.com, The Daily Kitten, EconoSpeak (the former MaxSpeak crew), Freakonomics, Homeland Stupidity, I can has Cheezburger, Independent Liberal, Poligazette, by way of balance Marginal Revolution, The Market Oracle, Mahablog, Last Left before Hooterville (I love the name, dahling!), Kiko-san no uchi, Paul Krugman, Preemptive Karma, Bruce Schneier, Shorty Stories, Unbossed, and EconBrowser.

And in closing, a little smörgåsbord that includes some choice morsels from my new blogroll members: Unbossed on the Civil Rights Act of 2008; Marginal Revolution on What would it cost to cover the uninsured?; Cogitamus on Profiles in Uninsured; GamePolitics on a game for the bibliophile in your life; AmericaBlog on the latest polls; The Crone Speaks on the most helpless victims of foreclosure; TheStreet.com on Unstoppable Moms; and three incredible people.

A Modest Proposal

Campaign season is too darn long.

It’s too long for a number of reasons, including this modest list:

  • “Voter Fatigue” — Joe and Jane Average get so tired of hearing about politics that they lose interest in voting altogether. Particularly since it looks like candidates will be finalized something like 9 months before the elections. That’s an entire human gestation period.
  • Circular Firing Squad — Candidates have such a grand time ripping on one another during primary season that they hand the opposing party ammunition for the general election.
  • Too expensive — The long campaign season means it costs a lot more money to mount a credible campaign. It’s not possible to really run without being on the hook to special interest groups. That is to say nothing of the insanity of spending millions of dollars to try and get a job that earns $400,000 that you only get to keep 4 years. Sure, there are perks like free housing, security, and riding a private 747 around the world, but you see the point.
  • Day jobs — The people trying to become President are almost all current elected officials. They should be doing the job their constituents elected them to do instead of going off on a year long job interview. Seriously, there have been some important votes in the Senate lately.

This year, the Democratic Convention is in late August; the Republican Convention is in early September. That’s fine! It allows a good solid 2 months of plain old campaign afterwards. What really needs to be shortened is primary season. The various states have tried to get their primaries and caucuses earlier and earlier so that they are still relevant. Various states use the process to flex political muscle in a race that would otherwise bypass them. It has gotten to the point that the Democratic Party has told Michigan and Florida that their primary is too darn early and doesn’t count! By the time Super Tuesday has come and gone, the fat lady is singing.

So yes, the Presidential campaign season isn’t just too long, it’s way too long. It was probably too long back before candidates could travel by airplane and have their comments on the TV within minutes, and it’s even worse in the “internet age”. I have an idea to fix that. It will never happen, because the Powers That Be seem to like things the way they are.

So here’s my idea.

Let’s keep the conventions and the general election cycle exactly where it is, but reduce primary season to 12 weeks. This is a full month longer than the period of time between the conventions and Election Day. Furthermore, let’s break this down into six sections, each 2 weeks long.

Let Iowa and New Hampshire continue the traditional kickoff to the season in weeks one and two.

By my count, there are 8 states (including the District of Columbia) that each have 3 electoral votes. They can all do their primaries in week 3. By now, one out of 5 states have done their thing, and several weaker candidates should be seriously considering dropping out of the race.

Another 9 states (excluding New Hampshire) have 4 or 5 electoral votes each. They all go in week 5.

An additional 10 states (excluding Iowa) have between 6 and 9 electoral votes (inclusive) each. They get week 7. In an ideal world, we are down to a half dozen candidates on each side.

The 13 states with 10-15 electoral votes all have their primaries in week 9.

So by week 10, 41 states and the District of Columbia have had primaries, caucuses, straw polls, or whatever else they do. In weeks 10 and 11 the remaining nine states — our nine most populous states — finish out the roster. Ideally, we have three or maybe even 4 candidates for each party still in play, even if some are regarded as longshots. Since at the moment these nine states control 226 electoral votes, they are still very much relevant to the outcome. They can still make or break a candidate’s chances.

Needless to say, after the 2010 Census, the Electoral Votes will be shuffled, and this order will have to be slightly adapted. I consider this a minor tweak. Even we we take a few weeks off before the conventions, we can still start the process in May!

Can anyone tell me why this would be bad for the voting public? Anyone?

Another Way to Boost the Economy

It occurred to me this morning that nobody has discussed the economic impact of Iraq beyond what it does to the national debt. What would happen — economically speaking — if we were to bring the troops home?

First, up to 158,000 military personnel and perhaps as many as 180,000 contractors would come home. Those that were with the National Guard would return to their home states and go to work. They and their families would then spend their money here in the United States, stimulating the economy.

Second, some of those people would not have jobs to which they could return. Yes, yes, it’s the law that employers must find work for returning servicemen; but the fact is that some of these guys have been gone a long time now, and their employers needed somebody to actually do the work. It’s not fair to the soldier to deny him work, but it’s not fair to fire the new guy who’s actually been doing the job either. While it is a sad fact that some of these brave people face unemployment, some of them will use what they have learned in Iraq to start their own businesses, stimulating the economy.

Third, we would no longer be spending billions of dollars each month — $275 Million every day — to wage war in Iraq. If you are an old-school conservative who believes in things like low deficits and fiscal responsibility, these figures had better make you think long and hard about the war.

Fourth, we would no longer have the ongoing cost — both in terms of VA spending and in human terms — of creating more wounded Iraq War veterans. Not to be cynical, but healthy vets take jobs and not disability checks; this is better for our bottom line, for our communities, and even more importantly for their families.

But what about the Iraqis, you may ask. Well, with our troops and contractors gone, they are no longer a flashpoint for violence. Without our people putting their noses where they do not belong, they will come up with an internal peace plan. And that brings me to the fifth and final way that bringing our troops home will help our economy: with an internal peace plan and no meddling from Western interests, oil production will rise. Rising oil production will result in lower petroleum costs and lower prices at the gas pump.

In closing: an amazing piece by Dennis Sanders on social conservatives; stupid job interview questions aren’t good for anybody and often skate the edge of being illegal; it’s FISA D-Day so call your Senators; two from BondDad; two on Food Stamps; and finally, a suggestion about what to do with your tax rebate check. Read it all to find out Nancy Pelosi’s plan for what happens if this doesn’t work (hint, Benjamin Franklin said that would be crazy).