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Walking at the Mall, this morning, while it rained, I saw retro-mannequins:  from the 1930s, I thought. 


How did I know that?   Maybe because I was born in 1931.  There are trees, in Washington State, born after me, that have been lumber for years.  I don't just have moss on my north side, where the sun scarcely shines, but all around my trunk.  


What I really remember, from those first years, is a kind of matter-of-fact hard times.   There was no money.  Mom told, later, of not being able to find three cents for a postage stamp, for a job application for Dad.  It never occurred to us--the kids--to ask for money for something.  There wasn't any.  We didn't ask.  


It was the Great Depression that began in 1929.  We were up shit creek.  Somebody had gambled our livelihoods away.  We were trying to get through.  


Before Barach Obama was elected President, our economy almost went down the drain, again.  We try to distinguish our own financial disaster from 1929 by calling ours a recession, not a depression.  It is a distinction without a difference, if you have no job. 


We were going down the tubes before Barack Obama was elected.  His job has been to recover from it.   


Now we are looking forward to another election.  If you listen to the Republican candidate and politicians, our slogging out of this disaster is all Obama's fault.  "Why aren't things better?"  They are, but not good enough.


It was under a Republican administration, insist on Republican political policies, that the banks ran wild and became gambling casinos, that wars were ignored, and everything possible was turned to private profit.  It didn't matter whether government programs were more efficient, and saved money:  government was bad.  Taxes are evil.  Starve the beast!  Go into debt rather than raise taxes to pay for what we want.  


So now Obama is being blamed for the disaster he has been trying to overcome.  Obama didn't demand a war in Iraq.  He didn't insist on turning the banks loose.  He didn't cripple government incoe by shifting  money to the rich.  He was elected after all that. 


We have no memory.  We just listen to what people say.  We hurt.  Obams is President.  It must be his fault.


Stupid stuff!

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