Hope in the Recession

Everyone has tighter budgets after spending $3.65 a gallon to fill their gas tanks. There have been so many things that put the economy on tilt--Stock markets plunged in the last few months. They are slowly climbing back but..

The price of a barrel of oil is at record levels. Food prices are escalating. We seem to be caught in a position of our food prices being tied to the cost of transportation. It might be time to resurrect "victory gardens". Those 18 wheelers supposedly cost $1400 to fill the tank with gasoline.

Added to the rising prices is the housing finance fiasco. People are losing homes. Some retirees have declining incomes because interest rates are low. Part of my IRA was invested in financial services. That took a good hit.

Jobs are scarce. Businesses may be hunkering down to ride out the storm. We have friends who have lost jobs and have trouble finding another.

In all this trouble there might be one sector of the economy that is still healthy. Politics. Yesterday I heard Obama still has 44 million $ in his war chest. Hillary has loaned her campaign 11million$ of her own money. Who is she calling elite? At any rate they will be spending money and the real campaign for president has not yet begun. I wonder if Guam and Puerto Rico will benefit from campaign $$ spent there to catch those last few delegates.

Another bright side of the political season is that there will be all those federal jobs to fill.

Yesterday the buzz was about vice presidential running mates. Sen. Obama dodged the question of whether he would chose Hillary as his running mate if he is the candidate. Pundits reading between the lines guess he may. He may have to in order to prevent a split in the party. Both sides have some extremely loyal supporters who would be reluctant to vote for the opposition.

John McCain must also chose a running mate. There is a video of Mitt Romney "making nice" that left some wondering if he is in the running for VP pick. I wonder if Hillary would accept #2 on the ticket if she doesn't win another primary. If those two scenarios happen; an Obama/Clinton ticket and a McCain/Romney ticket I predict there will be a new federal position to fill in the cabinet: official taster for the president. Would you feel comfortable if you were either of those two men with an ambitious VP only a meal away? I am not suggesting either of them would do anything wrong, but they do have loyal supporters. Apply for job only if you eat arugula and can do shots.