McCain Adviser on Economy: ‘Things Today Just Aren’t That Bad’

On Sunday, The Washington Post ran an Op-Ed piece written by McCain campaign adviser Donald Luskin in which he argues that, despite “trouble spots in the economy,” recent comparisons between the present moment and the Great Depression are the product of “pessimists” and “politics.”

Later that same day, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan appeared on ABC’s “This Week” and said that the U.S. economic situation is worse than he has ever seen before in his career — a “once in a century type of event.” Sunday was also the day when Merrill Lynch agreed to sell itself to Bank of America for $50 billion and a day when the outlook for Lehman Brothers was very grim indeed.

Donald Luskin in The Washington Post:

Overall, the pessimists are up against an insurmountable reality: In the last reported quarter, the U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 3.3 percent, adjusted for inflation. That’s virtually the same as the 3.4 percent average growth rate since — yes — the Great Depression.

Why, then, does the public appear to agree with the media? A recent Zogby poll shows that 66 percent of likely voters believe that “the entire world is either now locked in a global economic recession or soon will be.” Actually, that’s a major clue to what started this thought-contagion about everything being the worst it has been “since the Great Depression”: Politics.

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