The Herbert Hoover of the 21st Century

Earlier today, a friend forwarded to me this week's Martin on Monday newsletter from controversial investment guru Martin D. Weiss, Ph.D. Free subscriptions to this newsletter are available here:


This week Weiss does a good job of laying out the fact, based on studies by Citizens Against Government Waste and the Heritage Foundation, that both Bush and Kerry are proposing tax and spending plans that will increase the deficit. No surprise so far.

Weiss goes on to say the next president, whichever one wins, has two choices: prolong present policies which will only make the inevitable correction worse, or precipitate the next depression (Weiss disingenuously avoids using the "D" word) immediately so that the crash and subsequent recovery will begin sooner. Again, no surprise.

Then he concludes by saying he is an optimist and believes the latter course will be followed. Which just goes to show that Ph.D. really does stand for "Piled higher, and Deeper." [Old joke: "What does Ph.D. stand for?" "You know what B.S. means, don't you? Well, M.S. means more of the same, and Ph.D. means ..."]

No president of either party would choose the course of action Dr. Weiss hopes will be chosen. To do as Weiss recommends would convert to a certainty what is now the mere possibility (realists might say probability) that the president we elect this fall would go down in history as the Herbert Hoover of the 21st century. And I don't mean the Herbert Hoover who saw to it that millions were saved from starvation in China and later in Europe during and after the Great War - no one remembers him. I mean the Herbert Hoover who caused people to be homeless and starve in the streets, the Herbert Hoover whose name was appropriated to describe collections of ramshackle hovels and tents housing the poor and unemployed (Hoovervilles), the Herbert Hoover who destroyed any chance of his party controlling the three branches of the federal government for two generations.

Even George W. Bush, whom I believe to be about as good a man as can be elected in the present degraded condition of our country, would not be able to bite this bullet even if he were convinced it would reduce the pain of the ensuing depression to start it now rather than later.