Sunday, August 21, 2011

Jeffrey Sachs Sees the Light


Today we can count economist Jeffrey Sachs among those who have see the light. By now there are so many that we might start calling them the Light Seers Brigade.

A liberal Columbia professor, Sachs had originally supported Barack Obama. He had great hopes for an Obama presidency.

No more.

The other morning on the Morning Joe show, Sachs said this: “We're almost three years into this administration, and there's never been a plan. And that's what everybody feels. And the president didn't lead. He waited. The quintessential image, sadly, of an administration that I supported and hoped for much better, is the president waiting by the phone to hear what Congress calls to tell him. It doesn't work in this country that way. It's not a matter that it's August. It's a matter that it's August 2011. So we've been drifting for a very long time. And we've been drifting down. And we had a short-term plan that failed. A short-term stimulus that was supposed to get the economy back on track, but it failed. And now we have nothing behind it. And we have no agreements, and we have no leadership. And, frankly, I do think it's pretty odd the president's on vacation right now. Normally I wouldn't care about such things, but the world markets are in deep crisis. It's no joke. This isn't just an up-and-down little blip. This is a very serious situation."

The opinion is not news. The source is. A quick read of Sachs’ Wikipedia entry will show how important and influential he is.

Admittedly, there are still a few holdouts. The few remaining diehard Obamaphile intellectuals have shifted into campaign mode and are parroting the party line by blaming the economic crisis on God and the Republicans.

So, let’s give credit to Jeffrey Sachs for his intellectual integrity. And let's heed the observation of this world class economist that the "world markets are in deep crisis." As he says: "It's no joke."

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