Nice to see the two of you (at least) conducting a civil discourse about what to do to get this economy moving again. The counry as a whole would be better off if there were less name calling and more thought given as to what course of action is best at this time.

Originally, the rise in oil prices led to the collapse of the speculative dot com bubble, and the economic slowdown led to a reduction in federal revenues. Since the tower attacks, nobody has been spending their money, uncertain as to what will happen next.

The best thing for removing that comsumer and corporate uncerainty is going to be to wrap up the al Qaeda cells, those operating in Europe, the US, the Pacific, and Africa. We're going to have to pay for those operations, as well as those efforts to see that nothing like this happens again. We're also going to have to pay for the immediate costs of the attacks.

In sum, in case no one has noticed, we're at war, and in that case you conduct a war time fiscal policy.

EP