Come on guys. Let's argue foreign policy, abortion policy, stem cell research, etc. but it's so frustrating to hear intelligent individuals actually act like the executive branch, controlled by either party, has the ability to put up more than a blip on the economic trends of this country. If they truly had much control, the trends would always be the same during the terms in office of either party. That's obviously not the case. Presidents pass no legislation, they have limited executive branch budgets they control. Whether taxes are lowered or raised, the basic pot available to the economy stays the same.

I don't know how many times I need to repeat this before it begins to sink in to people on both sides of the political spectrum. We, the citizens of this country, are the economy. We, and our collective psychie of alternating optimism and pessimism, overspending and oversaving, create this huge momentum of rising and lowering economies. You can see it on the local level. The economy rises and people get overconfident. The housing project they had on the back burner gets the green light. Not only does it proceed but the plans are scaled up and the builders overbuild. People that have been paying off their bills during the hard times suddenly start to let their credit rise again. After all, that construction job is keeping them working 10 hour days and the fridge is stocked with beer.

It takes about 4 or 5 years for the realization to hit once again. The factories are overstocked, the houses overbuilt, the credit unmanageable. Everyone gets panicky and becomes conservative with their money. Extra cash, normally going into the economy, goes towards the credit cards. People are taking on extra jobs, if they can find them. All those construction workers, now laid off are vying for them as well.

Why any man would want to become president during one of these dropping cycles is beyond me. GWB is lucky enough right now that if he doesn't start a world war and alienate the rest of the nation, that he can bask in the glow of the eventual economic rise. Whoever becomes president in November is going to have economic success just as Clinton did at the beginning of his term.

Let's stop the employment and economic banter. It's trivial in a time when my kids might get drafted in a few years to fight overseas.