A lack of understanding

We come to the end of week in which we’ve seen the stock market drop precipitously. The indicators from Asia and Europe point towards another tough day for equities.

Each morning, I get up and turn on CNBC while I go through my morning exercise routine, then, sit down with a cup of coffee and check out the price of oil, listen to a the tripartite host team on Squawk Box and then, it's time to preen and prep for the day.

Interestingly, other than my sister and my wife, no one I have contact with seems to be aware of the gravity of what’s happening in global capital markets.

What do people do with their nonworking time? What will it take to have people acquire an understanding of events that goes beyond Obama/McCain?

There are a few places where the possibilities are talked about, but it appears that people I rub shoulders with are tuned to a different station.

I’ll spend my day at a conference on sustainable growth. The irony is not lost on me. I’m curious to see if Maine’s supposed leaders have any sense of what’s going on in the world, and recognize that subsistence, rather than growth, might be something Mainers are more focused on in the coming months.

Tonight, I'll engage with the bread and circuses of baseball, becoming one of the sheeple, finding pleasure in a simple game.

Congress and Senate stooges smarter than economists

When our economic vitality depends on the whims of Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi, and "Dingy" Harry Reid (feel free to insert almost any other politician's name, right, or left), rather than those with the credentials and background to make wise decisions, we're all on borrowed time.

Casey B. Mulligan, an economist at the University of Chicago has a blog post explaining that Wall Street isn't where our focus should be.

There was a time when people believed that the Sun and stars revolved around the Earth. Of course, now we know that the Earth is not the center of the universe, or even the center of our little solar system. In the somewhat more recent past, economists thought that the non-financial sector in a modern economy revolved around financial markets, despite the facts that only 4 percent of the workforce was employed in the financial sector (including insurance and real estate), and even today that sector employs only 6 percent of the total. President Bush and supporters of the recent massive Wall Street bailout plan still believe Wall Street to be the center of the entire economy.

According to Mulligan, economic research dispels that idea.

If you care to expand your knowledge base and learn something new, you can read the rest of Mulligan's ideas here. Otherwise, continue to take your marching orders from your two presidential wannabes, and the other apologists for oligarchy.