want someone who will bankrupt those hog lot bastards. I'll show them what kind of rights they have. I run this country now, with or without their consent."
After a brief lunch break, the work drones on all afternoon until late at night. Seizing control of a government is time consuming.
Friday, January 22, 2021
Time: 10:00 AM
DeWitt, Shane Bader, George Salazar, Warren Table, Jane Shouter and Cynthia Goff, Secretary of the Treasury meet in the Oval Office about the economy.
"Ok, Shouter, what the hell is going on?" says DeWitt in an exasperated voice.
Jane Shouter begins, "Well, Madame President, for the past few years, we've been having increasing structural difficulties in the economy. And now, more importantly, the Obama administration's EPA environmental policies are finally coming home to roost. They're pretty much savaging the energy sector. Beginning a few years ago, the regulations have now resulted in the closing of thousands of power plants along with drastic reductions in coal, oil and natural gas output. And, for the past few years, the climate has been cooling off and the demand for energy is rising. That wasn't anticipated when the regulations went into effect."
"So? How does that effect us?"
"This has made many things very difficult. Now we're having serious problems generating enough electricity or providing enough natural gas to heat homes, businesses, and run factories. For example, we have only half the natural gas supply for New England that we need. The environmentalists blocked a new gas pipeline back in 2014 and, now that the Plymouth nuclear station is closed, we're seriously short of gas to run power stations to makeup for the lost electricity. The last of the coal fired plants in that region were shut down six years ago. With most of the available gas now going to home heating, there's almost none now for electricity. So, basically we're expecting lots of brownouts, or worse, and very soon. Our only alternative is to burn oil but that is extremely expensive. None of this is good for the economy."
"Where did they expect to get their electricity?"
"Well, they thought all those wind farms out to sea would make up the difference. They haven't and, anyway, that electricity is just as expensive as oil fired electricity."
"What about all those solar panels?"
"For God's sake, it's New England! The sun never shines there in winter. But it's not just New England, factories are shutting down everywhere. Not enough electricity and not enough natural gas to heat or run them. It's an enormous drag on the economy and it's getting worse each month. Those regulations were time bombs set to go off after Obama left of office, just like the health car law which is still causing companies to fire people and automate. It seems companies have discovered that machines don't need health insurance."
"Then there are issues with raw materials. For all practical purposes, EPA regs now make it illegal to dig anything out of the ground, to cut down a tree or, for that matter, to build a factory. So, companies have been relocating to Mexico and Canada as fast as they can and taking the jobs with them. The job losses since the election are accelerating."
"And then there's our balance of payments problem. Since we don't really make much of anything in this country anymore, we import nearly everything and we export next to nothing. This means that the dollar is coming under significant pressure. We're not sure if we can maintain its value in foreign exchange markets. If there's a run on it, it could fall very fast and very far."
"So what? How will than effect us?"
"The price of all those imports will skyrocket, that's how. That means a huge increase in inflation. It's a very big danger, at the moment."
"But the economy is improving, right? The stock market's been up for the past few weeks," asks Bader.
"Perversely, the stock market is up because the economy is in a downward spiral. The market is going up because they expect more easing from us at the Fed. Translation, more printed money. That always makes the market go up. Bad news makes the market go up these days. The real problem is that no one wants to invest. Investors feel the risk is too great in a managed economy, running mainly on printed money. Too many people are putting their assets into precious metals, real estate, foreign currency, and tangibles, not factories, retail stores machine tools, software or research. Bottom line, no investment, no new jobs."
Salazar interrupts, "Hillary, the basic problem is that all those stimulus programs, buy backs, make-work government construction schemes have fizzled out by now and just left us with the debt on which pay interest. Now people are losing jobs, defaulting on loans, going on unemployment, disability, or welfare and becoming government dependents. Fewer people are working every day. The economy is shutting down."
"Well, there's nothing wrong with being a government dependent as long as you vote as you're told," mutters DeWitt.
Shouter says, "The Federal Reserve has been doing all it can to stimulate. Unfortunately, most of the easy money is ending up in stock buy backs, bonds and offshore transfers. Another problem is that it's also letting the government grab all the free cash it wants in order to support some very dangerous levels of public debt."
"I really don't understand how all this effects the economy. Why not have more money? People are always happy with more money," queries DeWitt.
Table interjects, "The problem is that Fed printed too much money. When that didn't work, they printed more. The more they print, the more they have to print just to keep the damned leaky balloon from crashing and the system from imploding."
"For the past twelve years, government deficits have been limited by nothing but the supply of paper, ink and electrons. All the massive overruns were covered by no-cost, zero interest money. The Fed printed and the government borrowed. Borrow and spend has been our national economic policy for twelve years. Now, if the they stop printing, the government will collapse. We're trapped."
Salazar interjects, "Yes, and all that printed money has actually only made the economy worse. Free loans made it cheaper for companies to automate and fire workers. So, then the government raised the minimum wage. And that killed off just about every entry level job in the country. They were all replaced with kiosks, robots and AI. That put millions more on welfare. Cheap money means more automation which means more unemployment."
"Right now, the economy is choking on free money. The country is running on nothing but increasingly worthless paper. The printing presses are making things worse, not better."
Shouter says, "I'm hoping for a miracle but I really don't believe one will happen. Perhaps you could start a nice little war someplace? That would sort things out in no time."
"So, bottom line, we're in trouble?" says DeWitt.
They all nod.
"We need a plan, Saying we're for puppies, sunsets and world peace might win a beauty contest but it's not a plan," mutters Salazar.
"Well, as it turns out, Bader and I do have a plan. I need to get my administration off on the right foot. Show the people that I mean business. So, looking over what's been done in the past, In my opinion, what this country really needs is for the government to step up and do its part. I've consulted with Dr. Peter Kroger, the Nobel Prize winning economist at Upper Montrose State University who writes for the New York Globe. He believes that the problem with Obama's stimulus plans is that they were too small. I agree. I think we need something much, much bigger," says DeWitt.
Shouter rolls her eyes and objects, "That's very dangerous, Madame President, with the current debit to GDP ratio. The markets will not receive this very well. And don't you need Congressional authorization for something like this?"
"Congress won't do what I tell them and I'm not going to stand around, do nothing, and twiddle my thumbs during a crisis. I don't need the Congress. I'll do it myself. I'm declaring an emergency and doing it by executive order. Congress is obsolete. We don't need them any more. And Kroger is very insistent. I believe him. We need to act. Bader, you've prepared the press release?"
"Yes Madame President. It's all ready. I
've already asked the networks for special air time for tonight at 9 PM."
"And the speech?"
"Already loaded into the Teleprompter."
"Excellent. Lets run it up the flag pole and see if anyone salutes. Thank you all for attending," says DeWitt rising.
The others rise and leave but Bader falls back and hands DeWitt the folder of press release materials, her speech, a copy of the talking points that will be sent to all the usual people who will be interviewed by the networks.
She thumbs through it and say, "Looks very good. Now we'll see if it works."
Monday, January 25, 2021
The Asian stock markets open in chaos after DeWitt's announcement of a new three trillion dollar stimulus program. The price of U.S. 10 year Treasury bonds drops twenty percent and dollar falls to 70 Yen.
The situation worsens when Europe opens. The dollar drops to 190 against the Euro and the cable rate falls to $3.50 Sterling. The London stock market drops more than ten percent The German and French market sag by like amounts.
The U.S. futures market is not pretty. At 9:30 AM the New York Exchange opens and all hell brakes loose. The market opens down 300 points and continues to drop. By noon, after over a thousand point fall, circuit breakers force a halt to trading. At 1:00 PM, when the market reopens, it falls another 1,000 points and trading is suspended for the day. The price of gold