mr president the most dangerous phrase in contemporary politics is something must be done
politicians have an unreasonable and disproportionate fear of appearing inactive and what that something is is secondary as we have seen during the financial crisis
it does not matter what the something is gbp five hundred billion in britain eur five hundred billion in europe usd eight hundred and fifty billion in the us alright that is something let us do it
never mind what its practical consequences are
the truth is that you cannot legislate against recessions any more than you can legislate to order the course of the sun or the moon
what we are seeing now is an inexorable correction to the years of easy credit created by these same governments which kept interest rates too low for too long
that was a political decision and not a market one and the air that was puffed into the balloon is now rushing out
the only practical change being made by the nationalisation of our banks and by these huge bail-outs is that instead of cutting taxes to help people through the tough times we are loading an enormous new additional burden on them
our taxpayers will pay a heavy price for our conceit
