“They Can’t Let Him Back In”

The New Neo Posted on by

Quite a few people have recommended this Michael Anton article. Anton was the author of the “Flight 93” piece prior to the 2016 election, which he wrote under a pseudonym at the time.

His more recent essay is about the left’s efforts to stop Trump at any cost. It happens to dovetail with the post I just published, which I had written late last night before I read Anton’s. But it’s not surprising that a lot of people are seeing similar things right now, because they are rather obvious – although Anton fleshes it out with greater scope and detail.

I think that people on the right sometimes underestimate how successful the framing of January 6th by the left has been. If a person reads sources on the right, it is easy to know a lot that undermines that “narrative” by the left. But most people don’t do all that much reading and at least half of America is unfamiliar with anything that would challenge what the January 6th show trial has been saying. From the start, shortly after January 6th, most of the people I know thought it was akin to a revolution from the right, a hyper-dangerous movement involving Trump supporters in general and needing to be crushed.

Anton’s piece has many things to recommend it, but one phrase that struck me in particular was this:

The regime can’t allow Trump to be president not because of who he is (although that grates), but because of who his followers are. That class—Angelo Codevilla’s “country class”—must not be allowed representation by candidates who might implement their preferences, which also, and above all, must not be allowed. The rubes have no legitimate standing to affect the outcome of any political process, because of who they are, but mostly because of what they want.

It’s not just that they think the deplorables are – well, deplorable, or that what the deplorables want is bad or wrong. It’s also because of who the members of the “regime” are: those whom Thomas Sowell has so aptly labeled the anointed. So many of his books, including ones written long ago, described the combination of self-righteous arrogance, ignorance, and condescension that they exhibit, and they’ve gotten a great deal more planful and ruthless in recent years.

Another part of Anton’s essay that struck me was this:

People I have known for 30 years, many of whom still claim the label “conservative,” will no longer speak to me—because I supported Trump, yes, but also because I disagree on trade, war, and the border. They call not just my positions, but me personally, unadulterated evil. I am not an isolated case. There are, as they say, “many such cases.”

Indeed.

Charging Trump

The New Neo Posted on by

They’ve been trying to convict Trump of something for a long long time. So far, no dice. But the thrust of the January 6th hearings was to lay the ground for conviction of a crime later on through the court system. Failing that, the secondary goal was to discredit him so that he either will not run in 2024 or if he does he will do poorly.

It the same technique that was successful with Netanyahu in Israel in 2021, although he appears to be making a comeback because the charges were so obviously bogus when the trial played out.

This is what they’re brewing for Trump:

The move by the Justice Department to bring two top aides to former Vice President Mike Pence in front of a federal grand jury is the most aggressive public step taken yet by prosecutors investigating the plots to subvert the 2020 election.

It signals that the Department’s probe has reached inside former President Donald Trump’s White House and that investigators are looking at conduct directly related to Trump’s and his closest allies’ efforts to overturn his election defeat…

The questions to Jacob and Short included a focus on the fake elector scheme and the role of Trump lawyers John Eastman and Rudy Giuliani, the source said…

The House committee has described the fake electoral plot, in which Trump supporters would be fraudulently put forward as substitutes for the legitimate Biden electors, as part of the broader push to have Pence interrupt the certification of Biden’s win.

Interesting that this all is being labeled as criminal. But the left is no stranger to related devices – such as calls for Trump electors to defect to Hillary – which I wrote about in 2016, after Trump won.

And then there was the election of 1876, which you can read about here.

One of the approaches to convicting Trump has to do with what the left has labeled the “fake electors” plot by Trump and company. I had written about the event back in December of 2020, when it occurred, and there was nothing fake or secret about it. In that post, I quoted this:

While the Democratic electors in the states of Pennsylvania and Georgia are casting their votes for Joe Biden, slates of Republican electors in those states cast votes for President Trump just in case legal challenges succeed.

There’s also word that Michigan may be doing it as well. Michigan GOP Electors were prevented from getting into the state house to vote. But they can vote anywhere.

So what that means is that they are trying to ensure that ultimately they have enough votes on record.

It also offers Congress and the state legislatures an alternate slate of electors in the contested states.

Here’s how “politifact” later described (January of 2022) what happened back then:

But on the same day — Dec. 14, 2020 — something unusual happened: In several battleground states where Joe Biden had defeated President Donald Trump, representatives of the losing side decided that they, too, would gather as purported electors to sign certificates falsely attesting to a Trump win and submit them for approval by Congress.

Months later, American Oversight, a watchdog group that seeks to hold Trump accountable through public records requests, published the phony certificates calling them “part of the failed attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election.”

This was no small caper by a few disappointed Trump loyalists.

The fake electoral certificates were signed by Republican state lawmakers and party officials in Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada and New Mexico, states accounting for a combined 84 electoral votes. And like the violent insurrectionists who came to the Capitol on Jan. 6 with knives, bats and other weapons, the fake electors sought to overturn a democratic election through extralegal means. They did so in a coordinated effort, mostly out in the open, and through official channels.

Note how the contingency of court approval is described:

The certificates in Pennsylvania and New Mexico hedged by tweaking the language suggesting that they would be the electors if it was later determined they were the electors — for instance, through a final court order…

“It was not freelancing. It was a coordinated effort,” said Norman Eisen, who was special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during the first Donald Trump impeachment and co-authored a report for Brookings about Trump’s effort to overturn the results in Georgia. “These appear to be false documents that were submitted to the federal government. They were handed in to the National Archives as the genuine articles are supposed to be.”

And everyone knew what they were and what they were intended to be.

See this for what’s happening now:

According to the Washington Examiner, questions are being asked about what Trump said in meetings around the time, including what he may have told others to do in regards to stopping the certification of the election results. One specific line of inquiry entails the so-called “false electors” scheme members of the press have been going nuts over.

This Washington Examiner story adds:

The investigation aims to uncover what the former president told his attorneys and senior officials to do as part of their bid to change the 2020 election outcome, and there are two other paths that could lead to additional scrutiny of Trump, the sources said.

One centers on seditious conspiracy and conspiracy to obstruct a government proceeding, similar to charges levied against individuals who were arrested for storming the Capitol. Another involves charging Trump with fraud in connection to the false electors plot or his efforts to pressure the DOJ to overturn the results of the election.

At RedState, “bonchie” adds:

None of the “false electors” ever cast a vote for anything, they didn’t interfere with the election, and the original electors cast their votes for Joe Biden. If that’s what the DOJ is probing, good luck proving a “seditious conspiracy” without any actual attempt at sedition on the record. Besides, how can something be a conspiracy when the plans were public knowledge at the time?

My response is that (a) they will take the actual facts and use them to allege something more nefarious, and this effort will include threats to the former Trump associates they want testifying a certain way; and (b) if they want to charge Trump, they will do so in DC and they will get the verdict they want no matter if the charges are incredibly flimsy.

After the Flynn case (and even before that), anything is possible. The only real question is whether they will actually try to do it, or whether they will be afraid of backlash and/or think a trial is not necessary because they think they have better means to accomplish their ends.

Open thread 7/28/22

The New Neo Posted on by

There are tiny houses, and then there are teeny teeny tiny houses. People who can pare down to this extent and keep it liveable must be extremely organized. In this van, it also helps to have strong squatting muscles:

Manchin and Schumer, together at last

The New Neo Posted on by

A compromise has been reached – surprise, surprise (not) – but the details aren’t quite ironed out yet:

Sen. Joe Manchin announced Wednesday that he came to an agreement with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on a reconciliation bill, after more than a year of negotiations among Democrats…

But with Democrats grasping for a legislative win ahead of the midterms, Schumer, D-N.Y., kept up talks directly with Manchin through the spring and summer. In a lengthy statement, the moderate senator said Wednesday those talks resulted in a deal for a slimmed-down bill that includes tax, climate and prescription drug provisions…

Manchin said in his statement that the bill will have a minimum 15% tax on companies worth more than $1 billion and invests in several forms of energy, including fossil fuel, nuclear and renewables. This is on top of agreements Democrats previously came to on prescription drugs and extending subsidies included in the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

“I now propose and will vote for the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. Rather than risking more inflation with trillions in new spending, this bill will cut the inflation taxes Americans are paying, lower the cost of health insurance and prescription drugs, and ensure our country invests in the energy security and climate change solutions,” Manchin said…

According to Schumer’s and Manchin’s offices, the bill will raise $739 billion in revenue through IRS tax enforcement, the corporate minimum tax, IRS tax enforcement and closing the carried interest loophole. It will spend $433 billion total, they said, on energy and climate change provisions and on the ACA extension…
“Senate Democrats can change the name of Build Back Broke as many times as they want, it won’t be any less devastating to American families and small businesses,,” Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said. “Raising taxes on job creators, crushing energy producers with new regulations, and stifling innovators looking for new cures will only make this recession worse, not better.”

“With inflation at a 41-year high and a looming recession, Democrats want higher taxes, more government spending, and to attack American energy,” Senate GOP Conference Chair John Barrasso, R-Wyo., added. “So much for helping American families.”

Sometimes these agreements run into a glitch along the way. This one may or may not, but my guess is that it will ultimately pass, perhaps after a short hitch or two. My other guess is that if it does, it won’t gain Democrats the approval of voters that aren’t already on their side.

The Biden administration is the bully threatening to take kids’ lunch money

The New Neo Posted on by

Accepting federal funds is accepting federal control through federal threats to withhold those funds.

Here’s an example:

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in May announced that K-12 schools must comply with its interpretation of the ban on discrimination based on sex in Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which includes sexual orientation and gender identity — and allowing boys to use girls’ restrooms and locker rooms — in order to receive federal funding for school breakfasts, lunches, and other food items.

And yet it’s the Republicans who are supposed to be the meanies.

Twenty-two states have decided to sue, led by Indiana AG Todd Rokita. The lawsuit was filed in the Eastern District of Tennessee, and alleges the following:

…[T]he USDA’s Guidance is unlawful because it:

–was issued without providing the State and other stakeholders the opportunity for input as required by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA),
–was premised on a misreading and misapplication of the Supreme Court’s holding in Bostock v. Clayton County, and
–imposes new and unlawful regulatory measures on state agencies and operators receiving federal financial assistance from the USDA, which will inevitably result in regulatory chaos that threatens essential nutritional services to some of the most vulnerable citizens.

This is another example of the executive branch of the administration trying to use agencies in order to to exceed its power and control states through that power. I’m glad to see so many states challenging it.

I think I can explain this bizarre-seeming phenomenon

The New Neo Posted on by

John Hinderaker observes:

Kamala Harris hosted some kind of event earlier today. Several mask-wearing (why?) women participated. As is now common in gatherings of liberals, they began the meeting by introducing themselves and stating their pronouns. And, weirdly, by describing themselves–their hair color, the dresses they were wearing, whatever. This might possibly make sense if it were a meeting of blind people, otherwise not. Utterly bizarre.

This tweet has a two short clips of the meeting:

It doesn’t appear to make sense – unless you realize that the left now defines everything connected with personal identity (with the possible exception of race, and even that depends on the circumstances) as being determined by subjective perception and wishes. In other words, your self-described identity can trump reality because truth and reality are not determined objectively.

So if you are a man such as Lia Thomas and would like to be called “she,” so be it. If you are one person and would like to be called by a plural pronoun, so be it. If you are a member of a protected group and think someone has dissed you, that person has done so. If you have voluntary sex with someone and thereafter change your mind and decide you were somehow coerced, and then accuse that person of sexually assaulting you (and the accused person identifies as a man), then that person is guilty and can even be kicked out of college on the basis of your accusation, without any objective proof and even if the objective evidence (texts, for example) would otherwise tend to exonerate him. If someone – anyone – on the left takes offense at something you say, you better apologize to that person.

So if Kamala Harris is obviously a woman and everyone who isn’t colorblind or literally blind can see that she is wearing a blue suit, one cannot assume that it is obviously true. There is no truth except the subjective wishes of Kamala Harris concerning how she would like to be perceived by others. So if she decided to say that she’s wearing a yellow suit, so be it.

And if she was sitting there naked and claimed she had on a beautiful article of clothing…oh, well, I guess that story already has been written.

More on the left’s language game

The New Neo Posted on by

Commenter “Bauxite” observes:

The language game is the MO of the left. It works most of the time because most of our political and policy debates occur in the realm of abstract theory. The left can bluff its way through with fancy words and a few studies from academic ideologues. A lot of the left’s recent problems have come from trying to play the language game with issues that are tangible and imminent.

Agreed. And the more tangible and personal, the more difficult the language game becomes.

Difficult, but not impossible.

Bauxite continues:

So compare climate change versus COVID. On climate change, every person alive today will be dead before climate change theories are proven or disproven. Everything is in the realm of theory. No person can perceive an average annual temperature increase of a few degrees.

Here’s where I differ. It’s not that these statements are wrong; I agree that climate change (AGW) rhetoric works better because of this indeterminate nature. But it’s not necessary for people to perceive the actual average annual differences. It’s enough that weather is redefined as climate. So every heatwave is attributed to climate change, and every cold snap too – because climate change is said to encourage greater fluctuations of all kinds.

What’s more, I don’t see how climate change theories can ever be proven or disproven, if many of the recommendations of the AGW people are actually implemented. If they fail to work and the climate warms, the proponents will say they weren’t done fast enough or comprehensively enough. If the climate fails to warm, they will say “See? They worked!” and it will be difficult to impossible to prove that it wasn’t the policies; it was just that the predictions were wrong.

If their policies aren’t implemented and things still go smoothly, then they can always move their dire predictions to a time in the future. That already has happened to a certain extent, and although it may have caused some people to doubt them, the theories still have plenty of adherants, including most climate scientists. That last fact gives the theories more believability for a great many people, too.

Bauxite compares to COVID:

On COVID, though, it didn’t work. The dire predictions of 2M dead in the US by June of 2020 were actually tested on a perceivable time frame, and they were off by two orders of magnitude. When people could see with their own eyes that the COVID restrictions were not justified, they ended, eventually.

To certain extent I agree. But again, I know that for many people it didn’t work that way. For those people, the explanation for the fact that the number of deaths was not as predicted is that worldwide lockdowns occurred. So they attribute the lower numbers to the lockdowns as well as other public health measures.

More from Bauxite:

On the economy, I think that the left will run into the same problem. Economic performance is tangible and imminent. You can’t bamboozle people with a dog and pony show and a few sympathetic studies.

Agreed. That’s one of the main reasons the administration is polling poorly. The economy is something that affects people very personally and very obviously, and not only has the administration made bad decisions around it, but they project a “let them eat cake” attitude that does not sit well.

The administration persists in its tone-deaf messaging on the economy despite its lack of success because they really are out of other ideas – other than changing their policy goals, which they will not do.

On puberty blockers for children with gender dysphoria

The New Neo Posted on by

The pharmaceutical treatment of children who present with gender dysphoria is getting more widespread. Children cannot validly consent, but they – and transgender activists on social media, plus therapists and doctors who believe in “affirming” the chosen new gender – can persuade parents it is in the child’s best interests. One way this is done is by stating that the child is at risk of suicide if it isn’t done, and social media sites actually instruct children and teenagers to tell parents and therapists that they are suicidal even if they’re not, in order to obtain such treatment.

Puberty is often difficult, even for those who don’t suffer from gender dysphoria. For example, I had a very early puberty – shortly after my tenth birthday (that’s probably the most intimate information you’re ever going to get out of me). Fortunately, I was also nearly fully grown, so I looked about sixteen. That didn’t make me happy, because I was really just a child, and looking like a woman took some adjusting to, as you might imagine. But at no point did it ever occur to me to stop the process – which wouldn’t have been possible anyway. Nor did it ever occur to me that I might “really” be a man.

Fortunately, social media didn’t exist. If it had, I still don’t think I would have thought myself a man, but who knows? I grew up in a world that’s very different from today’s. I’m just glad it was less confusing back then, or I believe I would have had an even harder time. My point, though, is that today’s youths are subject to a lot more confusion and a lot more pressure (including sexual pressure from puberty on), and it doesn’t surprise me that many believe that changing sexes might solve their problems.

The are a great many untold dangers to puberty blockers. For example, there is apparently a rare side effect of something called pseudotumor cerebri, and the FDA has issued a warning about that.

But there are much more common problems:

The [British] NHS has changed their guidance on puberty blockers. From previously claiming that blockers “are considered to be fully reversible” the NHS webpage now states:

“Little is known about the long-term side effects of hormone or puberty blockers in children with gender dysphoria.”

Although blocking the progression of puberty can in some cases relieve the immediate distressing symptoms suffered by children with gender dysphoria, the evidence is mixed. The long term effects are unknown. There have been no long term studies on the effectiveness of puberty blockers and it is unknown whether interrupting natural puberty alters the natural trajectory and perhaps resolution of gender dysphoria in children.

Gender identity is shaped during puberty and adolescence as young people’s bodies become more sexually differentiated and mature. Given how little we understand about gender identity and how it is formed and consolidated, we should be cautious about interfering with the normal process of sexual maturation.

What we do know however is that virtually all the children who start on puberty blockers eventually go onto cross-sex hormones suggesting that changing their minds is rare once natural puberty is interrupted.

The Tavistock’s own published study on their Early Intervention trial shows that of 44 children given puberty blockers, 43 (98%) progressed to cross-sex hormones…

Cross-sex hormones have serious lifelong effects which cannot be reversed if treatment is discontinued. If a child takes puberty blockers at Tanner stage 2 of puberty followed by cross-sex hormones at age 16 they will be sterilised as gametes have not developed…

Proponents of the use of puberty blockers say that not only do these drugs relieve the distressing symptoms of ‘the wrong puberty’ in childhood but also prevent the body from undergoing irreversible changes which then have to be modified surgically during adulthood. For example, permanent growth of breasts in females which may necessitate a double mastectomy in the future. Alternatively, permanent facial hair growth in males which may necessitate its removal in the future. However, what is rarely discussed is the effect on the reproductive and sexual development of the child.

Puberty blockers followed by opposite sex hormones cannot create ‘opposite sex puberty’, only secondary sex characteristics of the opposite sex. However, normal sexual or reproductive development will not occur. Girls will not begin menstruation and so will be infertile. Boys testes will not grow and develop and will impact on fertility. The change therefore is only cosmetic. A boy’s penis will remain immature and remain the size of a child’s into adulthood. This will cause problems sexually if the penis is retained, both functionally and in terms of sexual arousal. It is also problematic if gender reassignment surgery is later chosen since there is too little material to use from the penis and testicles.

Much more at the link.

The Mayo Clinic site has similar information, although it whitewashes it a bit:

If children with male genitalia begin using GnRH analogues early in puberty, they might not develop enough penile and scrotal skin for certain gender affirming genital surgical procedures, such as penile inversion vaginoplasty. Alternative techniques, however, are available.

The site doesn’t mention what they are, but they are described here. You may note at that site that the surgery involves a very lengthy recovery period (12 to 18 months) and it also requires lifelong periodic vaginal dilation.

To take a completely healthy child – and one who often would otherwise grow up to be a fully functioning gay or lesbian person – and set that person on this road through puberty blockers is child abuse, IMHO. At what age can so-called “bottom surgery” be done? It varies somewhat, but for example Boston Children’s Hospital sets the age at 17. And a person qualifies at 17 without parental consent, as far as I can tell (the age for “top” surgery, or mastectomy, is 15).

The FBI whistleblowers and the Hunter Biden laptop coverup

The New Neo Posted on by

I remember, when the Hunter Biden laptop first came out shortly before the 2020 election, that I had a moment of thinking it might become a big scandal – which it deserved to be. But almost immediately the news was suppressed and discredited, and the media cooperated, and I thought of course. I knew they had to protect the Bidens at all costs, and if one cost was their integrity, well then, they really had no integrity left by that time anyway.

I also recall hearing that the FBI had received the laptop from the store’s proprietor much earlier (turns out it was in December of 2019), and had supposedly been investigating it. It didn’t surprise me, either, that not only had the investigation gone absolutely nowhere, but that in this case there were no leaks to the public – and in fact the reports that did get out later about the FBI investigation said it concerned whether the laptop’s contents were Russian disinformation. The reason for all of this seemed the same: the FBI was determined to protect Joe and his family.

Therefore this news is utterly unsurprising:

Several FBI whistleblowers say that the agency’s probe into Hunter Biden was internally sabotaged during the 2020 election in order to derail the investigation, after agents wrongfully deemed verified evidence as “disinformation” to ignore.

According to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), agents investigating Hunter “opened an assessment which was used by an FBI headquarters team to improperly discredit negative Hunter Biden information as disinformation and caused investigative activity to cease,” adding that his office received “a significant number of protected communications from highly credible whistleblowers” regarding the investigation.

It’s a bit late and a dollar short for all this whistleblowing, isn’t it? Not that it would have mattered at the time, because all of social media as well as almost all of the MSM (with the exception of a few outlets on the right such as The NY Post) had resolved to shut the scandal down, too, and they would have also shut down news of the FBI shutdown if it had come to them.

From the Washington Examiner:

FBI supervisory intelligence agent Brian Auten opened in August 2020 the assessment that was later used by the agency, according to the disclosures. One of the whistleblowers claimed the FBI assistant special agent in charge of the Washington field office, Timothy Thibault, shut down a line of inquiry into Hunter Biden in October 2020 despite some of the details being known to be true at the time.

A whistleblower also said Thibault “ordered closed” an “avenue of additional derogatory Hunter Biden reporting,” according to Grassley, even though “all of the reporting was either verified or verifiable via criminal search warrants.” The senator said Thibault “ordered the matter closed without providing a valid reason as required” and that FBI officials “subsequently attempted to improperly mark the matter in FBI systems so that it could not be opened in the future,” according to the disclosures…

The new information comes after Auten was involved in the Trump-Russia investigation, including interviewing Igor Danchenko, the alleged main source for British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s dossier in 2017. Congressional sources confirmed to the Washington Examiner that Auten is the “Supervisory Intel Agent” from DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s 2019 report on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act abuse.

By the way, if you look at the Wiki page for “Hunter Biden laptop controversy” and read the first paragraph of the introductory part – a summary that probably constitutes what many people seeking general information would look at and go no further – you could easily still get the idea that the laptop information is bogus and/or suspect. Here’s some of the copy there [the remarks in brackets are mine]:

The Hunter Biden laptop controversy involves a laptop computer that was allegedly [“allegedly”?] dropped off at a repair shop in Wilmington, Delaware, by an unidentified person [the owner has a receipt with the signature “Hunter Biden” that has been authenticated] in April 2019 and never collected. The New York Post published a story stating the allegation three weeks before the 2020 United States presidential election, and president Donald Trump seized [“Republicans seize!!” is always the big story] on it in an attempt to engineer [“engineer” indicates something contrived; this was certainly real] an “October surprise”. The laptop was of unclear origin [not in the least; it is “disinformation” to say so, and the disinformation was designed to protect the Bidens] and contained emails obtained by Donald Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and other materials relating to Hunter Biden, some of which were later confirmed as authentic [many have been confirmed as authentic and not one of them has been confirmed as inauthentic]. The discovery of the laptop spurred speculation as to whether it supported what became the Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory, which falsely [there is no indication the “conspiracy” theory is false, and quite a bit that it is true] alleged that the then vice president Joe Biden acted corruptly in Ukraine to protect his son from a corruption investigation by Ukrainian Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin [what’s more, that’s not the only type of corruption alleged about Joe Biden in Ukraine; there are allegations that he was on the take as well, through Hunter’s reimbursement].

Just now I did a search for stories on Grassley and the whistleblowers’ allegations about the FBI quashing the laptop story, and aside from news outlets on the right such as the NY Post, Fox, and the Washington Examiner, so far I could only find one regular liberal/left MSM outlet mentioning it. That is CBS News, and it doesn’t surprise me that the story is by Catherine Herridge, a good reporter who used to be at Fox.

The Biden administration says a recession by any other name would smell as sweet

The New Neo Posted on by

The Biden administration continues the Obama administration’s emphasis on labeling, as though calling something by a different name would fool people into actually seeing it differently. Why do they do this? The main reason is that they believe in the power of words to shape perceptions.

And this is true to a certain extent, particularly for those on their side. For example, how many Democrats now call illegal immigrants (or, to be more retro, illegal aliens), “undocumented migrants” or something of the sort, and believe they should have full rights? Quite a few.

So when is a recession not a recession? When the administration decides it’s not:

What is a recession? While some maintain that two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP constitute a recession, that is neither the official definition nor the way economists evaluate the state of the business cycle. Instead, both official determinations of recessions and economists’ assessment of economic activity are based on a holistic look at the data—including the labor market, consumer and business spending, industrial production, and incomes. Based on these data, it is unlikely that the decline in GDP in the first quarter of this year—even if followed by another GDP decline in the second quarter—indicates a recession.

First of all, I don’t think most people care what it’s called – they know what they know, and a poor economy is one of those in-your-face realities that it’s harder for government to lie about, although they can certainly try. Call it macaroni, call it whatever you want – it still stinks.

And then there’s this:

NOTE: The title of this post comes, as you probably know, from the balcony scene in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”, one of my favorite plays. Juliet doesn’t know Romeo is listening, and she’s musing on the fact that she’s fallen in love with the scion of her family’s hated enemy:

Jul. ’Tis but thy name that is my enemy;
Thou art thyself though, not a Montague.
What’s Montague? it is nor hand, nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O! be some other name:
What’s in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call’d,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name;
And for that name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself.
Rom. I take thee at thy word.
Call me but love, and I’ll be new baptiz’d;
Henceforth I never will be Romeo.