Conspiracy of Dunces?

I got an email today from a woman in England whom my husband dated briefly. I call her "The Fair Arlene," not entirely sarcastically. (Actually, she's good fun.) Anyway, she wrote to us this afternoon, superficially to compliment us on our wedding photos, but really to ask for my opinion of some video that alleges our current economic woes are the result of a cabal of international bankers who planned to undermine our economy. (Why a woman from Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, now living in the U.K., is concerned about the machinations of international bankers meddling in the U.S. economy, that I can't say.)

Anyway, I responded to her as follows -- and this is just what I dashed off in a rush, mind you, so no footnotes!

Arlene -- How nice to hear from you. Re: international bankers having it in for the U.S.: I hate to rain on a good conspiracy theory, but I have to suggest that we (Americans) managed to trash our own economy on all our own. I don't doubt we got help, but the whole thing has been the dog's breakfast. Here's my view of how it happened:

The dot-com boom in the mid- to late-90s was truly the rising tide that floated (almost) all boats in this country. That led to an explosion of the American tendency toward self-aggrandizement and arrogance. Truly wealthy people were convinced that they could do everything, buy everything, have everything. Merely moneyed people were convinced they were already really wealthy, or would end up very wealthy in short order. They favored regressive monetary policy that increased the opportunity (risk-free, they thought!) to make money hand-over-fist. Middle class folks also thought it was just a matter of time before they were rich too, so they voted in line with the wealthy. This was known as "aspirational voting."

So, when Bush took office in 2001, he inherited a surplus (not that we weren't still in debt, but we'd been making more money through tax and other revenues than we'd been spending) and a mandate to loosen or get rid of regulation that hampered the free market forces so loved by conservatives. The next thing you know, we have Enron (a company that really figured that their financial shell game was okay because, you know, they were making money), and the housing market that permitted absurd lending practices on the grounds that it was good for poor people to own their own houses, and after all, we're all making money. But then 9/11 happened (now, do you think that Osama bin Laden is in the pay of these shadowy international bankers? That would be hinky!), and Bush led us into not one but two wars in short order. Chasing after oil revenues was part of that, of course -- and don't miss the fact that the oil companies are pretty much the only sector making money hand-over-fist even today! -- plus the arrogance and self-aggrandizement natural to Republicans. (They *say* they're all about fiscal responsibility but it's a lie.) Well, just like Enron, so went the credit business entirely. And I'm not optimistic overall. But I really don't think anyone planned this. I'm pretty sure it happened the way all sorts of bad things happen: Nobody thought it could happen, so they failed to heed conventional wisdom and common sense, and then that it-could-never-happen bad thing happened.

As I say, though, if you prefer the elaborate conspiracy theory, don't let me stop you. There's undoubtedly enough bad news to fuel everyone's pessimism!

Take care -- Magdalen