-
The New York Stock Exchange - Source: Reuters -
Related
Driving up out of Manhattan, heading to the America's Cup hearing at the New York State Court of Appeals in the state capital, Albany, we took the bellicosely-named Major Deegan expressway.
As we shuddered along the pitted and patched roadway, I said - ok, in that casual jingoistic way of the expat - that the roads would never be so poor in New Zealand.
"This is like Bosnia," snorted my passenger. He's an American, and no he hasn't been to Bosnia, it's a figure of speech, but you get the point.
Before what the New York Times has come to call "The Reckoning", the paucity of American infrastructure was presented as a lifestyle choice, tax cuts rather than spending, ice cream over spinach.
But even that elective aspect in this economy seems now to have been an expensive luxury.
I've been trying to catalogue the fraying of the US, or at least to explain it in the visible changes around New York.
Some of the story is explained in the empty taxis skittering around Times Square last night when we were filming there, tooting inquisitively, touting for business.
Other parts of it are in the signs we saw on Fifth Avenue, heading back to the studio: "Going out of Business!" "50 per cent off!"
Or take the three stores in a row, emptied and with brown paper in the window, on the Upper East Side. Around the corner is an empty Circuit City, gone, gutted, out of business.
Some places, some businesses prefer to hide the grim truth behind a polite facade, like the bank branch I passed last night (a Bank of America, from memory) that had been closed, and was insisting that for the convenience of customers, it had been relocated to an address nearby.
The story is there in the gloom merchants, like Dr Peter Schiff , aka "Dr Doom" who has predicted that this recession will become a Depression as bad as the 1930s.
When I interviewed Schiff in his office on Park Avenue, he praised Roger Douglas, and told an amusing "small world/small country" story about dating a New Zealander.
I doubt he would approve of the bank rescue plan announced by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner , or President Obama's stimulus plan , passed in the Senate - around 1.5 trillion plus in NZ dollars. A portion of the latter is assigned to infrastructure. This is the very plan that Republican Senators held up because they believed it was wasteful, even though in the past eight years Republicans presided over the largest expansion of government spending in decades.
I don't know how to tie this all together, the failing of something as simple as roading, the finger pointing, the empty stores, the arguments over what is waste and what is stimulus.
The fraying of the US, a political, ideological and actual unravelling, began long before anyone thought of a recession or depression.
What's certain is that the skeins of this tattering reach from New York all the way to New Zealand.
Have you got an opinion on the issues that Tim discusses? Share them on the message board below.
World News Video
-
Dangerous rush to Everest summit (1:59)
-
Dozens killed in Syrian massacre (2:09)
-
'King of Romance' competes in Eurovision (1:46)
Add a Comment:
Post new commentNewzgal said on 2010-01-03 @ 15:46 NZDT: Report abusive post
Hi Tim, great blog. I agree right wingers have a Hobbesian view of existence, and like many I welcomed Obama’s presidency. However I always watched Fox News just to see how they were framing up the news (which far too many people rely on). I now find it more useful than ever to tune into the right just incase there is a kernel of truth in their rants as it seems the media and world have been far too soft on the new president and democrats, perfect recipe to slip things in!
jackdoitcrawford said on 2009-09-11 @ 23:24 NZDT: Report abusive post
Please don't label all people you disagree with, and put them in the same camp. Ayn Rand was pro abortion, achievement, reason, freedom, capitalism and happiness. She was definitely neither a conservative nor a libertarian. She also didn't want to live under a dictatorship. I see nothing wrong with this at all.
Kiwi in USA said on 2009-09-11 @ 17:58 NZDT: Report abusive post
I would have to disagree with Tim saying Bill ORielly is a right wing loon as if it were. He is defintly a independet and he always tells his viewers that. I know that there is plenty of loons like rush but come on, Obama is really turning America in the wrong direction. He has spent more money than all the presidents have combined. America is in trillions of dollars worth of debt.