I trust the government numbers on inflation and here is why.

While food and gas are way up other things are way down. I just got a 60 in flat screen TV that would have cost about $2400 dollars last year. I bought it for $800. My house was down about 20% from the price I would have paid a year ago. Clothes a cheaper, toys are cheaper, furniture is cheaper, computers are cheaper, and cars are way cheaper. Most Americans will buy some of these big ticket items annually.

Any increase I see in gas or food is mostly off-set by the savings on that TV alone. If using the house price as a guage we are seeing deflation in our economy.

So as far as the amount of inflation seen throughout the entire economy I think the government calculations give a pretty good indication.

As I stated already inflation has become a concern this year for the first time under Bush. I'm more inclined to believe government stats over a conspiracy theory web site. There's a reason when government stats are released financial analysts take note and the financial markets react. The govt figure gives us a broad measure of inflation and not just individual areas as you state above. Besides heath care inflation along with college tuition increases are not exclusive to Bush's term.

Why would your hero do such a thing? Clinton was able to reduce the rate of spending increases but government spending still increased overall. How much of this reduction was due to military cuts as opposed to domestic spending? The ending of the Cold War gave Clinton a golden opportunity to reduce overall spending so you can thank Ronald Reagan for the cuts.

http://www.heritage.org/research/fe...d-2008-boc-C6-Defense-Spending-Is-on-the.html

You are completely oblivious to the concept of cutting government expenses. You don't even acknowledge cuts as a means of reducing the deficit. It's all about taxes with you.

This is exactly what your Hero Clinton did and it worked. Spending under Clinton increased every year except one year in which is was flat. Clinton was able to slow down the rate of spending increases due to the ending of the Cold War as I explained in a previous post.

http://www.heritage.org/research/fe...08-boc-S1-Federal-Spending-Has-Increased.html

They did not fail. Those tax cuts made the economy resilient considering the enormous pressures put on the economy due to the Nasdaq crash and 9/11. You can't discount that these two major events had a long lasting negative effect on the economy. And there you go again. You choose to ignore the fact that the middle class received a large tax cut under Bush.

http://allfinancialmatters.com/2008/02/27/the-middle-class-and-taxes-under-clinton-and-bush/

Doom and gloom.

All the talk about drilling for more oil by Republicans along with decreased demand has led to the drop.

According to your conspiracy theory sites inflation started early in 2000 so if it takes years of bad policy to creep into the system then you are talking Clinton administration. Do these sites even show "inflation" charts during the Clinton term?

Are you talking about technology costing less in a year's time? Isn't that the nature of technology? The new cutting edge stuff is still expensive.

I guess a waning housing market offsets inflation. I hadn't thought of that before.

I haven't noticed this.

It just seems to me like working class families are having a tougher go of it. I am in Florida, so maybe I'm not getting a clear view of what's going on around the country.

What about Bush I?

We probably need to drill for oil, but it will hardly put a dent in gas prices. Alternatives are the best hope for the future.

I am not oblivious to cutting govt. spending, I'm practical. I have never seen a year over year federal budget go down. Your view is impractical. You advocate a position that has not occurred in the real world in the US in the last century.

It is not all about taxes with me. It is all about fiscal responsibility. If you don't want to raise taxes, then don't raise spending. If you want to raise spending, fine, provide the taxes to cover the expense or grow the economy into it.

Do Not cut taxes, raise spending, balloon the deficit, trash the dollar, trigger inflation, and consider yourself fiscally responsible.

Yes, the NASDAQ crash and 9/11 had material lasting effects on the economy. You attribute the recovery to the tax cuts, and ignore the action of the fed to cut rates to the bone during that period of weakness. How do you know the tax cuts worked at all? The rate cuts typically work better, which is what the fed always does, and has done again since the housing bubble burst. You have never explained why it was necessary to drop fed funds to 1% in 03 and 04, 2 to 3 years after the recovery was underway in late 01. (hint, the tax cuts hadn't worked).

In your love of the tax cuts, you have never acknowledged the harm to the economy they have inflicted, the huge deficits (highest annual one and highest 8 year total deficit in history). Where do you think the weak dollar came from, and the inflation we have?

Here's a current new article:

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/t...ectors/banking_and_finance/article4563171.ece

If you don't want to be fed lies and pablum by the administration (whichever is in power), or by the stock brokerage community, or by the press which seems to be in cahoots with the administration to not panic the people, read articles from the UK specifically, europe, and asia. They are not trying to pacify the people and I find them intellectually much more honest and blunt.

Wrong. Repubs wanting to credit repubs with something for which they deserve no credit. Talk of drilling that will not produce oil for 7 years best case is NOT actionable investment info for today. I'm an investor, and its just noise. Actual drops in usage, which we see today, that is actionable investment info, and it knocked the speculators to sell their long positions. The stampede for the exits took oil down 20% in 4 weeks. That was based on real info (drop in demand) squashing speculators.

(in the pure "talk" category, there was also the dem hearing on the "impact of speculators" on oil prices and threats to "do something" to blunt the effect of futures speculators, which would hold potential to knock speculators out of the box since it could be much more immediate than possibly drilling and hitting oil in 7 years).