"Former Sen. Phil Gramm, a top economic adviser to presumptive GOP nominee John McCain, referred to the economic slowdown as "a mental recession" and called the United States "a nation of whiners."
"Phil Gramm: Recession Is "Mental," America Is "Nation Of Whiners"
"McCain's top economic adviser Phil Gramm tells America to suck it up and stop complaining about the economy:
"You've heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession," he said, noting that growth has held up at about 1 percent despite all the publicity over losing jobs to India, China, illegal immigration, housing and credit problems and record oil prices. "We may have a recession; we haven't had one yet."
Financial institutions have written off millions of dollars.
Fannie Mae is near financial collapse.
Bank seizures have tripled.
Gas is heading toward 5 dollars per gallon with no end in sight.
Pension funds and 401Ks have lost value.
Major corporations (because tax laws are written in such a way that they can) have outsourced most of their manufacturing offshore.
People without jobs have no health insurance, and are many times cannot get the health services they need because they don't have the money to pay for them.
All these elements, sir, are not psychological: they are purely economic.
Of course, you wouldn't know, would you?
You and the rest of congress have voted yourselves the best retirement package and health care package that the taxpayer's dollar would buy for you.
And opening your mouth and making this statement in public is the US politician's 21st century equivalent to to Marie Antoinette's statement, about the starving French who could not buy bread, when she was reputed to have said "Let them eat cake!"
(Ahem)
You do remember the subsequent response of the French people to the excesses of their government, Senator, do you not?" -- Mike Rivero of What Really Happened
