08:07 – The taxes are done, other than printing off final copies to mail in. I’ll print those today, Barbara will sign the returns tonight, and I’ll mail them tomorrow.
So, it’ll be Romney versus Obama in November. I don’t much like Romney, to put it mildly, but he’s certainly worlds better than Obama. Let’s hope that Romney kicks Obama’s ass in November, and that the Republicans retake the Senate on Romney’s coattails. Ordinarily, I prefer that the president and congress be at each other’s throats, but we really need the Republicans in control to repeal all the laws that the Democrats passed and undo as much as possible of the damage that Obama, Reid, Pelosi, and their crowd have done.
And it looks like the economy will turn sour again, just in time to frustrate Obama’s hopes. From about mid-2011, telegraph.co.uk had a “Financial Crisis” link on the hot news bar on their front page every day. That disappeared a few weeks ago, but I predict it will soon be back. The effects of Draghi’s LTRO have by now pretty much completely worn off, and the market euphoria from the Greek default is fast dissipating. People are realizing that the LTRO and Greek default didn’t improve matters at all. Fundamentally, Europe is still bankrupt, and now the vultures are coming home to roost. The euro crisis is about to come roaring back, worse than ever before. Europe, having wasted a lot of money to buy a little time, is now in a worse position than it was. Spain will soon be forced to seek a bail-out, with Portugal and Italy not far behind. And the cupboard is bare. This will be an exciting spring and summer.