Good Morning all of you brilliant minds currently residing out there in reality land; your King of Simple News is on the air.

At the bottom of many investment contracts, stated in extra fine print…or, in blazing speech, following a TV or radio investment advertisement, the words, “Past performance is not a guarantee of future results,” is attempted to be slipped past us.

What are they saying? Have you ever gone fishing and gotten completely skunked, only to have another fisherman say, “You should have been here last week?” What changed to make fishing good last week and nada this week?

When we hear the talking heads say that recessions’ normally last about two years, they are referring to past history and expecting for the earlier period to repeat itself as timely as Old Faithful spews out hot water every 90 minutes. But wait, in 1974, 1989, and 1991, Old Faithful lost its rhythm and ran late. But why?

The word that we are looking for to explain the inaccuracies of historical repeats is “circumstances.” The definition of circumstances was apparently not taught at Harvard, as President Obama is still trying to figure out why jobs continue to be lost. After all, historically, these recessions are short and sweet; and he was very much counting on a historical repeat.

Merriam Webster defines “Circumstances,” as; a condition, fact, or event accompanying, conditioning, or determining another: an essential or inevitable concomitant.

So then, to “normalize,” historical events and to determine the level of probability for those events to repeat themselves, one must first examine the circumstances that surrounded the prior event and then determine whether those same circumstances exist today. More importantly, we must determine whether current circumstances exist that would absolutely prohibit a repeat of history. Uh-oh.

As a simple example, each and every year since the first oil well was drilled in China using bamboo drill stems in 347 A.D., our planet has produced greater and greater quantities of the black gold without fail. Certainly then, an event that has historically repeated for 1662 years is a sure thing to do it again next year; right?

Well, maybe not. A new report out today states that we have reached the end of the yellow brick road for that historical repeat.  here  Ya see, circumstances changed; humans now consume more oil than the earth can produce.

Our current plight is often compared to that of the Great Depression, which is unfortunate, because America has made some staggering changes in circumstances since 1929 that are not being given their just importance.

The Great Depression lasted for some 18 years. From 1929 until the end of WW-II, America was held in the grips of Depression. It is my studied opinion that the Great Depression was brought on (and drug out) by unchecked capitalism and greed (one of the same), combined with poor political decisions; rather than by any actual critical fault in our base society of that time period. But that’s a whole nother subject. The fact remains that the Great Depression did occur and lasted for a very long time.

We are constantly told that safeguards have been put into place to assure that a repeat of the horrors of the Great Depression will never occur again. In other words, the circumstances that surrounded the Depression have been eliminated from any possibility of reoccurring. Has anyone ever explained to you exactly what those safeguards consist of?

While this may seem to be a complex subject, when reduced to Mikeronomics, it really isn’t. The safeguards that were installed are that government is willing to encumber future generations to whatever extent necessary in order for our generation not to suffer from the consequences of own idiotic planning. And that is what all of those who predict a full recovery for me, me, me, are counting on.

The pundits who continually promise a full recovery to our “borrow and spend” past are simply counting on there being no limits to the burden that can be shifted to the innocent bystanders of the future. “Kick the can” isn’t a game; it’s the basis of our entire economic underpinnings!!!

 I only wish that planning to grow forever in a finite world was merely idiotic; unfortunately, it’s impossible. But, we wouldn’t want a little thing like facts get in our way.

My opinion remains unchanged in that the United States has reached maximum viable employment. When the artificial stimulus is withdrawn (or reaches its outer limits), the artificial jobs that were created will collapse along with millions of artificial jobs that already existed.  

We have reached the limits for our precious resources to support us at the unrealistic population levels and standard of living that we had briefly become accustomed to. The past 40 years of supporting growth by creating a mirror image of debt, in league with vigorous population expansion, has created circumstances that brought our economy to an abrupt halt.

“Circumstances,” is a powerful word.