Our recession, like Japan's, is due to poor monetary policy

"Recessions, in short, are positive, and historically brief occurrences that signal an economy on the mend. Failure to allow recessions to run their course in order to weed out bad investments and poor management merely ensures longer periods of economic strife; thus Japan's lost '90s decade, and ours at present."

http://www.forbes.com/2010/08/12/japan-deflation-united-states-opinions-columnists-john-tamny.html?partner=commentary_newsletter

Very interesting, and very scary, reading -- it seems we *know* what to do, and what not to do about the recession and recovery -- and our government is earnestly and relentlessly doing exactly the things it should not do, and refusing to do the things it should do. It is repeating the mistakes of Japan in the 1990s, condemning us to a decade of no growth.

It is all too depressing.

Economics 101: Why Is Gas So Expensive?

Are gas prices really all that high? Yes? Here, have a history lesson: "Something that cost $1.00 in 1950 would cost about $8.78 today. As for gas prices, in 1950 the price of gas was approximately 30 cents per gallon. Adjusted for inflation, a gallon of gas today should cost right at $2.64, assuming taxes are the same." (Which they aren't, of course.)

So says this article on the Mises Institute site that contains more common sense and overlooked facts than anything you are likely to have been reading in your newspapers or hearing on your daily newscast -- or reading in the online blogs, for that matter, or you will EVER hear from your Congressperson.

And get an answer to a surprising question: "Why are gas prices not higher than they are?"

Never thought to ask the question that way, did you? Lots of interesting surprises in this short article -- give it a look, upgrade your understand A LOT.