Wonkette

Marketwatch wants you to cheer up. Well, not all of you, just the ones with investments and money who are freaking out because poor people are rioting over scarce food supplies, millions of foreclosed homes are sitting empty and unsold, and local governments are no longer able to afford police and firefighters to protect rich people from the hordes. What to do? Laugh, that’s what! MORE »

On this day in 1933, another smooth-talking Ivy League hopemonger won the White House during a terrible depression. He was also a minority in a way, in that he had no legs. Meet Franklin D. Roosevelt! You may have heard of him! MORE »

Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke testified about our flourishing American economy to Congress again today, and the economy’s just not good at all! He signaled more rate cuts would come to stave off the growing credit crisis, but balanced it with fears of inflation. As the Federal Reserve noted in its semi-annual policy report today, it foresees “a negative combination of below-trend growth and inflation rates topping 2% this year, though conditions are expected to start improving in 2009.” So we’ll have horrible stagflation for all of 2008, but Ben Bernanke will make 2009 wondrous! MORE »

BERNANKE SUGGESTS FED MIGHT KEEP LOWERING A KEY INTEREST RATE: Continued housing and credit crises blamed for sluggish economy. Happy Valentine’s Day, we are all doomed! [AP]

Do any of these tired old men want to be president? When the worst campaigner, the worst public speaker and the worst “conservative” is the frontrunner and presumed nominee — yeah, we’re talking about “Arizona” Senator John McCain — then we might as well let Hillary and Obama run against each other in the General Election, for fun. But that’s a dream for another day. For now, we are stuck with these old men who are sitting around the table at the senior center, vaguely complaining about Mexicans and Abortions. MORE »

They are sitting! They are serious! They are just saying “Ronald Reagan” again and again. It’s time to liveblog this very special debate from the Ronald Reagan Magical Library in Simi Valley, California. MORE »

Mitt Romney took an adventurous campaign turn today by trying to connect with the Fortune 500 C.E.O. crowd, a demographic that always votes for the most progressive, tax-hiking liberal candidates. He mentioned how hard it is to lay off workers, how much it eats away at your corporate humanity, and how he’s done it like 50 million times. Coincidentally, this purging of the soul took place before a Latino builders’ union. Ohhhh Mittens! MORE »

The economy is crumbling and very soon we will all be dead. For example, Apple expects sales to grow by 29% in its second fiscal quarter, and Wall Street is calling this a “disappointment” (Mr. Wall Street, he said it himself). But White House demon ice queen Dana Perino tells us “the long-term fundamental health of our economy is very strong,” which should ease the fears of the growing mortgage-default hobo brigade. [AP/Yahoo]

This recession scare, it’s real. Too real! The Federal Reserve, much to Ron Paul’s dismay, lowered the fed funds rate by 3/4 of a percentage point today to stave off a, hrm, bank panic of neo-Victorian proportion! MORE »

Thanks to Martin Luther King Jr.’s stand for economic justice and his resulting assassination which provided U.S. markets with a holiday from the global economic collapse, Wall Street didn’t get hit again until this morning. And by “Wall Street,” we mean your 401k, 403b, IRA, access to basic business or consumer credit, income, value of your house, and value of your young children’s labor (selling apples down on Main Street by the Starbucks soup kitchen). But don’t worry, because Ben Bernanke and his Federal Reserve superheroes just did an emergency interest rate cut. Head over to the PayDay Loan joint and pick up a case of Cristal! MORE »

If you’re freaked out over oil topping $90 a barrel for the first time in history, maybe this will add some depressing historical perspective: Oil topped $100 per barrel at another grim point in U.S. history when George Bush was first running for president and America’s imperial troubles in Iran and Iraq threatened our precious oil supply from the Persian Gulf — in 1980! MORE »

So, um, there’s this CNN video of Bush talking about the subprime mortgage meltdown. And there’s a frickin’ SPACE ALIEN standing over his right shoulder, presumably giving him his lines. Go ahead, watch the video. WHAT IS THAT OMG WHAT IS GOING ON?

Help for homeowners in trouble [CNN Video]