Hello Obama: We are not in a recession

"Our economy is in serious trouble. You can feel it in your own lives and see it in your own communities. I hear it everywhere I go."
Barack Obama, May 3, 2008

Here's some breaking news for Barack Obama and his enablers in the mainstream media. Despite all of the doom-and-gloom panic peddling, we are not in a recession.

A recession is defined by most economists as two consecutive quarters with negative growth. We have not had even one of those during our so-called "economic downturn."

From AP:

The economy plodded ahead at a 0.9 percent pace in the first quarter — slightly better than first estimated — but still underscoring caution on the part of consumers and businesses walloped by housing, credit and financial problems.

The new reading on gross domestic product, released by the Commerce Department on Thursday, was an improvement from the government's initial growth estimate for the January-to-March quarter as well as the economy's performance in the final quarter of last year. Both periods were pegged at a 0.6 percent growth rate.

Gross domestic product, or GDP, measures the value of all goods and services produced within the United States.

The first-quarter performance matched analysts' forecasts and offered a somewhat encouraging sign because it showed the economy was still growing at that time. The figure didn't meet a definition of recession, which under a rough rule is two straight quarters of shrinking GDP, and might raise hopes the country can dodge a full-blown downturn.

Unfortunately Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee, sees political opportunity in talking down the economy. Much of the mainstream media (Hello MSNBC!) is covertly in the Obama camp, and they enjoy touting the "Recession of 2008."

Repeat after me: "We are not in a recession." The economy may be sluggish, but it still is in a "Yes we can" mode.

Technorati tags: Election Democrats economy business recession Obama Barack Obama Yes we can media bias