Millions, Billions, Trillions? Oh, My!

Millions, Billions, Trillions? Oh, My!

What comes next after trillions? Quadrillions? Humungozillions?

Does it matter?

Good old Everett Dirksen, Republican senator and minority leader from Illinois in the 1960′s, is most remembered and credited today for his semi-tongue-in-cheek reflection that, “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money.”

That cynical reference to the uninhibited spending of LBJ’s Democrats during the “Great Society,” which proved to be not so great and which in fact devolved into an economic disaster, is today fiscally as antiquated as high-button shoes have been for a century. In 2010, Dirksen would probably scratch his hoary, grey head and gasp, “Trillions?”

That’s the number politicians speak of today as if it’s simply the logical, economic extension of millions and Dirksen’s billions. On Friday, the Wall Street Journal published an article under Real Time Economics titled, “Number of the Week: 10.2 Trillion in Global Borrowing” which, in gross understatement, concluded, ”It’s easy to see that the risk of serious financial trouble is growing:” http://tiny.cc/rmda9

Excuse me? “Serious financial trouble?” Ya think?

Is that in any way translatable for the ignorant masses, us hoi polloi, as meaning, “We’re in deep sh*t?” That the WSJ is well aware of that deep sh*t . . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=2560)