Bush is recorded at a fundraiser explaining his Depression: “Wall Street got drunk.” This is a version of Keynes’s “animal spirits.” Our increasing economic troubles have nothing to do with his inflationary policy and the Federal Reserve, with his wars and domestic spending, with his subsidies and interventionism. It’s all the fault of businessmen. What we need, in the Bush-Keynes view, is the wise, steady hand of government to guide the economy (just like they have since 2001). Of course, in reality, government is a band of thieves writ very large, and its inflationary theft has horrific economic consequences, in artificial booms and busts, prices increases and redistributionism. Watch the federal mafia leader talking off the record, or so he thinks, to some of his lowly gang members. (Thanks to Adam Muntner.)

The Best of Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.