Originally Posted by Eric the Green

The philosophers wheel/tree of life/chakra diagrams turn the quadrant to the right by 90 degrees (subjective vs. objective or I/WE vs. IT/ITs equals the spiritualist vs. materialist axis, or axial mundi/backbone).

Using MBTI, if we expand the meaning of introvert I and extravert E to include inner-directed vs. outer-directed (which were Jung's original meanings of these terms), and equate it with subjective=I/objective=E, then we can say the awakening quadrant is IP, the unravelling quadrant is EP, the crisis quadrant is EJ and the high quadrant is IJ. These are the first and last letters in your MBTI type.

Does your favorite or personally most-influential turning quadrant match those letters in your MBTI type? If the coming of age generation is most typical of a turning, then IP = prophet/2T, EP = nomad/3T, EJ = hero/4T and IJ = artist/1T. The middle aged generations in these quadrants would be IP = artist/2T, EP = prophet/3T, EJ = nomad/4T and IJ = civic/hero/1T. The former correlation to coming-of-age gens fits this scheme much better.

It seems to me you have two axes, a judgement-perceiving axis replacing the communitarian-individualist one and a introvert-extrovert axes replacing replacing subjective-objective. If I keep Wilber axis for the first but make the switch for the second I get

an introverted individualist archetype: the Sage, Hermit, Prophet; Magician,* Gandalf**
an extroverted individualist archetype: the Entrepreneur, Wheeler-Dealer, Politician; Rogue Pippin
an extroverted communitarian archetype: the Leader, Hero, Organizer; Warrior, Aragorn
an introverted communitarian: the Care Giver, Chronicler, Artist; Cleric, Sam

*D&D character classes
**LOTR characters

These combinations bring up examples in my mind that include the S&H archetype name in three of four cases. It seems to work pretty well. What examples come to other's minds with these four pairings?

I think I'm thinking of the 8 generational system, meaning Hero (1), Artist (1), Prophet (1), Nomad (1), Hero (2), Artist (2), Prophet (2), Nomad (2).

So, I'm trying to add an additional variable here of some kind. And for the life of me, I can't remember what it is or where to find in at the moment (but it was on this board somewhere).

I don't think it was one of Mike's.

Originally Posted by JonLaw

I think I'm thinking of the 8 generational system, meaning Hero (1), Artist (1), Prophet (1), Nomad (1), Hero (2), Artist (2), Prophet (2), Nomad (2).

So, I'm trying to add an additional variable here of some kind. And for the life of me, I can't remember what it is or where to find in at the moment (but it was on this board somewhere).

I don't think it was one of Mike's.

Advancement-Atonement? That's a popular way of categorizing alternating saeculums around here.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

No, Over 80% of Hoover's presidency fell into a 4T, he was the first president or the last 4T. Obama is he first president of this 4T. They are the same cycle-wise. They differ in party, a closer analogy would be Obama to an Al Smith who won the 1928. For example suppose the corrupt Harding had followed the upright Coolidge rather than the reverse and he sought re-election so as the further reward his friends. Al Smith could well win. And since many Democrats were in favor of free-silver it would be politically easier for a president Smith to do what FDR did, suspend the gold standard by executive order without there being a war. Like it did in March, doing this would immediately stop the deflationary spiral and begin a partial recovery. Prosperity would not return, but improving conditions would probably have gotten him reelected in 1932. What it probably would not get him was a strongly Democratic Congress and so there would be no New Deal; no clear-cut regeneracy. In other words it would look a lot like today.

OK -- so Barack Obama is more like Al Smith than like FDR. The Hoover Presidency obviously began in a 3T with the booming economy and the successful crusades of moralizers in politics if not results (Prohibition, eugenics). I see the Teapot Dome scandal and Enron as compelling analogues (corruption involving energy). Of course there were some unfit analogies -- Harding had no 9/11, but he did have the leftover Red Scare as an equivalent response to an international ideology (Communism, Islam) commonly seen as a real danger. Harding died in office, which Dubya did not do. Coolidge kept America out of war while he was President.

Some of us thought that we had a Regeneracy in 2009 and 2010... only to find the political degeneracy of the Double-Zero decade returning with the rise of the Tea Party.

History doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme, as the saying goes.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

It seems to me you have two axes, a judgement-perceiving axis replacing the communitarian-individualist one and a introvert-extrovert axes replacing replacing subjective-objective. If I keep Wilber axis for the first but make the switch for the second I get

an introverted individualist archetype: the Sage, Hermit, Prophet; Magician,* Gandalf**
an extroverted individualist archetype: the Entrepreneur, Wheeler-Dealer, Politician; Rogue Pippin
an extroverted communitarian archetype: the Leader, Hero, Organizer; Warrior, Aragorn
an introverted communitarian: the Care Giver, Chronicler, Artist; Cleric, Sam

*D&D character classes
**LOTR characters

These combinations bring up examples in my mind that include the S&H archetype name in three of four cases. It seems to work pretty well. What examples come to other's minds with these four pairings?

Certainly the wheeler-dealer, entreprenuer and rogue seem similar to the nomad archetype in S&H. Those examples do seem to cover it. I imagine our literary/film expert Chas could fill it out.

Originally Posted by JonLaw

I think I'm thinking of the 8 generational system, meaning Hero (1), Artist (1), Prophet (1), Nomad (1), Hero (2), Artist (2), Prophet (2), Nomad (2).

The problem I have with these sorts of models, there's a number of 16 generaiton systems that come of the rubric of megasaeculum also, is it reduces the number of such cycles from the already short list of past instances to an even shorter list. It's akin to going to ever-higher order approximating functions, as the degress of freedom shrink, the model becomes more and more like a just so story.

What might have been-Al Smith

The election calendar didn't line up with the saeculum in the same way in 1929 and 2008. The "regenerator" came into office last time after 4 years of suffering that discredited the rugged individualist model. This time he came into office immediately, so there was less suffering to discredit the rugged individualist model, and consequently it has come back to resist the regeneracy.

Dane Rudhyar was a philosopher, psychologist and composer who was also a great astrologer, and he pictured the houses of the horoscope with their 4 quadrants in 1933 in a similar way to Wilber's quadrant model. A horoscope is a map of the hour, with its 12 houses and 4 directions representing where the Sun and planets are in the sky wherever you are. Aries and the Ascendant represent self-awareness and independence in a horoscope; Libra and the Descendant represent awareness of others and relationships. Capricorn/Midheaven represents objectivity and orientation toward success in the outer world, and Cancer/Nadir represent family and subjectivity. If you have the majority of planets in your chart in these areas, you are inclined toward these tendencies.

Rudhyar is the one who had said the meaning of Uranus in astrology is determined by its orbit of 84 years equaling the normal length of a human life (same as saeculum). I altered Sean/mike's graph to represent Rudhyar's scheme to show how it compares to the saeculum. Again the graph is rotated 90 degrees; this time moving it backwards. Rudhyar used the terms "subjective and objective" like Wilber, for the lower and upper hemispheres of the horoscope (respectively), and the similar terms "awareness of self" for the ascendant hemisphere and "awareness of others" for the descendant hemisphere. Awareness of Self in this scheme also becomes P, for freedom, and awareness of others becomes J, for order. This model confirms my earlier attribution based on the houses and their zodiac equivalent signs to the generation archetypes:



Aries (ascendant/1st house) = nomad = EP = objective self-awareness = extraverted independent
Capricorn (midheaven/10th house) = civic hero = EJ = objective awareness of others = extraverted communitarian
Libra (descendant/7th house) = artist = IJ = subjective awareness of others = introverted communitarian
Cancer (nadir/4th house) = prophet = IP = subjective self-awareness = introverted independent

I then continued to link each generation archetype to the following sign and its element. This exhibits the ancient symbol of Nature, the swastika (which the Nazis coopted and reversed). This happens because signs move in opposite direction to houses, because signs represent the yearly motion of the seasons and houses the daily motion of the Earth, which run in opposite directions. This famous symbol is also called the quincunx or Christ in Majesty, and was used by the Christian Father in the 2nd century who chose the 4 gospels for the Bible, based on the idea that 4 is the proper number, and symbolizing the 4 evangelists (gospel authors) with the 4 symbols of the fixed signs of the zodiac, which always follow the 4 cardinal signs listed above. It is also shown on the World card of tarot, with the goddess of wisdom Sophia in the center instead of Christ. It also represents the four seasons and four elements.

Rudhyar went on to identify the 4 quadrants with the 4 Jungian functions. This results in a different pattern which I disagree with, and which is too much to explain in this post.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

The problem I have with these sorts of models, there's a number of 16 generaiton systems that come of the rubric of megasaeculum also, is it reduces the number of such cycles from the already short list of past instances to an even shorter list. It's akin to going to ever-higher order approximating functions, as the degress of freedom shrink, the model becomes more and more like a just so story.

Well, if the crisis ends badly or really does something stupid, you would think that next round would be different than if you had a successful crisis.

Meaning that you can either advance or atone, so to speak.

Yes, these 16 generation multisaecula start to resemble the history of Chinese dynasties. Th4e Chinese, after all, had their own theories of saecula. Each dynasty wrote the history of the previous dynasty.
Nor is this theory needed. I just came to this thread, so I don't know if anyone has touched on this point, but the 27 year long generation and youth phase can be adequat4ely explained by what we know of European conditions during the Early Modern Period. This period, which we now know as the Little Ice Age was marked by low agricultural productivity and frequent famines caused by cold years. Civilization survived in Northern and Western Europe in this cold age when it didn't in previous cold ages because a) the Black Death (1350-1500) reduced the population of Europe to 1/3 of what it had been during the HIgh Middle Ages and b) Western and Northern European society engaged in marriage practices that resulted in a high age of marriage (20s-30s) and lower birthrate which kept European populations within the land's carrying capacity, albeit at the cost of a great deal of social tension and ultimately, pressure to expand out of Europe. Those marriage practices involved the Church requiring the approval of both spouses and the parents of both spouses and sometimes the approval of the local feudal landlord before a marriage could take place. This, combined with the stigma of bastardy meant that marriage was delayed until a husband could adequately support a family. It also meant a very high age of marriage and a very long period of youth --into the mid 20s.
When Europeans settled the New World and later, Europe industrialized, opportunities to support a family arose earlier and the age of marriage fell perhaps resulting in a more conventional four beat cycle.
The best way to test this hypothesis would be to compare generational cycles in Western Europe with that of Eastern Europe and the Middle East where this Western European pattern of late marriage and low birthrate never took hold until the 20th Century.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

The election calendar didn't line up with the saeculum in the same way in 1929 and 2008. The "regenerator" came into office last time after 4 years of suffering that discredited the rugged individualist model. This time he came into office immediately, so there was less suffering to discredit the rugged individualist model, and consequently it has come back to resist the regeneracy.

Yes, Eric. I recall that around 2010-2011 there was a fair bit of opinion within the Democratic Party that the Party --and progressivism's --chances would be better if John McCain had won the 2008 Election so that Americans would be thoroughly sick of individualist libertarianism by 2012. It can be argued that in the normal course of things, a 12 year cycle would have been maintained ; that Bush's VP would have run and won a single term only to be kicked out in the next election by which time the country would be truly ready for a change. Bush perturbed that cycle in 2001 by picking a VP who he depended upon in policy matters (Dick Cheney) but who was too old and too unelectable even to run for the White House, leaving the field unnaturally wide open. Then again, Bush perturbed the cycle by insisting on winning the White House by contesting Florida's electoral vote, thus denying Gore HIS one term . So the US had two unsatisfying 8 year electoral cycles and we shall see if we get a third.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

Yes, Eric. I recall that around 2010-2011 there was a fair bit of opinion within the Democratic Party that the Party --and progressivism's --chances would be better if John McCain had won the 2008 Election so that Americans would be thoroughly sick of individualist libertarianism by 2012. It can be argued that in the normal course of things, a 12 year cycle would have been maintained ; that Bush's VP would have run and won a single term only to be kicked out in the next election by which time the country would be truly ready for a change. Bush perturbed that cycle in 2001 by picking a VP who he depended upon in policy matters (Dick Cheney) but who was too old and too unelectable even to run for the White House, leaving the field unnaturally wide open. Then again, Bush perturbed the cycle by insisting on winning the White House by contesting Florida's electoral vote, thus denying Gore HIS one term . So the US had two unsatisfying 8 year electoral cycles and we shall see if we get a third.

Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid were already in place.

The unraveling only unraveled some of it, so now we are in a Gilded-Age and New Deal society.

There was never going to be a repeat of 1929 because we never went all the way back to the Gilded Age in the first place!

Originally Posted by JonLaw

There was never going to be a repeat of 1929 because

Actually we did have a repeat of 1929 in 2008. Both were fall from plateau events indicating the start of Kondratiev winter.

If anything 2008 was considerably worse. The financial bubble was much bigger: the stock market at its peak in 1929 was about 25% above true value whereas in 2000 it was nearly 50% higher.* The same thing was true for real estate. At its 1925 peak real estate was about 25% above "use value". In 2005 it was more than 50% above. In 1929 it was the stock market bubble whose collapse led to panic a few years later; n 2008 it was the real estate bubble. Also, leverage ratios were higher in 2008 than 1929, meaning the financial impact would be magnified.

So the raw material for disaster in 2008 was much greater than in 1929. On the other hand, the response to the situation was very different. After 1929 policymakers let the money supply contract after the bubble collapse by sticking to the gold standard. Had they taken the country of gold and flodding the market wity dollars they would have avoided a deflationary depression, or so argumed Milton Friedman and Anna Swartz in their classic Monetary History of the United States. In 2008 the country was no longer on the gold standard and policymakers said they would follow Friedman and Swartz's advice. FOr this reason I believed that despite all the tinder lying about, there would be no fire--just a dragged out version of the 1982 recession. Thus, I explictly ruled out the 1929-1933 precedent and was very bullish on the stock market in late 2008 and early 2009. (I had no idea at the time that the 2008 event was an actual panic--I truly believed that panics were a thing of the past because policymakers like Bernanke would not let them happen).

Even though we got a panic, it was contained: there was no deflation and no deflationary spiral. Hence there was no depression, and my 2008 purchase was a good move. We got a severe recession that was further blunted by a large stimulus. The result was a peak unemplyment rate that was 60% less than what happened last time. And just like last time we got a slow, partial recovery. So far events after 2008 are about as close to identical as you can get in history--it is uncanny.

The politics is different partly because of the differences in timing, as others here have pointed out. It was also different because policymakers have learned things since 1929. Treasury Secretary Mellon did not advocate austerity because he hated working people, but because he truly believed it would work, just as it had worked for him in 1921 under what looked to be similar circumstances. He was not like todays pro-austerity folks, many of whom favor austerity precisely because it could lead to economic disaster, possibly making Obama a Democratic Hoover, and giving Republicans decades more of political ascendancy. It is a smart strategy.

*The stock market on average trades at a level much below its fair value. The extra return provided from this discrepancy is often known as the "risk premium". The principal flaw in the late 1990's bulish predictions like "Dow 35,000" is they all assumed that market participatants had concluded that stocks were risk-free and so there would no longer be a risk premium. Thar is, going forward stocks would trade at levels well above their true value. I made the opposite argument.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

Actually we did have a repeat of 1929 in 2008. Both were fall from plateau events indicating the start of Kondratiev winter.

Yes, this is true, as is everything else you are talking about with respect to the *financial* system. I really like your work in this respect.

My best year, financially, in recent years was 2008. I'm hoping to have a good year once the next bear gets started sometime in the next 12-18 months.

In fact, I was loving the experience by posting on a bear market chat board in real time each day once it became obvious that it was a true crash similar to 1929.

Granted, this was only because I had just unloaded HSGFX just as Hussman *cut* his hedges. I remember thinking at the time "um, that is not a good idea right now, so I'm going to unload you because you don't know what you are doing." I had been knocked out of my short positions because of all of the wacky stuff they were doing in the previous months.

Most. Fun. Ever.

I *know* that the Fed and friends are clueless.

*My* point related to the political-cultural issue in terms of the existence of Social Securty, etc.

And it looks like we are about to start the final rocket-shot in this go-round, but I will have to wait to see.

I just cut all my shorts and am now in cash, similar to 2007.

Originally Posted by JonLaw

Yes, this is true, as is everything else you are talking about with respect to the *financial* system. I really like your work in this respect.

My best year, financially, in recent years was 2008. I'm hoping to have a good year once the next bear gets started sometime in the next 12-18 months.

I saw the bear market as a certainty after seeing an article in Business Week that showed that the alleged 'low-risk investments' in highly-rated bonds were in fecal investments. It was only a matter of time before the whole basis of lending of the time would implode. It's hard to time when to short-sell... the article was written in 2005, so there was still some potential for delusional growth in the markets.

In fact, I was loving the experience by posting on a bear market chat board in real time each day once it became obvious that it was a true crash similar to 1929.

1929 and 2007 were the peaks, the real crashes coming in 1930 and 2008. The recoveries began three and one-and-a-half years after the relative peaks. The bank runs of 1931 and 1932 allowed a nasty recession to become a full-blown depression. Hoover didn't back the banks; Obama did.

Granted, this was only because I had just unloaded HSGFX just as Hussman *cut* his hedges. I remember thinking at the time "um, that is not a good idea right now, so I'm going to unload you because you don't know what you are doing." I had been knocked out of my short positions because of all of the wacky stuff they were doing in the previous months.

In a healthy economy, short-selling is crazy. Indeed, short-selling is crazy until the last frenzy of speculation.

Most. Fun. Ever.

The real fun comes from enjoying the proceeds.

I got an insurance payout in early 2009... and bought mutual funds.

Best. Decision. Ever. At least involving money.

I *know* that the Fed and friends are clueless.

The most clueless people were those who bought into a speculative bubble based upon rip-off financing. The Good Lord isn't making more real estate, but eventually he quits churning out financial fools.

*My* point related to the political-cultural issue in terms of the existence of Social Securty, etc.

And it looks like we are about to start the final rocket-shot in this go-round, but I will have to wait to see.

I just cut all my shorts and am now in cash, similar to 2007.

The economy is fundamentally stronger now. It's more like 1937 than like 1927. But 1937 was an improvement.

Originally Posted by JonLaw

*My* point related to the political-cultural issue in terms of the existence of Social Securty, etc.

You considered an alternative history if McCain had been elected. You did not consider the saecular consequences of that alternate. A McCain victory means 911 is the 4T trigger, not 2008. See below.

The 4T start according to the stock cycle was 2000 and according the long wave it was 2008. If McCain had won in 2008, that would give 3 straight for the GOP and 2000 would be a critical election. The average of the three dates is 2002.7. The closest big event to this is 911, hence 911 would be the start of the 4T. The start of the active period in the PE cycle would be 2004. This is the arithmetical interpretation.

A 911 4T trigger makes the war on terror a central issue. Electing McCain would mean the electorate has placed a higher priority on the WoT as opposed to the economic crisis, which is consistent with the WoT being front and center. Electing the guy who sang bomb bomb Iran means America chose war with Iran. Having a Silent military man as commander in chief means we take the war seriously (no Bush-style "war lite"). Taxes are raised and a draft is discussed. Republicans have no probem with passage of stimulus twice the size of Obama's which combines increases in defense spending increase with lots of spending for defense-critical infrastructure such as alternate energy, electric grid, and information network upgrades, nomially to to secure them against terrorist attack. A side effect of all this spending would be the economy gets stimulated out of recession, just like in WW II (ensuring that McCain gets re-elected). Remember all this would be in the absence of any Tea party because no Obama, no TP.

Illegal immigrants could be given amnesty because the country would not afford to have a potentially disaffected population that could be employed as a fifth column by the enemy. Some sort of universal health care scheme could be enacted since McCain ran on this. If done, these things would serve to continue the Bush innovation of compassionate conservativism, which was a long-term strategy to get minority populations to realize that the GOP can represent them too--if they first support the GOP. If it worked it would solve the long-term demographic problem the GOP faces. 2000 would end up being like 1896, the start of another period of GOP dominance after a period of balance between the two parties. Karl Rove thought of 2000 as akin to 1896. This is the political interpretation.

This is how I thought it might play out after the 2004 election. I thought the fall from plateaus was in progress; my reduced price method simply no longer had the power to visulaized the K-cycle, just as raw prices stopped showing up as ordinary price cycles after 1933. I was wrong. I hadn't seen the fall from plateau on my reduced price indicator because it hadn't happened yet, not because reduced price no longer worked. You see it had to have happened already if Rove's 2000=1896 notion was going to come true. In other words the the 4T had to have begun if McCain was going to win because winning would confirm 2000 as a critical election and make Rove right. That is, it would allow the maverick Republican McCain as a wartime CIC (who commands obedience form his party) to make the sort of policy changes that could lock in Republican dominance for a second run.

But it hadn't happened yet. It happened in 2008. It was perfectly visualized on the reduced price graph, so that tool still works. There also was a panic (something I thought was a thing of the past). And because it happened McCain lost, 2000 was not a critical election and Rove's dream went up in smoke. Repubicans now have no strategy with which to deal with the demographic disaster lumbering down the road towards them and they have begun to act irrationally in response. This is the experiential interpretation as my preconceived notions were shattered by events after 2004.

All of this because of a single event. For want of a shoe....

This is what makes an event a trigger.

Good stuff, Mike. What's the interpretation for a 2008 start date if we get another severe crash, led by an asset crash triggered by a foreign event?

Btw, I wanted to mention that I liked the Obama = Al Smith analogy

Originally Posted by Mikebert

You considered an alternative history if McCain had been elected. You did not consider the saecular consequences of that alternate. A McCain victory means 911 is the 4T trigger, not 2008. See below.

The 4T start according to the stock cycle was 2000 and according the long wave it was 2008. If McCain had won in 2008, that would give 3 straight for the GOP and 2000 would be a critical election. The average of the three dates is 2002.7. The closest big event to this is 911, hence 911 would be the start of the 4T. The start of the active period in the PE cycle would be 2004. This is the arithmetical interpretation.

A 911 4T trigger makes the war on terror a central issue. Electing McCain would mean the electorate has placed a higher priority on the WoT as opposed to the economic crisis, which is consistent with the WoT being front and center. Electing the guy who sang bomb bomb Iran means America chose war with Iran. Having a Silent military man as commander in chief means we take the war seriously (no Bush-style "war lite"). Taxes are raised and a draft is discussed. Republicans have no probem with passage of stimulus twice the size of Obama's which combines increases in defense spending increase with lots of spending for defense-critical infrastructure such as alternate energy, electric grid, and information network upgrades, nomially to to secure them against terrorist attack. A side effect of all this spending would be the economy gets stimulated out of recession, just like in WW II (ensuring that McCain gets re-elected). Remember all this would be in the absence of any Tea party because no Obama, no TP.

Illegal immigrants could be given amnesty because the country would not afford to have a potentially disaffected population that could be employed as a fifth column by the enemy. Some sort of universal health care scheme could be enacted since McCain ran on this. If done, these things would serve to continue the Bush innovation of compassionate conservativism, which was a long-term strategy to get minority populations to realize that the GOP can represent them too--if they first support the GOP. If it worked it would solve the long-term demographic problem the GOP faces. 2000 would end up being like 1896, the start of another period of GOP dominance after a period of balance between the two parties. Karl Rove thought of 2000 as akin to 1896. This is the political interpretation.

This is how I thought it might play out after the 2004 election. I thought the fall from plateaus was in progress; my reduced price method simply no longer had the power to visulaized the K-cycle, just as raw prices stopped showing up as ordinary price cycles after 1933. I was wrong. I hadn't seen the fall from plateau on my reduced price indicator because it hadn't happened yet, not because reduced price no longer worked. You see it had to have happened already if Rove's 2000=1896 notion was going to come true. In other words the the 4T had to have begun if McCain was going to win because winning would confirm 2000 as a critical election and make Rove right. That is, it would allow the maverick Republican McCain as a wartime CIC (who commands obedience form his party) to make the sort of policy changes that could lock in Republican dominance for a second run.

But it hadn't happened yet. It happened in 2008. It was perfectly visualized on the reduced price graph, so that tool still works. There also was a panic (something I thought was a thing of the past). And because it happened McCain lost, 2000 was not a critical election and Rove's dream went up in smoke. Repubicans now have no strategy with which to deal with the demographic disaster lumbering down the road towards them and they have begun to act irrationally in response. This is the experiential interpretation as my preconceived notions were shattered by events after 2004.

All of this because of a single event. For want of a shoe....

This is what makes an event a trigger.

This whole logical progression is foiled if opposition to 9-11 policy, not the event, is what the crisis is about. You're only looking at 9-11 as a catalyzing event if people are in favor of the response. What if the 9-11 was a catalyst, but it's because the response was ridiculous and people opposed that. It's not too far off. Remember Obama clinched the primary mainly because he campaigned in a way that he seemed to be opposed to a lot of the War on Terror issues that nobody else seemed to really be concerned over. Promising to close Gitmo, get the troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, etc. It also explains the success of the tea party better, as congressional democrats didn't follow suit on this platform. And it just seems to have more links to the era and more related event points overall than "there was a really big recession, it was really inconvenient. Nobody did anything about it." The War on Terror as a narrative of a nation corrupted as opposed to a glorious campaign against evil makes more sense in terms of really why there seems to be no forward momentum. Simply, it's the people versus the institutions.

Originally Posted by JonLaw

Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid were already in place.

The unraveling only unraveled some of it, so now we are in a Gilded-Age and New Deal society.

Such irony!

Originally Posted by Kepi

This whole logical progression is foiled if opposition to 9-11 policy, not the event, is what the crisis is about. You're only looking at 9-11 as a catalyzing event if people are in favor of the response. What if the 9-11 was a catalyst, but it's because the response was ridiculous and people opposed that. It's not too far off. Remember Obama clinched the primary mainly because he campaigned in a way that he seemed to be opposed to a lot of the War on Terror issues that nobody else seemed to really be concerned over. Promising to close Gitmo, get the troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, etc. It also explains the success of the tea party better, as congressional democrats didn't follow suit on this platform. And it just seems to have more links to the era and more related event points overall than "there was a really big recession, it was really inconvenient. Nobody did anything about it." The War on Terror as a narrative of a nation corrupted as opposed to a glorious campaign against evil makes more sense in terms of really why there seems to be no forward momentum. Simply, it's the people versus the institutions.

Not quite; Obama didn't oppose the war in Afghanistan, but promised a surge; which he provided. He did nothing about Iraq that Bush had not already set up. He did close Gitmo; the Republican congress kept it open. So there were no "failed promises" to react against. The Tea Party had nothing to do with 9-11, or any reaction to it. The Tea Party is pro-war. None of the Tea Party folk were protesting the wars, or the war on terror or its method. It is just a resurgence of Reagan/Gingrich; a reaction to fears of government spending and higher taxes. "Taxed Enough Already" -- could that be any clearer? The 2008 recession and Obama's stimulus-response in 2009 was the catalyst for the Tea Party, which supports the 2008 crisis date. The Tea Party's success was due precisely to "there was a really big recession, it was really inconvenient. Nobody did anything about it." The voters impatience over the recovery enabled the TEA Party to win on Black Tuesday, and thereby to stalemate the nation through the 2010s, setting up possible revolution and/or civil war in the 2020s; our internal 4T.

Originally Posted by JordanGoodspeed

Good stuff, Mike. What's the interpretation for a 2008 start date if we get another severe crash, led by an asset crash triggered by a foreign event?

Btw, I wanted to mention that I liked the Obama = Al Smith analogy

First I will define significant panics as those financial crises that were followed by severe (adverse) economic response or which were politically important. Examples of the first are the panic of 1837, 1873, 1893 and 2008, and the crash of 1929. The economically-important panics also had political impacts. Examples of the latter are the panics of 1772, 1792, 1819, 1857 and 1907. Examples of financial crises that were not significant by this definition would include the gold panic of 1869 and the financial crises in 1884, 1890, the near-panic of 1970 and the crash of 1987 and others.

So it depends on what kind of event the crash would be. Historically the significant panics are spaced roughly a generation apart with one per empirical turning (I used them in the dating the PE cycle of empirically-derived "turnings"). The insignificant events can happen any time it seems. This means that if the crash produces an insignificant crisis it can occur in the same turning as another significant one. This means that if the 4T began no later than 2008 and this crash happens, either the crisis it triggers is mild, or if severe policymakers are able to take action. Congress and the Presidency must be controlled by the same party for action to be possible; action is not possible before 2017. Thus a crisis leading to a serious crisis before 2017 is not possible unless 2008 is not in the 4T.

Assume the crash triggers a serious financial crisis before 2017. With an economic disaster while they hold the white house, Democrats would lose big in 2016. Republicans take over the government at a time when unemployment is very high and rising. The economy eventually bottoms and by 2020 unemployment has fallen to something like 10% from higher level at the bottom. Americans no longer expect prosperity to return, electoral participation falls and Republicans win in 2020. This eliminates 2008 as a critical election and puts the start of the PE active period no earlier than 2012. The 2008 panic would now be in a 3T so the historical precedent of one significant crisis per empirical turning would be upheld.

If somehow Democrats win back control in 2020 and successfully acted to address the economic problems, then they would stay in power for some time. This would keep 2008 as the 4T start and give two significant panics in the same turning. I find this scenario hard to believe. IMO an electorate that would empower the Democratic party in 2020 would not have tossed them out in 2016. A 2020 Democratic victory would more likely be a continuation of the parties trading off back and forth. The 4T concept is meaningless with this outcome and there are no turnings, just random history.

What if they don't toss them out in 2016? Say, if the Republicans don't manage to address their demographic woes (possible, though the recent Supreme Court ruling should empower the party establishment to tug on the leash), recapture the Senate and keep the House in 2014 and thus share blame for the crisis, and a different Democrat is able to run on a platform of actually doing things?

Originally Posted by Kepi

This whole logical progression is foiled if opposition to 9-11 policy, not the event, is what the crisis is about. You're only looking at 9-11 as a catalyzing event if people are in favor of the response. What if the 9-11 was a catalyst, but it's because the response was ridiculous and people opposed that. It's not too far off. Remember Obama clinched the primary mainly because he campaigned in a way that he seemed to be opposed to a lot of the War on Terror issues that nobody else seemed to really be concerned over. Promising to close Gitmo, get the troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, etc. It also explains the success of the tea party better, as congressional democrats didn't follow suit on this platform. And it just seems to have more links to the era and more related event points overall than "there was a really big recession, it was really inconvenient. Nobody did anything about it." The War on Terror as a narrative of a nation corrupted as opposed to a glorious campaign against evil makes more sense in terms of really why there seems to be no forward momentum. Simply, it's the people versus the institutions.

In Jan 2009 this was a very plausible hypothesis. It had empirical support in the elections of 2006 and 2008. But then came 2010 and 2012. Both elections featured intense opposition to the course taken since 2001. It just had nothing to do with 911. Republicans liked Bush's tax cuts and the course of action taken in response to 911. With the exception of Rand Paul and his father, they still do.

They were cool to the Medicare drug benefit, but did not object because Bush was their guy, just as Dems have stood by Obama when he became the drone-happy terror-warrior he is now. They did not like the TARP and a majority of pre-Tea Party Republican congressmen were opposed to it. In the wake of the rise of the Tea Party they are even more opposed today. They were 100% opposed to the stimulus and absolutely loathe the ACA. These things, bailouts, ineffective big government programs that we cannot afford and continued Adminstration failure on the economic front has animated opposition to the course laid out since 2008 that led to a Republican takeover of the House in 2010 and a likely Senate takeover this year.

The guy who was the alternative to Mr. Drone had no problem with Drones and embraced all things Bush on the WoT front. Where was this anti-WoT response in 2012? Unless we see Rand Paul nominated in 2016 and making ending the WoT a centerpeice of his campaign, there will coninue to be no support for this idea. At some point, it's time to throw in the towel on a hypothesis whose predictions keep failing, no matter how plausible it seems. Remember if 2001 is the 4T start then in 2016 we will be about two-thirds of the way through it without anything remotely resembling a WoT regeneracy appearing.

The only viable opponent for hawk Obama and Hawk Clinton is from a party who wants war with Iran. These guys want to double-down on what Obama and the Dems have been doing on the WOT front. If there is some opposition to the WOT policy, why have Republican beliefs about foriegn policy remained the same, while their economic views have radically changed?