Here’s what I want to know: When did it become August and I missed it?
I mean, yes, there’ve been a few things happening business- and economy-wise since Monday, but honestly, it’s been kind of slow. Sitting here early in May, you’d just think there’d be… more, you know?
So with that, a couple of themes and/or trends I’ve got my eye on:
- I know I say this on the air all the time, but I’m constantly amazed by how enduring the effects of the financial crisis are. To wit, the announcement Tuesday by Mel Watt, the head of the FHFA, that he’s going to make sure there’s still plenty of liquidity – money – in the mortgage system. We’ll see whether that’s a smart idea or not, but it’s yet another sign it ain’t over yet. See also: Geithner, Tim and his new book, about which you heard… well… elsewhere on public radio.
- Bigger really is better. The Wall Street Journal’s been all over this, but apparently AT&T wants to buy DirecTV for $50 billion, in part to keep pace with the Comcast/Time Warner Cable deal. Roll that in with the still-burbling Pfizer/Astra Zeneca talks over in London – at $106 billion, if you can believe that – and I think it spells M&A boom.
- Pay no attention to the stock market. That is all.
Special bonus thing: Last week I was talking about going out in Jim Fallows’ plane for another installment of the project we’ve got going with him – American Futures. He flies a Cirrus SR-22, for reasons that’ll become clear in about three sentences. Anyway, Jim came and picked me up in Birmingham, Alabama, and flew us back over to Columbus, Mississippi. Nice easy flight, if a little bumpy. But that’s not what I wanted to mention. Two days after I got back to Los Angeles, Jim posted this on his blog at the Atlantic. Crazy, huh?
The radio story – about Columbus, Mississippi, and what we found there (not about planes parachuting safely to earth) is set to air next week.
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