Elena LaVictoire's Library tagged no_tag →  View Popular

This was all ridiculous from the beginning. The '08 election was a historical anomaly. A uniquely charismatic candidate was running at a time of deep war weariness, with an intensely unpopular Republican president, against a politically incompetent opponent, amid the greatest financial collapse since the Great Depression. And still he won by only seven points.

Exactly a year later comes the empirical validation of that skepticism. Virginia -- presumed harbinger of the new realignment, having gone Democratic in '08 for the first time in 44 years -- went red again. With a vengeance. Barack Obama had carried it by six points. The Republican gubernatorial candidate won by 17 -- a 23-point swing. New Jersey went from plus-15 Democratic in 2008 to minus-four in 2009. A 19-point swing.

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What happened? The vaunted Obama realignment vanished. In 2009 in Virginia, the black vote was down by 20 percent; the under-30 vote by 50 percent. And as for independents, the ultimate prize of any realignment, they bolted. In both Virginia and New Jersey they'd gone narrowly for Obama in '08. This year they went Republican by a staggering 33 points in Virginia and by an equally shocking 30 points in New Jersey.

His scorecard for the year is largely an "incomplete," if he's being graded.

He banned torture and other extreme interrogation techniques for terrorists. But he also promised to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a source of much distaste for the U.S. around the world, a difficult task that now seems headed to miss his own January 2010 deadline.

He said the problem was "the
appearance" of conflict of interest. I asked how that could be
when I never wrote about the subject at all. He said the real
problem was that FreeScore was a major financial company and I
wrote about finance. But, as I told him, FreeScore was a small
Internet aggregator, not a bank or insurer.

Never mind. I was history. "You should have consulted us," was
the basic line.

This is magical thinking. Obama, talented as he is, can't repeal the laws of supply and demand. Costs are real. If they are incurred, someone has to pay them. But as economist Thomas Sowell points out, politicians can control costs -- by refusing to pay for the services.

It's called rationing.

The Economides spend $350 a month on food and cleaning products, feeding seven mouths for 30 days.

Careful Planning How do they do it?

Step one: Careful planning. The Economides make a grocery list and check it three times before heading to the store.

"These women that are at the grocery store every day, three times a week, are spending gobs of money on food that they don't need to be spending," said Annette Economides.

"It takes a little bit of time to sit down and plan a menu. But you eat better, you save more money, and it creates less stress in your life."

Step two, they say, is using coupons, and having them clipped, filed and ready for action when they arrive at the store.

The family goes to the store with walkie-talkies and scours for bargains. On one recent trip, Steve asked his wife over the walkie-talkie: "Vidalia or yellow onions?"

"Oh, get the vidalia," came the reply.

Step three is a carefully coordinated in-store check for last-minute deals on the shelves.

"Buy one, get two free," Annette said, reading from a coupon for brownie mix. "So you now have three boxes. And I have a coupon for another dollar off. All three for $1.19!"

Step four of the family's money-saving plan involves having a lot of freezer space. Whatever the family cannot consume right away can be purchased and saved for a later day.

"One day a month the family all cooks meals," Annette said. "And we put away anywhere from 13 to 17 meals in a freezer."

Careful Planning How do they do it?

Step one: Careful planning. The Economides make a grocery list and check it three times before heading to the store.

"These women that are at the grocery store every day, three times a week, are spending gobs of money on food that they don't need to be spending," said Annette Economides.

"It takes a little bit of time to sit down and plan a menu. But you eat better, you save more money, and it creates less stress in your life."