Official data show that the output of the economy in the most recent quarter is down-- by less than one-half of one percent-- but at last the media have one of those two quarters required to qualify as a recession.

Whether they will get the other quarter that they need, in order to start using the word "recession" legitimately, is another story. In fact, the data-gathering process is by no means so precise that we can expect the one-half of one percent decline to hold up, since such statistics often get revised later.

It is not just a question of being able to put scare headlines on newspapers or alarmist rhetoric on television. Such things are just the prelude to massive political "change" in fundamentally sound institutions that have for more than two centuries made the American economy the envy of most of the world.

If the left succeeds, it will be like amputating your arm because of a stomach ache.

To add to the painful irony, many of those who are most eager to have a massive government intrusion into the market are among those whose previous intrusions into the market are largely responsible for the current financial crisis.

It was the left-- the "liberals" or "progressives"-- who led the charge to force lending institutions to lend to people whose credit history made them eligible only for "subprime" loans that were risky for both borrowers and lenders.

It started way back in the Carter administration, with the Community Reinvestment Act, and gained momentum over the years with legal threats from Attorney General Janet Reno and thuggery from ACORN, all to force lenders to lend where third parties wanted them to lend. Now we have a bad stomach ache-- and now the left wants to start amputating the market.