You Know It’s Bad When…

President Obama is saying the economy is better, Bernanke is warning that real people don’t believe that; and while earning $250,000 per speaking engagement, Ye ‘Olde’ Fed head was unable to refinance his mortgage…

The world has gone insane…

First, President Obama unleashes his ‘the economy is doing great so stick with the Democrats at the election’ strategy:

*OBAMA SAYS ECONOMIC PROGRESS HAS BEEN `STEADY’; `IT IS REAL’

Except it’s not…

and a majority don’t believe him:

Which – secondly – none other than Ben Bernanke is also worried about… Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said Americans’ perceptions of the economy are “not that encouraging,” even amid signs of improvement.

The “severity of this recession has been quite a shock. If you look at the polls about ‘Is America on the right track and those sorts of things?’, they’re generally not that encouraging” – quite a shock indeed!!??

“There may be some lag between the actual improvement and people’s perception” – 5 years!!??

“I do hope that we’re now moving back towards a period of greater normalcy and one that will transit into something that is sustainable over the medium and longer term” – hope is not a strategy!!??

And then – thirdly – even he cannot refinance his mortgage… (via Bloomberg)

Ben S. Bernanke said the mortgage market is still so tight that he’s having a hard time refinancing his own home loan.

The former Federal Reserve chairman, speaking at a conference in Chicago, told moderator Mark Zandi of Moody’s Analytics Inc. — “just between the two of us” — that “I recently tried to refinance my mortgage and I was unsuccessful in doing so.”

When the audience laughed, Bernanke said, “I’m not making that up.”

“I think it’s entirely possible” that lenders “may have gone a little bit too far on mortgage credit conditions,” he said.