We Are Flying Blind

Last week, an editorial leader in The Financial Times started with a simple declarative sentence: We are flying blind. Last month, Krugman, I believe, observed that, given all the attempts to draw lessons from past financial crisis, the way in which this current situation resembles the Great Depression is that the last time our policymakers didn't know what to do and our economists didn't understand what was going on, was the Great Depression.

Between the ink stained wretch's simple declarative sentence and the Nobel Laureate's nuanced observation expressed in a complex tense, the most important aspect of the current situation is nicely captured.

We'll know what happened when it's all over. We'll understand what happened a good while after that. And that's the way it is. Perhaps the best response would be, not analytical, but liturgical.