We have lots to celebrate...

...and lots to work like crazy to fix. A failing economy, for instance...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of just 3 percent in the spring, a dramatic slowdown from the rapid pace of the past year, as consumer spending fell to the weakest rate since the slowdown of 2001, the government reported Friday.

The Commerce Department said that the gross domestic product, the country's total output of goods and services, slowed sharply in the April-June quarter from a 4.5 percent growth rate in the first three months of the year.

Of course, as proudly partisan as we may be here at Upper Left, we still feel compelled to share the "good news" with the bad...

In one piece of good news, inflation pressures eased with a key GDP inflation gauge that excludes energy and food rising at an annual rate of just 1.8 percent in the second quarter, down from a 2.1 percent increase in the first quarter.

See? If you don't eat, drive, heat your house or turn on the lights, things will be just fine!

Thank goodness that Hope Is On The Way.