Even a cursory look at the business pages shows an economy in the worst shape it’s been in since the Great Depression, no matter what the economists say. Ordinary Americans are reeling at the double-barreled assault gas and groceries are having on their wallets.

But none dare even call it a recession because it doesn’t meet the strict definition of two consecutive quarters of a net GDP loss. The economists who have to prop up predatory and ruinous capitalism at all costs say it’s just a cyclical downturn. We’ll bounce back. But this is different. Bouncing back will take a long time for the millions who have to start from scratch. We’re living through Thomas Hobbes’ vision of the jungle as “nasty, brutish and short.”

Even if we get the bounce, you can bet that wages will not go up. They will continue to stagnate or drop for the middle- and lower-middle classes. The bounce will only be good for the investor class.

Fights over food are breaking out in such countries as Morocco and Mexico. A recent Associated Press article showed skyrocketing wheat prices that will create higher prices on grocery shelves. If foods contain no wheat, don’t worry. They’ll be priced higher too because their makers will sniff more profits from customers who will grow accustomed to paying more.

Anything with corn is going to go up too. That crop will be used for ethanol, the false demigod of alternative energy. Ethanol is now being blended more and more into gasoline, and guess what is happening? We’re getting fewer miles to the gallon. But what the hey, someone is getting rich so we’ll just have to pay.

One of the reasons gas is so high is the value of the dollar is sinking on the world market to an all-time low. One of the biggest reasons behind the dollar’s fall is the war in Iraq. Two Nobel prize winning economists state that the U.S. will be spending $12 billion a month in Iraq in 2008. That’s a figure that will surely escalate. Those two economists say the war will eventually cost $3 trillion.

How is America funding that war? Metaphorically speaking, Uncle Sam is maxing out his credit cards to foreign investors. The U.S. is so deeply in debt that the country is selling everything it has to kill and be killed in Iraq. The U.S. isn’t paying its way because the Bush administration and its lackeys in Congress won’t raise taxes to pay for the war, the only administration in history to be that stupid. Our grandchildren’s generation will still be paying this off.

Companies have been cutting jobs drastically to salvage their profits. Unemployment figures have crept up marginally but they never take into consideration the millions who are not on the unemployment rolls or have just given up ever finding a decent job. But never fear, CEOs and financial middlemen who broker deals continue to make a killing.

As terrible as the economy is, it’s always nice to read a column by right-wing comedian Ben Stein titled “Exxon needs a hug” because the company made $40 billion in profits in 2007.

Stein’s reasoning, such as it is, is that 2 million people have investments with Exxon. Do we want to deny them their money by seeing less Exxon profits? This is disingenuous, a pathetic sop to the powerful. Let’s look at the math. Those 2 million people might have a minuscule part of Exxon in their IRAs and 401(k)s, but it’s chump change. The real power dollars go to the 52 percent of stock owned by Exxon. Also, that leaves 298 million people who have nothing to do with Exxon except pay its artificially inflated prices for gas and contribute to the couple of bucks return for Joe and Mary Jones in Omaha.

The point is this: The economy is so terrible that it needs to be rebuilt from the ground up. The days of laissez faire have to be over. It’s that kind of economic thinking that gives power to huge, unregulated financial banks such as Bear Stearns that go belly up and take the whole economy with it.

People all over the world have watched as corporations — with no loyalty, no borders, no regulations and all the money — brutalize workers and the environment in the selfish pursuit of riches and, of course, the few bucks they give those small-time investors.

If the economy continues without regulating the corporations and financiers who control 90 percent of the wealth things may get marginally better as the cycle goes back up, but average Americans are going to continue to be at the mercy of ravenous, capitalist predators bent on destroying everything to preserve themselves. America is a better country than to allow that.

Stephen Dick writes for The Herald Bulletin in Anderson, Ind. He can be reached at steve.dick@heraldbulletin.com.