You remember rather vividly Bush talking about the economy and its need for stimulation (in 2000) in his campaign speeches (in 2000) and him getting flak for 'talking down the economy (in 2000). 2000 saw the first signs of instability.

I repeat: No boom this past 8 years. In 1998, it was still booming all the way into 2000.

Bill Gates?

The IPO was in 1986....Microsoft Office released in 1989....Windows 3.0 in 1990....taking advantage of the Intel 386 processor....selling over 100,000 units in 2 weeks....overtaking the OS/2 as the preferred PC platform...more from WiKi:

During the transition from MS-DOS to Windows, the success of Microsoft's product Microsoft Office allowed the company to gain ground on application-software competitors, such as WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3.[38][39] According to The Register, Novell, an owner of WordPerfect for a time, alleged that Microsoft used its inside knowledge of the DOS and Windows kernels and of undocumented Application Programming Interface features to make Office perform better than its competitors.[40] Eventually, Microsoft Office became the dominant business suite, with a market share far exceeding that of its competitors.[41]

In 1993, Microsoft released Windows NT 3.1, a business operating system with the Windows 3.1 user interface but an entirely different kernel.[38] In 1995, Microsoft released Windows 95, a new version of the company's flagship operating system which featured a completely new user interface, including a novel start button; more than a million copies of Microsoft Windows 95 were sold in the first four days after its release.[38] The company also released its web browser, Internet Explorer, with the Windows 95 Plus! Pack in August 1995 and subsequent Windows versions.[42]

More:

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, from about 1977 to 1983, it was widely predicted [16] that computers would soon revolutionize many aspects of home and family life as they had business practices in the previous decades..........

It took another 10 years for technology to mature, for the graphical user interface to make the computer approachable for non-technical users, and for the internet to provide a compelling reason for most people to want a computer in their homes. Predicted aspects of the revolution were left by the wayside or modified in the face of an emerging reality. The cost of electronics dropped precipitously and today many families have a computer for each family member, or a laptop for mom's active lifestyle, a desktop for dad with the kids sharing a computer

More Facts Irwin Will Ignore

Yea........

Bill Clinton invented the computer.....and Al Gore invented the internet.

All they did was occupy the White House and rode the fruition of all the groundwork laid in the 70's and 80's.

Laughable.....and hysterically so.

Um....no.

You are the only one left alive who believes dot coms are possible without computers and the internet.

You can't have cake without flour and eggs.

 When one considers that Phil turncoat Gramm was at the root of the repeal of the banking laws that allowed the subprime lending mess to occur and that he drafted the legislation that created the so-called ENRON loophole in speculator trading that is driving up and possably doubling the  current price of gasoline, and that J Sydney McCain looked to him for guidance and called him his economic "guru",one can plainly see that McCain is part of the problem ...not part of any solution.
 He freely admits that he knows nothing about the economy and then he turns to the scum who created our current problems for advice.
 http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0308/9246.html
 http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/6/22/14203/6921

Neue, Bush began his presidential campaign talking about tax cuts. Since the economy was booming throughout most of the campaign, he explained that the tax cuts were necessary because the surplus proved that Americans were overtaxed. As late as the fall of 2000, surpluses were forecast far into the future. He promised to slash taxes, save Medicare, preserve the Social Security trust fund, and still keep the budget in balance. Gore called it "fuzzy math." Bush got away with it, thanks to a lapdog media that was more focused on Gore's "exaggerations" which were themselves exaggerations--by the media. It was only after the economy slowed that Bush switched his excuse rationale for tax cuts from "fairness" to the need to stimulate the economy.

JPN, if you want to also take the absurd position that the Dot Com bubble Clinton rode through the 90's would have even been possible without computers/internet technology/Windows 95 and Internet Explorer....you go right ahead.

I see only you and Irwin seem to believe the opposite....that it was the technical genius of Al Gore inventing the internet.......and that's to be expected.

Notice how even you didn't call it the Computer Bubble, LOL! but the "Dot Com bubble." My source proves that the stock market took off because of the Dot Coms, not computers.

By your logic, since there could be no computers without wires the dot com bubble began in the Bronze age with the first smelting of copper.

You have no source, just your lying.Will your lying never end?

The bubble began in 1995, just exactly what my source said:


"Investors were attracted to the IPOs of high-tech and e-commerce companies in the last half of the 1990s. Many of those companies had yet to turn a profit, yet their IPOs were successful beyond all expectations. Investors appeared more interested in a firm's potential for success in the online world, as indicated by its market position or market share, and seemed willing to overlook its losses. This displacement of profitability by market potential in the eyes of investors was one phenomenon that led observers to develop the concept of the New Economy.

Although America Online went public in 1992, it was the hugely successful IPO of Netscape Communications in August 1995 that was credited with starting the investor craze for Internet start-ups that lasted until the end of the decade. Netscape's stock was first offered at $28 a share; it was worth $75 after one day of trading, and it peaked at $171 on December 5, 1995. The company's first-day market capitalization was $2.2 billion.

In 1996 it was the IPOs of Internet search engines that attracted the interest of investors. Yahoo!, Lycos, and Excite all went public in April 1996. Yahoo! sold 2.6 million shares at $13 per share on the NASDAQ. By the end of the first week shares more than doubled to nearly $33. Following its IPO Yahoo! had a market capitalization of more than $1 billion. Lycos raised $40 million with its IPO. Following their successful IPOs, other Internet companies announced plans to go public."

http://ecommerce.hostip.info/pages/583/Initial-Public-Offering-IPO-MORE-E-COMMERCE-COMPANIES-GO-PUBLIC-1997-1999.html