A piece of geek: Williams syndrome, brain function, and an all out social way of thinking.

Lifted from an e-mail by Stormy. Another topical thread.U.S. military….massive oil shortage.I have not tracked down the original report….but there has been growing concern from a number of unusual quarters. (I discount the Oil Drum, Matt Simon, et al.) With gas usage in the states at low levels and with oil prices continuing to rise….something […]

Barkley Rosser at Econospeak takes aim at immigration and worker ratios: Robert Reich says so, “Why More Immigrants Are An Answer to the Coming Boomer Entitlement Mess“, which is also linked to by Mark Thoma. He has been on the Social Security Advisory board and has heard all the tales of coming Demographic Doom due […]

by cactus The 1920s Depression: Glenn Beck, Thomas Woods, and “Benefits” of Cutting Taxes to Combat a Recession, Part 1 So I get an e-mail from reader Dean Moriarty, stating: Yesterday, I found myself in the sad position of inadvertantly listening to the Glenn Beck show. He was talking to some caller about how American […]

The battle over credit and debit card “swipe fees” that has been raging on Capitol Hill for the past 5 years will be heating up again soon. The credit card industry makes $125 million a day in swipe fees, so it is obvious why they are fighting to protect this “secret tax” on consumers and […]

by Marshall Auerback, Fellow and Contributor to the Roosevelt Institute’s New Deal 2.0 Marshall Auerback warns that Germany’s obsession with a defense against the external threat of inflation is blinding them to the real risks facing Europe. The Maginot Line, named after French Minister of Defense André Maginot, was a line of defenses which France […]

Lifted from comments. Vtcodger summarizes his thoughts on a layman’s approach to trade and trade policy: 1. It’s pretty clear that there is no protocol for determining if a currency is under or over valued relative to another or by how much. It’s all guesswork. 2. Foreign Exchange probably is not a marketplace that is […]

China’s March trade deficit Patrick Chovanec on Seekingalpha asks the basic question on the direction Chinese policy makers will take regarding the currency question, but the underlying question remains unanswered… What tipped this month’s figure from a marginal surplus to a deficit was a surge in imports, up 66% from last year. But it’s going […]

Lifted from comments. Before they cut our paid for stuff, I think we need to “Audit the Government”. Not sure if anyone in Congress, Treasury, or Federal Reserve is up to the task. As far as the annual budget goes, I always see those pie charts where they make SS, Medicare and Medicaid look like […]

There has been some arguing about the dangers of federal deficit spending (little said about the huge private sector debt levels except on econoblogs), but Kevin Drum on Mother Jones notes in a post how the argument appears to be framed in the public’s mind no matter which party or movement is involved: Ah, the […]