Populism has a nice ring; ‘will of the people’ and all that good stuff. So, why doesn’t it ever work? Not even in backward nations? Populism is disastrous in a nation as complex as the United States in times as complicated as these. There’s a reason that it never turns out well. Populism feeds off […]
How are libertarian lovers of liberty responding to the assault on democracy and the rule of law that took place in the Capitol Wednesday? Over at Marginal Revolution, Tyler Cowen speaks out eloquently against Trump’s anti-democratic behavior. Just kidding! In a post entitled “That was then, this is now” Cowen reminds us about the terrorist […]
Zooming in on the Defects of PowerPoint I’ve just finished several days of staring, hour after hour, at the year’s economics meetings via Zoom. What really struck me, beyond the content of the talks, was the way Zoom exacerbates “death by bullet point”. PowerPoint’s capabilities encourage speakers to load up their slides with lots of text and […]
History Professor Heather Cox Richardson at Morrissey College of Arts and Sciences, Boston College writes a daily(?) news letter (Letters from an American) which she describes as; “a chronicle of today’s political landscape, but because you can’t get a grip on today’s politics without an outline of America’s Constitution, and laws, and the economy, and […]
Infidel753 at Infidel753 blog had an interesting post up which I thought makes for a good read. Infidel753 can also be found at Crooks and Liars blog. Soon the time of Trump will give way to a Democratic presidency and House and hopefully a 50-50-plus-Harris control of the Senate. Some things to keep in mind: 1. When […]
Professors Piketty, Saez, and Zucman! Have a minute? A minute to talk about rentiers, retirement, growth, and sharing? Thanks. Seems some sixty-percent of Americans think that things are going pretty well. For them, things are going pretty well. But, for the lower forty, things aren’t going well at all. Surely, this sixty – forty ratio […]
While everyone is social distancing (?), wearing masks when out, and staying at home (mostly); there has been an uptick in women and men not getting along together well when confined to apartments or homes. No place to go and the heart may not grow fonder of your-other when confined due to the COVID-19 pandemic. […]
Who Has Been Warring Against Christmas? Where I am the Third Day of Christmas is just finishing with the news that Grinch Trump has ended his own brief War on Christmas and is signing the Covid-19 relief bill, thereby reinstating unemployment benefits for 14 million people although they’ll miss a week of payments, as well […]
The GOP has crossed the Rubicon – by New Deal democrat In the Roman Republic, military leaders automatically lost their legal authority to command at the Rubicon River in northern Italy. When Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon with his legions, it was an act of war against the Republic. With the filing of their Amicus brief […]
Unprecedented It occurs to me that our current president has engaged in a rather large number of actions that are unprecedented by any other president, as well as some only rarely happening and not for a long time, many of which for nearly all other politicians would make them viewed as simply unacceptable for being […]