Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Coronavirus dashboard for June 7: a Tale of Two Pandemics: the Vaccinated States vs. the Idiotic States

Coronavirus dashboard for June 7: a Tale of Two Pandemics: the Vaccinated States vs. the Idiotic States The drive towards “herd immunity” via vaccination has slowed to a crawl. The slowing is almost entirely driven by Trump-voting States in the South and West. Those Idiotic States are continuing to suffer from an ongoing pandemic, while […]

The Big Lie

Ross Barnett didn’t invent the big lie, but he was a practitioner. One might even say that Ross was to the manor born. The big lie had been a southern thing from the get go; comes with the turf. First you must lie to yourself, and so they did. Hitler appropriated, without acknowledgment, the concept […]

Wings

Why the reference to the wings in re the two major political parties? Are we being asked to envision either of our two major political parties as a bird, an aircraft. If so, each would surely have two matching wings, one on either side of the body/fuselage. Maybe they meant to make an analogy with […]

Construction Increases 0.2% in April After March is Revised 0.5% Higher

Angry Bear Commenter RJS blogs at MarketWatch 666 and presents current economic market information. Estimates the impact of the February and March revisions on the 1st quarter GDP and is estimating the impact of this April report on 2nd quarter GDP (see below past Census reports. ___________________ The Census Bureau’s report on construction spending for April (pdf) […]

Slamming Chase CEO Jamie Dimon – Overdraft Fees

Elizabeth Warren Slams JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon on Overdraft Fees – Rolling Stone I could watch this over and over. It is similar to when she put the spotlight on John Roberts in the Senate. This is a good take down of Jamie Dimon by Senator Elizabeth Warren. The Senator is relentless. It appears Chase […]

Revised 1st Quarter GDP Report Still Shows Growth at a 6.4% Rate

“Revised 1st Quarter GDP Report Still Shows Growth at a 6.4% Rate,” Marketwatch 666, Commenter RJS and analyst The Second Estimate of our 1st Quarter GDP from the Bureau of Economic Analysis indicated that our real output of goods and services grew at a 6.4% rate in the 1st quarter, unchanged from the 6.4% growth rate reported in […]

April Personal Income Down a Record 13.1%,

April Personal Income Down a Record 13.1%, Disposable Personal Income Down a Record 14.6%, Savings Falls 54.0%, Marketwatch 666, RJS The April report on Personal Income and Outlays from the Bureau of Economic Analysis reflects the partial unwinding of the March government stimulus in just about every metric it tracks except for prices, which are said to […]

Why does McConnell favor a criminal investigation into the events of January 6th?

Josh Marshall nails it (paywalled, but here’s part of his argument): Published reports suggest – and it is no surprise that this is the case – that the DOJ investigations are not looking deeply into the causes of the January 6th insurrection, causes which are inherently political and tied to numerous public officials and electoral politics. They’re […]

The Uninsured and Free Healthcare Insurance

Eighteen million uninsured Americans are eligible for free or subsidized health insurance. Kaiser Family Foundation estimates, 12.5 million of the uninsured are eligible for free coverage which includes 3.4 million for whom “free” means high-deductible bronze coverage. More than likely, half of the uninsured could get “platinum-equivalent” silver healthcare insurance coverage for a premium amounting to no […]