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

How dry I am…

By: Divorced one like BushNo body knows, how dry I am. I went home, I rang the bell, my wife came out and gave me hell. Juan posted a link to this paper: OPEC Pricing Power, The Need for a New Perspective Besides the issue of how oil is priced, and the relationship of the […]

Soc Sec XXIX: What does patriotism have to do with Social Security ‘crisis’

Well more than you might think. If you examine the economic and demographic assumptions that together generate the standard Intermediate Cost alternative of the Social Security Trustees you see a picture of a future America that is kind of bleak. I mean I lived through the period from 1968 to 1983 and economically it was […]

"Yours!"

Fed values Bear Stearns assets at a level where it has only cost them $100,000nothing—so far. (Indeed, there’s a $50,000 “buffer” left.) Strangely, the scuttlebutt in the market yesterday was that the valuation should be around $24 billion. Or at least that’s how I read this paragraph: If the portfolio’s value were to drop to […]

Beginning path to a career in econ

Hat tip Robert Waldmann post autistic thought…er, economic … stochastic…er. Just press the button already. Ken Houghton says the race is on. A man who likes this video should be a guest…he takes himself seriously.

Same lithium battery, new connection X10 power

Reader ddrew2u sends this post: Readers of December’s Popular Mechanics know that Stanford University scientists have already engineered a lithium ion enhancement that promises to multiply charge capacity ability about four times in the short term and as much as ten times in the long term. For 30 years it has been known that building […]

Republicans warn that Democrats will cause a difference

I’m looking for a bumper stickers that says,Bin Laden still has his job, do you? But seriously, when Bush took office in January 2001: The unemployment rate was 4.2%, now it is 5.5%. The inflation rate was 3.7%, now it is 4.1%. Gasoline was around $1.45, now it is over $4.00. The S&P 500 was […]

Concealed Guns in Airports

The NYT notes the following on gun bans: A decision by Georgia legislators to relax the state’s gun laws has led to a dispute over whether people can legally carry concealed firearms in the nation’s busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International. A Georgia gun rights group filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court in Atlanta on […]

Cross posting with Naked Capitalism

We’ve mentioned we are going to go to Alaska to watch the ice melt. That means no Internet from August 3 to August 10, inclusive, save maybe a visit to an Internet cafe to check e-mail. Those who might want to try their hand at guest blogging (or have an established blog and would cross […]

Who’s your daddy?

Mark Thoma has original attribution at Economist’s View Economic Dreams-Economic Nightmares discusses Jamie Galbraith’s recent presentation: Hyman Minsky, John Kenneth Galbraith and John Maynard Keynes take center stage as James Galbraith throws down the gauntlet to contemporary mainstream economists. Speaking at the 25th Annual Milton Friedman Distinguished Lecture at Marietta College, Marietta, Ohio, Jamie Galbraith […]