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

Never Mind Schrödinger’s Cat, Here’s David Bohm’s Dream

Never Mind Schrödinger’s Cat, Here’s David Bohm’s Dream I’ve had dreams of all sorts from time to time, but I don’t remember them too well. There was one dream that had a sort of philosophical content. I dreamt I was in a place that had a cat. I came into the room where this cat […]

More bad faith about New Zealand COVID policy from the Brownstone Institute

According to Our World in Data, as of February 25, 2022, cumulative COVID deaths per million in the United States were 14 times higher than in Australia and 259 times higher than in New Zealand.  Most of this difference was undoubtedly due to the border controls and internal lockdowns these countries used to keep COVID […]

Consumers still spend, real income declines, leaving them vulnerable to price shocks

Consumers still spend, but real income declines, leaving them increasingly vulnerable to price shocks Nominal personal income was unchanged in January, while spending rose 2.1%. In real terms after inflation, personal income declined -0.5%, and personal consumption expenditures rose 1.5%, completely reversing December’s decline, and adding about 0.2%. I have stopped comparing them with their […]

Expressions that pass from hand to hand like sealed containers…

Expressions that pass from hand to hand like sealed containers… In Herbert Marcuse and Planned Obsolescence I undertook to develop a theoretical foundation for ‘planned obsolescence’ from Georg Simmel’s analysis of the “preponderance of objective culture over subjective culture that developed during the nineteenth century.” My intuition has proved to be uncannily prescient. Besides the indirect influence […]

Original Sin And Planes In The Air

Original Sin And Planes In The Air  The original sin of the current catastrophe in Ukraine was the failure of the US and UK to defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine when Putin’s Russia seized control of Crimea as they promised to do in the Budapest Accord of 1994 when Ukraine gave up […]

wheels of a global political and historical change

It is unusual for Prof. Heather Cox Richarson to have posted last night. The good Prof. of History typically rests on the weekend. Further down this post, you can read her latest. Just a bit more of my comments, some news, and then Prof. Heather. It appears the wheels of a global political and historical […]

Weekly Indicators for February 21 – 25 at Seeking Alpha

by New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators for February 21 – 25 at Seeking Alpha My “Weekly Indicators” post is up at Seeking Alpha. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia has added some elevated risk to a few of the numbers, but there is nothing that indicates any economic crisis. In general, there are accumulating signs that […]