In 2012, a man named Peter Turchin predicted that by 2020 the US would reach “peak instability” marked by violent unrest and major social upheaval. Turchin is one of those “cycle guys.” That means he looks for patterns in history to help predict the future. He’s an ecologist, evolutionary biologist, and mathematician at the University […]
In today’s online version of the paper, WSJ writer Jon Hilsenrath blames you for the poor “recovery.” Here’s a brief excerpt of the story headlined “A Letter to Stingy American Consumers,” edited only for brevity: Dear American Consumer, This is The Wall Street Journal. We’re writing to ask if something is bothering you. The sun shined […]
Yesterday, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announced that the government would not slow its bond purchasing (money printing) because the economy had not yet improved sufficiently. The magnitude of this decision is still being absorbed, but may have negative effects on the entire world in the coming years. How exactly? This might be a bit […]
In our last story, we noted how government backed loans in the housing market encourages rising home and rent prices throughout the nation, a transfer of wealth from almost every single American to various establishment organizations. Now we have another example of banks transferring risk to the taxpayer. The term “Too Big To Fail” should […]
The divide between what the majority of people want verses what the establishment wants is never greater than it is when discussing property values. Those who have assets want them to rise in price, while the poor and those just starting out want lower prices they can afford. Of course, they have no political power. […]
Courtesy of comedians John Oliver and Andy Zaltzman, some comedic commentary on the Libor scandal. Accurate and humorous, they state: “I cannot afford my brain to be distracted for a second by the lingering suspicion that our entire society is based on greed fueled financial trickery and economic larceny on a mathematically unfathomable scale.” That’s it, […]
We hear a lot these days that due to high levels of sovereign and private debt, we will be unable to avoid a massive financial collapse, reshaping the world as we know it. Usually, proponents argue the collapse will happen quickly, bringing about a short term political vacuum and by necessity, a new economic model. Odd as […]
Finally, our long national nightmare is over. The government brought charges, submitted its case to the people, and the people decided. Baseball player Roger Clemens has been acquitted of perjury for allegedly lying to congress when asked about using performance enhancing drugs. Of course, no amount of press fanfare should be spared for such a […]
When I was a child, friends and I would waste time on the railroad tracks behind my house. The funny thing about industrial trains is that you’d think the massive hulk of steal and engine would be audible from a mile away and yet we continued to find ourselves surprised at how silently it approached. […]
The Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act or JOBS Act was passed last Thursday to no great fanfair, but we wonder if it may yet go down in history alongside Gramm-Leach-Bliley as a law which helped set the stage for ‘pump and dump‘ bubble schemes and financial fraud. To put it another way, its a bad law, one […]
