Been writing on SCOTUS for a bit as they seem to be roguish in their approach and to the right favoring monied interests.

This is humorous and Kathryn caused me laugh with her take on Amy Coney Barrett questioning Clarence Thomas’s dabbling in historical facts backing up attorneys and a court’s finding. From the reading of Kathryn’s take on this, Justice Barrett may take on Clarence. This is something I would like to read if it was in public.

What side would Robert’s support?

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Amy Coney Barrett Is Sick of the Supreme Court’s Bullsh*t,

by Kathryn Rubino

Above the Law,

Let’s be clear — Amy Coney Barrett is a staunch conservative. Nothing about this article should give progressives hope that ACB will become the fulcrum of

This popped on the ABA Journal as written by Attorney Erwin Chemerinsky. Erwin is the guy to follow when it comes to the impact of certain cases on the US citizenry.

Today, he is identifying several rulings which may have a bearing of election results. In fact, he is saying such towards the end of his article. Hopefully, he is wrong and the court rejects it if it comes to the court. One could always hope.

Commenter Jack usually has a good take on these issues.

Chemerinsky: SCOTUS rulings on election districting likely to affect who’s going to Congress in 2025, ABAJournal

Two recent rulings of the Supreme Court—one on its “shadow docket” and the other a decision on the merits reveal a deep division among the justices with regard to issues

What Bill Barr has said about Donald Trump:

In May 2023, when asked whether Trump is fit to be president at a City Club of Cleveland event in Ohio, he responded:

“If you believe in his policies, what he’s advertising is his policies, he’s the last person who could actually execute them and achieve them. He does not have the discipline, he does not have the ability for strategic thinking and linear thinking or setting priorities or how to get things done in the system. It is a horror show when he is left to his own devices.”

AB: Who would have thought? 🙂

Barr told NBC News in July 2023 that:

I have made clear that I strongly oppose Trump for the nomination and will not endorse Trump.

In an August 2023 interview with CNN’s

Introduction:

It appears HHS and CMS are taking action with Medicare Advantage plans and their payments to brokers selling Advantage plans. They allowed Kaiser Family Foundation healthcare to republish a Modern Healthcare article. I am lucky enough to have access to and republished at Angry Bear.

According to the article, “insurers increasingly not only pay commissions to brokers and agents but also contract with field marketing organizations that pay the same marketers.” A double dipping of fees. CMS’s rule rectifies the issue by establishing a standardized compensation limiting whether a field operation is involved or not.

Medicare Advantage has been overpaying insurance companies offering the plans for years now. Maggie Magar, Kip

July 31, 1789, the U.S. Congress passed the last of three acts providing for administering customs tariffs and collecting duties. On the nation’s birthday, the Tariff Act of July 4, 1789, had been passed by Congress followed by the Duties on Tonnage statute on July 20.

Mainly, they provided operating revenue for the government. From 1816 they were designed with the additional goal of protecting manufacturing enterprises from low-priced imports.

In 1791, Congress approved a new, federal tax on spirits and the stills that produced them. What it did lead too was the whiskey rebellion.

Direct tariffs are not necessarily good. It is better to find ways to stimulate manufacturing so it grows and labor is paid well. Comments welcome to this

Less than a week away and the debate between Biden and Trump will occur. Given Biden’s State of the Union Address, I do not envision he will be giving much room to trump. I do believe trump’s main weaponry will be interrupting Biden’s speech so as to confuse the issues amongst people. There is no real way to control trump so as to conduct a civil exchange.

Economist Robert Reich has a pretty good idea of what to do. I hope Biden’s speechwriters prepare him.

Biden should welcome their “hatred,”

by Robert Reich

Substack

Advice for Joe in his first debate with the convicted felon — one week from tonight.

I have only one morsel of advice to Joe Biden as he prepares for his first debate with Trump, one week from tonight: Channel Franklin

It appears upper management is running away with most of the compensation. Adding to this is the lowered taxes resulting from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act which was passed using Reconciliation. The TCJA is due to reverse in 2025. I am sure President Biden will reverse it for the upper 20% at least.

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NEW YORK (AP) — Compensation packages for S&P CEOs running companies jumped nearly 13% last year. This easily surpasses the gains for workers at a time inflation was putting considerable pressure on Americans’ budgets.

A median CEO pay package in 2024 rose to $16.3 million. This is up from12.6%, according to data analyzed for The Associated Press by Equilar. Meanwhile, wages and benefits netted by private-sector workers rose 4.1% through

Parking where you should not park with your oversized toy.

This picture was also on Reddit. I believe the original pic(s) are from here: “Driver shares photo high-lighting a parking problem with oversized vehicles: ‘These cars are pointless,’” The Cooldown.

According to one Planning Commission member in Arizona, sixty percent of the vehicles being purchased are pickup trucks. Most of these vehicles are used for non-work travel. Maybe some groceries in the back. I am finding many of the drivers will tailgate at high-speed travel even in the right lane. Probably they do so because they can see what is ahead of you.

They burn more fuel than a car even if diesel. More material goes into the manufacture of them. Cars are wasteful also; and

This particular graph was pulled from an April 2024 Morning Star article. The source of it being the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It depicts wage growth before during and after the Pandemic. In particular I believe the government did quite well in providing for and protecting its citizens during the pandemic when many people could not work. The stimulus packages may have caused some of the wage growth and inflation. There are other things which are taking place also causing inflation.

Others may argue the point. It appears the Democrats and Biden’s stimulus packages rescuing the population as a whole had an impact on the nation’s business also, labor, and wage growth. Not a 2008-10 slow down this time. Even so, wage growth peaked in 2022 at ~8%

By David Zetland

The one-handed economist

Humans are not doing enough mitigation to slow — let alone reverse — climate change chaos. Average global temperatures are now +1.xxC, far above the 2015 Paris Agreement’s target of “holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels.”

In this 2011 post (“We’re screwed, now what?”), I wrote:

Mitigation-focused investments (solar, biofuels, zero-emissions stuff) are wasted if there’s no “carbon reduction payback” — this means that a lot of projects are going to turn instantly unprofitable.

Thus, it’s time to adapt: lift your skirts for floods and prepare

Post-June FOMC: By Overreacting Hawkishly, the Fed Risks Being Behind the Ball

by Preston Mui

employ america org

The simple fact as seen in a longer-run view, inflation has fallen greatly. Whether you start from its peak at 5.6% in February 2022 or 4.2% when the Fed raised rates to the current level, core PCE inflation—which is on track to deliver a 2.6% year-on-year read for May 2024—is most of the way back to 2%.

The inflation outlook is pointing towards further cooling. Rent and owner’s equivalent rent now accounts for nearly two-thirds of the excess of core PCE inflation above 2%, which should mechanically follow the much softer new tenant rent indices. The uncertainty there is about when exactly that softening will trickle through

I put much of this short article in up just to make the point, “we had no basis for what we were doing. And wat we did promote was not a cure. It was preventive actions on droplets within six feet rather than a plan to limit exposure to an aerosol spread of Covid. The article make that point. And Ms. Greene makes a fool of herself.

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COVID taught us a lot for future pandemics. Attacking Fauci doesn’t make us safer.

by Dr. Ashish K. Jha Contributor

USA Today

by Dr. Ashish K. Jha

[embedded content]
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-GA, providing in person evidence she really is the idiot many people have claimed her to be. With her own version of science, we see her attacking Dr. Anthony Fauci the on the US response to an unknown

It is unfortunate we do not possess a “Wayback Machine” to fix the issues we are experiencing with banks since 1986. Instaed we bumble again and again, making the same mistake over and over with banks.

In a cartoon series called Peabody’s Improbable History, Mr. Peabody and Sherman would open the door to the past, speak in English to everyone they met (even if they could not speak English). The translation was a part of the machine. Both Mr. Peabody and Sherman were enabled to correct any distortions that were occurring then and having an impact in the future.

This is more a commentary about banks and how we are arriving at another crisis. In 2023, I wrote this:

Two Banks in Trouble, Some History, and Four Opinions

I have read enough on

This article can not get any easier to read and explain how the economy survived a pandemic from 2020 onward and even into 2024. With the right actions by a president and supported by a Congress, the nation survived and it grew. In summation? The “economy has had a remarkable four-year run, judged against both its own history or the international competition.”

If you disagree, this one has few technical details to confuse the issues. Make your pitch.

Good news outside of inflation.

Atlantic article “The US Economy Reaches “Superstar Status,” Rogé Karma . . . “if the United States’ economy were an athlete, right now it would be peak LeBron James. If it were a pop star, it would be peak Taylor Swift. Four years ago, the pandemic temporarily

First, this report (GDP and Income) is almost three months old. The latest release: will be June 28, 2024. “Gross Domestic Product by State and Personal Income by State, 1st Quarter 2024.”

Some detail establishing a base for the June 28, 2024 report which will cover 1st Qtr. 2024.

Briefly:

The BEA has updates on population which I will have to check out. If you remember from New Deal democrats report, there has been a discrepancy between Household and Establishment numbers. It is thought the one report did not include immigration numbers. “continuing severe disconnect between the Establishment Survey, which continues to show strong growth, and the Household Survey, which has been downright recessionary.“

The detail is in the report, real

I am sure borrowers having to use Payday Lenders are thrilled to wait till March 2025.

Supreme Court ruling in May, the federal government is expected to get tougher on regulating payday lenders and other firms that offer high-interest, short-term loans. This type of lending — which often targets low-income borrowers — has long drawn fire from consumer groups on grounds that these small-dollar loans quickly balloon when they’re not repaid, accruing exorbitant fees and interest.

The Supreme Court ruling resolved a challenge to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s authority to act — meaning that the agency can come off the sidelines and get back in the game of fighting predatory lending. “The U.S. wants to crack down on payday loans,” The

By Merrill Goozner

GoozNews

Hospitals are pushing back on an experiment that would put providers on budgets. CMS should ignore their lobbyists and consultants playing games with numbers.

Changing the way hospitals and doctors get paid is central to reforming our dysfunctional health care system. Payment reform can achieve better health outcomes, improve the patient experience and help keep overall health care costs in check, the three goals of any reform worthy of the name.

I am a partisan in this debate. Nearly two years ago, I co-wrote a two-part series in Health Affairs (here’s Part 1 and Part 2) touting Maryland’s payment system, which features common prices for all payers and capped hospital budgets. The four-person team was led by

By Lawrence O. Gostin and Sarah Wetter

MEDPAGE TODAY

— A slew of cases this term could reshape health policy.

Undecided Issues still before SCOTUS which should be decided this month. The Justices will then take off for a bit to reconcile the decisions they made causing issues amongst the population. Nothing unusual here, it happens every year. This group of 6-3 appear to be more partisan (right-wing) than prior Justices.

Abortion as emergency medical treatment and the abortion drug mifepristone.

In Idaho v. United States, the Department of Justice (DOJ) argues that Idaho’s abortion ban, which prohibits abortion unless necessary “to save the life of the pregnant woman,” violates the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act

Today, the Supreme Court released its opinion in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine. Here’s a little background—you can be forgiven if you’ve lost track of how this case has evolved since I first wrote about District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk’s order granting a nationwide injunction banning mifepristone in April of 2023.

In April of 2023, Matthew Kacsmaryk, a federal district judge in Amarillo, Texas, entered a nationwide injunction banning mifepristone, one of two drugs used for medication abortion. He did that despite 20 years of data that established mifepristone as safe and effective, with fewer complications than Tylenol. Judge Kacsmaryk entered a stay for seven days to give DOJ an opportunity to appeal his order. They didn’t need a week,

By Fix the Court

AB: April 2023 Propublica reported on the largesse of outsiders and their generous nature of their gift giving to SCOTUS. June 2024 and we are again hearing of the propensity of the gift givers to SCOTUS and in particular Justice Clarence Thomas. If only they acted in the same way with much of the population who could use $6 million in aid to exist.

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“Fix the Court” unveiled a list of the gifts the justices have received over the year. The numbers make one wonder about the legitimacy of the court’s decisions. At a certain point, the question of whether there is influence due to the numbers of and value of the gifts comes into question. As Fix the Court has documented from data over the last two decades (Jan.

There are many comments about the increasing costs of automobile insurance. In Michigan, once the no fault insurance was dropped and catastrophic injury insurance was cut, the care of long-term care was edecimated. Many people with serious lifetime injuries were left to fend on their own after reduced payments to caregivers. Past payments to medical was cut in half. The reserve funds were cut also when reimbursed back to customers.

I guess what I am attempting to warn you about is, being careful what you achieve from cost cuts. In Michigan many people were hurt by business and people supported cost cuts.

Billionaire businessman Dan Gilbert is starting a ballot drive as a “failsafe” in case Michigan’s Republican-led Legislature and Democratic

A long and interesting read. And yes on paying the price.

Article by David and Lindsay on what is happening today with increasing pricing across the economy. You can experience it in just about every part of the economy.

Further on down this article the authors say, this is more about pricing than supply chain. I would say this is true. However, you can discern whether excess pricing can be justified by reviewing the supply chain costs. Not knowing those costs makes it easy for deception. Those costs are also not difficult to discern.

The Age of Recoupment

by David Dayen and Lindsay Owens

The American Prospect

The Federal Reserve chair’s semiannual monetary report to the Senate Banking Committee is not typically of great interest to

If you are driving a big behemoth SUV thinking you are safer, maybe you should think about another vehicle. Here are some results.

Logan Carter at Jalopnik gives us the break down. It is picked up in Quartz Business News.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) just released new crash test results for three full-size, three-row SUVs. The Ford Expedition, Chevrolet Tahoe, and Jeep Wagoneer were reviewed. These family haulers had varied crash test performances. Full-size SUVs are popular choices due to size and the perceived safety coming with size. Size alone does not necessarily equate to safety. According to the IIHS, the Expedition performed worse than 90 percent of all new vehicles in the small overlap crash tests. A video reflects

Some background on Joyce Vance: Presently: Law Prof, MSNBC/NBC Legal Analyst, Podcaster Previously: US Atty, Fed’l prosecutor Always: Wife, Mom, Dogs, Cats & Chickens, Knitting

One has to wonder if Justice Sam Alito ever learned to shut up and not discuss what he believes in or his thoughts on the court. He gives all the wrong answers when he believes the person also agrees with what he thinks.

There is a take on Chief Justice Roberts too. Quite the opposite of Justice Alito. He gives the right answers and questions the person asking him whether they really wish him to take such actions. One could believe Roberts is virtuous and an unbiased Justice. Roberts suggests that putting the nation on a path to moral beliefs is a role of Congress. I do

This reads like a Christmas tree where people or children get to pull a tag off the tree and whatever it states is your gift. Except this tree is the tree that keeps on giving all year.

There are three charts in this Newsweek article which pictorially details the numbers of gifts and value of them to each Justice. At the end of this article is a link to an XCELL Spread Sheet which will give you the numbers and dollars associated with each justice. I do not have to explain to you who is the number 1 recipient. Look at the amount. Then begin to wonder why no other Justice or Chief Justice said a word.

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Supreme Court: Gifts for Justices Explained in 3 Charts

by Joe Edwards

Newsweek

A view of the U.S. Supreme Court at sunset.

It is difficult to argue against an electric vehicle when the efficiency is far greater. The only argument one could make presently is the sunk cost of your scrapping out your gasoline powered vehicle. There is no gain there and also no penalty if you keep it. The penalty of keeping it will come eventually.

And then there is the paying out of another $30,000 for a new EV plus infrastructure. I am not talking about a pickup truck EV either. Looking at a Nissan Leaf as an example.

Electric vehicles use half the energy of gas-powered vehicles

by Karin Kirk

Yale Climate Connections

As U.S. Electric Powered Vehicle sales rise, more cars than ever are using the electrical grid to power up. It would be reasonable to assume that means the grid

AB: I tend to believe the Pandemic caused more economic upheaval than Wall Street blowing up the economy and Main Street paying for WS’s pennies on the dollar gambling with CDS, naked CDS, etc. in the derivatives market. More was made available in 2020 onward by the government to lessen the impact of the Pandemic. This softened the blow pf the Pandemic and the economic shutdown.

With the FED holding the reins on the FED Rate, timing is important as to when the rate will be lowered. Hopefully, it is soon.

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Evidence of manager wage growth rising while typical workers’ wage growth slows . . .

Elise Gould

Economic Policy Institute

Over the last few months, there’s been much talk about the return to normal in the labor market. A

Taken from the “SCOTUS Blog” and originally published at “Howe on the Court.”

Usually if I am going to read about SCOTUS, I go to the SCOTUS Blog. There I find up to date information about what it is doing and what is left for it to decide upon. In 2024, there are some important decisions to be announced. I am surprised Alito has not dropped a few hints. “Howe on the Court” will join my list of reads.

One has to wonder how many more “oops I missed this occurrence” by Thomas. At what point does Roberts say “enough is enough?”

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In financial disclosure Thomas adds two “inadvertently omitted” trips from billionaire Crow

Justice Clarence Thomas revealed on Friday that conservative billionaire Harlan Crow paid for two trips in

Privatization Warning

by Suzanne Gordon and Steve Early

The American Prospect

When the Department of Defense (DOD) or U.S. intelligence agencies face a crisis, they often assemble a task force to conduct a review and recommend solutions. In response to cost overruns on care for nine million patients of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) recently convened such a high-level “Red Team.”

The panel of six health care leaders includes former VHA undersecretaries for health, ex-DOD officials with military health experience, and prominent health care system executives. The group conferred with VA leaders in Washington, collected relevant budget data, and pored over reams of peer-reviewed studies. It

Following up Joel Eissenberg’s commentary “Is 3D printing the answer to the housing crisis?” with some history on prefabs as supplied by Lloyd Alter of Carbon Upfront.

A bonus from the archives, looking at the work of Carl Koch.

by Lloyd Alter

Carbon Upfront!

There has been so much news recently about how prefab could finally revolutionize housing. The Canadian government in particular has suggested that Prefabricated housing offers one solution to the supply crisis. Architects have been saying it for years; when a major prefab company went bust in 2008 I wrote a post, now deleted, about how long people have been saying prefab is the future of housing.. I found it in the Wayback Machine and republish it here:

While writing the obit