The Angry Bear

Taken from: “Bill Barr Struck With Amnesia About His Work To Spread Big Lie” | Crooks and Liars, Susie Madrak Me: If you are listening to the Hearings, you have been hearing Bill Barr testifying of his warnings to trump of his actions. If you have been reading what Barr has been saying in the past, it sure did not appear to be warnings. Indeed, it was more along the lines of Dems being wrong. Definitely “Two Faces,” have been on display by...

Understanding the situation in Ukraine and how it will likely evolve in the future is impossible for me, partly due the inherent complexity and unpredictability of war and international relations, and partly because the main players have such strong incentives to strategically misrepresent their actions and intentions.  Are the Ukrainians really getting killed by Russian artillery fire in unsustainable numbers, or are the Ukrainians putting pressure...

The increasing trend in new jobless claims continues Initial jobless claims declined -3,000 to 229,000 last week, vs. the 50+ year low of 166,000 set in March. The 4 week average also rose 2,750 to 218,500, compared with the all-time low of 170,500 ten weeks ago.  Continuing claims rose 3,000 to 1,312,000, or 6,000 above their 50 year low of 2 weeks ago: It’s now clear that initial claims have been in an uptrend over the past 2.5 months. If...

Pre-COVID, who would have thought that a significant part of the libertarian thought collective would go anti-vax?  Not me.  But I stand corrected.  From a recent blog post at the illustrious Brownstone Institute: The people whose directives you are following talk a lot about “pseudoscience,” always accusing those of us who disagree with their directives of pushing it. But you know what pseudoscience actually is? It’s putting forth a premise that...

Negative May and YoY real retail sales add to the foreboding signals of a recession next year Nominal retail sales for the month of May declined -0.3%, and April was revised down by -0.2% to +0.7%. This reduces April’s number, after inflation to +0.4%, followed by a “real” decline in May of -1.2% after rounding. YoY real retail sales were up 8.1%, but because inflation in the past 12 months has been 8.5%, real retail sales YoY is down -0.4%. Here...

As taken from “Letters from an American,” June 12, 2022, Prof. Heather Cox Richardson “Yesterday, Politico’s Betsy Woodruff Swan and Kyle Cheney reported on January 5, 2021, then – vice president Pence’s attorney Greg Jacob wrote a three-page memo concluding what the president and his supporters were demanding Pence do the next day would break the 1887 Electoral College Act—that is, the law – in four different ways. The memo responded to John...

RJS: MarketWatch 666 ~~~~~~~~ Summary: April Trade Deficit Decreased by a record 19.1%, Led by Lower Imports of Consumer Goods and Industrial Supplies and Materials ~~~~~~~~ Our trade deficit was 19.1% lower in April, as our exports increased while our imports decreased. The  Commerce Dept report on our international trade in goods and services for April, incorporating an annual revision, indicated that our seasonally adjusted goods...

Texas is big. To frame how big, let me contextualize the normal travels for a rural resident in a few touch points that are universal. The closest large city with a decently large grocery store and a Home Depot are 37 miles one way. When running an “errand” it is easy to tack on 100 miles to the odometer in just a few hours. The parents are 42 miles away in the next city “down the highway” as it were. Sister in law 92 miles, brother 121 miles, Tesla...

“New Auto Emissions Rules Have a Loophole You Can Drive a Light-Duty Truck Through” (treehugger.com), Lloyd Alter, December 2021 ~~~~~~~~ President Biden and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have revised the existing greenhouse gas emissions standards for passenger cars and light-duty trucks. Rolling back in four years the rollbacks the Trump administration implemented to change the standards set in place by the Obama...