The Angry Bear

The July-August issue of New Left Review published an essay by Robert Pollin titled “De-growth vs. Green New Deal” in which he outlines his objections to what Peter Dorman affectionately refers to as “a suicide cult masquerading as a political position.” I have written a response to Pollin’s article, that I have submitted to NLR, a draft of which, “Pollin’s Green New Deal: Blueprint for Ecological Salvation?” may be downloaded as a pdf file from dropbox....

China Starts Yuan/RMB Futures Market Juan Cole reports that Reuters reports that China is establishing a commodities futures market in Shanghai that will operate in yuan/rmb.  According to the report the commodity that is most expected to be traded is crude petroleum.  This will put this exchange in competition with the West Texas intermediate crude market, the London-based Brent crude market, and the Dubai market, all of which operate in US dollars....

Brad DeLong hops aboard the “Employers have a Taboo against raising Wages” bandwagon For Labor Day Prof. Brad DeLong posted a talk on the implications (or not) of the US being near “full employment.” The arguments on a few of the pages will be familiar to readers of this blog: My only significant quibble here is that “Job Openings” rates from both the JOLTS reports and the NFIB (Small Business) survey have been soaring for over 2 years....

Trump Shafts Abe On Trade And North Korea The Washington Post (on Monday on p. A11) has a revealing story about how President Trump has essentially shafted an important world leader who may have tried harder than any other to please and appease Trump from the moment he became president, with the story ironically reporting that supposedly Trump views the friendly feeling as mutual and has said much more respectful things about this leader than almost any...

(Dan here…better late than not) by New Deal democrat A thought for Labor Day, 2018 US voters will continue to vote for alternating partisan “waves” in Congress, and for “outsiders” however chancey for President, until the problem depicted in the below graph is solved:

by New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators for August 27 – 31 at Seeking Alpha My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. Several of the long leading indicators have deteriorated further.

Trump’s base: not the white working class, but white evangelicals — all men and lesser-educated women — who believe the ends justify the means Via Digby: __________________ 1. Trump has always been unpopular with college-educated voters [A] Pew Research assessment … [using a] validated voter survey (they matched voter file with the survey respondents) showed white women narrowly preferring Trump to Clinton by 2 points – 47 percent to 45 percent. … the Pew...

Has Trump Gone Over The Edge On Negotiating With Canada? He may well have.  Facing the  deadline for submitting his deal with Mexico to Congress on Friday, he did so.  However, he did so without Canada signed on, the apparently intense negotiations in Washington between Canadian Foreign Minister, Chrystia Freeland and US Trade Representative, Robert Lighthizer having failed to come to an agreement.  With both the Mexican leaders and major Republican...

“For nearly a decade, Republican officials have been treating ordinary Oklahomans like the colonial subjects of an extractive empire. On Governor Mary Fallin’s watch, fracking companies have turned the Sooner State into the earthquake capital of the world; dictated policy to her attorney general; and strong-armed legislators into giving them a $470 million tax break — in a year when Oklahoma faced a $1.3 billion budget shortfall.” The state went from...