Mike Norman Economics

Backgrounder.The Vineyard of the SakerThe Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan back with a bangPepe EscobarSee alsoTKNews by Matt TaibbiAfghanistan: We Never Learn

More Vietnam redux. The US learned nothing from Vietnam and repeated the same mistakes. The US also did not learn from the French defeat in Vietnam that the US had aimed to reverse. French author Bernard Fall explained this at the time. I read his work while in the military during the Vietnam era. Did anyone else, especially the general staff running the war. I doubt it. The same mistakes were made in Afghanistan and Iraq. Somewhat ironically, similar mistakes are being made by the elite in...

The Deficit Myth.InSide HigherEdRead this Book. Seriously.Matt Reed

In the wake of further Covid angst in Australia, the airlines are once again laying off thousands of workers. One of the airlines, Qantas, formerly the publicly-owned national carrier announced last week major job cuts soon after it secured a rather substantial rescue package from the Federal government. Qantas makes a habit of crying poor despite paying its executives slavishly large salaries and aggressively using its market power to undermine smaller regional airlines that have served...

I ran into a discussion on Twitter about the use of the terms positive feedback and negative feedback. These phrases really should not be applied to discussions of things like economic dynamics. I have discussed this before, but I decided to give the full explanation....Bond EconomicsWhy You Should Avoid Using "Positive/Negative Feedback"Brian Romanchuk

15 yard personal foul to GOP for piling on…Unmitigated Disasters: Biden's First Months Have Been Some of America's Worst. https://t.co/8vwnbmVu97— Raheem J. Kassam (@RaheemKassam) August 15, 2021 He’s scrambled eggs he looks like Captain Pike in the original Star Trek pilot pre Shatner:Scary!!!

This is just going to be incessant… hey what about “the debt!” they forgot that one… highest probability of default ever compared to any past debt ceiling episodes… The Biden Administration. pic.twitter.com/ulB7Q8AvU1— House Judiciary GOP (@JudiciaryGOP) August 15, 2021

"Who lost Afghanistan?" Fingers point in many directions.RT‘Manifestly not Saigon’? WATCH US helicopters evacuate Kabul embassy as Blinken defiantly rejects Vietnam pullout comparisonsYahoo NewsAfghan President Ghani Flees Country as Taliban Enter Kabul: ‘It’s Over’Sputnik International'This is Not Saigon': Blinken Insists US' Afghanistan Mission Was a 'Success'RTTaliban vows to respect rights of Afghan women, will allow access to work & education provided hijabs are worn –...

 Backgrounder.India PunchlineRussia, China circle the wagons. Iran is in it.M. K. Bhadrakumar | retired diplomat with the Indian Foreign Service

Apparently we have enough power to drive ourselves to extinction, or at least a severe culling. Is that "too much"?Do some people have too much power over others? Do we humans have too much power over the natural world? These questions get to the heart of our biggest global problems. They also force us to think critically about the way society is organized, and about our own behavior. We often tend to give knee-jerk answers, but too much is at stake for that. We need to think critically and...