Tag Archives: politics

. H/T Holly Nelson

I have met this man on several occasions. He is one of the most unimposing and quiet people I have ever run across. You would never know he is one of the most knowledgeable and capable constitutional attorneys in the nation having testified to Congress on SCOTUS appointments. Erwin Chemerinsky: In Marbury vs. Madison, in 1803, the Supreme Court declared that it is “the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is.”Quoting Chief...

(Dan here…lifted from Robert’s Stochastic Thoughts) by Robert Waldmann Nomoremisterniceblog almost states the bitter truth, but he’s too nice to tell us what fools we are. He wrote: I don’t want to relitigate the McGovern and Mondale campaigns, but Dukakis? “Free everything and impossible promises” weren’t what defeated him. My comment I want to relitigate events of 1984, which Delaney has sent down the memory hole. Mondale was not hammered because he...

A Serious Problem For Dems It is that progressive Dems some time ago glommed onto the idea that protectionism is “progressive.”  It has been going on so long and has become so ingrained that Bernie Sanders has been running around bragging about how he is more protectionist than Trump.  Elizabeth Warren has been a bit more subtle about it, calling to renegotiate all existing US trade agreements to make them super strong on labor and environmental...

I really enjoy Rick Wilson’s thoughts on the Republican Party, his former party until 3 years ago. I don’t know which part of his latest Washington Post Op-ed I like most but here goes As the saying goes, you had one job, Republicans. Now? Your job really isn’t representing your districts. It’s backfilling and wallpapering over your president’s latest excesses, outrages, racial arson and verbal Twitter dysentery. Every day is a new crisis, and every day...

Monetary policy is roughly the only issue on which I regularly disagree with Matt Yglesias. So it is boring to note that I agree with almost everything he wrote in his Vox article on the recently announced 0.25% Federal Funds target rate cut. His main assertions are: – it is a very reasonable move even though Trump advocated it and it will help Trump’s 2020 campaign. – The previous stance of normalizing interest rates because normal interest rates are...

Kevin Drum notes conservative hackitude. I’m just going to fair use the whole post (please click the link so I don’t feel guilty) I would like to offer a comment on the hack gap this morning: It’s remarkable the number of liberal economists who continue to favor an interest rate cut from the Fed. They are displaying intellectually honesty here: with inflation low, there’s no reason not to take out an insurance policy that could keep the current economic...

Degeneration of Bipartisan Blog Sites: Econbrowser This is probably just a whiny complaint of well-known and long running issues.  Indeed for a long time most blog sites (not to mention most twitterspheres and Instogram Idiotspheres) have been mono-partisan in those who participate in their discussions/debates. This has been true for a long time for most sites in the Econoblogosphere, including this site, which clearly tilts “left,” even though we have...

Pledging Zero Carbon Emissions by 2030 or 2050: Does it Matter? We now have two responses to the climate emergency battling it out among House Democrats, the “aggressive” 2030 target for net zero emissions folded into the Green New Deal and a more “moderate” 2050 target for the same, just announced by a group of mainstream legislators.  How significant is this difference?  Does where you stand on climate policy depend on whether your policy has a 2030...

Donald Trump addressed a rightwing crowd (Turning Point USA) in Washington on Tuesday. The audience roared in support of the president standing in front of the Presidential Seal. Now take a close look at the seal. It had been doctored to include a two-headed eagle – the same as the Russian seal and in place of arrows in one of the eagle’ talons – there was golf clubs. Click on the image for better detail. ...