Reverie

Evidence of the quasi-religious nature of Sartre’s serial dictator-worship is in the title he gave to the newspaper he relaunched in the 1970s and which still publishes today: Libération. Liberation from what, exactly? France at the time was hardly a tyranny. It is difficult not to conclude that what was meant was a mystical or other-worldly liberation from the existential conditions under which mankind is constrained to labor forever.--Dalyrmple

Global warming is not even the obvious top environmental threat. Dirty water, dirty air and insect-borne diseases are a far greater problem today for most people world-wide. Habitat loss and human predation are a far greater problem for most animals. Elephants won’t make it to see a warmer climate. Ask them how they would prefer to spend $1 trillion—subsidizing high-speed trains or a human-free park the size of Montana.

.... Climate policy advocates’ apocalyptic vision demands serious analysis, and mushy thinking undermines their case. If carbon emissions pose the greatest threat to humanity, it follows that the costs of nuclear power—waste disposal and the occasional meltdown—might be bearable. It follows that the costs of genetically modified foods and modern pesticides, which can feed us with less land and lower carbon emissions, might be bearable. It follows that if the future of civilization is really at stake, adaptation or geo-engineering should not be unmentionable. And it follows that symbolic, ineffective, political grab-bag policies should be intolerable. (wsj)

Who is....Joseph Priestly?

This is from a recent movie review of "Dunkirk:"

Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, ..... is both an astonishing filmmaking achievement and an epic narrative failure. Nolan, who wrote and directed Dunkirk, made a deliberate choice to tell the story almost exclusively from the close-up perspective of individual sailors, soldiers, and pilots. This relatively short, blindingly sharp, and painfully vivid feat of impressionistic moviemaking gives one a rare sense of the horrors of war as experienced by those whose country is losing the fight. Nolan is a great director. What he is not, in this picture, is a great storyteller. His view of the events at Dunkirk is nearsighted. He misses the forest for the trees.

The economic phenomenon that people who call for higher minimum wages ignore is that when the price of anything rises, people seek substitutes. We see it with anything. When the price of oil rose, people sought ways to use less of it through purchasing more insulation for their homes and fuel-efficient cars. When the price of beef rose, people sought cheaper substitutes such as pork and chicken. The substitution effect of price changes is omnipresent, but do-gooders and politicians seem to suggest that labor markets are an exception. It’s bad enough when do-gooders and politicians have that vision, but it is utterly disgusting and inexcusable for a trained economist to buy into that zero-elasticity vision.--Williams

This is the basis for all of the government's efforts at social engineering. They raise the price of cigarettes through increased taxation to decrease their availability. The only place where this economic law does not apply is the minimum wage.

Why do you suppose Trump closed down the CIA's Syrian covert program?



The top 200 S&P 500 companies have pension shortfalls totaling $382 billion and corporations like GE spent more on share buybacks ($45b) than the size of their entire pension shortfall ($31b) which ranks as the largest in the S&P 500.



Hackers have broken into the networks of HBO and reportedly leaked unreleased episodes of a number of shows, as well as the script for next week's "Game of Thrones" episode.


In 1774, dissenting British minister Joseph Priestly, author of Observations on Civil Liberty and the Nature and Justice of the War with America, discovered oxygen while serving as a tutor to the sons of American sympathizer William Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne, at Bowood House in Wiltshire, England.
Joseph Priestley shared the liberal religious and political philosophy of many of America’s revolutionary leaders, including Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, all of whom became his friends and correspondents. ("Dissenting" here means "non-Anglican." He was a Unitarian.)


"The abiding genius of Karl Marx lies precisely here, in his acute understanding of the possible reaction of the ignorant intellectual to the workings of the capitalist or market order." This is Buchanan on one of his beliefs about Marxism, that it's success hinges on the Left's not knowing anything about economics.

An indictment, unsealed recently, describes alleged illegal dealings of former FCA labor relations chief Alphons Iacobelli, deceased UAW Vice President General Holiefield and his widow, Monica Morgan, a prominent Detroit photographer. Morgan will be arraigned in a Detroit federal court today, July 31. Iacobelli will be arraigned Tuesday, Aug. 1. Federal investigators claim the three were at the center of a conspiracy from 2009 through 2014 that included Iacobelli personally pocketing $1 million and helping funnel $1.2 million from the UAW- Chrysler National Training Center to Holiefield, Morgan and other high-ranking members of the union.

Golden oldie:
http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2013/08/bicycles-taxis-and-history_12.html

Bicycles, Taxis and History steeleydock.blogspot.com General von Schlieffen bicycled through the Belgium countryside reconnoitering the grounds of the war he knew would come. Years later, in...

VW is trying to go electric. Matthias Müller was hired to drag the automaker away from the emissions scandal and into the world of modern automotive technologies. He’s facing opposition from the company’s skeptical managers. (wsj)

"The reason why startups are disrupting companies in the 21st Century is not because they are smarter. It's because they have capital to do so," said Steve Blank, a serial entrepreneur, startup mentor and adjunct professor at Stanford University. [...] The zeal that prevailed just two years ago has faded. Seed and angel investors completed about 900 deals in the second quarter, down from roughly 1,100 deals in the second quarter of 2016 and close to 1,500 deals during that time period in 2015, according to a report released last month by Seattle-based PitchBook Inc, which supplies venture capital data. The dollar amount provided by seed and angel investors was $1.65 billion in the second quarter. That's just shy of the $1.75 billion for the same time period of 2016 and down significantly from 2015, which saw $2.19 billion invested into fledgling startups

Contrary to myth, the United States in recent decades has not experienced a flood of immigrants. The net annual inflow of immigrants per 1,000 population is actually lower than the average rate since 1820. Foreign-born residents account for 13 percent of the U.S. population, compared to 20 percent in Canada and 27 percent in Australia.


Major health insurers in some states are seeking 2018 premium increases on Affordable Care Act plans of 30% or more, according to new federal data. (wsj)

There is news of a really important new inscription discovered recently in Pompeii. It is the funerary memorial of a wealthy man with seven  surviving lines about 4 metres in length, according to Mary Beard. One highlight that has been reported is a reference to him giving a gladiatorial display with 416 gladiators. 416! The other thing that is going to be important are some added details about the riot in the amphitheatre in Pompeii in 59 CE. It apparently says that the local magistrates in Pompeii at the time were exiled by Nero (something we didn’t know already and isn’t mentioned by Tacitus who is our main source of information).

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s “scientific” recommendations  include “reduced gender inequality & marginalization in other forms,” “provisioning of adequate housing,” “cash transfers” and “awareness raising & integrating into education.” Even if some of these are worthy goals, they are not scientifically valid, cost-benefit-tested policies to cool the planet.(wsj)

"Nearly half of Americans do not benefit from DOW 22,000." That is a headline from the WashPo. Someone high in the news industry thought that insightful and important.

At the time, NFL officials claimed they did not know why ratings were down and even used the 2016 presidential election as an excuse for why more people weren't watching. But according to a new survey from J.D. Power, NFL fans did in fact tune out in droves because of the disrespect and protest of the National Anthem before games.

William Browder before the Senate Judiciary Committee:

Graham: So, I just want to absorb that for a moment. The group that did the dossier on President Trump hired this British spy, wound up getting it to the FBI. You believe they were working for the Russians?

Browder: That's correct.  And in the Spring and Summer of 2016 they were receiving money indirectly from a senior Russian government official.

The government bought a disused budget hotel to turn into a shelter for up to 85 migrants. Protesters in the town in southwest France under the cover of darkness have built a nearly-two-yard-high wall around the entrance to try to prevent access to it.

AAAAAnnnnnnddddd.......a chart: