“The big question that seldom— if ever— gets asked in the mainstream media is whether these are a net increase in jobs. Since the only resources that the government has are the resources it takes from the private sector, using those resources to create jobs means reducing the resources available to create jobs in the private sector. So long as most people do not look beyond superficial appearances, politicians can get away with playing Santa Claus on all sorts of issues, while leaving havoc in their wake— such as growing unemployment, despite all the jobs being ‘created.'”--Sowell
Stone tools recovered from an excavation in China suggest that our evolutionary forerunners trekked out of Africa earlier than we thought.
Until now, the oldest evidence of human-like creatures outside Africa came from 1.8 million-year-old artifacts and skulls found in the Georgian town of Dmanisi. But the new find pushes that back by at least 250,000 years.
Medscape (7/12, Mulcahy, Subscription Publication) reports, “The big question about proton beam radiotherapy – is it any better than conventional radiotherapy? – is being addressed in seven ongoing randomized clinical trials sponsored by the National Cancer Institute.” However, “these trials, which cover cancers of the breast, lung, prostate, esophagus, liver, and brain, are all enrolling more slowly than expected, report” Justin Bekelman, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and Andrea Denicoff, MS, RN, and Jeffrey Buchsbaum, MD, PhD, both from the NCI. These “trials are ‘at risk’ mainly because of this poor accrual, say” the authors. Medscape adds, “Unfortunately, ‘restrictive’ insurance coverage is dragging down the entire research effort and is ‘a principal barrier to enrollment,’ they write.”
Who is....Matt Ridley?
Have you ever wondered why foreigners are willing to invest far more money in Texas and California than they are willing to invest in Argentina and Venezuela? Do you think it’s because they like North Americans better than they like South Americans? No. We’ve always had an attractive investment climate, and we’ve had current account deficits and capital account surpluses throughout most of our nation’s history.
Adamantine: The Greek and Latin word for the hardest imaginable substance, whether applied to a legendary stone or an actual substance, such as diamond, was "adamas." Latin poets used the term figuratively for things lasting, firm, or unbending, and the adjective "adamantinus" was used in similar contexts. The English noun "adamant" (meaning "an unbreakable or extremely hard substance"), as well as the adjective "adamant" (meaning "inflexible" or "unyielding"), came from "adamas." "Adamantine," which has such figurative uses as "rigid," "firm," and "unyielding," came from "adamantinus." "Adamas" is actually the source of "diamond" as well. "Diamas," the Latin term for diamond, was an alteration of "adamas."
Rummel has been criticized in his assessment of the benign nature of democracies with the War of 1812 and the American Civil War being examples of one democracy vs. another. His answer:
"The War of 1812, of course, was between the United States and Great Britain, but the franchise in Great Britain was then severely limited. Parliament was dominated by members from rotten boroughs, districts that aristocrats controlled. Booming regions like Manchester had little, if any, representation. Serious electoral reforms didn’t begin to come until 1832, and major extensions of the franchise came decades later.As for the Civil War, I don’t consider the South a sovereign democracy. Only about 35 percent or 40 percent of the electorate—free males—had the franchise. President Jefferson Davis was appointed by representatives of the Confederate states, not elected. There was an election in 1861, but he didn’t face any opposition. . . .
There are other possible exceptions people sometimes mention, but none of them involve established democracies."
Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano erupted, shooting lava high into the air in a residential neighborhood, which prompted mandatory evacuation orders for people in nearby homes. (wsj)
Interesting discussion on money and work. Matt Ridley said recently that the average person spends only 10% of their time actually working. How is that true, when you work 40 out of 168 hours in a week? Well, you don’t work until age 18 or 21, for starters—and you don’t work after age 65. If you don’t work weekends, and take 4 weeks of vacation… you can see how the free time all adds up.
So we have built this society by spending only 10 percent of our lives working? Imagine if we spent 11 percent!
But what is particularly interesting is the European-like satisfaction that is beginning to emerge in younger people. They can be content with much less because so much is provided them in high quality, affordable products. They have Uber so they don't need a car. The birthrate is down so saving for children is less. And the electronics--some of which are really expensive--are filling their lives in rewarding ways. (Streaming is more and more popular; those tv, movie and cable expenses are sliding away.) Really good food is more and more available at cheaper prices.
But what is particularly interesting is the European-like satisfaction that is beginning to emerge in younger people. They can be content with much less because so much is provided them in high quality, affordable products. They have Uber so they don't need a car. The birthrate is down so saving for children is less. And the electronics--some of which are really expensive--are filling their lives in rewarding ways. (Streaming is more and more popular; those tv, movie and cable expenses are sliding away.) Really good food is more and more available at cheaper prices.
Maybe the future investment is upscale dorm living.
Economics has always defined itself as the allocation of resources in scarcity. But what about surplus? It's like that question about population: All economic theory assumes population growth--so what happens with stagnation or even decline?
A film based on a real-life special collections robbery in 2004 is making its way to a national audience after a successful premiere at Sundance. American Animals follows four Kentucky college students who plot to steal John James Audubon's Birds of America from Transylvania University's library.
According to economist Maximiliano Dworkin of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, competition from China resulted in the loss of 800,000 jobs between 2000-2007, primarily in the production of computer and electronic goods, primary and fabricated metal products, furniture, and textiles. However, he also found that the economy gained a similar number of jobs in other sectors, such as services, construction, and wholesale and retail trade (significantly, Dworkin also says that as a result of savings to firms of lower production costs and access to cheaper Chinese-made goods, “U.S. consumers gained an average of $260 of extra spending per year for the rest of their lives.”).
http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-poetry-of-war.html
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steeleydock.blogspot.com
'All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic.'--Oscar Wilde ...
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The Congressional Budget Office projects that new federal borrowing over the next 10 years will total $12.4 trillion and that at the end of 2028, the debt will be $28.7 trillion — 96 percent of gross domestic product, up from 39 percent in 2008. This is assuming that the government does not raise its spending from it current course.
Hillsdale College’s Gary Wolfram notes that total discretionary spending — including defense — for fiscal 2019 is projected to be $1.362 trillion, which is just $381 billion more than the projected deficit.
In 2007, the Great Recession arrived in December when the national debt was $7.5 trillion and the average interest on it was 4.5 percent. Imagine paying 4.5 percent on today’s $16.5 trillion debt. (from Will)
Speaking of irrational spending:
There is a new "philosophy"---and its attendant editorials and musings---out: Guaranteed jobs. A new poll finds that 46% of Americans approve of this thing called "guaranteed jobs."
The liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities figures the annual price tag of such a notion at $543 billion — roughly equal to the entire defense budget. That would be enough to fund 9.7 million full-time jobs, which would cover those currently unemployed plus those "marginally attached" to the workplace.
That's almost certainly not enough. In addition to the 9.7 million the CBPP counts as unemployed, there are nearly 10 times as many people who aren't officially in the labor force because they aren't looking for work.
Where the money would come from is conveniently not offered.
The idea seems to be to fund unproductive activity because it is good for...for...I'm not sure.
Finland actually tried this and it was unsuccessful. And of course the Soviet Union....
The Swedish panel that awards the Nobel Prize in Literature said on Friday that it would take the extraordinary step of not naming a laureate this year — not because of a shortage of deserving writers, but because of the infighting and public outrage that have engulfed the group over a sexual abuse scandal.
Joy and relief over North Korea's new peace offensive. Charen is unimpressed:
"In 1991, North Korea signed a joint declaration endorsing the "denuclearization" of the Korean peninsula. Both sides promised not to "test, manufacture, produce, receive, possess, store, deploy, or use nuclear weapons" or to "possess nuclear reprocessing and uranium enrichment facilities."
There were immediate problems with compliance. The Clinton administration responded with a flurry of diplomatic efforts (Jimmy Carter was a special envoy to Kim Jong Il), which led to the Agreed Framework of 1994, in which North Korea once again promised not to pursue nuclear weapons.
In exchange, the allies gave the North heavy fuel oil and two "light water nuclear reactors" for peaceful energy. President Clinton called it "a good deal for the United States." North Korea's negotiator, Kang Sok-ju, described it as "a very important milestone document of historic significance" that would resolve his country's nuclear dispute with the United States "once and for all." The pact, he swore, would resolve "all questions of the so-called nuclear weapons development by North Korea" that have raised "such unfounded concerns and suspicions."
The North cheated, and formalized it in 2003 by dropping out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty."
Politicians are not trustworthy. Politicians with absolute power are untrustworthy absolutely.
I'm really confused about the money and Stormy. Was she paid for sex or was the money extorted?
Recent studies are finding that drugs such as LSD and psilocybin can help to alleviate depression, anxiety and addiction—and may have profound things to teach us about how the mind works, writes Michael Pollan in the WSJ.
The problem of knowledge is to discover what consumers want and how to efficiently provide for those wants. Entrepreneurial competition is a process for making such discoveries. In the absence of such competition, the central planner must rely on guesswork.--Kirzner
In Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Mohammed is behind the move to push oil prices higher, aiming to raise revenue as his government seeks to overhaul the economy.
A divided Connecticut Supreme Court on Friday threw out the 2002 murder conviction of Michael Skakel, a member of the Kennedy family, and ordered a new trial.
The 4-3 decision upheld a lower court judge's 2013 ruling that Skakel's lawyer did not provide an adequate defense, necessitating a new trial.
"Having read several new books on climate change, your reviewer Verlyn Klinkenborg advises us to be frightened (”Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid,” May 30). I’ll resist.
How is it possible, I wonder, to review the updated ”Limits to Growth” book and Paul R. Ehrlich’s latest tome without showing even a trace of recognition that these authors’ predictions are notorious for being consistently and dazzlingly wrong? In ”The Population Bomb” (1968), for example, Ehrlich predicted that ”the battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970’s the world will undergo famines — hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.” Ehrlich later lost his bet with the economist Julian Simon that resource scarcity would intensify during the 1980’s."--letter to editor, nyt
AAAAaaaannnnndddd.....a graph:
Image: taxnotes.com
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