“If you don’t want a man unhappy politically, don’t give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none. Let him forget there is such a thing as war. If the government is inefficient, top-heavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than that people worry over it. Peace, Montag. Give the people contests they win by remembering the words to more popular songs or the names of state capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year. Cram them full of noncombustible data, chock them so damned full of ‘facts’ they feel stuffed, but absolutely ‘brilliant’ with information. Then they’ll feel they’re thinking, they’ll get a sense of motion without moving. And they’ll be happy, because facts of that sort don’t change.” ― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
Good Friday.Chris had a tougher day yesterday but is still doing very well. Mom and Mrs. Buchman went to the movies, The Aftermath, and both liked it. (Keira Knightly) The local sports shows were horrified about how disappointed the Penguin management sounded about their team. Rutherford praised his defense but really was critical of the vets. Listening to them, I have no idea what they will do. Last night's Washington game was wild.
What does it tell about a culture when people are hoping the President is a traitor? What does it say when a sizable portion of the citizenry thinks it likely? Or believes its own manufactured political smear? What does it mean when the Press and the Democrats are surprised by a report which was publicly summarized the previous week? Does the presumption of innocence still apply here? Barr was attacked by the Press for obscuring a report that was to be released 90 minutes later. Schiff claimed knowledge of collusion but Mueller didn't find it; Adam Schiff is the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Can you have collusion involving events that are not criminal, or when does defending yourself from an unjust accusation become obstruction? A lot of politicians are saying that this event casts a cloud over Trump; they may be underestimating the size of the cloud. I wonder if attacking Barr is a good plan; he looks like a guy who might take an attack on his integrity seriously. And maligning Barr for Mueller's report is pretty weird. But the weirdest was the “does not exonerate” quote Mueller threw in; has such a thing ever been done before? Or is it just a pandering self-serving judgmental non-sequitur? Maybe Diogenes had no high aim of finding an honest man, maybe he was just looking for a grownup. National Enquirer, along with two of its sister publications, will be purchased by the head of Hudson Media, whose family used to own the Hudson chain of airport newsstands. The two new changes to damage savers and to punish people who believe government, the SECURE act and RESA, are both getting some popular press. Under the SECURE act, non-spousal beneficiaries would have to take out all the money within ten years. The Senate version forces all distributions to occur over five years if the account is worth more than $400,000. Make all the previous posturing about retirement, lies. The offer of money to rebuild Notre Dame has inspired criticisms of inequality and white privilege.
"In 2014 alone, the U.S. government misspent or lost over $125 billion of taxpayer monies." I read this recently and thought it an outrageous exaggeration. Then I read this: Using public data from federal databases, Mark Skidmore, a professor of economics at Michigan State University, found that $21 trillion in unsupported adjustments had been reported by the Defense and Housing and Urban Development departments between 1998 and 2015. these are astonishing numbers, astonishing incompetence and criminality. That’s about $65,000 for every American. That's the debt. Big day in history.On this day in 1775, 700 British troops, on a mission to capture Patriot leaders and seize a Patriot arsenal, marched into Lexington to find 77 armed minutemen under Captain John Parker waiting for them on the town’s common green. British Major John Pitcairn ordered the outnumbered Patriots to disperse, and after a moment’s hesitation the Americans began to drift off the green. Suddenly, a shot was fired from an undetermined gun, and a cloud of musket smoke soon covered the green. When the brief Battle of Lexington ended, eight Americans lay dead or dying and 10 others were wounded. Only one British soldier was injured. But that battle led to Concord later in the morning, then the retreat to Boston. The American Revolution had begun.
Sung at the Completion of the Battle Monument, July 4, 1837
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set today a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.
Five Charts
Populations
It was as recently as 2012 when the number of couples without children globally surpassed the number of those with children.
Taxes in a Vacuum Sowell's argument that taxes are only numbers and do not predict returns because it does not know the taxed victim's response is no better seen than in this graph:
So many of these government plans and ideas depend upon a static, unresponsive community. Most governments deny the very existence of incentives, whether positive or negative. Government sees its citizens as slugs. Specific Population Declines
The decelerating pace of population decline has made Japan, once a thriving empire and global economic powerhouse, the country with the highest rate of natural population decline in the world. Some European countries, including Bulgaria and Romania, are seeing their populations decline at a faster rate, but this is mostly driven by immigration. The pace at which Japan's population is declining has even outpaced Venezuela, even as widespread starvation and societal collapse have driven millions of people out of the country over the past five years.
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