Gongol.com Archives: June 2019
June 12, 2019
Take note of what's happening in Hong Kong
"Huge" isn't enough to describe the scale of the protests -- perhaps half a million people -- and they are self-organizing, too.
Cutting the check isn't the same as paying the price
The President wants to believe that Americans pay "very little" for his tariffs on Chinese goods. But when high taxes are imposed on anything, consumers end up sharing in that cost, period. You can quibble about their share of that cost vis-a-vis the relative slopes of the supply and demand curves, but they absolutely do pay.
Just half a century past Loving v. Virginia
The Supreme Court case that squashed bans on interracial marriage isn't that far in the rear-view mirror. If you're looking at a Baby Boomer, you're looking at someone who is older than this Supreme Court case. Sometimes it's hard to put into perspective just how long the law has permitted injustices to go on.
A bank is no place for a sloppy, made-up name
SunTrust, merging with BB&T, will call itself "Truist". Not "Truest", "Trust", or "Tryst".
There are those who would say it's alarmist to take too seriously the rise in US Treasury securities outstanding. Those people would be wrong.
Norway's legendary sovereign-wealth fund divests from most coal mining
A socialized market economy can work...if you have strong social cohesion, ample rewards for private-sector investment, a big natural-resource endowment (like Norway's oil), and prudent managers of the profits from that resource endowment. It also doesn't hurt to have some form of work requirement and supplemental form of gainful employment -- lest you encounter the often grave risk of creating a large class of young men with nothing productive to do. These conditions are not met in all of the places where "democratic socialism" gains traction, and that's a real problem -- because in those places where the preconditions are not met, the system is extremely unlikely to succeed. And that's not a statement of criticism about the people who are lured by the appeal of what such a system promises; it's simply a recognition of certain immutable facts of human nature.
First it was Amazon Prime-branded trucks rolling up and down I-35 and I-80. Now, it's delivery in Amazon-branded vans in top-100 markets, like Omaha.
Iowa needs a new state flag. Here's an idea.
Stealing a few ideas from the "Good Flag, Bad Flag" pamphlet by the American Vexillological Association, a symbolic substitute for our present-day overcomplicated mess.
A delusion: "Some people said it was the best speech ever made by a president in Europe"
A Presidential claim on par with "My girlfriend is hot and she lives in Canada". There is an unfathomable degree of ahistorical hubris involved in his thinking that an unremarkable speech is somehow comparable with "Tear down this wall" or "Ich bin ein Berliner".
The triumph of spontaneous order
Hong Kongers leave water for one another during mass protests. Most people are good by nature, and are trying their best for themselves and their families. Sometimes we just need to be nudged or led in the right direction.
Changes in routine shouldn't put babies at risk
Summer changes in patterns can put children at risk of being left behind in hot cars. Don't let it happen.
May the Warren and Charlie Show reign for a thousand years
Warren Buffett says he wants to keep up the extravaganza that surrounds the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting in Omaha
