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Archive for 2022
March 13, 2022
REMEMBER WHEN ANYONE WHO GOT COVID WAS SHAMED FOR BEING A SCIENCE-DENIER? Barack Obama tests positive for COVID: The former president said he is “feeling fine” other than having a scratchy throat. When I got Covid over a year ago I felt fine, too, though I did lose my sense of smell for a few days. And I was unvaccinated.
OF COURSE HE DOES: Alec Baldwin amazingly blames Halyna Hutchins for her own death.
HOW YOU KNOW HISPANICS ARE TRENDING REPUBLICAN: The rise of white nationalist Hispanics.
THROUGH THE DELIBERATE EFFORTS OF A GROUP OF PEOPLE THAT DOES NOT MEAN US WELL: How America became a nation of the woke and wary, walking on eggshells.
OPEN THREAD: All That Wasted Time.
ALL THE EXPERTS ASSURED ME THIS WOULDN’T HAPPEN: Shocking Discovery: Paying People Not To Work Makes People Not Work.
NEWS YOU CAN USE: The cost of gasoline the year you started driving.
Although this moment is amusing:
1979
Absolute gas price: $0.90
Inflation-adjusted price: $3.38 (#15 most expensive year in 85-year span)
The Iranian Revolution began in January 1978, disrupting the country’s oil exportation process. Availability dropped as a consequence, but in reality, Iranian oil exportation only dropped by a small percentage. Nevertheless, the panic was enough to send gas prices around the globe skyrocketing once again. America was, for the second time in a decade, faced with high prices, long waits at the gas station, and extreme inflation. In November, the global situation worsened as the 444-day Iranian hostage crisis began.
1980
Absolute gas price: $1.25
Inflation-adjusted price: $4.14 (#5 most expensive year in 85-year span)
After the oil crisis of 1979, gas prices surged once more in 1980, jumping from $0.90 to $1.25 per gallon as global oil prices peaked. Jimmy Carter’s presidency was marked by inflation, gas shortages, and international crises, and despite his 1979 “crisis of confidence” speech, Carter was defeated by Ronald Reagan.
The “despite” referencing Carter’s infamous “malaise” speech is a nice touch. No word yet if Fox Butterfield contributed to the above list.
RUSSIA THREATENS TO MAKE EXTERNAL DEBT PAYMENTS IN ROUBLES: “Moscow is scheduled to make a combined $117mn in interest payments this Wednesday on two dollar-denominated bonds, according to JPMorgan. Neither bond’s contracts gives Russia the option of paying in roubles, according to the Wall Street bank. The latest warning to foreign bondholders ratchets up the chances the country will default on its debt for the first time since the Russian financial crisis in 1998, as its financial system comes under heavy strain from the measures western governments have taken following the invasion.”
WEIRD, TO JUDGE FROM THE NEWS IT’S CLIMATE CHANGE, GENDER PRONOUNS, AND ELECTRIC CARS:
You can always tell how insular a person has become in their politics when a term that has been used regularly regarding a topic that has been in the news for years strikes them as something “new.”
“Fans of Florida’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill have a new favorite word: ‘grooming'”
Of course, people who don’t share columnist Monica Hesse’s Bryn Mawr value system have actually been using the word for some time.
Okay, I shouldn’t be so hard on Bryn Mawr. After all, it has a politically diverse student body with only around 42% identifying as “liberal” and the rest identifying as Marxists.
Read the whole thing.
THE MARS ROVERS HAVE OUTPERFORMED EXPECTATIONS. Ingenuity still “as good as new” after nearly a year on Mars.
TOM BRADY UN-RETIRES:
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): A friend comments: “Inflation is so bad Tom Brady had to go back to work.”
ONE OF SEVERAL AREAS WHERE ELITE OPINION SHARPLY DIVERGES FROM PUBLIC OPINION: 70% Favor Increased U.S. Oil and Gas Production.
DEFENDING STATIC POSITIONS THEY WON’T BE GREAT BUT MIGHT MANAGE. ANYTHING MORE WILL LIKELY BE A DISASTER.
Maybe experience with violent videogames will help. I took a relative from NYC to the pistol and the skeet range and he shot amazingly well at both having never done it before. The Insta-Daughter attributed that to his extensive experience with first-person shooter games. . . .
STACY MCCAIN: ‘Simply Not True.’
Joe Biden believes he is honest, and that anyone who disagrees with him is lying, or is ignorant, or has been deceived by liars.
So deeply convinced is Joe Biden of his own honesty that he thinks his very name is synonymous with truth-telling:
“I give you my word as a Biden: I will never stoop to President Trump’s level.”
— Nov. 20, 2019“I give you my word as a Biden: If I am elected president I will do everything in my power to protect our children from gun violence.”
— March 10, 2020“I give you my word as a Biden: When I’m president, I will lead with science, listen to the experts and heed their advice, and always tell you the truth.”
— March 18, 2020When I first noticed him using this “my word as a Biden” phrase during the 2020 campaign, I was puzzled. Has the Biden family been so prominently associated with honesty that when Joe says this, most Americans say, “Well, that settles it”? Of course not. In fact, Biden’s first presidential campaign, in 1988, collapsed in disgrace specifically because of Joe’s dishonesty, when he was caught plagiarizing others — most notably British Labour leader Ne0l Kinnock — in his speeches[.]
Related: It’s the return of Creepy Joe:
In light of Biden’s accumulated baggage, this tweet seems like quite an unforced error by whoever is running the Democrats’ official Twitter account:
BE PREPARED: Augason Farms Breakfast and Dinner Variety Pail Emergency Food Supply Everyday Meals 4 Gallon Pail. #CommissionEarned
NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG: Russia-Ukraine War Threatens Wheat Supply, Jolts Prices: Poor harvests have left global wheat inventories low and fighting has jeopardized Black Sea exports.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine threatens a big portion of the world’s wheat supply and has sent prices on a dizzying ride to new highs as well as the sharpest weekly drop in years.
Wheat stockpiles were already running low and prices were the highest in years thanks to two years of poor growing weather when Russia’s attack jammed up Black Sea trading and endangered nearly a third of the world’s exports. The invasion prompted fears of food shortages in countries fed with imported grain and pushed prices to new highs.
Milling wheat in Paris and the most-traded U.S. futures contract, for soft red winter wheat delivered to Chicago, notched record prices early in the week. Then they plunged. Chicago futures ended the week 8.5% lower, the worst weekly performance since 2014 when wheat was coming down from a drought-induced spike. French markets, as well as on-the-spot trading in St. Louis and Kansas City, followed similar arcs.
Still, the benchmark U.S. price, at $11.07 a bushel, is 72% higher than a year earlier and analysts expect the war will keep wheat high. Germany’s Commerzbank AG on Friday boosted its spring-quarter price forecasts by 19% for Chicago futures and by about 14% in Paris.
Rising wheat points to further inflation of food prices and another force blunting the post-pandemic economic recovery. Global food prices hit an all-time high in February, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization. U.S. food prices in February were up 7.9% from a year earlier, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, taking a big bite out of Americans’ purchasing power.
Yes, I’m shocked by our grocery bills nowadays, even when we’re not buying anything special.
ROGER KIMBALL: Kamala Harris laughs at a war.
Do you know the word “battologist”? According to the excellent Dictionary of Early English, it means “one that endlessly and uselessly repeats the same thing.” (According to Herodotus, there was a Spartan named “Battus” who stuttered, hence the word. But I digress.)
That presser got worse, much worse. In response to an earnest question to about whether the United States was willing to make “a specific allocation for Ukrainian refugees,” Harris laughed, looked at President Duda, and said, “A friend in need is a friend indeed.”
Then came the cackles. Painful, what?
That was Thursday. On Friday, she had moved on to Romania. Another presser, this time with the Romanian president Klaus Iohannis. A reporter asked, “How long should Americans expect — how long should we be bracing for — this historic inflation and some unprecedented gas prices?”
An excellent question! This is what the vice-president, she who is a heartbeat away from the most powerful office in the world, did in response to the question. First, she looked pleadingly at President Iohannis. Maybe he would save her? Just a little boost, a small lifeline?
He smiled back, but no.
Of course, the DNC-MSM will attempt to save Harris from herself: VP Gaffe Watch: Nets Hide Kamala’s Bizarre Laughing Fit While Discussing Refugees.
And of course, the old fallback: The View: Criticism of Kamala’s Laughing is ‘Based in Racism…Misogyny.’
SO MUCH FOR “ZERO COVID:” China’s daily cases of symptomatic COVID more than triple.
Related: China shuts business center of Shenzhen to fight virus surge.
Their lockdowns didn’t work, and their vaccines were a flop.
QUESTION: DOES THIS MAKE THEM LEGITIMATE MILITARY TARGETS FOR PUTIN? “This week, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta Platforms — the parent company of Facebook and Instagram — decided that people could temporarily use those platforms to call for the deaths of other people.” “”Not anyone or anywhere, to be clear: Users are only allowed to call for the killing of Russian soldiers, Russian president Vladimir Putin, and his Belarusian counterpart, Aleksander Lukashenko, and only in specific ways related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.” And it gets more crazy from here.