Here at the Montecito Journal, we have long believed in offering a variety of views, letting each side have its space to speak. In light of the upcoming election, two of our longtime contributors have written in on what they think you should consider when heading to the ballot box this November 8. With Rinaldo […]
This will be the last Perspectives column you’ll be reading for the time being. Personnel changes at the World Business Academy, and the incredible demands on my time as the Founder and CEO of H2 Clipper, Inc., has made it clear that I need to let go of this weekly column for now. I do […]
Shays’ Rebellion, which doesn’t get much attention in History class, was the first test of the young nation of the United States of America. And yet, understanding the uprising and its immediate after effects is extremely important today. On August 29, 1786, just three years after the formally securing independence through the 1783 Paris Peace […]
Does it upset you when you hear traditional media refer to the current Supreme Court as dominated by “Conservatives”? If not, it should. The truth is, there is nothing conservative about the current six-person majority of the Supreme Court. They are radical, pure and simple. Referring to these Justices as “conservative” implies that their judicial […]
The last two columns in this space revealed the ridiculousness of burning more natural gas as a way to combat climate change just because it is half the carbon of coal. In case everyone isn’t already aware, the time for half measures is way gone! Greece, France, and other major areas of Europe are on […]
Fareed Zakaria is a man deserving of considerable respect. He is not only a great columnist, television host, interviewer, and pundit, but he is also an opinion maker. The general public listens to him. So do kings, potentates, politicians, and major corporate executives all over the globe. Hence there’s no joy when we are compelled […]
No doubt many of you know of Fareed Zakaria, the very intelligent columnist for the Washington Post and popular host of Fareed Zakaria GPS (where GPS stands for “Global Public Square”). Fareed is more than a popular pundit; he is a significant opinion maker himself. For years his prestigious interviews of global elites in government […]
Let’s get something straight: just because the Supreme Court comes up with a clearly wrong opinion doesn’t mean it is correct, or that it won’t be eventually thrown out as bad jurisprudence. Here’s a notorious example: The Supreme Court led by Justice Roger B. Taney (who, until John Roberts, was viewed as the worst Chief […]
With the 4th of July Holiday just past, it is more important than ever to reflect on the Nation’s founding “energy,” what the Germans would call our Zeitgeist. Famously observed, America is not a nation that arose due to geographic isolation of a singular genealogical population, as the British Isles or Japan. Nor did it […]
Whether we like it or not, we are all witnessing something particularly horrific, an incredible tragedy, being televised for all the world to see as the January 6th Committee Hearings. The world’s democracies are getting scared — as should all of us be. In Germany this week, President Biden was confronted by our closest allies […]
1972 was a very bad year for everyone in the USA. Richard Nixon defeated the unshakably honest son of a preacher, Senator George McGovern. McGovern ran, and lost, on a platform of peace, determined to end the Vietnam War. Nixon promised to stay the course. Upon winning, Nixon nevertheless signed the Paris Peace Accords just […]
Electric cars are gushing onto our streets from Tesla, and from Nissan, GM, Ford, Volkswagen, and a half dozen other car manufacturers (450 different models globally!). Elon Musk succeeded beyond Detroit’s wildest dreams in convincing first the American public, and then the global marketplace, that driving an electric car was “cool.” Everyone wanted one, and […]
Just what is a “Windfall” or “Excess Profits Tax”? The words “windfall profits” is your first clue. Wikipedia defines an excess profits tax as “a tax on any profit above a certain amount.” The definition clarifies that this fiscal instrument is typically used in a wartime setting, and is designed to capture the upside profits […]
What ever happened to the League of Nations? You know, the global organization founded on January 10, 1920, by the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War? It was created in order to get all willing nations to band together in an attempt to prevent all future wars. The U.S. never joined, and […]
Elon Musk is the world’s richest person and one of the most brilliant individuals in business. He is the P.T. Barnum of our age — only more effective by far. And yet no one has ever accused him of: 1) having an ego that is under control; 2) a desire to benefit his fellow citizens; […]
Hard to believe though it is, the leaked draft opinion of Justice Samuel Alito is one of the most radical decisions in Supreme Court history. The proposed majority opinion striking down Roe v. Wade is not going to be remembered for its doctrinaire, misogynistic, didactic, and insensitive tone, nor for its incredulous conclusions. No, it […]
A macroeconomic argument circulating during World War II stated that the nation couldn’t afford both “guns and butter,” pitting the costs of waging war against luxuries like silk stockings and abundant food choices like creamy milkfat. In fact, this saying originated decades earlier, with the passage of the National Defense Act of 1916 as the […]
On April 14, this column introduced the concept of “Freedom Fuel.” It outlined the potential unlocked by shifting from a planetary fuel system based on fossil fuels to a system based on the wide availability of hydrogen created by electrolyzing water with renewable energy (so called “Green Hydrogen”) at prices below fossil fuel. As that […]
Most folks are feeling significant pain at the gas pump and the grocery store these days. Remarkably, the cause for that “pain” is the same for both – inflation. The question is, should we all be worried about that issue in isolation, or should we focus on the economic fundamentals that underlie this spurt of […]
1,000,000,000 = 1 billion Euros ($110 billion in U.S. dollars) per day. That’s what Europe sends to Russia in cash every single day. At that rate Russia can finance a war for a very long time. At that rate, Russia can commit unlimited atrocities. And, even though some are afraid to call what Russia is […]
Forest fires, cyber warfare, sabotage, and plain old utility company incompetence, greed, and malfeasance have brought us to the point where we must abandon the electrical grid. It isn’t safe. It does cause a significant percentage of forest fires here in California, it supports a utility (PG&E) that has been convicted of multiple felonies for […]
A great many things about the Russian invasion of Ukraine bother us, as well they should: the genocide, the war crimes, the images of starving children intermingled with dead bodies and urban wreckage that hasn’t been seen in Europe since the bombing of Dresden. Through it all, we in the U.S. have imagined ourselves tucked […]
We must do more! What more can we do? These twin phrases have become a refrain throughout western civilization. We are profoundly aware that Russia is committing war crimes in Ukraine on a genocidal scale. We are tormented by a desire to do something “more” but uncertain what that could be. Or how “something more” […]
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has captivated, as well it should, our general news coverage, our hearts, our minds, and our ability to clearly see the greater peril which is momentarily being obscured by the war. That is understandable on many levels when we see our fellow human beings, average Ukrainian civilians, targeted as victims of […]
The first battle of the Greco-Persian wars occurred in 490 B.C. in the town of Marathon, Greece. With Persians attacking cities all along the Greek mainland, and as Athenians braced for their own attack, Athenian General Miltiades took command of a civilian army and marched to Marathon to meet the Persian army. Using superior battle […]
Here they go again! It never ceases to amaze how far Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), a “public utility,” will go in harming the public interest. Their latest ploy is an attempt to surreptitiously resurrect the nearly 40-year-old Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, which is scheduled to close by 2025. They want to bring it back […]
In the political swamp that has ensnared our democratic republic a glimmer of something we haven’t seen for almost six years is on the horizon: the emergence of a fissure in the Republican party, which has lately been in the grips of Mr. Trump’s remarkably single-handed control as it morphed into the Cult of Trump. […]
A major battle broke out between a bunch of Irish fishermen from County Cork Ireland, and the pride of the Russian navy. You may have missed the news story, so it is worth spending some time looking at what happened, why, and what lessons we can take away from the exchange. The story begins with […]
Last week this column skewered the plaintive cry of the character Gordon Gekko in the film Wall Street when he propounded that “Greed is good.” In doing so we wrapped up the article by quoting one of the most famous and powerful of all capitalists, Chairman and CEO Larry Fink of BlackRock. The firm Fink […]
Many people familiar with economic history are familiar with the huge influence that Milton Friedman commanded in our recent economic past. Friedman, an economist and statistician, had an outsized impact on nations around the world through his work heading up the “Chicago School” (referring to the University of Chicago where he taught and led a […]
Investor-Owned Utilities (“Utilities”) are plotting to kill California’s solar program. Apparently, avarice, and the ability to get away with causing 85 percent of area lost in recent forest fires in California, are not enough, and they are now coming up with ways to dramatically reduce all new solar installations in California. Can you believe that […]
Who was Martin Luther King, Jr? Why do we celebrate a “MLK Holiday” and is he still relevant in 2022? All great questions. Joyfully, the research to explicate those answers took a full day that I will be grateful for the rest of my life. Many of us grew up in the civil rights era. […]
Auld Lang Syne Sometimes referred to as the “New Year’s Anthem,” Auld Lang Syne begins with a markedly rhetorical question: Should old times “be forgot and never brought to mind,” and spends the next several verses confirming the value of times gone by and friendships that were developed to be celebrated into the new year. […]
This is one very difficult column to write. It is the end of the year, a time typically filled with Holiday cheer — whether Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, or just Santa Claus and family. We pause to celebrate the happiness of the season, complete with the exchange of gifts, and to bask in the warm embrace […]
Almost every parent of a K-12 school age child is really concerned about the incessant school shootings that plague our nation. These have been escalating in violence and complexity over the 23 years since the Columbine massacre in 1999, and it is past time for a national conversation on gun violence and young people. If […]
Have you heard all the news stories lately about “the Great Resignation” (or as some podcasters are calling it, the “Take this job and shove it” moment)? Tune into CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, or pick up a copy of the Economist, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Washington Post, or even your […]
Inflation is on everyone’s mind these days. Currently running at 6.2% (4.6% if you strip out food and energy), inflation is at its highest rate in many decades — since 1990 to be precise. And, although that number is unacceptably high, a historical lens can put things into perspective. From the early 1970s to the […]
The trial of Kyle Rittenhouse has galvanized the country, splitting already “warring factions” into something far more dramatic. The travesty of that trial began with the systematic exclusion of Black jurors and was further amplified by a clearly biased and incompetent judge: he openly fought with the prosecution in front of the jury, denied them […]
Robert Muller, the deceased Santa Barbara resident and globally known United Nations official who many of us admired, famously observed: “Use every letter you write, Every conversation you have, Every meeting you attend,To express your fundamental beliefs and dreams…”. I was reminded of this wisdom as I pored over the numerous letters we received from our last […]
Gwyneth Paltrow famously described her attempts to end a long-term marriage without acrimony as a “conscious uncoupling,” which she explained is a way that a couple can consciously choose to disengage with each other and go their separate ways. No matter what you might think of the talented Ms. Paltrow, or her brand of unusual […]