Earliness
By Ashleigh Brilliant   |   April 29, 2025

No doubt you’ve heard the proverb, “It’s the early bird that catches the worm.” Those words of wisdom would have a different meaning to you, depending on whether you were a bird or a worm. Not being either, I can nevertheless vouch for the fact that it’s not always easy to get up early, especially […]

Tariffs and Why Trade?
By Robert Bernstein   |   April 15, 2025

The left used to want tariffs on imports to protect American union jobs. Now it is the far right MAGA that wants tariffs. Why? Trump had no economic policy until he asked Jared Kushner for one. Jared searched on Amazon for a cool book title Death by China. Co-author Peter Navarro cited expert Ron Vara […]

 

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It All Ghost to Show
By Ashleigh Brilliant   |   April 8, 2025

You may know that one of the first characters to appear, in what is generally considered to be Shakespeare’s greatest play, is the Ghost of Hamlet’s Father. He has not been dead for long, and Hamlet is still fuming at the callousness of his mother for having remarried (and to his Father’s brother!) so soon […]

Cost Disease?
By Robert Bernstein   |   April 8, 2025

Many Americans feel that the country is headed in the wrong direction. They feel they spend more and get less. Many factors feed this sense but here I want to focus on a nearly 60-year-old idea from late economist William Baumol called “Cost Disease.” There was rage in this recent election about inflation. But inflation […]

Don’t Stop
By Ashleigh Brilliant   |   April 1, 2025

If you’ve ever played Monopoly – you know there is something almost addictive about it. As is the case with life itself, it combines a certain amount of skill with a great deal of chance. The skill derives from decisions you make about the acquisition and development of real estate and utilities. The luck depends […]

This All Started with Reagan?
By Robert Bernstein   |   April 1, 2025

Before Trump, many thought that Nixon was our worst president. Nixon lied strategically about starting a war that destroyed the idyllic country of Cambodia. He sabotaged the peace deal to end the U.S. war in Vietnam when Johnson was president. He used the IRS, FBI and CIA against people he didn’t like. He lied to […]

Chaos and More Chaos
By Jeff Harding   |   March 25, 2025

I attended Radius Commercial Real Estate’s 15th excellent annual forecast at the Hilton. One of the presenters was economist Christopher Thornberg who gave an optimistic view of the economy, much of which I agreed with. Regarding the world since Trump took office Dr. Thornberg’s rosiness hit a wall. The current state of things? “Chaos,” he […]

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  • Mags and Rags
    By Ashleigh Brilliant   |   March 25, 2025

    In the time between the invention of printing and the advent of the Internet, many types of periodicals have come and gone. In our own era, we have seen the birth and demise of magazines of news, humor, commentary, housekeeping, and many other more specialized subjects. A key element in the survival or failure of […]

    The Message You Were Waiting For?
    By Robert Bernstein   |   March 18, 2025

    Democrats lost in 2024 because they supposedly didn’t have the right message. Canadian philosophy professor Joseph Heath offers the message Americans are waiting for. Ever since the New Deal, Democrats have been the party of large-scale improvements: rural electrification, Social Security and Medicare and promises of true universal health care, high speed rail, green energy […]

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    That Wondrous Time I Got Beat Up
    By Jeff Wing   |   March 11, 2025

    Centennial Junior High School. Boulder, Colorado. 1973? What happened was this. In PE we were playing soccer (what the rest of the planet calls “football”) and a stocky little guy named Tony kicked the ball out of bounds. Tony was in my German class (please don’t ask), wore his stick-straight hair in bangs and kept […]

    Hope
    By Ashleigh Brilliant   |   March 11, 2025

    If anybody asks you, “What Is the Southernmost point of Africa?” you would probably say “The Cape of Good Hope.” And you probably identify that location with the City of Cape Town, South Africa. But you would be a little off. Cape Town is located at a point which the earliest Portuguese explorers called the […]

    “Silly” Science with Serious Consequences?
    By Robert Bernstein   |   March 11, 2025

    Have you heard the one about taxpayers funding a $3 million shrimp treadmill? It is a brain virus spreading through the MAGA world – to validate the utterly lawless vandalism of our government by Trump and his unconstitutionally appointed hit man Musk. MAGA people apparently never heard of “Google,” which when prompted yields the real […]

    At Last
    By Ashleigh Brilliant   |   March 4, 2025

    How do things end? I made a whole career out of writing very short “Thoughts.” But where does a thought end? For years, I’d been jotting down various ideas. They could be a new form of literature. But every such form must have some structure, and a crucial dimension would be its length. Looking through […]

    “Help! I’m Locked in the Waterloo!” The Spectacular Rise of the Shallow State
    By Jeff Wing   |   February 25, 2025

    Our glowering POTUS has wrecked all our excited rumormongering with the usual blunt force. Isn’t it in the interest of a benevolent despot to keep his cards close to the vest? Promulgate an air of mystery? I suppose after all these years of having been enslaved by the deep state we should be grateful for […]

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