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Well, We've Answered This Question (Chess Master v. Pawn Dept)
Last month in four installments -- one, two, three, and four -- I posted readers' views on how we should understand President Obama's negotiating stance during the (unnecessary and abusive)...
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More Reading to Bring Good Cheer (Debt-Ceiling Dept)
1) In the latest issue of the New York Review of Books, Elizabeth Drew on how our current moment may look in retrospect:>>Someday people will look back and wonder, What were they thinking? Why,...
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Let's Look on the Brighter Side! More on Chess Master v. Pawn
Over the past 24 hours I have put up a number of non-supportive items about the debt-ceiling "compromise," the least upbeat being this and this. A number of readers have written in to sound the note...
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A Churl-Free Day of Posting, Part #1
Having struck a sour tone these past few days, it will be all upbeat, all the time, with posts today. That is to say, no politics, public finance, FAA or TSA screwups, Chinese unrest or high-speed...
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Churl-Free #2: Little Sumpin' Beer
Apropos only of good cheer for the day: If you haven't yet tried the oddly named Little Sumpin' Sumpin' Ale from Lagunitas, or if -- like me -- you'd been put off by knowing that it's a "summer beer"...
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Churl-Free #3: Shark Week!
Shark Week is a favorite in our household as it is everywhere. Reasons: 1) It is Shark Week 2) It stars the South African shark photographer Chris Fallows, who is some kind of cousin and an example...
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Churl-Free #4: In Flight
Getting this in under the wire on an only-positive day. Late yesterday afternoon this is how the upper Hudson River Valley, north and east of Albany, looked from 4500 feet at around 6pm. Miles away to...
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While I'm Still in the Churl-Free Mood: #5, Tecnu!
I mean to bring this up at the beginning of every summer, and it always keeps getting put off. So I'll do it now: if I had my own Nobel Prize for chemistry to award, I would give it to Dr. Robert Smith...
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On Rules and Norms: Four Reasons to Regret This Moment
OK, enough of this uplift. Back to business.A few months ago, after I had done a post about destructive rule-changes in current American politics, Andrew Sprung wrote back with this...
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Huntsman Update: The Good News, and...
While Mitt Romney was avoiding taking any position at all on the debt-ceiling controversy, and most of his Republicans competitors were unanimous in denouncing it -- as Romney eventually did too, once...
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FAA Stalemate Plan: Make Congress Travel by Bus
UPDATE 3:45pm EDT: It looks like this is over. The solution appears to be more or less a "clean" extension of FAA funding, allowing the anti-union and small-airport funding issues to be fought out...
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Obama as Chess Master: 'Think of Him as Bobby Fischer'
I've published a series of rough assessments of the savvy and game plan that the Obama Administration brought to the debt-ceiling fight. For a change of tone, here is a reader's argument today that...
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Yet More Charts That Should Go With Debt Discussions
The Globe and Mail in Toronto weighs in with these "infographics," showing the total tax burden that Americans bear in both international and historical perspective.The chart on the top shows how the...
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The Real Deficit Problem: One More Essential Chart
From Calculated Risk, this morning. We have spent six months in an invented political crisis about the nightmare "emergency"Â of the federal deficit.The federal deficit is a serious challenge in the...
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Welcome Jack Fallows
There will be time later on for challenging news of finance and politics. Right now, here is some wonderful news of local interest. Please welcome Jack Fallows, making his debut in the early morning...
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Dueling 75-Year-Old Pilots: Now This Will Be an Interesting Test Case
I'm staying off the main financial/political news of the day for a while longer. The non-headline news of the weekend offers an interesting test case of how the wheels of regulatory justice turn.As...
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Language Mystery: When Did Americans Stop Sounding This Way?
The Atlantic's wonderful new Video Channel has a lot of great material, and it is invidious to point to any one offering rather than another. But this clip, "Wings Over the Golden Gate," which I...
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The 'Meltdown' Article; Also 'Passionless'
Thanks to Joe Nocera for a reference to my 2005 article, "Countdown to a Meltdown," in his NYT column today. I wanted to say a word about the background of that piece, and of another, older one.As I...
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On the Universality of Baby Cuteness
Not long ago I posted a picture of the baby boy born on August 6 whom members of my family consider a paragon of newborn adorability. From his bassinet in Los Angeles:That same day, a baby girl made...
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The Poison Ivy Update
Last week, advice on the miracle protector against/cure for poison ivy, Tecnu. (Uma Thurman's rendering of Batman-world character Poison Ivy at right.) This week, readers' additions and clarifications....
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