1. A review of the new Amazon bookstore: ““Wow, am I inside the Internet? Is this how the characters in TRON felt when they first entered the game?” I thought, more than a few times.”
2. More detail on the Kansas Republican tax hike.
3. “Around two thirds of Brits own a shed; of those who don’t, 44% would like to.” Link here.
#1 why did you think that?
The cool bikes that zip you from section to section, I’m sure – like these https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GBLtnxxtzQ
No, I don’t Believe it!
I would still like to know how a bookstore is like being inside the internet?
The signage using internet typeface, along with images of book covers, resemble internet visuals. Which raises the question, am I inside the internet right now?
6. Trump has normalized conduct that was at one time considered impeachable. But I do agree with Cheap Talk that the daily outrage in the media has numbed our senses to the conduct. While the attention is on Trump’s conduct to enrich himself (I give Trump the benefit of the doubt that he is not a traitor), his conduct on the world stage has increased, increased significantly, the risk of all out war between Saudi Arabia (Sunni Muslims) and Iran (Shiite Muslims) (and throw Israel in the mix and eventually Russia and the US), reflected in the brazen Saudi (Sunni) terrorist attack in Iran yesterday. Will Iran retaliate? Trump’s response to the attack likely exacerbated the already tense situation between the two countries. Trump really is an ignoramus.
I know. Between the widespread surveillance of US citizens for political purposes, and the illegal unsecured bathroom server sending out classified information to people without clearance, it’s been a nightmare.
Those were him, right? (CNN is vague about this.)
Trump’s candidacy for president reminds me of the plot in The Producers. He wasn’t supposed to win, he didn’t want to win, he just wanted to ingratiate himself with the Russians so he could continue to get funding from them for his real estate projects. Like the producers in The Producer, he lost by winning. How can a con man succeed when the media reports his every move and every utterance, when the FBI spies on his every move and every utterance, including those involving the Russians!
Unhinged.
I thought that was Hillary’s story.
Liberals do project, don’t they?
So funny. It is like in a nation with about 135 million adults over the age 35, Hillary is the only alternative you can contemplate for President. Not a second for the Cruz, Bush, or Rubio counterfactual? Or Romney starting his second term?
Two reflections:
“Trump does not remotely understand his role, status, and duties as President and Chief Executive, and this failure infects or undermines just about everything he does. It is an amazing state of affairs: A President of the United States who does not at all grasp the Office he occupies, and who thus entirely lacks the proper situation sense, or contextual knowledge, in which a President should exercise judgment or act. Let that sink in, and then imagine all of the decisions a President must make, all that he is responsible for. This reflection is the main reason why I have come to believe that the President does not deserve a presumption of regularity in his actions—not just by courts with respect to the immigration executive orders, but by the public more generally with respect to ‘everything the Executive does that touches, however lightly, the President.'”
https://lawfareblog.com/two-reflections-comey-statement
It’s funny how very obviously awful Trump is…
…. and America said “Hey, still better than Hillary.”
By all means, keep piling on him. It gets funnier every time!
As I say, I am not worried in the long run. But it was a sad detour.
Where were you 8 yrs ago lamenting the sad detour. At least this knocks us a little back on track.
The sad fact is that Romney would have likely been just fine as prez. An actual adult in the room.
46% at any rate.
Karl Rove concurs with that quote above: “increasingly, it appears Mr. Trump lacks the focus or self-discipline to do the basic work required of a president”
Who knows what the future will bring, but the Comey testimony had no revelations of any significance. So far this entire issue seems to have been manufactured out of thin air. The 4th estate doing its best to unseat someone they dislike.
Bill Clinton normalized the idea the President is above the law (specifically perjury.) W. normalized the spy state. Obama normalized the funneling billions to (health insurance) corporations to buy their cooperation with no legislative authorization.
The process of normalizing of behavior that was once considered impeachable has thus been made normal.
Impeachment is simply a political process. What is impeachable is defined by the congress and is completely ad-hoc. This is emphatically demonstrated in that no impeachment process has ever been enacted against a president when the house was of his own party.
A war between Shiites and Sunnis would probably be bad for Shiites and Sunnis, but it would not necessarily be a problem for us as long as we don’t do something stupid like invade (again). Let them sort their own crap for a while.
The spike in oil prices would likely do more to curb global warming than any hand-wringing about the Paris accord will.
5. Control-f for “migra.”
3. Wow, those Kansas income tax rates are high, even before the increases.
Indiana Republicans raised taxes this year as well. Raised the gas tax 10 cents a gallon to “pay for roads”. I think you see it in the Kansas story as well, it was all well and good until road construction projects started getting cut. You can see who really runs the GOP, and it ain’t ordinary citizens.
2. correction
Despite that, they are still on the left side of the Laffer curve. Interesting.
More important in Indiana is the Indiana toll road tolls just doubled, after the State legislature blocked toll hikes by the private operator forcing it into insolvency and bankruptcy court.
So much for privatization being able to deliver more for less, unless you consider jack boot wealth redistribution by unelected Federal technocrat to be part of doing more for less.
“Two-axle vehicles will now a pay a toll rate increase of 126 percent on the Indiana Turnpike after the 10-year subsidy has officially come to an end.
Effective June 1, all cars, motorcycles, pickup trucks, SUVs and other two-axle vehicles will pay more for Indiana tolls. Those with E-ZPass transponders will now pay $10.52 to travel the full 157-mile length of the Turnpike, compared with the $4.65 they were paying.
Back in 2006, the Indiana Toll Road subsidized frequent users of the toll road as part of an agreement leasing the Turnpike to a private company. The subsidy was expected to last 10 years and to expire in June 2016. However, additional funding was injected to the subsidy, extending the discount for another year.
According to ITR spokesperson Dylan Souza, all motorists paying cash or driving a vehicle with more than two axles have been paying the current rate.
“Right now, everything is the same across the board as cash rates,” Souza told Land Line.
From 2006 to 2014, truck toll rates to travel the length of the state increased from $14 to $38.70, a 176 percent increase. State legislation approved of annual truck toll increases from 2006 to 2009.
In 2015, Australian investment group IFM took over ownership of ITR Concession Co. after the toll road experienced a disastrous lease with the original Spanish-Australian partnership.
ITR Concession Co. was initially owned by Cintra of Spain and Macquarie Bank of Australia. Cintra had bankruptcy issues with tolls on SH 130 in Texas.”
My thought exactly. The rate for earners between 30 and 60 thousand is higher than California’s.
According to http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/income-tax-by-state , Kansas has low taxes, about 4% compared to California’s 8%. Probably the cuts in education made the tax unpopular in KS. Since education is basically signaling and glorified day-care centers, it’s probably not unsound to cut education along with everything else, but people love the Wizard of Oz aka Big Brother, whether in Kansas or elsewhere.
“Marginal rates on less affluent Kansan households will increase as well, from 4.6 percent to 5.25 percent by next year for married taxpayers making between $30,000 and $60,000 a year”
The rate for households (married filing jointly) for this income level in California is 4%.
For the math challenged, 4 is less than 5.25.
5. Off topic, unless you are Asia-oriented, speaking of trying to have influence the AFR and Singapore Straits Times need to lower their subscription prices. The Financial Times and certainly the WSJ are cheaper.
6. I will repeat myself as an answer to this concern:
“I really can’t wrap my head around Trump knowing that Russia attacked hundreds, to a thousand, election related servers, and then while holding much of that from the American people, laughing and joshing with the Russians about shutting down the investigation in the Oval Office, US press excluded.”
That smolders.
And yet the only person to have actively obstructed justice was Loretta lynch. Talk about an own goal.
Someone will have to explain that to me. I see Trump firing Comey to end an investigation. I see neither Obama nor Lynch firing Comey. I have heard that Lynch gave some request on press interaction, which may have been in her preview.
And again we have the massive Russian attack, a cyberwar in the background.
Firing Comey wouldn’t end the investigation, could not end it and if it had THEN you “might” have a point. But alas, you do not.
Hilary’s server was hacked by almost every government including friendly ones. It is likely that the ONLY government that did not get everything that was on her server was the U.S. government.
Again, for emphasis, Hillary’s server was one of the US assets that withstood the Russian assault, and you nimrods are still on the same page as Trump on July 27, 2016:
“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’ll be able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,”
Traitors.
“Hillary’s server was one of the US assets that withstood the Russian assault”
You don’t know that.
Even if true, so what? It was an illegal avoidance of FOIA laws if nothing else.
Again, we just suffered a cyberwar. If you have not read it:
https://rodneybrooks.com/is-war-now-post-kinetic/
Which side were you on?
This is what complete and utter political panic looks like. And it is making me giddy.
Hey, aren’t you “scoreboard” guy?
http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/07/politics/donald-trump-approval-rating-quinnipiac/index.html
Look I’m smiling and delighted and you are frantic and on the verge of tears. Clearly your tribe isn’t winning.
Anon,
Maybe this will help:
https://www.preparationh.com/products/cream-with-maximum-strength-pain-relief
So sorry about today’s nothingburger.
You went hunting for impeachment, and the only obstruction was apparently committed by the blue team. ARRRGH!
That’s gotta hurt.
To quote a bit of German from 1653 – ‘Gottesmühlen mahlen langsam, mahlen aber trefflich klein / Ob aus Langmut Er sich säumet, bringt mit Schärf’ Er alles ein.’ or as translated by Longfellow ‘Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small; / Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He all’ (Possible source may be this man, though – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sextus_Empiricus Or Sun Tzu – sourcing gets a bit flaky, to be honest.)
Comey already achieved his objective, which was the naming of a special counsel to investigate what is going on with those around Trump involving Russians and the 2016 election, along with providing the groundwork to investigate Trump for obstruction of justice. That Cheap Talk seems unaware of this is not exactly surprising, since Trump apparently hasn’t figured it out yet either.
Or Trump’s personal lawyer, who said this in a statement – ‘The President also never told Mr. Comey, “I need loyalty, I expect loyalty” in form or substance.’ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2017/live-updates/trump-white-house/james-comey-testimony-what-we-learn/here-is-the-full-statement-of-trump-personal-lawyer-marc-kasowitz/?utm_term=.705650b3b45e
As pointed out by Trump, there are ‘tapes’ of Trump’s conversations with Comey, so we should be hearing those tapes any time now, to show Comey is lying. Otherwise, as has already been legally established in the U.S., and pointed out here – https://www.lawfareblog.com/congressional-access-comey-memos – those memos are fully admissible as evidence, regardless of what Trump or his lawyer say. Better, and in terms of that second link, Comey also mentioned that if the Senate Intelligence Committee wants a copy of a set of notes concerning at least one meeting, they need only ask a law professor for them. Without having to bother the administration to search for them, talk about executive privilege, etc. And there is no classified information contained, and thus no reason not to publish them, just increasing the pressure to release all of the other documents created after Comey’s meetings/calls with Trump. Unless, of course, Trump plays his ‘tapes’ first, and thus shows the world that Comey is indeed lying.
Humiliatingly firing the head of the FBI, a former U.S. Attorney, and a former Deputy Attorney General, with just a touch of experience in this little political affair – Comey having appointed Patrick Fitzgerald to be the Special Counsel in the Plame affair – shows that reality TV is not good preparation for being president.
And really, a lawyer stupid enough to say that Comey is lying, after President Trump has made an official statement that he has ‘tapes’ is far beyond incompetent. Nixon essentially lost office in the end because of 18 minutes of missing audio on one tape. Either Trump plays those ‘tapes,’ soon, to show what was said, or he will be in the unenviable position of having his lawyer having defamed a former head of the FBI, with his carefully prepared evidence already in the hands of investigators.
The entertainment value has nothing to do with bombshells, it is in watching some of the most utterly incompetent people to ever hold power in the White House (certainly in my life time) play out the finest political slapstick imaginable – and then exceed themselves, over and over again.
Head of security service [and friends in security service] leads power play against elected president in revenge.
No chance of that ending badly.
It is not the first time a president is threatened by the security force who gave him the job in first place. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_María_Bordaberry#President_of_Uruguay American politics is 100% corrupt.
Indeed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galba
OK, but no one would have said “omnium consensū cāpax imperiī nisi imperasset” about Trump (or any American presidents in the last three decades — this is another reason I am proud to be a Brazilian).
Every server in existence, and almost all desktops are under attack from someone. The US government had the security records of all it’s current and past employees stolen by someone. These computers and servers were under attack any time they were online. Have you ever run a server and read the logs?
The Russians surely were doing it. So were the Chinese. Likely the Israelis as well. The Norks. Probably the DNC tried, but couldn’t figure out. And likely the RNC as well, probably successfully but well hidden.
Your spouting off is more about showing your ignorance than anything else.
The DNC showed itself profoundly incapable of existing in this world. Hillary showed an extraordinarily cavalier attitude towards computer security, actively avoiding the security restrictions of the State Department. Oddly they lost the election as a result.
Trump knows the threat, and has actually operated security operations. Perfection isn’t possible, but due care and attention can limit the exposure and damage, and contain the threat. He and the RNC didn’t face humiliating security breaches likely because they have people who are reasonably competent. Oddly he won the election.
If Trump was as evil as many think he is, he would be running around with his hair on fire demanding that the CIA and NSA and FBI be granted enormous and intrusive powers to freely wander around the nation’s servers ostensibly for our protection. But he isn’t doing that, first because he knows that it wouldn’t work, second because he doesn’t trust that they would not make a hash of it and third that they wouldn’t abuse their power and authority.
You see, the question isn’t whether the Russians or anyone else was poking around in the servers. The question is were they maintained with competent due diligence, and are they in fact necessary due to the inherent risk involved?
If the US government is incapable of running an election after how many centuries without making a hash of it, Trump isn’t the problem.
3. The only proper shed is a bodger’s shed.
Googling failed to shed light on this topic (pun intended). I do know this: in the USA, the ‘little Dutch barn” shed will set you back about 3000 USD, quite expensive. In the Philippines, you can get some guys to build it for you for around one-tenth that price.
https://youtu.be/KUv3OwY5Etg
It was really a comment on working vs lounging sheds.
Yikes what a disaster for Democrats. The thought they had trumped nailed and instead all they got is Loretta lynching inching closer to being frog marched into jail. It was so bad for the hard left that WaPo and NYT reporters resorted to falsely reporting that Sessions not lynch obstructed justice.
These are the kind of disasters that plague political parties for years.
You know, I rarely do this, but only a truly scummy person would use the word ‘lynching’ to replace part of a black person’s name.
However, it is certainly possible that it was a spell check mistake, of the sort that a decent person would apologize for as soon as it was pointed out.
I don’t normally do this but go eat a dick.
2nd. The scummy person in question was the former AG. Your comment is unfocused and contains no substantive response to Sam’s comment, for which he definitely has a point. F U.
Hahahahaaaaaahaha.
Comey’s testimony about Loretta Lynch does not provide grounds for an obstruction of justice accusation and repeats details that were reported in the New York Times over a month ago (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/22/us/politics/james-comey-election.html?_r=0):
“At the meeting, everyone agreed that Mr. Comey should not reveal details about the Clinton investigation. But Ms. Lynch told him to be even more circumspect: Do not even call it an investigation, she said, according to three people who attended the meeting. Call it a “matter.” Ms. Lynch reasoned that the word “investigation” would raise other questions: What charges were being investigated? Who was the target? But most important, she believed that the department should stick by its policy of not confirming investigations.”
2. The article is too weak on explaining the root cause of the tax hikes: spending mandates imposed by state judiciaries. This is just as much a problem in New Jersey as in Kansas, but the latter gets more coverage because it can be spun as a “rebuke” which supports a particular narrative. Most state budgets are completely dominated by health care and education spending, which leaves all the other government functions fighting over the remaining scraps. When the federal government or state supreme courts make expenditures on these top two items entirely inflexible, then tax decreases without deep drops in the quality and output of everything else are basically impossible because illegal. The Kansas governor gambled that he could convince the judiciary to grant him some additional room for maneuver on education spending, but it didn’t pan out, though there are obviously plenty of perfectly reasonable efficiencies which can be found in the public education system. And so now the legislature has little choice but to bite the tax bullet if they don’t want to be a “health care and education but nothing else” state. That neither constitutes a “rebuke” on behalf of other Republicans nor even any disagreement regarding the desirability of lowering taxes and spending. This is arising more out of resigned acquiescence to necessity than from any political opposition.
Interesting observations. I live in Illinois, which has gone without a budget for three years, and the short answer to the question “how can that be?” is that various courts have ruled that most of the spending is mandatory even if not authorized. It’s an odd development from a system that originally emerged from the notion that the power to tax and spend should rest with the representatives of the people to one in which the judges decide who gets paid. From a game theory perspective, the judges have eliminated much of the pressure to pass a budget.
Doh you consider the Indiana constitution, article 8, Unconstitutional?
ARTICLE 8. Education
Section 1. Common school system
Section 1. Knowledge and learning, general diffused throughout a community, being essential to the preservation of a free government; it should be the duty of the General Assembly to encourage, by all suitable means, moral, intellectual scientific, and agricultural improvement; and provide, by law, for a general and uniform system of Common Schools, wherein tuition shall without charge, and equally open to all.
Section 2. Common school fund
Section 2. The Common School fund shall consist of the Congressional Township fund, and the lands belonging thereto;
The Surplus Revenue fund;
The Saline fund and the lands belonging thereto;
The Bank Tax fund, and the fund arising from the one hundred and fourteenth section of the charter of the State Bank of Indiana;
The fund to be derived from the sale of County Seminaries, and the moneys and property heretofore held for such Seminaries; from the fines assessed for breaches of the penal laws of the State; and from all forfeitures which may accrue;
All lands and other estate which shall escheat to the State, for want of heirs or kindred entitled to the inheritance;
All lands that have been, or may hereafter be, granted to the State, where no special purpose is expressed in the grant, and the proceeds of the sales thereof; including the proceeds of the sales of the Swamp Lands, granted to the State of Indiana by the act of Congress of the twenty eighth of September, eighteen hundred and fifty, after deducting the expense of selecting and draining the same;
Taxes on the property of corporations, that may be assessed by the General Assembly for common school purposes.
Section 3. Principal and income
Section 3. The principal of the Common School fund shall remain a perpetual fund, which may be increased, but shall never be diminished; and the income thereof shall be inviolably appropriated to the support of Common Schools, and to no other purpose whatever.
By amendment, 1972.
Do you consider Article 6, section 6 of the Kansas constitution to be unconstitutional?
§ 6: Finance.
(a) The legislature may levy a permanent tax for the use and benefit of state institutions of higher education and apportion among and appropriate the same to the several institutions, which levy, apportionment and appropriation shall continue until changed by statute. Further appropriation and other provision for finance of institutions of higher education may be made by the legislature.
(b) The legislature shall make suitable provision for finance of the educational interests of the state. No tuition shall be charged for attendance at any public school to pupils required by law to attend such school, except such fees or supplemental charges as may be authorized by law. The legislature may authorize the state board of regents to establish tuition, fees and charges at institutions under its supervision.
(c) No religious sect or sects shall control any part of the public educational funds.
Although amended since, this section was in the original 1860 Constitution Congress required of Kansas to be admitted as a State. It was afpgreed to by thousands of Kansas elites which were in greater proportion to those in either the conservative or liberal elites of today.
The section should be repealed. It makes the state constitution a bankruptcy pact. Current economic trends mean that Kansas simply can’t afford the hit to competitiveness of being a high tax state: it doesn’t have a lock on some special draw needed to capture the necessary captive audience.
And in almost every state that included similar language in their constitutions, these sections have proven to be enormous mistakes prone to all kinds of budget-busting mischief.
The quite typical problem is the unreasonable way the Kansas Supreme Court has interpreted the meaning of the word “suitable”. In other states the term more often used is “adequate”, which has proven subject to the same jurisprudential manipulation. It has been taken to mean a positive right to essentially unlimited expenditures if some expert testifies that’s what it’s going to take to get some class of students up to some standard.
Members of the elected branches of government simply cannot use discretion or make basic judgment calls and utilitarian decisions about trade offs, opportunity costs, and value. The current situation is a result of some terribly unwise and unsustainable legal and policy choices. But the usual suspects want to spin this story as some kind of triumph of political common sense. It is the almost precisely the exact opposite: a capitulation to entrenched insanity.
On the British sheds situation…
Has there been a survey asking those who already have sheds whether they are considering building a second shed, in the manner of Arthur “Two Sheds” Jackson?
As I recall, Arthur made the mistake of telling friends that he was thinking of buying a second shed…
#3 And “moderate” Republicans wonder why conservatives despise them.
Can’t reduce spending, gotta raise taxes. We are moderately stealing from you.
At least the taxpayers got a few years of lower taxes.
Sorry, comment is about #2 of course.
No, No SORRY you can’t take it back now, that was for Item #3!
Oooooo May is about to win big and that’s exciting for a cuck like me!
I hope after Theresa May wins a crushing majority tonight she gives me a spanking and a stern dressing down!
#6…Senator Clinton was investigated for possible inadvertent leaks of classified material, I believe. How hard is it understand that these constant leaks are intentional? Maybe, years ago, classified meant something. However, since classifying documents has primarily become CYA, no one cares about a document being classified any longer. Of course, some documents are profound enough to be seriously classified.
The story is no longer about the prevalence of leaks, but, rather, the strategy behind leaks. Their timing, for instance. D.C. is a bacchanal of leaks, outrage about merely being a pose for the partisan and credulous. Today, the D. C. crowd lives to hear “Well played!”
5. I am an Australian living in Canberra (the capital city). A few quick points for those unfamiliar with Australia:
a) Australia has mandatory voting for local, state and federal elections;
b) Australia allows foreign donations; and
c) Australia has trended towards hung parliaments recently.
The result of (a) above is that the Australian electorate is highly susceptible to scare campaigns and propaganda. The result of (b) and (c) is that cashed up countries looking for legitimacy within the region see providing donations for elections as a sound investment. If ever there was a fertile ground for Chinese to influence a WEIRD country it is within Australia.
Despite the above I would say that we Australians have danced to the tune of the US far too often and for very little gain (Afghanistan and Iraq). New piper, different tune. Although I must say I prefer my superpowers democratic.
Jus to heard about the dismal failure of your leftist big government socialism…
Poor gdp growth of only 3.5% which extended the current expansion to only 100 consecutive quarters, tied with the dismal socialist Denmark, I think.
Trump in just 6 months has beat the Australian governments economic record hands down!
You need to repeal your socialist health care laws. You will no longer be killed by government death panels, who control 100% of the health care in Australia, to keep costs to 9% of gdp.
Poor old pseudo-dearieme: two goes, and neither in British English. He must be tin-eared.
Tabarrok pays his interns too little to attract competent sock-puppets.