Removing Saddam Hussein Did Not Cause This Crisis

My Comments: The price of oil is increasing. The news is full of both the World Cup and Iraq. How will any of this affect our investments? And, of course, as always, it depends. At first glance one might dismiss the author as expressing a self-serving platitude. On second glance, you remember he rose to …

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Eric Cantor’s Defeat is a Shaft of Light in Dark Political Times

My Comments: There is nothing I can add to this except encourage you to read it. By Jurek Martin / June 12, 2014 The House majority leader’s defeat disproves the hypothesis that money is all there is These had not been the best of times in America. A seemingly endless round of shootings in public …

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Generation Z, the world’s saviour?

My Comments: 1)  call me slow, but I’ve not heard of Generation Z. 2)  does the world need a saviour? 3) never mind the spelling; this comes from the Financial Times, which comes from London. 4) I was once in the 16-25 age group and look at me now. 5) without Eric Cantor, who is …

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Obama: Prevaricating On Foreign Policy

My Comments: It’s hard not to be tired and uninterested in the speeches of a President now well into his second and last term as President. Never mind that I voted for him twice and have a generally favorable opinion of his efforts on our behalf. Foreign policy is not something that does much for …

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Capitalism: Looking Past The Bottom Line

My Comments: If this author is right, then this issue will have an impact on the mid-term elections this fall as well as the elections in 2016. The lasting legacy of the Obama administration will be the PPACA or ObamaCare legislation. When it was enacted, our cost of health care was increasing much faster than …

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First Million-Dollar Drug Near; Prices Double on Dozens of Treatments

My Comments: This is the power of free market enterprise. Without controls, if you have a monopoly, or close to a monopoly, you can expect a profit motive to drive the train. What I see happening is that while they can, drug companies are taking in as much as possible before ObamaCare (PPACA) forces them …

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RIP Obama’s Stimulus: Funeral for a Policy Success

My Comments: OK, maybe “funeral” is too strong but the bloom is clearly off the lily. I’ve been registered as a Democrat since I was in college. This was when you had to be if you wanted to vote in the primaries. The only people running were Democrats. I’ve called myself an economist since my …

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The Astounding Power of “Economic Elites”

My Comments: I confess to having been naive when it comes to some people having a greater influence on political outcomes than others. But now I've read about this report, and what it claims, and my naivete is now boundless. Some friends and family stopped voting long ago. They have accepted that their votes are …

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U.S. Defense Policy in the Wake of the Ukrainian Affair

My Comments: I was born in England in 1941 with bombs dropping on and around us almost daily. My father, with the Royal Tank Regiment, was across the Channel in the thick of things. Today I have memories of blasted buildings and walls standing here and there, some with staircases. My mother used to put …

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