Everything was worn out about people: they complained about debts; they were involved in gossip; they had five-storied houses built; they traded in large objects; they bought ships, mines, vineyards; at bridge parties they lamented worriedly and falsely about being too busy; everybody talked about his work, whereas, in fact, nobody did anything; people played bridge and for whole nights groaned for a moment of love. — Miroslav Krleža, On the Edge of Reason Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Money
How Can You Do Good With Someone Else’s Money?
The essential notion of a capitalist society is voluntary cooperation and voluntary exchange. The essential notion of a socialist society is fundamentally force. If the government is the master, you ultimately have to order people what to do. Whenever you try to do good with somebody else’s money, you are committed to using force. How can you do good with somebody else’s money unless you first take it away from them? The only way you can take it away from them is by threat of force. You have a policeman, a tax collector who comes to take it away from them. Whenever you use force, the bad moral value of force triumphs over good intentions. — Milton Friedman Read more →
Joe Biden Believes in Hard Work and Ingenuity?
Joe Biden believes that there’s no greater economic engine in the world than the hard work and ingenuity of the American people. But for too long, the economy has worked great for those at the top, while working families continually get squeezed. — President Biden Announces the Build Back Better Framework Joe Biden believes in hard work and ingenuity! Unless that hard work and ingenuity results in the acquisition of wealth, at which point aspiration and investment are to be punished. Read more →
Psaki: “Unfair and Absurd”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki claimed during Monday’s press briefing that it would be “unfair and absurd” for companies to raise costs on consumers in response to the Biden administration raising the corporate tax rate: Jen Psaki: It’s “unfair and absurd” that companies would increase costs for consumers in response to us taxing them more. ? pic.twitter.com/rHilrYdj4j — Jason Rantz on KTTH Radio (@jasonrantz) September 28, 2021 You can depersonalize the theft by saying “Well, it’s corporate tax rates — greedy corporations, you know.” You don’t need to be an economist to understand that corporate taxes, like any taxes, have to be paid by people: either shareholders, or employees in the form of lower wages, or customers in the form of higher prices. The money has to come from somewhere. Read more →
A Solution for Abortion Access
From the Los Angeles Times: California law states that people have a “fundamental right” to choose and obtain an abortion before a fetus becomes viable. The governor has vowed to protect that right. But just because abortion has more legal protection in California does not mean it is readily accessible to all, advocates of reproductive choice say. Many Californians struggle to afford the procedure, and some live far from a clinic that provides it. Such practical barriers can make abortion too difficult to access for Californians, despite the legal assurances on the books, advocates say. What a calamity! There are no legal roadblocks to abortion in California, and yet a mother-to-be who doesn’t want to be a mother may still find the procedure inaccessible or unaffordable. What about condoms? Are condoms inaccessible or unaffordable? Read more →
An Open Letter to My Former CEO
Today is my last day with Company X. I’ve really enjoyed working with my colleagues. That said, the events of two weeks ago really made me ill. To call an all-hands webinar, announce that the company is losing too much money, as a result of which 80 people will have their jobs taken away, then boom, meeting over. Not even the decency to take a comment or question. I feel like those 80 people probably did not lose the money, probably just did what they were told to do to the best of their ability. The responsibility for losing the money lies with whoever told them what to do, starting with the CEO. There’s a law of the sea, I think it’s a good law, that the captain goes down with his ship. Not that he grabs hold of 80 people and throws them overboard, then follows up with a… Read more →
A Review of This Year’s Met Gala!
Excerpts from an essay By Glenn Greenwald: When it comes to mask mandates, it is now commonplace to see two distinct classes of people: those who remain maskless as they are served, and those they employ as their servants who must have their faces covered at all times. . . . Last month, a delightful event was hosted by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) for wealthy Democratic donors in Napa — the same wine region of choice for Gov. Newsom’s notorious dinner party . . . Pelosi’s donor gala took place as millions face eviction, ongoing joblessness, and ever-emerging mandates of various types. . . . Even though many of the wealthy white donors had no food in front of them and were not yet eating, there was not a mask in sight — except on the faces of the overwhelmingly non-white people hired as servants, all of… Read more →
Will $5 Billion Solve LA Homelessness?
Rep. Lieu seeks to fight homelessness with a $5 billion federal program — smdp.com Rep. Lieu is Ted Lieu, who represents California’s 33rd District, encompassing the coastal areas of Los Angeles from Palos Verdes through Malibu, including Santa Monica, where I currently live. Who’s going to pony up the $5 billion, Ted? You, or you’re going to stick it to the taxpayers? The bill would authorize $1 billion in grants annually for five years for local governments to spend on supportive housing models with comprehensive services and intensive case management. Are there examples of this kind of plan actually working somewhere? Because I can give you examples of plans that don’t work right here in your district. There isn’t a Republican elected official for 100 miles. The LA mayor is a Democrat, every member of the city council is a Democrat, any proposal they want to implement, there’s no one… Read more →
Minimum Wage: $33.58/hr?
Here’s a factoid someone posted on LinkedIn: If the minimum wage had kept up with CEO pay since 1978, it would be $33.58 an hour now. Assuming that’s true, it’s also true that a lot of people do not have skills worth $33.58/hr and it would therefore be illegal for those people to have a job. Also, no one is required to work for minimum wage. If you want to make $33.58/hr, get a job that pays that. If you can’t, then be happy that $33.58/hr isn’t the minimum wage and you can still get a job that pays what your skills are worth. Read more →
I Couldn’t Afford to Smoke if I Wanted To
I was at the local gas station/convenience store and the guy in line ahead of me was buying a couple of Monster energy drinks and a carton of cigarettes. “90 dollars,” the clerk said. I figured he must be buying a tank of gas as well and the price included that, but I asked the clerk when I got to the front of the line, “Did that guy just pay 90 dollars for two Monsters and a carton of cigarettes?” “Yeah — and those are not really expensive cigarettes.” “Wow, I remember when I could buy a carton of cigs AND fill my motorcycle for 15 bucks.” “I know what you mean,” the clerk replied, even though I’ve never smoked or owned a motorcycle. Read more →
Thomas Jefferson: Why Are Democratic Cities Such Disaster Areas?
My fellow Americans – A lot of people ask me, “Tom, why are Democrat-run cities such shitholes?” I was reminded of this by President Biden’s upcoming “soak the rich” tax plan. In my view, there are three Democratic philosophies that destroy American cities. For example, did you know that Detroit in 1950 was the richest city in America? Now it’s a wasteland where half the residents can’t even read. The first philosophy is that Democrats hate rich people because “they don’t pay their fair share.” What is their “fair share”? What is your “fair share” of what someone else has worked for? I would suggest it’s nothing, but Democrats enact punitive tax rates on the most productive people, who then leave town and go somewhere else. The second philosophy is that Democrats hate business because corporate fat cats “don’t pay their fair share.” So they enact anti-business policies, the result… Read more →
Dershowitz on Maxine Waters
[Maxine Waters’] message was clearly intended to get to the jury. If you acquit, or if you find a charge less than murder, we will burn down your buildings. We will burn down your businesses. We will attack you. This was an attempt to intimidate the jury. It’s borrowed precisely from the Ku Klux Klan of the 1930s and 1920s when the Klan would march outside of courthouses and threaten all kinds of reprisals if the jury ever dare convict a white person or acquit a black person. And so efforts to intimidate a jury should result in a mistrial. — Alan Dershowitz Rep. Waters lives in a nice house in the wealthy Los Angeles neighborhood of Hancock Park. Her mansion is valued at $6 million. I guess living outside the boundaries of the district you represent is allowed, because Hancock Park is outside of her South Central LA district,… Read more →
And That’s the Truth: Anti-Asian Racism
[And That’s the Truth is a feature by our guest blogger, Sojourner Truth — PE] The media dont give a goddamn about Asians unless they can fit em into a narrative that they like and thanks to some idiot in Atlanta shooting up massage parlors, Asians can be fit now into two narratives. The guy in Atlanta said massage parlors gave him a sex addiction so he had to shoot eight people. Six of em were Asian women. I dont know if’n youve noticed this but theres a lot of Asian women in massage parlors. But the narrative is white supremacy and he hates Asians. So why did he shoot the other two people? Does he hate Asians but he caint tell is someone Asian or not? And the other narrative is wealth disparity. See, you got them crazy rich Asians and then you got the Asians who aint rich… Read more →
Woke White Boy: Giving Tuesday
I wanted to remind you that today is “Giving Tuesday,” a day set aside every year to interrupt the Christmas shopping blitz so that Americans like you can give to non-profit causes like attacking free enterprise, capitalism, freedom of expression, religious values, and everything that makes America remarkable. Please fight back. — WWB Read more →
Read My Lips: No New Frackses
My fellow Americans – This Biden fellow is the biggest liar on two feet. I heard him on last night’s debate saying “I never said I oppose fracking.” “You said it on tape,” President Trump replied. “Show the tape!” Biden said angrily. “Put it on your website!” OK, first of all, here’s the tape: View this post on Instagram A post shared by President Donald J. Trump (@realdonaldtrump) on Oct 22, 2020 at 10:59pm PDT Second, Biden knows he said it, he knows he said it on tape . . . I’d seen the tapes many times myself. Why on God’s green earth would he stand there and not only lie about it but insist that his opponent produce a tape of him lying about it? It’s the most shameless thing I’ve ever seen! Given the audacity of it, do I believe he’s taken millions of dollars from foreign entities?… Read more →
Traffic Stops and Swimming Pools
We know that people can maintain an unshakable faith in any proposition, however absurd, when they are sustained by a community of like-minded believers. —Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow When I was younger (we’re all very well-behaved now 🙂 ), I had several friends and family members who had unpleasant run-ins with police, where they were cuffed or arrested or beaten, the common thread being not that they were black (they were all white), but they were all wise-asses who didn’t respect authority and couldn’t find it within themselves to be compliant to a police officer. One day my 9th-grade gym teacher told us (again, all white boys) to be excessively polite to police officers — yes sir, no sir — have your day in court if it came to that, but better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6. In my experience, the narrative that only… Read more →
Be Prepared
An ad comes on the radio for a lawyer offering to sue the Boy Scouts on behalf of anyone molested by a scout leader . . . “I was in the scouts. I wasn’t molested though. Or maybe I was molested so traumatically that I’ve blocked it out of my mind. What was that guy’s number again?” “What are you talking about?” “I like to ‘Be Prepared’ for financial opportunities.” Read more →
Four Existential Questions
Can I eat it? Can I have sex with it? Can it kill me? Can I buy it at a discount? Read more →
On This Date: Settling Clergy Sex-Abuse Cases
On this date, July 15, in 2007, the Roman Catholic archdiocese of Los Angeles announced it was settling clergy sex-abuse cases for $660 million. Some people, including some in my own family, will tell you that America started going down the drain when we took God out of schools, whatever that means. Call me a skeptic but we haven’t taken God out of churches and yet we still have $660 million worth of child rape. In one archdiocese! Pass the collection plate, Padre! Read more →
We Giveth But We Also Taketh Away, Just Like God
“As driving behaviors evolve during the COVID-19 pandemic, XYZ Insurance Company is working to reduce auto rates in every state. The national average for those rate reductions is 11%, saving customers a total of approximately $2.2 billion. “‘Current driving data and claims experience show a considerable decline in miles driven and fewer accidents,’ said XYZ Senior Vice President Kristyn Cook-Turner. ‘As a result, we’re looking for ways to continue supporting our customers while we monitor and adjust to trends.’ “‘On the flip side, we’ve also noticed that a lot more of our customers are getting sick and dying,’ Cook-Turner continued, ‘so we’ll be correspondingly increasing premiums for health and life insurance.’ “‘You win a few, you lose a few.’” Read more →