Clearing the Tabs 2-22-2019

Some things I've read this week or will be reading over the weekend.

February 16
America’s role model should be America

February 17
Cities Point the Way in Promoting Opportunity and Reducing Poverty

February 18
The dark side of Green technology

Cheer up. Despite national gloom, we're actually pretty happy with our lives and neighbors.

February 19
Health Care and Opportunity Zones: The Game Begins

"Of the 8,762 census tracts across the county that have been designated as Opportunity Zones, 2,905 (33%) either contain a hospital or are ½ a mile from a hospital."

I found Alan Alda's conversation with Stephen Fry completely interesting:


February 20
New York’s Slow-Motion Fiscal Suicide

February 21
Arthur Brooks has a new podcast episode this week that is off the beaten path and completely worth your time:


February 22
Curing Blindness is Just the Beginning

America’s oligarchs face left-wing, right-wing backlash

Clearing the Tabs 2-15-2019

Some things I've read this week or will be reading over the weekend.

February 9
Restoring the California Dream, not nailing its coffin

February 11
Own the Libs, or Let the Libs Own Us?

She’s No Alexander Hamilton

February 12
Five Reasons the Green New Deal Is Worse Than You Thought
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal isn't even serious about environmentalism, let alone economics.

February 13
This Train Won’t Leave the Station
If high-speed rail can’t make it in California, it can’t make it anywhere.

February 14
Arthur Brooks has begun season 2 of his outstanding podcast. Here is the first episode of the new season:

February 15
How the collapse of communities gave us Trump

Twilight of the Oligarchs?
Still capitalists at heart, tech titans cozied up to the progressive Left—until the contradictions became too obvious.
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This is a really interesting podcast interview by The Bulwark with Democratic Presidential candidate John Delaney. Delaney is a very cerebral, pragmatic thinker. I do not agree with him on much, but consider this: If Mr. Delaney's positions were the starting point, rather than the radical exception, for the Democrats, this would really improve both parties. I hope you will take some time and listen to this:

Reaction to Super Bowl LVIII

Super Bowl LVIII not one for the ages . . . I thought Gladys Knight did a nice job with the National Anthem . . . Nothing about the game was dramatic or interesting . . . Tony Romo couldn’t flourish because there was little flourishing on the field . . . Few of the commercials were good, far fewer than I ever remember . . . There was a strong commercial featuring Martin Luther King Jr’s words . . . Telluride by Kia with a Georgia boy doing the voiceover for a Georgia town outside Atlanta, I liked it . . . Eat like Andy by Burger King was odd, and interesting, not sure it’s going to get me to a Burger King anytime soon . . . Bubly with Michael Buble, that was kinda funny, Dave isn’t pronounced that way . . . Amazon with a woman answering questions about bad inventions at Amazon made me laugh out loud, the clincher was when she was questioned about whether an incident involving blackouts was Amazon’s fault, she replied, “I don’t know, was it?” . . . The silver lining, next year can’t be worse than this, can it?

Clearing the Tabs 2-1-2019

Some things I've read this week or will be reading over the weekend.

January 26
No, Trump Should Not Be Given Increased Trade Authority

Americans would suffer from an escalating trade war.

January 28
How much revenue would the 70 percent tax rate on millionaires raise? It depends.

January 29
The Evidence-Based Case for Free Trade

Well, of Course the Number of Uninsured Is Rising

January 31
Make the Moral Case for Capitalism

February 1
Trump, Xi, Trade, and the Need for a Second Stage of Pro-Market Economic Reform in China

Clearing the Tabs 1-25-2019

Some things I've read this week or will be reading over the weekend.

January 19
The Tech Economy’s Untold Story

An open letter to Gillette from Godfrey Elfwick (humor)
‘In order to get through to the majority of men, you need to really talk down to them’

Enjoy this conversation with Matt Lewis and historian H.W. Brands:

January 20
As Kliff Kingsbury Ascends To The NFL, Hal Mumme Must Be Smiling Somewhere

January 22
Beware Academics Aiming to Centrally Plan Your Buying Habits

Urban Renewal
A conservatism that doesn’t work for city dwellers doesn’t really work at all.

January 24
The Secrets of Lyndon Johnson's Archives
Robert Caro is an amazing writer, researcher, and story teller. I was fortunate enough to meet him at the Library of Congress in 2003 when he gave a talk about his then most recent book on LBJ, Master of the Senate. I got a signed copy of the book. The speech was also filmed by C-SPAN and aired on Book TV some time later. Anyway, this piece by Mr. Caro is simply amazing and I could not stop reading. As someone who has done research in the archives of presidential libraries and the Library of Congress, I could absolutely envision what Mr. Caro was describing with the request slips and the obscure folder names and then the luck in finding something magical. Anyway, spend some time with it and let me know what you think.

Tony Romo In The Booth

I was watching Sunday's AFC Championship game between the Patriots and the Chiefs and I followed along briefly on Twitter for a few minutes. I happened to see Tony Romo was trending so I clicked to see what people were saying. Most people were dogging him pretty bad, and most felt that he was rooting for one team and/or against the other team. I was NOT getting that impression. I think Tony Romo gets giddy about football in general. So, in the second half of the game, the Chiefs scored a touchdown on a short screen pass by Pat Mahomes and the receiver (I have forgotten his name) made a nice run along the sideline for a touchdown. Almost immediately, Romo was diagramming the "bottom of the screen" where the play went and he circled on the screen how four guys had been bunched up and allowed the receiver to be open with space to run. I was stunned at how he had seen that so quickly. I went ahead at that point and posted to Twitter what I was thinking, like anyone cared.

I seem to be going against the grain here, but I like @tonyromo in the booth. Dude is seeing stuff right away that no one else sees. #KCvsNE

— Steve “Beto” Parkhurst (@SteveParkhurst) January 21, 2019

By the end of the game, Romo was looking like Nostradamus as he had been proven right in calling places for both teams and he was seeing stuff that frankly, even the Kansas City defense apparently was not seeing. After the game I was happy to see Romo getting some praise. I do not want to assume that the people making the negative comments were on the losing end of the game, I hope people were listening more objectively than that. The praise from Romo seemed to be coming from all quarters. Here is just a sample:

Think about the gamble CBS took on Tony Romo. Remember, when he was first hired, people thought there was a chance he would still go back to play.

To boot Simms and put Tony on the A team took guts, but it’s resulted in the best announce team in the sport.

— Anthony Romano (@ARomanoWDBJ) January 21, 2019

And Tony Romo has firmly taken the mantle of best analyst in football. He was incredible. I love when the analyst tells you what WILL happen.

— Dale Arnold (@DaleEArnold) January 21, 2019

I enjoyed both games Sunday, though the fact that the NFL has a huge officiating problem that they have to fix was on display. Anyway, I enjoyed hearing Tony Romo and right now I think he is the best guy in the booth on any network.

Clearing the Tabs 1-18-2019

Some things I've read this week or will be reading over the weekend.

January 12
House Democrats Threaten Workers and Competitiveness with a Higher Corporate Income Tax Rate

The Democrats Finally Won the Suburbs. Now Will They Destroy Them?
Whatever the thinkers say people should do, what they keep doing given the choice is moving to places where they can live in single-family homes.

Liberty Has a New Champion on the Federal Bench
Don Willett has championed economic freedom and accountability for cops.

January 14
Arthur C. Brooks to join The Washington Post Opinions section as a columnist
Brooks’ first column for The Post will run on Sunday, January 20th

January 15
AEI Political Report: America’s outlook — the economy and the country

January 16
The Ideal Free Trade Agreement

Fed Says Student Debt Has Hurt the U.S. Housing Market
Student loans prevented 400,000 young Americans from buying homes, Fed says in paper covering 2005 to 2014

January 17
‘Modern Monetary Theory’ Is a Joke That’s Not Funny
Yes, a government that issues its own currency can pay its bills. But piling up debt for no urgent reason is lunacy.

Dear Shutdown Alarmists, the Economic Growth Already Happened

January 18
AEI names Robert Doar as new president as conservative movement tries to find its way in Trump era