The unimportant news thread

[Todd]

Reddit is 63.8% male.

That percentage seems low.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

The New York Times.  Home Appraised With a Black Owner: $472,000. With a White Owner: $750,000.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/18/realestate/housing-discrimination-maryland.html

[Karl Henning]

The New York Times.  Home Appraised With a Black Owner: $472,000. With a White Owner: $750,000.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/18/realestate/housing-discrimination-maryland.html

Oof!

[Todd]

Britain is plunging deeper into crisis by the day, but its government is missing in action

I don't follow internal politics of other countries, so I would need residents of the UK to confirm whether CNN's reporting is accurate or sensationalized - not that CNN succumbs to sensationalism.

[Todd]

Sanna Marin: Finnish PM reveals she has taken drug test

And here I thought US political scandals pushed the boundaries of ultimate stupidity, but along come Europeans to outdo the yanks.  So awesome.

Shaw Moore approves of this scandal.

[Iota]

Sanna Marin: Finnish PM reveals she has taken drug test

And here I thought US political scandals pushed the boundaries of ultimate stupidity, but along come Europeans to outdo the yanks.  So awesome.

Shaw Moore approves of this scandal.

I agree, it's absolutely pathetic.

As to the implied question in your preceding post, the CNN report about the state of affairs in the UK seems reasonable. The country feels in a state of limbo, the government feels absent, price and bill rises are disconcerting, the people who suffer most from the effects of inflation won't be heard and will comfortably be put on hold by an apparently uninterested Tory government, a fact which may well indeed come back to bite them at the next general election. All imho. For expert opinion you will need to look elsewhere.

[Todd]

Polio in US, UK and Israel reveals rare risk of oral vaccine

[Todd]

UK inflation to hit 18.6% next year according to Citi


German central bank chief Joachim Nagel warns inflation to hit 70-year high


As inflation soars, access to Indigenous foods declines

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Apple workers launch petition over firm's return-to-office stance.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/aug/22/apple-workers-launch-petition-over-return-to-office-stance?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

[Todd]

As many as one in six U.S. tree species is threatened with extinction

The headline should read continental US, but at any rate, the US is apparently lucky if the two below sciency articles, both citing the same report from last year are correct:

Some 30% of global tree species at risk of extinction -report

Up to half of world's wild tree species could be at risk of extinction

Meanwhile, the human population keeps growing and CO2 emissions reached a new record in 2021.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Gen Z candidate will win Democratic nomination in Florida's 10th District. 

For the first time, in 2022, members of Generation Z – those born after 1996 – are eligible to be elected to the US House of Representatives. (Under the Constitution, House members have to be at least 25 years old, a US citizen for at least seven years and live in the state they represent, though not necessarily the district.)


https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/24/politics/gen-z-maxwell-frost-florida-democrat/index.html

[drogulus]

     OK, Trump stole government secrets. Now, he's Trump, not someone else, so his intention will be to profit from them in some way. Trump needs money now and forever. He must pay the fifth rate bottom feeding lawyers he engages or he'll be stuck with sixth rate lawyers working for publicity.

     TrumPutin may no longer be an option due to the level of scrutiny the war has brought. Perhaps the Saudis should be considered most likely buyers.

     An alternative is Trump merely thinks the documents belong to him the way everything not nailed down does, and monetization hasn't crossed his so called mind. Do we believe that?

[Karl Henning]

Monetization not crossed the Trump Lizard brain-stem? Not bloody likely, mate.

[drogulus]

     Fed wizard Powell warned inflation fighting will be painful, and the fantasy value of stocks dropped. So, mission accomplished?

     When should inflation be fought, and who are the casualties in this war? It's my view that inflation should be allowed to go away without creating more victims. No doubt that's a minority view. Almost everyone believes in a form of human sacrifice to appease the inflation god and high priest Larry Summers.

     Do Fedsters believe they need to combat inflation or are they appeasing the inflationistas who bay for their heads if they fall too far behind the curve? After countless iterations of the same old same old, it doesn't seem rational to think creating worse outcomes is a better outcome. Maybe it's better by definition. That must be it. The principle is something like "never let the world contradict my perfect idea". The world is always wrong.

[JBS]

Sorry, but if the cost of keeping my grocery bill from going up even more has to be paid out of your stocks, then I will be happy to have your stocks pay the price.  Especially since I view stocks as not being fully tethered to reality and therefore likely to regain whatever they lost before too long.

[drogulus]

Sorry, but if the cost of keeping my grocery bill from going up even more has to be paid out of your stocks, then I will be happy to have your stocks pay the price.  Especially since I view stocks as not being fully tethered to reality and therefore likely to regain whatever they lost before too long.

     You mistake me. I'm fine with stock market voodoo. What I care about is unemployment. Since raising interest rates adds to inflation, it's only when higher rates weaken the economy that any deflation can occur. In order to get any good at all, the bad must happen first.

     My grocery bills go up too. How come I don't demand jobs be destroyed? What's wrong with me?

[JBS]

     You mistake me. I'm fine with stock market voodoo. What I care about is unemployment. Since raising interest rates add to inflation, it's only when higher rates weaken the economy that any deflation can occur. In order to get any good at all, the bad must happen first.

     My grocery bills go up too. How come I don't demand jobs be destroyed? What's wrong with me?

Ah, now jobs is a different story, since I need to keep working for a couple more years.

[Todd]

U.S. warships transit Taiwan Strait, first since Pelosi visit

Grrrr.

[drogulus]

Ah, now jobs is a different story, since I need to keep working for a couple more years.

     I don't see what's different about it. It is the story. All you have to do is follow the news about how jobs will be lost to fight inflation. The job loss is not collateral damage, it's the method.

     Here's my view of success. 123 go. The Fed goes coward mode and appeases Moloch but not enough to recess the economy. Inflation subsides normally like it does when a rough equilibrium obtains. The Fed claims the success of its management, and the failure to destroy jobs is part of the success, while the obvious notion that inflation subsides through the same supply/demand balance that would have happened regardless is ignored because it doesn't serve any libraservative narrative. Nobody gets a bonus by claiming modest interventions taken for political CYA reasons don't change inflation much. Inflation went down so voodoo shit must be the reason. It doesn't have to make sense.

[Todd]

NASA calls off Artemis 1 moon rocket launch over engine cooling issue

Oh no!  This is bad.  I mean, this is super important because:

China Will Ultimately Overtake the U.S. in Outer Space, a New Study Warns

That's from Time magazine.  Time!

I mean, sure, it seems like an episode of Space Force, but it is very serious stuff.  If we are not careful, we will end up with a moon base gap.