7
More on the higher-ed bubble
The housing bubble expanded to unsupportable proportions in large part because too many people, attracted by cheap credit, took out loans they could not afford to pay back. The same thing is happening in the student-loan market. The iconic example is the law graduate carrying 100k in debt who ends … Read More »
7
Misguided carping about oil speculators
President Obama has groused from time to time about oil speculators, but former Rep. Joseph Kennedy has taken all this to its doofus conclusion. Ban all “pure oil speculators” from U.S. commodity exchanges, he suggests in a New York Times piece; that will bring the price down.
Nonsense. Markets exist … Read More »
3
Even on Wall Street, cluelessness isn’t a crime
The author Michael Lewis (“Moneyball”) popped up on CNBC last week and the hosts asked him about an earlier book, “The Big Short.” It was about the few individuals who foresaw the housing bubble’s collapse and became rich after making big bets to profit from it.
Lewis was asked … Read More »
10
Higher ed bubble grows ever-larger
I spent some time on search engines, but couldn’t find the blogger who snarked that university administrators behave as if they see incoming freshmen classes as “cash crops.” Whatever the source, it’s a devastating analogy. Students bring in not only their parents’ money, but all that federal aid and those … Read More »
5
Morning in America it’s not
Former Clinton adviser William Galston throws a bucket of cold water on President Obama’s re-election bid. It will be a steep climb, says Galson. Forget all that hope ‘n’ change and winning the future stuff. It won’t wash this year.
The off-year races last fall, which unleased a … Read More »
6
Romney has a chance, but he must make the sale
What a gift for the Obama campaign — a poll last week showing the president up by 7 points: He’s over 50 percent in a head-to-head matchup against putative Republican nominee Mitt Romney.
And look at Romney’s showing among women. Wow! President Obama is crushing Romney 57-38. As the … Read More »
2
The health care competitiveness fallacy
One fallacy that still comes up frequently in the health care debate is the idea that employer-provided health insurance hobbles American competitiveness. This has been rebutted frequently but it keeps popping up, most recently in a Fareed Zakaria piece in Time (to which my attention was drawn recently by a … Read More »
7
The court should give Congress a do-over
Last week, President Barack Obama laid down a marker to the Supreme Court: Invalidate the health care law, and the court itself will become an issue in the election. He warned the justices against taking the “unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority … Read More »
5
A very bad jobs number
For each of the previous three months, the economy added in the neighborhood of 200,000 jobs. First-time claims for unemployment have been trending steadily down. That’s why today’s jobless report for March was such a disappointment. It was so lackluster it raises fears the economy is slowing again.
Only … Read More »
11
Why liberals were horrified at the Supreme Court hearings
The consternation that erupted from the left after last week’s Supreme Court hearings on Obamacare was highly entertaining. Those of us who see the world from the right side of the spectrum understand that our friends at the other end are often not only unaware of the arguments against their … Read More »
7
If Obamacare is struck down …
What then? Before this week, this was something barely to be hoped for. But the reception from the Supreme Court this week makes it more than conceivable. In Wednesday’s hearing on severability, Justice Kennedy noted that yanking the mandate and leaving the rest would amount to crafting a new law … Read More »
8
Another train wreck at the court for Obamacare
The Supreme Court session Tuesday on the constitutionality of the individual mandate was described by several commentators as a train wreck for the government. Wednesday’s arguments on severability — whether the rest of the law can remain if the mandate is yanked — went about as well. Or maybe In his first year in office, President Obama scrapped a missile-defense plan that would have resulted in a big radar installation in the Czech Republic and interceptors in Poland, mainly to defend against the threat from Iran. Obama took this step without consulting with our allies and the reaction was …
Read More »
Rick Santorum has gone much farther in this campaign than most people, including yours truly, expected. He struck an obvious chord with many who place high importance on the social issues, but along the way there were some revealing moments. He said the JFK speech on separation of church and …
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The people over at The Associated Press are trying to sell the notion that domestic oil production has nothing to do with the price of gasoline. This is silliness on stilts. The story, published in The Star Thursday, makes the obvious point that oil is a global commodity and “U.S. …
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2
What’s Obama up to with the Russians?
4
Santorum: Opens mouth, inserts foot
14
A silly AP story on drilling and the price of gasoline