Okay, this one is verging on a golden oldie, because I am, you know, very lazy, but a week or two back Glenn Kessler, the WashPost’s “Fact Checker” really got my eminently gettable goat with this post The zombie claim that the 2017 tax cut gave ‘83 percent’ to the top 1 percent. Glenn appears…
Author: Alan Vanneman
A Cheer for Elizabeth Warren
Damn straight! My gal Lizzie, whom I confess has received more thumbs down than thumbs up from me in the past, holds the sad distinction of being the only Democrat—and thus of course the only member—of the Senate Armed Services Committee not to vote to boost the Biden administration’s already massively bloated defense budget from…
Daniel Larison reads the Washington Post editorial page so I don’t have to. Fred Kaplan has to ask, what’s it all about, anyway?
And thank God that Dan does read the Post for me, because if I did have to read it myself I’d have the shakes even worse than I’ve got ‘em now. In his excellent substack site Eunomia, Dan alerted me to the Post’s most recent eruption, taking them to task in his post China Hawks…
In Space, No One Reads Adam Smith
That’s what I get from the first episode of The Expanse, an elaborate space drama brought to you by the good folks at SYFY, now in its sixth season, which I’m watching on Amazon. Set in the 23rd century, it envisions a solar system dominated by Earth and Mars, with the hapless denizens of “The…
America’s latest “Forever War” not finding too many recruits
I have frequently—frequently—and loudly—loudly—complained about the compulsion of America’s foreign policy “Blob” to find a replacement for everyone’s favorite multi-trillion-dollar arms race, the late great Cold War, centering, of course, on China, but eagerly tossing in Iran, Russia, and even Venezuela, for good measure. The problem is, not everyone seems to be as afraid of…
Is this ad racist, or just incredibly annoying? In either case, why the hell are we seeing it again?
I have not, nor will I ever, own a Discover card. And I thought the Duluth Trading Company underwear ads were bad! Imagine having a porcupine in your underwear! Ha, ha! That’s pretty funny!
Joe Biden gets tough with Iran by murdering innocent Iraqis and Syrians.
He sure did. The bad, and unsurprising news is, the Biden administration launched new attacks on “Iran-backed” militia, maintaining a tradition of the U.S. doing whatever the hell it pleases on the international scene whenever it damn well feels like it, which goes back at least as far as George H. W. Bush. The good,…
They Got Rhythm: How George Gershwin begot Lester Young, Charlie Parker, and Thelonious Monk
Back in 1930, George Gershwin wrote a tune, “I Got Rhythm”, whose underlying chord structure proved a god-send to jazz musicians for decades to come. “Rhythm Changes” served as the basis for dozens of jazz tunes, which served, in turn, for some of the greatest performances in jazz. We’ll start off with the original, served…
Terrible Dan Drezner. Terrible Dan Drezner!
Hey, I promised, and a blogger always keeps his word—well, within the limits of reason, of course. And, anyway, Dan is at his terrible worst in this one—his terribleist, one might say—in an abysmal missive abysmally titled The progressive case against NATO is weird. When a pundit, particularly a scholarly one such as Dan, uses…
Great Dan Drezner, Terrible Dan Drezner
Why do I wax hot and cold on poor old Dan Drezner? Because Dan does so himself. Sometimes, Dan is so hot he’s boiling, or perhaps I should say “incandescent”! I mean, the light he sheds in his recent column, Is the United States capable of industrial policy in 2021?, is amazing. Because Dan’s answer,…