Today’s Water Cooler: Buttigieg and national service, Gravel outpolls Gillibrand, Harris in South Carolina, Sanders,Trump, Warren, Pelosi vs. AOC, AOC and Green New Deal, housing, international trade, retail trade, Zuckerberg (again), CO2, geoengineering, Lake Erie, MMT, Tiger Woods, class warfare
Wednesday, August 20, 2025
Greening Monetary Policy
Monetary policy favors carbon-intensive industries. Time to stop doing that.
Festering Brexit
Even though the Good Friday/Easter weekend is coming up and Brexit matters are thus in low gear, the UK still seems stuck in its pattern of confusing motion with progress. A short list of updates: Labour-Tory talks still going nowhere. I’m not sure it would be progress even if the negotiations were going somewhere, since […]
‘The Greed of UnitedHealth Is Killing Americans’: Progressives Hit Back as Insurance CEO Bashes Medicare for All
The health care industry’s first salvo against Medicare for All did not go well.
Americans Have No Idea What “Freedom of the Press” Means
Why First Amendment “freedom of the press” protections are far broader than most Americans realize.
2:00PM Water Cooler 4/16/2019
Today’s Water Cooler: China trade, Q1 Democrat fundraising, Biden, Buttigieg, Sanders (FOX, CAP, taxes), Trump, Pelosi, reparations, industrial production, housing, AirBnB, Huawei, Kropotkin on climate, ridesharing and traffic fatalities, dairy farming, Game of Thrones, cats and dogs
Why China’s Current Account Balance Approaches Zero
China’s once-hefty current account surpluses are falling away. What are the implications?
Mourning Notre Dame
A few sad words about the loss of Notre Dame.
How to Win: Lessons from the Zad
Members of the Zad engaged in a nearly decade long, successful commual effort to block the construction of an airport near Nantes. But what happens when you win?
Sanders Takes the Campaign Against CAP to Eleven
Sanders takes off his gloves.
2:00PM Water Cooler 4/15/2019
Today’s Water Cooler: Biden and brokered convention, Buttigieg and South Bend, Booker’s crowds, Harris’s book, Sanders vs. Neera Tanden cage match, Trump could win, Yang, voting machines, manufacturing, Panasonic, Uber, Amazon, Tesla, Japan Display, average warming, cursive handwriting
Framing “Climate Change”: Denialism vs. Exterminism
A proposal for a revised terminology climate change opponents.
