Thursday 30 November 2017

Around the Traps 2/12/17

It is time for Around the Traps again.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy
Northern America
Europe
Asia
Wonk
General
Climate
Andrew Gelman (mainly stats)
Genial Dave Giles (econometrics)
Dianne Coyle (quirky + book reviews)
Vox Wonk

Wednesday 29 November 2017

Why Trump is unfit for office

Andrew Prokop of Vox nails Trump on various matters in this article.

He is the Fake News President.

He is simply another fat elderly gentlemen man who is gradually losing his marbles

EZRA KLEIN opines about how to impeach him.

Tuesday 28 November 2017

There is no case for the 'Christian Baker'

I was totally against accepting same sex marriage ( calling it marriage equality is taking cognitive dissonance to a new level) but arguments to protect the mythical christian baker from having to bake a wedding cake to two homosexuals getting 'married' has no biblical basis at all.

It starts and ends with the statement that there is no such thing as a christian baker. There could be a baker who is a christian.
If you are a christian engaged in commerce there is no suggestion simply because you supply goods or services to someone you agree with their political and social views.
There is no instruction in the bible for Christians to abstain from providing their goods or services to people because it might mean they are recognising a sinful lifestyle for example.

There were plenty of sinful lifestyles in New Testament times. The most common being adultery was very common. Men had sex with their mistresses all the time. They only had wives to have children.
Were christian bakers back then told not to bake cakes for them? No!

If there is the mythical baker whom is a baker out there bake the cake. Take it as an evangelical moment!

I might add it two homosexuals came into a cakeshop obviously owned by a christian and then made disparaging remarks or out to make a statement even a public one simply quote a price far too high for them to pay and go on with your business.

Monday 27 November 2017

Austerity and Mortality

Austerity is an evil policy when not used when the economy is humming. This was done by Hawke in the 80s , Howard in the 90s and Clinton in the USA in the 90s. It worked in these cases just as Keynes said  it would back in 1936!However used when the economy is weak it will lead to a recession or a depression ( a reduction in output of 10% or more).

Simon Wren-Lewis of Mainly Macro fame examines the link between austerity and mortality.

Yet another reason on why not use this policy in the wrong circumstances.

Thursday 23 November 2017

Around the Traps 24/11/17

It is time for Around the Traps again.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy
Northern America


Europe
Asia
Wonk

General
Climate
Andrew Gelman ( mainly stats)
Genial Dave Giles ( econometrics)

Dianne Coyle (quirky+ book reviews)
Vox Wonk

Wednesday 22 November 2017

This Sporting Life

As Roy ans HG would say too much sport is never enough.

1) Football

Ange has decided to quit now. I call this a dog act to copy my youngest son. You do not quit when your goal is to reach the World Cup. Ange took over when we looked all at sea after a terrible selection for national coach. Ange was all we could afford. He succeeded in some ways. Not for him to take a backward step. He played to win. Unfortunately his sides always leaked goals.Not a lot at first but it was consistent after the Asian Cup win. His sides also took a lot of shots at goal before scoring.
Some of the players never reached the heights playing for Australia they did with their clubs. for some reason he changed formations AFTER our mighty Asian cup win. The defence always looked leaky and often was. He selected players such as Brad Smith which had us all jawdropping. He had little playtime, little skill. Why was this man in the squad let alone playing.

In all that his time as a coach was a positive one. Even though he did not have the players he always played to win against any opposition. He knew the Australian way and kept consistent with that.

Who will replace him. I would go for Frank De Boer. however I think they will go locally and the only selection could be Graham Arnold.

It is interesting to know Ange was a failure in coaching the youth squad but learnt from that. Arnold too was a failure when he temporally took over from Guus Hiddink. Has he learnt.

2) Cricket
The Ashes start today. I cannot see how England can win. They simply do not have the bowlers in Australia to take twenty wickets.I anticipate fast and bouncy wickets and expect a number of english batting failures . If Root and Cook fail they will lose very easily.

THIS is the best place to be for exchanging views

Tuesday 21 November 2017

The Labour market

One of the more interesting developments was how deregulation has changed the labour market. Political partisans could not see it so kept on saying how a wages breakout was near , strikes were on the way up etc.
In fact the opposite occurred. Did Katesy, Sloan or Gerard Henderson ever admit to being wrong on this topic. Indeed badly wrong. No siree.

Our mate the inimitable Ricardian Ambivalence has two great articles on this topic.
They are:



Are we trapped in an era of low inflation because of a labour market where employers have far too much power ?  It almost makes one want to become a marxist. Almost

Monday 20 November 2017

Lionel Murphy

Four Corners ended last night in brilliant fashion . Its program on Lionel Murphy was sensational.

Everything is there. The Program had interviews with both supporters and those not supporting Murphy.

I never liked Murphy. He was one of f the most evil;  men ever to be in politics. His proposals to 'liberalise ' marriage was the death roe of that institution. Same sex marriage finally destroyed it.

Murphy was supposedly a left winger yet had money to burn, living the good life and had mates who were crooks!

Even now Murphy supporters still make up reasons why he was innocent. I remember being outraged that a man who was a QC and then a high court judge made an  unsworn testimony in court.

Things get interesting in Bennelong

Two polls recently released show the Bennelong re-election will be close.
I actually participated  in the Reachtel poll.

It is a very gutsy move by the ALP to essentially make this poll all about whether the people support the government or not.

Some people would want a change  of MP but not in the government at this stage.in the.

It all seems rather rushed to me. There surely will be other re-elections so why not have them all at the same time?

It will be close here.

Thursday 16 November 2017

Around the Traps 17/11/17

It is time for Around The Traps again

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy
Northern America
Europe
Asia
Wonk
General
Climate
Andrew Gelman (mainly stats)
Genial Dave Giles (econometrics)
Dianne Coyle (quirky + book reviews)
vox wonk

Wednesday 15 November 2017

Bill Clinton should have resigned

It was interesting to read Mathew Yglesias's article saying Bill Clinton should have resigned given the Lewinsky affair.

At the time I believe i was one of the few Bill Clinton supporters ( in that I supported most but not all of his policies) that said he should have resigned.

My reasons were he had breached the trust with his wife and with his daughter. He also should not have tried to have ANY relationship with such a young intern given he was President.

I was on my lonesome and given the article well ahead of time.

I think I should also comments on the 'rape' allegations.( it is linked in the article.)
 My brother is a retired detective. He tells me people's behaviour is pretty consistent.

In this case if we are to believe the allegations Bill Clinton can be both Gollum and Smeagol.

He is your typical ladies man/womaniser. He is very charming and makes the woman believe she is the centre of his universe (see Gennifer Flowers). On the other hand the other Bill Clinton is brusque, forces himself on women, Has sex and leaves abruptly never to be seen again.

Everything I have ever read on Bill Clinton says he is the former never the latter. I might add another accuser , Paula Jones, said Clinton had certain marks on  genitals that he never had!

Postscript

I have been asked if adulterers make good leaders. Unfortunately yes. Clinton, Hawke and Lloyd George were amongst the best leaders their countries ever had and all were serial adulterers!

We are in the World Cup

A great win last night. Mind you Honduras were horrible. They obviously played for a penalty shoot out. Woeful throws taking all night to take throw ins. the first half was as boring as old get up!

In the second half we get a lot better. We created more chances but it took a free-kick and two penalties to do it. ( the referee whop had an ordinary first half put in a much better display in the second half!)

Mile Jedinak was magnificent in the two games as captain. You just would not believe he had played little football recently. He did not lose a tackle , a ball in the air nor was any of his passes misdirected ( unusual for him).

We have a leaky defence yet Honduras really did not look like scoring a goal against us in the two games. The only time they did was when we were in celebratory mood.

Onto Russia.  I very much doubt if we will get out of our group.We simply do not have the talent.

Tuesday 14 November 2017

Were the Democrat Primaries rigged

I am somewhat bemused by the allegation the Clinton team rigged the primaries for her to win. how does someone ensure people whop turn up to vote in a primary vote for a certain candidate. you cannot.

Reading this Ezra Klein article I can see what the criticism is all about. My my, Fancy Clinton being able to organised that well and get all that money.

As we saw ( ans as I said at the time) it doesn't matter how wonky you are as a candidate and how many good policies you have and how organised you are if you have a political tin ear or no political smarts you are up against it.

As it is Clinton will now be known as the person who gave us the worst President in history.

No the primaries were not rigged.

Monday 13 November 2017

The Bennelong Re-election

My local member John Alexander has resigned because he found out that he had dual citizenship with Great Britain courtesy of his English father.

Unbelievably he made no effort to find out until AFTER the Court of Disputed Returns made its judgement. This justified the judgement I made about Alexander just prior to the last election.

My belief no MP should get a vote in any re-election ( it ain't a by-election because they were never the MP in a legal sense) if they were so stupid as never to have made an enquiry until AFTER the Court ruling.

My wife will not be able to vote as she will be in south america very soon and nominations for the seat have not closed as yet. My son can however. I am hoping the ALP nominate an impressive candidate. Jason Yat-Sen Li would be such a candidate!

Update: The ALP have apparently selected Kenneally as the candidate. wow a local (sarc). A typical NSW right selection. Woeful.

Sunday 12 November 2017

Still looking good again in retrospect

Way back in 2012 John Quiggin wrote an article entitled the-zombie-economics-of-austerity-in-australia. It was a response to a very poor article by Stephen Kirchner and Robert Carling in the AFR.
It was very poor because it was a regurgitation of  expansionary austerity that was demolished by the IMF.
Neither of them tried to address the issues raised by the authors rather they ignored them.
What is more interesting is the piece linked by John. it is an appealing piece by Sinclair Davidson.

I was using the moniker JB Cairns On Your Marx at he time ( get it!).
Reading it again I am impressed by my arguments and again by the bellicose bombast of extreme ignorance by JC and Mark Hill going .

In retrospect my arguments make look like Solomon!  I expect nonentities like JC and Mark Hill to  to have a clue about current economic arguments  but Carling and Kirchner look like used car salesmen.
Why because if they should have addressed the criticisms of expansionary austerity if they had any. By ignoring them they showed they had none!

It is no wonder Soony defended Carling. I also should have noted Soony was a supporter of the re-regulated labour market hypothesis. Oh dear

Almost there

We should have won on Saturday morning in Honduras and won easily.

Honduras were not as good as I thought. They in reality never looked like scoring. Our defence for once did not leak.

Once again we created chance but could not put them away. This worries me in Sydney.

Homebush will favour how we play. We get players back from suspension as well.

I will be there on Wednesday night!

Tuesday 7 November 2017

Around the Traps 10/11/17

It is time again for Around the Traps .

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy
Northern America
Europe
Asia
Wonk
General
Climate
Andrew Gelman ( mainly stats)
Genial Dave Giles  (econometrics)
Dianne Coyle ( quirky + book reviews)
Vox wonk