weekend notes

Hope all goes well… “Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this TOGETHER!” tweeted the president. Of Trump’s 56,600 tweets, this one drew his bitterly polarized audience together unlike any other, albeit for wildly opposing reasons. The President’s post received 1.8mm “Likes,” which was nearly 1mm mor

A“We constantly do exercises,” said Sea Dog. “They are our biggest show of force,” he explained. “When the Chinese act up, we quickly do an exercise close to Taiwan, it never hurts to remind people we can reach out and touch you.” Anywhere, everywhere, anytime. “We have contingency plans for everything.” Ready to go. “Certain events come up on the fly, unexpectedly, a President gets sick, a multit

Who is John Galt? Ayn Rand wrote Atlas Shrugged atop that question. At twenty-five-years-old, it infected me. Powerful ideas do. Her philosophical model, Objectivism, helped explain the world’s workings. At least for a time. I was predisposed to fall for her model. Rugged individualism, laissez-faire capitalism, and an abhorrence for state power left me longing to live in Galt’s Gulch, her mythica

Hope all goes well… “It’s really interesting – they have us do something that seems pointless for a few days,” wrote Jackson, my oldest. “Then they explain the importance of it,” he added. “For example, we’re required to not smile or make any facial expressions whatsoever.” Even with a Marine screaming in your face. “We’re being taught to maintain composure in situations where we think we ca

Hope all goes well… “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed,” whispered Ruth Bader Ginsburg to her granddaughter. With this closing statement, the extraordinary Supreme Court Justice left a deeply divided nation to litigate her final case. Now the political games really begin. As prognosticators scrambled to recalculate their odds given this Septembe

A“Modern Monetary Theory is Pandora’s Box,” lamented Lithium, Handsfree on Highway 1. “It’s not that MMT is wrong, in fact it’s right in terms of describing how money works in a fiat system,” he said, banking a turn, the Pacific shimmering to the left, Malibu’s cliffs on the right. “But I’m afraid we’ll soon discover that compared to what we’re now unleashing, we were better off engaged in endless

AToday’s Fed impotence is a rare occurrence in nature, decades in the making. And like everything on this magnificent planet, spinning in space, it has manifested within an infinitely complex web of relationships that we can sometimes glimpse, grasp, but are more often woven in ways impossible to unravel, difficult to even observe, let along comprehend. So here we are, interest rates at zero, cent

Hope all goes well… “Stay low,” I whispered to Charlie as we moved slowly toward the pool, Wildcat Brook gurgling, pristine, high in New Hampshire’s White Mountains. “He’s there,” I motioned. Charlie nodded, presenting the fly with a gentle cast. Fishing has connected fathers and sons forever, and we in turn to our environment. A delicate dance. Ancient. The tiny book trout hit, Charlie pulled bac

Hope all goes well… I take a break from writing each summer, to catch up on reading, recharge, seek solitude. Hope you found some of the same – going to be a wild ride from here to the January 20th inauguration. Dusted off an anecdote from 2017 comparing the American system to a poker game (see below). Back next Sunday with full weekend notes. All the best, E Week-in-Review (expressed in YoY