Moda, you have spelled out something that bothers me too. And probably most smarter/educated people. It's closely related to "what is the meaning of life?" Mountaineer explained the religious answer to that. I am not atheist, but not as trusting as Mountaineer in these matters. One thing t...

This case is tailor made for the Institute For Justice.

They are always litigating on behalf of people trying to make livings as hair braiders, eyebrow threaders, tour guides, and all sorts of others who run afoul of such nonsense regulations. I think they are a good charity for libertarian donors.

The writer Matt Ridley advances this idea: We have six basic needs: food, clothing, health, education, shelter, and transport. In most countries the market supplies food and clothing, the state supplies healthcare and education, and shelter and transportation are of mixed supply. The costs of food a...

Libertarian666 wrote:End the fed, restore sound money.

Did you not realize that all the fake money had to go somewhere? You just named where it went.

That's a great observation.

It is way too much hand-wringing. The average welfare recipient in the US lives way better than a king lived 500 years ago. Food, medicine, hvac, entertainment, comfort, clothing, safety, you name it. 20 years ago the book The Dilbert Principle had a big effect on me. It made me realize that people ...

Haven't read the article yet. In your short excerpt, he makes one glaring mis-characterization. Namely that the high cost of college isn't fair to the government, which has to pay ten times the cost it should. The "government" has no money of its own. I think that is an important point, an...

I have seen figures like 1% a year loss in output. If you google it, you'll find there are some studies, and basically "your mileage may vary".

There are some R's in Congress who are deficit hawks. They could probably all sit at a picnic table. But they do make noise now and then.

I don't know, I've read that the panels do degrade. I bet his 30 year old one was built a lot better than the cheapies today.

test

I like it.

Craig, I'm right with you on the schadenfreude. I'm getting so many feel goods that I am feeling guilty about it.

Not enough info, but I don't think this is the kind of gold exposure for a PP. I'd like to better understand the product, though.

test of uploaded avatar.

(I can see it.)

One more thought about the fake news complaints. The people pushing this and related lines are playing a dangerous game: de-legitimizing a President is serious business. There's almost no precedent for the scale and depth of what's happening now. The closest is the endless investigation of Bill Cli...

I am also very sorry to hear this. My wife and I have some experiences but long term dementia was not involved.
At some point, it's just not possible to accommodate their wishes. We all want to do so, but sometimes it just can't be done because the care is too difficult.

I had an RD350. For such a small motor, it was terrifying the way it would suddenly come into its powerband. I never got comfortable trying to figure out how fast I could crank the throttle without the wheel coming up unexpectedly. It looked just like this one, and you see how easily he wheelies it....

the dead don't vote . the dead don't always vote .. but when they do vote they vote democrat ..... ;) ^^^ that's a good one! PS, you and I are in agreement. The estate tax does not amount to much, but it is a political sales and recruitment point for each side. Symbolism. And it causes a lot of was...

Rick, the points at those links can be summed up as: 1. He/she has a lot of money, 2. Give it to me, 3. Or else. All of the whys and wherefores are rationalizations for the above sentiments. It always struck me as informative that even most ordinary people consider the estate tax to be distasteful, ...

It's a very interesting story, WiseOne. I think some people have suggested that this would eventually start happening. I am trying to be charitable about Obama, but he really didn't do anything about much of anything. In fact that is probably the best thing I can say about his 8 years. Trump is such...

I sense that we are about to have a climate change thread. :) Every several years there is some catastrophic prediction. Global cooling. Peak oil. Overpopulation. Drug resistant bacteria. Global warming. Based on past experience, I refuse to get worked up by the current ones. The problems get solved...

Today I get the impression that there is going to be an effort to talk down the dollar.

Interestingly, Hard Assets Alliance advertises that because they are a US institution, you can choose an allocated overseas storage location without having to report it. Sounds like that's a gray area too, but certainly the account (which will list the overseas gold holdings) being US-based means y...

The thing is, most of these vaults do not let people in to view their gold. Being able to visit the country is not the same as being able to visit your gold. So no matter what, you have to have faith in the vault process.

A reportable account does not have to be a bank account. It can be a brokerage account or something similar. I don't know if a Perth Mint Certificate counts as an account of any type. No one knows, it doesn't seem. I have never seen a report of someone being fined under this law for owning overseas ...