Remember how Obama summed up his first-term successes with the pithy “Bin Laden’s dead and GM is alive”? Well, I think reports of GM’s life have been greatly exaggerated. ((And for that matter, where’s Osama’s body?)) Fiat just finished buying out Chrysler, propped up by billions of your tax dollars. One of the big three, […]
Continue reading →The most commonly used marker for income inequality is called the Gini coefficient. Most leftists regularly refer to it when they make claims like “inequality is rising every year” or “the income gap is now worse than ever and getting even worse.” But what is the Gini coefficient, and why is it misleading? The Gini […]
Continue reading →According to an article published in PR Watch, Google is giving “substantial” grants to some high-profile right-wing political groups. Corporations are not required to post details concerning their grants and subsidies, but Google decided in 2010 to start voluntarily posting a selection from their grant budget. The figures are interesting, to say the least. Some […]
Continue reading →WebMD, the world’s second-most-popular website for health advice, has very quietly secured a government contract in which it agrees to promote Obamacare and educate doctors about it. Representatives of the website have argued that this does not constitute a conflict of interest, since WebMD would be allowed autonomy to present its own take on medical […]
Continue reading →In spite of two weeks of government shutdown (read: paid vacation for non-essential bureaucrats), federal regulators are set to add the fifth-highest annual number of federal regulations in history. If the trend continues to the end of the year, the Federal Register (which compiles all of the federal regulations in any given year) for 2013 […]
Continue reading →Facebook’s recent financial numbers don’t look that great. Apparently, the social media giant is going the way of MySpace and AOL chatrooms. They are failing to maintain the attention of Generation Z (that may or may not stand for “Zombie,” btw). Apparently the younger generation is far more concerned about privacy and real connections—they are […]
Continue reading →I never know what to think about news stories on big pharmacy and big medicine. On the one hand, I’m open to believing that there is a global Malthusian conspiracy aimed at destroying our health, or that, at least, corporations in our day generally care more about money than they do about ethical uprightness. But […]
Continue reading →According to an article in Wired, net neutrality is being threatened by an impending decision by the DC Circuit court, apparently the highest court in the land second only to the Supreme Court. Net neutrality is the doctrine that ISPs like Comcast and AT&T may not play favorites with some sites over others, and that […]
Continue reading →In an article in USA Today, ((I think it is odd how many politicians write partisan opinion pieces for major news outlets. It seems obvious to me that fair and unbiased news is less than likely to come from professional liars with a vested interest in swaying public opinion. But alas…)) Bernie Sanders, the Democrat […]
Continue reading →Texas oil production is higher than it’s been since 1985. It has doubled in less than three years, and the boom doesn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon. Meanwhile, gas prices keep going up. Why? The most major reason is inflation. If you look at an inflation-adjusted curve for gasoline prices, you’ll notice that inflation-adjusted prices […]
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