John T. Reed’s news blog

Armed Forces Day in Manhattan On Trump’s military parade: When I was a West Point cadet, were were in one on Fifth Avenue every Armed Forces Day in Manhattan—all 4,400 of us. Plus there were a whole bunch of other military units behind us. No hardware, I believe. Just troops and their bands..If they still do that, Trump should go to Manhattan on that day and observe it. No need to schedule another parade. Display one of each vehicle, don’s parade them Driving tanks and mobile missile launchers down the street in such parade is dictator stuff. The way we do that...

CBO says Trump tax cuts increase national debt by $1T oven ten years I just heard Rush talking about dynamic scoring of the budget projections. CBO says the Trump tax cuts will add $1T to the national debt over the next ten years. He says not so because people’s behavior will change and the tax revenue will go up. Without mentioning it, he is saying the Laffer curve will apply.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laffer_curve Laffer Curve I like the Laffer Curve, which is really the Adam Smith curve. It applies to taxes, casino and lottery house take. and mass transit fares. It says that...

Much of the problem with our politics is parties. “Bipartisan” has almost become a punchline. On our recent cruise, one of the speakers was former Congressman Martin Frost who wrote the book Partisan Divide. Among other things, it proves that the divide is no optical illusion. The number of laws passed with only one party’s votes has gone way up.My reform suggestions—national binding referendums and a grand jury congress—remove the parties from legislation. In the national binding referendums, you might hear which side the major parties favor, but there would be no mention of the parties on the ballot. All...

A facebook reader recently said investing in U.S. nickels is impractical, merely a curiosity. That inspired me to reconsider the amount of nickels I own. I bought more. $50,000 worth of nickels Suppose you have a net worth of $5 million and you want to put 1% of your assets into nickels. That would be $50,000. Is it practical? Cars Do you have any assets worth that much? I have a 2018 Lexus that cost twice that. Is it practical? Sure. Where do I keep it? In the garage. Real estate We also own a house and most of a...

A statistical tie First, I must acknowledge that the game was more or less a tie if you understand statistics. If you really wanted to know which was the best team in the NFL this season, you would look at all the games, like the way they used to do the MLB pennants. Team with the best win-loss percentage at the end of the regular season wins the pennant.  The playoffs like they now have MLB and the NFL are a less accurate way of determining which team is best. They are artificial Hollywood drama that panders to ignoramuses and makes...