Thursday--April 27

Yesterday turned out very nice and very warm. I think the temps went into the low 80s. The rain held off till late last night.

So the #45 administration "unveiled" its "tax reform plan." I put quotations because nothing was unveiled or revealed and the so called tax reform plan was a mere "wish list." The devil is always in the details and the press release had no details.

I noticed one item on the list for corporations: allowing a big, one-time tax reduction on repatriated funds. I had a flash of deja vu remembering a past effort to do something similar to stimulate jobs and the economy. Evidently some one at CNBC had a similar memory.  Result: lots of jobs cut from companies taking advantage of the program (though the express purpose of the act was to stimulate job creation), corporations "shored up" their balance sheets, gave share holders a big bonus often through stock buy-backs (though that was expressly prohibited by the law as congress enacted it.) Why does #45 and his appointed idiots think it will do any differently this time?

Friday--April 28

Supposed to be cool and wet today. We'll see.

As usual, James Kunstler is right on in describing the root causes of the so-called "opioid epidemic." He is also right about the uselessness of most studies of the situation. The describe what is not how it became what it is and it is much easier to blame the individual than to look at the conditions to which that individual is responding. For a parallel take on our current depressing condition that doesn't mention drugs check out Charles Hugh Smith today.