Reality television, despite bearing no relation to reality, has shaped Trump into a man for the age, the reality TV age
Once a Diva, Always a Diva
Ms. Ross has survived in stunning fashion. One wonders if Gaga, Adele, and the Queen Bey will do as well and be as worshiped when they hit their 70s.
From a Business Entrepreneur to a Political One
It’s clear how Linda McMahon sees her future, not as a business entrepreneur, but as a political one. She has run twice unsuccessfully for the Senate but didn’t give up, donating enough money to attract Donald Trump’s attention to run a Cabinet-level agency.
Sin City's other Main Industry: Land!
The Las Vegas land numbers (price and volume) pale compared to the boom years of the post 9/11 Fed induced bubble. However, interest rates are still low, and as Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins once said, "God ain't makin' no more dirt, but he is still makin' babies. Stay tuned.
Extraordinary Cuddly Delusions and the Madness of Crowds
Easy money and the allure of certain riches have trapped speculators for centuries. A bubble that is easy to see in hindsight seduces the imagination while in progress, whether the trading is in tulips or teddy bears.
In heat of the market, as speculators give chase, bubble values make perfect sense.
We're Here for the Party, Not to Gamble
Las Vegas has turned into a big party with more low-rollers thinking its BYOB. They don't have the money to gamble, so they club it a bit, then trash their cheap hotel room for kicks.
Keynesians at the central bank think people are just so many particles to be plugged into their models to determine what to set the fed funds rate to, or how much Q to stir into its QE. But when the researchers plugged numbers into MV=PQ, they admitted, “(I)nflation in the U.S. should have been about 31 percent per year between 2008 and 2013, when the money supply grew at an average pace of 33 percent per year and output grew at an average pace just below 2 percent.”
Rickards emphasizes that economic order emerges spontaneously from economic complexity instead of being imposed by central bankers and their policies. So what we have now with central bank central planning is disorder and continuous malinvestment.
The Independent Institute’s Boom and Bust Banking: The Causes and Cures of the Great Recession features multiple authors but puts the blame for the crisis with one institution–the Federal Reserve.
Most home sales in Las Vegas are made during the warm month window (March to October) making this February sales spurt unusual.
Even as a kid, Buffett was constantly making money, delivering papers and whatnot. Viewers won’t be surprised he was nerdy kid, good with numbers, bad at school, and awful with girls.
The shy undertaker was not a swashbuckling Randian hero or libertarian firebrand, but a passive-aggressive political manipulator.
Trump on Time
A builder of skyscrapers and ego, Donald Trump’s hubris won’t allow him to consider magazine indicators and such. After his inauguration, he asserted, “Time magazine—and I have been on their cover, like, 14 or 15 times. I think we have the all-time record in the history of Time magazine.”
Federal Reserve chairman Janet Yellen makes no apologies for raising the prices of
stocks and bonds. It’s all for the little people, she says. “We are trying help families afford
things.” What her employer really does is allow the bankrupt to keep operating.
Property Means Preservation
To the minds of most environmentalists, the ham-hand of government is needed to protect wildlife. Private property be damned — the government must step in, otherwise every species on the planet will be hunted into oblivion, or human development will gobble up all remaining wildlife habitat, leading to the complete extinction of all species.
The New Nevada: Taxpayer Bucks for Billionaires
There was a time Nevada was thought to be libertarian, with no income taxes, bars that never close, and good gamble always available. The government was relatively small and the government handouts for business few. When the recently passed Perry Thomas began making bank loans to gambling halls, replacing union slush funds and mob money, legitimate capital sources couldn’t wait to throw money at Sin City and the Silver State.
But the Silver State is not what it used to be. Its freedom ranking has fallen from 5th to 11th. With a ranking of 33rd, the state is among the worst run in the country and its lawmakers cannot help saying ‘yes’ to billionaires, smooth-talking or otherwise, seeking taxpayer largesse.
Like most bubbles this one is being fueled by debt. USA Today reports, 40 million borrowers owe $29,000 each, totaling $1.2 trillion outstanding. Student loan debt is easy to get, but hard to get rid of. It’s hard to pay back without a high salary, nor can it be bankrupted away. “Government either guarantees or owns most of the student loans and has the power to sue and to garnish wages, tax refunds, and federal benefits like Social Security when borrowers default,” Kelley Holland writes.