The Week In Pictures
September 15, 2021 — Steven Hayward
• These first few charts from the great Zach Goldberg are a couple years old, but it is worth aggregating them again to demonstrate how wokery broke out from the campus and took over the media. But could this be a woke bubble about to burst? Surveys show large majorities of Americans hate this business. • The economy continues to be weird. Or in bar chart form: Contrary indicator: if
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September 11, 2021 — Steven Hayward
The most incredible thing about the many incredible things to note on the 20th anniversary of 9/11 is who is leading the country right now. You’d be forgiven the mordant thought that the 9/11 attackers succeeded in their larger aims. More on this scene later today. Headlines of the week: And finally. . .
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September 4, 2021 — Steven Hayward
Supposedly the American war in Afghanistan is over, but I keep going back to the Bertolt Brecht line, “What if they gave a war and nobody came?” The anti-war left used to emblazon this on t-shirts and bumper stickers, ignoring the immediate sequel: “Then, war will come to you.” More likely some decades from now we are going to look back on this new period that began this week as
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August 31, 2021 — Steven Hayward
With the California recall two weeks away, it is an interesting coincidence that both polls trends for Biden and Newsom are tracking in a similar direction. Let the charting begin! Lots of other interesting stuff happening out in identity land: And what Geek in Pictures without some energy charts, all showing the same thing: fossil fuels? Yeah, they still rule. Junk bonds: what could go wrong? So why do we
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August 28, 2021 — Steven Hayward
Has anyone considered the possibility that Joe Biden’s prodigious consumption of ice cream has given him a permanent case of brain freeze? Now I know what you’re thinking: that explanation assumes he had a . . . do I really need to finish this sentence? At least he prefers soft-serve ice cream, which fits the progressive sensibility. I wonder if soft-serve works against COVID? Headlines of the week: And
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August 26, 2021 — Steven Hayward
I’m working on a theory of the case that somehow the COVID fiasco and the Afghanistan fiasco are clearly linked at some metaphysical level. And why didn’t we just have the wit to threaten the Taliban with unleashing COVID on them if they didn’t cooperate? Funny how we don’t hear anything about the COVID risks of the evacuation. Are people being tested at the airport? Bonus Biden Incompetence Chart: And
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August 21, 2021 — Steven Hayward
What else is there to say about the comprehensive failure of the Biden presidency unfolding in front of our eyes? Jimmy Carter must be shaking his head, while Barack Obama is likely trying to scrub his reported remark on “never underestimate Joe’s ability to f— things up.” Where do I send the one-way plane ticket: Headlines of the week: The Babylon Bee predicts: And the Los Angeles Times delivers: American
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August 18, 2021 — Steven Hayward
President Biden’s July statement that “there’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of the United States embassy” will stand next to President George H.W. Bush’s “Read my lips: no new taxes” pledge as the most self-damning statement from a modern president. And we learn that as recently as the middle of last week, the State Department was flying over a regular rotation of
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August 14, 2021 — Steven Hayward
Between the Cuomo disgrace and President Obama’s “scaled back” and maskless celebrity birthday bash, did this week see peak liberal hypocrisy? Surely not, because, like Olympic records, there’s always another level liberals can reach. Speaking of the gender wage gap: And why not include loyal Power Line reader NM: Headlines of the week: And finally. . .
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August 11, 2021 — Steven Hayward
There are enough charts this week with obvious kinks in them to excite every male Democrat in New York. • As we noted yesterday, the Biden Administration is now begging OPEC countries to increase oil output because of this, which the Biden Administration helped cause (hat tip—Mark Perry, as usual): At least someone is still investing in new oil and gas production—oh yeah, those guys: Also relevant: • We keep
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August 10, 2021 — Steven Hayward
What’s the Italian word for the German word schaenfreude? I think maybe the word I’m looking for is “Cuomo”? Certainly we’re entitled to some heavy alfredo sauce schadenfreude for Andrew, a first class Weltverderber (“world worsener”) if there ever was one. All day today I’ve been smacking my lips in anticipation of what the New York Post would come up with, and I was not disappointed! Reminder of how our
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August 7, 2021 — Steven Hayward
The progressive “ratchet effect” has been well known for a long time now: that is, government grows in a crisis, but never recedes to back to the scope or level it had been before the crisis. Hence, government ratchets up permanently with every new crisis. You can therefore understand why progressives are addicted to crises—the more apocalyptic the better. This is one reason the late Aaron Wildavsky called climate change
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July 31, 2021 — Steven Hayward
You can almost feel the Biden Administration and blue state governors jonesing for another lockdown and mass masking madness. It’s in the air. Like a virus in fact. But sequels are almost always disappointing. Too bad we can’t come up with a vaccine for leftism. Especially since the infection fatality rate is so high. Headlines of the week: And finally. . .
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July 29, 2021 — Steven Hayward
So It’s wall-to-wall “Delta Variant” right now, and it’s ideally named to appeal to our Deviant Variant governing class. John has already shared some good charts on how out of whack this is, but why not have more: One clear benefit of the lockdown madness: Inflation? I’m sure it’s nothing. That free needle program is doing great: Strange how the media (and the Biden Administration) has lost interest in the
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July 24, 2021 — Steven Hayward
I’m still overseas and not keeping complete track of things back home, but I get the sense that a lot of things are getting blown out. Like the Women’s US Olympic soccer team. Like the left’s long-held Cuba narrative. Maybe the infrastructure bill?—a blowout of a spending blowout? Heck, even Biden, a classic blowhard, seems to be getting blown out by the simplest questions from a CNN blowup doll. The
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July 17, 2021 — Steven Hayward
Funny how times change. Try this for a thought experiment: what if someone had hijacked that private jet with the fleeing Texas Democrats and diverted the plane the Cuba? Might have been a grand experiment in cognitive dissonance, and the dim Dems would wonder why Havana looked more like Peoria than Austin, what with its marching deplorables waving American flags. And then they’d wonder how to find a Kinkos. Headlines
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July 16, 2021 — Steven Hayward
Time for another periodic data dump, though a bit of a themeless pudding this week. Let’s start with the explosion of public debt. I’m sure it means nothing. Meanwhile, the price of coal is soaring. Gee, I wonder why this is happening? Hmmm. . . why is housing getting so expensive everywhere? Idea: stop paying people not to work. Capitalists are doing their part: Evidence of how corporate tax cuts
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