Category: Politics, Religion & Money

Beantown at Its Worst

Last night I watched the devastating 3-part HBO series, “Murder in Boston”. The documentary shows how, during the worst of the “crack wars” in 1989, Boston’s cops and politicians were blinded by racial prejudice, making them utterly incompetent in their handling of the Chuck Stuart case.

The “Murder in Boston” videos can’t be embedded, but there is this 9-part podcast that goes into even more detail about the crime and its aftermath. Episode 8 examines the media’s role in the debacle, including some well-deserved criticism of Boston Globe columnist Mike “Southie” Barnicle.

After baseball became integrated, racial prejudice was a factor in why the Red Sox failed to win the World Series until twenty years ago, when the team had new owners.

The notorious Whitey Bulger conducted his criminal activities with impunity in Boston, while his brother Billy was president of the Massachusetts Senate. Whitey got the death he deserved, and Billy turned 90 five days ago.

The ultimate example of Boston’s failed leadership was the favoritism that was shown to the Catholic Church. A blind eye was turned to the child sex abuse done by some priests over many decades.

Unsustainable Fiscal Path

In April, 2021, I said, “I don’t see the $1400 windfall spiking inflation, and certainly not for very long.” I was wrong about the stimulus money, because of the persistent supply chain problems. Too much money chased too few goods, and inflation spiked.

I did better in saying inflation wouldn’t last for very long. Scott Pelley asks Jay Powell how that was done.

So, what about the unsustainable fiscal path the United States is on, according to Powell? This graph compares the national debt to gross domestic product over the past 55 years.

The problem of deficit spending getting ahead of debt started under Reagan. It was stamped back down during Clinton’s term. George W. Bush’s financial crisis of 2008 was where the debt-to-GDP ratio took off.

With interest rates at zero, there was a lot of borrowing during Obama’s administration (with some of that money going to the HITECH Act, that distorted the hospital software market, giving Epic Systems of Verona, Wisconsin a leadership position). The effect of the pandemic appears as a vertical line, with all debt and no product!

Republicans are going to insist that spending must be cut to deal with the unsustainable fiscal path. Democrats are going to insist that the ultra-rich pay more in taxes, and that corporations no longer be allowed to hold their profits in overseas tax havens.

Somewhere in the middle is a solution. I think it’s called compromising, which is something Democrats are willing to do. Republicans see that as a sign of weakness in their insistence on playing a winner-take-all, zero-sum game.

Something else Powell said is very concerning in the short term, regarding commercial real estate loans. “Certainly there will be some banks that have to be closed or merged out of existence, because of this. That’ll be smaller banks, I suspect, for the most part.”