Bits from the weekly smorgasbord:
The economy: Department stores, restaurants and malls generally are overbuilt, face drastic shrinkage. (Article) Consumer debt is now $12.7 B (Report) (Predictions, anyone?)
The courts: Trump’s judicial appointments seem to respect the Constitution; Democrat Senators seem in no hurry to approve them. (Report) (Constitutions can be inconvenient if you want changes)
The culture: Violent crime continues to rise in big U.S. cities (Report) (Schools degrade, religion disappears, what’s not to expect?)
North Korea: China announced a ban on trade desperately needed by North Korea; that state cannot continue without them. (Report) (Such ‘bans’ to discourage the nuclear missile program have proven fake before)
Air travel: Drunken passenger arrests in Britain up 50% (Report) (Hmnn … Are there more drunks or just more arrests? Betcha it’s both)
The economy: Interesting analysis of the financial illusion pulled over the last recession to provide a fake recovery (Article)
The government: Public schools are run to deliberately dumb down U.S. citizens? (Article)
The culture: An arrest warrant was issued for a man accused of having sex with a fence. (Report)
The “Dump Trump” plot thickens? (Article)
More culture: Seattle has prohibited landlords from using criminal records to screen new tenants, excepting only sex offenders (Report) (Will sex offenders sue against such discrimination?)
The economy: The Federal Reserve warned: Household debt hit an all time high (Article)
The new politics: Update, in one Craigslist advertisement (Today’s political scene explained in one short internet post)
Venezuela: The Bolivar’s inflation rate now channels the Weimar Republic? (Report) (Or Zimbabwe)
The culture: Billionaire Branson pushes free cash handouts, (Other peoples’, not his; New York schools will use smoking/bullying detectors, Los Angeles will pay homeowners to house the homeless (Reports)
China: Facing a Japan 1990’s style crash? (Article)
China: Heats up its grab for a piece of India (Report) (Could there be any connection with the news above?)
Immigration: The American Bar Association wants illegal aliens to practice law in the U.S. (Report)
The economy: Why there’s no inflation but everything costs you more (Article)
More economy: How most of the income has shifted from the masses to the few (Article)
India is criminalizing contributing to anyone’s religious conversion. (Article) (Hmnn … Murderers, thieves, rapists and now missionaries?)
Self-driving cars are currently a con (Article) (Like global warming?)
Science: A blood test can now find cancer before symptoms appear (Report) (Huge, if they’re for real)
The politics: Ex House Speaker Nancy Pelosi demanded that “reprehensible” Confederate statues be removed from Washington D.C. (Report) (Hmnn … Weren’t most of them originally put up by Democrats?)
Religion: A cardinal attacks the Pope. Will Pope Francis save or destroy his church? (Report)
The culture: Mainstream conservatives are now on the hate map? (Report)
Iraq: Update re Iran and ISIL (Article)
The culture: A list of Confederate monuments removed/vandalized (Report) (History as an item of political fashion)
Science? Apparently NASA is exploring means for averting eruption of the Yellowstone caldera (“supervolcano”) (Report) (Well, NASA is home to global warmers …)
Retail competition: Wal-Mart is patenting use of blimps as mobile warehouses for home delivery via drones; Amazon is building stores and buying Whole Foods (Article)
New York City Subways provide declining service to growing crowds. (Report) (City blames overuse but it’s really government neglect; use is only returning to 1940’s levels)
California: Proposed legislation puts jail behind political correctness? (Article) (Far Left or Right, it’s always by force in the end, right?)
Electric cars create more CO2 than they save? (Article) (And there are other ignored obstacles too)
Chicago: 9 dead, at least 30 wounded in weekend shootings (Report)
A naked Fremont, CA woman was arrested after ignoring a police warning to stay clothed. (Report) (But it’s so warm in Fremont, this time of year …)
And such was the week.
jcurtisblog 