Tag Archives: Koch

Ecuador and the Media’s Selective “Victim” Memes

By William K. Black

In my prior column I discussed the U.S. media frenzy that arose when a leaked emails revealed that Martha Roldos, a leading politician in Ecuador who (very badly) lost an election contest with President Correa, was trying to obtain funding from an infamous United States group that goes by the Orwellian name National Endowment for Democracy (NED).  The U.S. media responded with three memes.  Roldos is the “victim” first of a theft of her emails by someone unknown (but with the U.S. media presenting a fact-free assertion that it was Correa’s administration followed by a “take back” sentence using the magic “if”).  See my first column for the full context.

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Kansas, Where Science De-Evolves into Creation Myths

By William K. Black

This is the fourth article in my evolving series of pieces prompted by the Kansas Regents’ new policy that eviscerates academic freedom and tenure.  In my third installment I explained that the Regents’ action, while cowardly, unconstitutional, and self-destructive, was not taken on their initiative but in response to extortion by Kansas legislative leaders.

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They’re Back: The Poltergeists in the Kansas Senate Renew their Attack on Education

By William K. Black

Two Kansas legislative leaders who have been attacking Kansas education for over a decade through their wars on teaching about sex and evolution are back.  Their threats drove the Regents’ policy destroying academic freedom and tenure.

Poltergeist:  A ghost that manifests itself by noises, rappings, and the creation of disorder – from the German Poltern (to make noise) and Geist (ghost).

I have written two prior columns (here and here) explaining how the Kansas Regents casually ended academic freedom and tenure in their universities with no notice to or participation by the faculty.

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The Kansas Regents’ (Unintentional) Honesty about Academic Freedom

By William K. Black

I published a column this morning about the Kansas Regents’ effective elimination of academic freedom of tenure.

In thinking about the rule I realized that I had failed to make in blunt terms five points about how radical a rule it was.  I circulated these five points about an hour ago to a number of my contacts.

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The Kansas Regents (Casually) End Academic Freedom

By William K. Black

Wednesday, December 18, 2013, the Kansas Board of Regents drastically curtailed tenure and academic freedom.  The state attorney general aided this action.  The Regents decided that when university faculty use common forms of modern communication (“social media”) they no longer have the protections of tenure and academic freedom.  The Regents’ policy change does not even mention tenure or academic freedom.  The Regents acted without consulting the faculty and without any open debate.

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Say W-h-a-a-a-t?


Warren Buffet told CNBC reporter Becky Quick that he could fix our nation’s deficit problem real quick — in precisely five minutes. Problem is, the US doesn’t have a deficit problem. We do, however, have an aggregate demand problem, as MMTers have been arguing for more than two years. And we could fix that in five minutes too, if we could just circumvent Congress.

The Occupy Wall Street Protestors have announced that Nov. 5th is “Move Your Money Day.” A few folks started early and discovered an unusual new penalty for “early withdrawal.” You have to see it to believe it.



Prior to Sept. 17, 2011, no one would blink (or cringe) at a photo like this.  But with the Occupy Wall Street movement drawing so much attention to the cosy relationship between Wall Street and the politicians who serve them, this photo of Mitt Romney and his colleagues at Bain Capital just doesn’t seem very funny.


In this private letter from Charles Koch to Fredrich Von Hayek, Koch urges the grand poobah of free-market economics to be sure to take advantage of the benefits he is entitled to under Social Security.



Until today, the bloggers at New Economic Perspectives had ever heard of Ben Strubel. But he’s definitely got our attention (and our respect) now. He posted a very nice summary of our macro approach — often dubbed MMT — and made a strong case for increased deficit spending. Maybe it’s just easier for people like this (practitioners/traders who haven’t had their heads fuddled with mainstream economic theory) to grasp how the modern monetary system actually works.

Here’s a terrific parable on de-leveraging from an anonymous author.  We recommend using it the next time someone takes out a chart of outstanding debt (public, private, or both) and the money stock (monetary base, M1, M2, MZM) and tries to make the asinine point that we don’t have enough money to pay off all the debt.

CNBCs John Carney says that “very few people understand how the modern banking system really works.” He praises MMT for its more accurate depiction of finance and banking.
 
 
 
Here’s an incredible statistic on the FIRE economy Interest on mortgages is now over 20% of personal consumption expenditure vs. 5% in 1980.  And this is in spite of the fact that 60% of the housing stock is owned outright.