Category Archives: economic news

economic news, Joe Biden

Trying to un-boggle my mind

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My mind is in a constant state of bogglement as I watch Donald J. Trump try to blunder his way through the maelstrom he keeps creating.

I am left with a question that has no obvious answer: How does this individual look himself in the mirror and pass all this chaos, confusion and catastrophe off as someone else’s problems that he inherited upon being elected to a second term as POTUS?

The economy was rocking along under President Biden’s firm hand. Now it’s on its heels, thanks to Trump.

The nation was at peace (more or less) with the rest of the world. Then Trump goes to war with Iran.

Fuel prices were inching down under Biden. Now they’re spiraling into deep space.

Inflation was in check under Biden. Today, well … enough said about that.

And still, Trump’s delusion continues to dictate what flies forth from his yammering puss. Ah, but good news can be found if we look for it. It rests with a public that is seeing through the lies, the deception, the hypocrisy.

Donald Trump, to quote former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — and one-time Trumpkin — is committing political suicide. Christie’s advice to the rest of us? Leave the POTUS the hell alone!

business news, economic news, entertainment news, local news

Downtown doesn’t exist here

Allow me a moment to vent about something that’s been gnawing at me since just about the time I laid eyes on the city I am proud to call home.

I have lived in Princeton, Texas, for seven years. My wife and I found a lovely, modest home in a newly built subdivision just south of U.S. 380.

We took to life in this Dallas suburban community right away … except for one key element that was missing. Princeton does not have any sort of downtown business, finance or entertainment district. I know where it should be, near the Veterans Park near Second Avenue. But it ain’t there, man.

The city has become the fastest-growing city in America, a label that I love advertising to people I meet. Many of the Dallas-Fort Worth residents know it already. I tell folks we’ve exploded from fewer than 10,000 residents to something north of 40,000 in just the past 15 years. The growth isn’t letting up, not even a little bit.

It’s happening, though, despite the absence of a downtown district that could serve as a magnet for those seeking a place to do business, to shop for goods and gifts, or to enjoy a quality meal with friends and family.

I spoke to Derek Borg, who at the time of our arrival in Princeton served as city manager. He told me of some conceptual plans that the city had approved and assured me downtown development would occur. He offered no timetable, no specific notion of what downtown would include. All he spoke about, as I recall it, was of some vague notion that the City Council had approved. Borg is now gone from City Hall and all the reporting I have read about the city’s future has made next to zero mention of downtown development.

I have noted already on this blog that Princeton is sprouting into a city with no personality, no identity. The place to establish such a trait must be in its downtown district. State demographers tell us the city will be home eventually to more than 100,000 people. Where in the world are they going to go to enjoy city life in this one-time burg?

We aren’t a burg any longer. I am just one resident in a community that needs to build an identity on which it can attract others to come here to enjoy themselves, or just to do business.

Downtown Princeton needs to be conceived and then given a set time for birth and then growth.

economic news

Shut the f*** up about tariffs, Donald

If Donald J. Trump gave a rat’s righteous red-ass damn about ordinary folks — such as, oh, me for example — he would stop yammering about threatening to impose tariffs on countries to get what he wants.

He did so again overnight, threatening yet again to launch a worldwide trade war over EU and NATO opposition to his desire to annex Greenland. I am watching my retirement income fly out the window today as the markets react to Trump’s bellowing, bluster and bloviating over tariffs.

You see, Trump doesn’t give a sh** about those of us who have worked hard, played by the rules, invested money in markets and hope to have it available to enjoy in our retirement years.

Just shut the hell up about tariffs, you delusional piece of mule dookey.

economic news

Fed boss becomes latest Trump target

Jerome Powell is the new man of the hour, designated victim in Donald Trump’s campaign against those who disagree with him on matters that go way over the pointed head of the president of the United States.

Powell is the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, the nation’s central bank that is charged with making fiscal policy based solely on economic evidence and trends. The Justice Department issued subpoenas this week to Powell about remarks he made during testimony before the Senate Banking Committee … except the subpoenas have nothing to do with Powell’s testimony.

Oh, no. They have everything to do with Trump wanting the Fed to reduce interest rates. Powell is pushing back, to which I say, “You go, Mr. Chairman!”

Powell insists that the Fed remain independent and free from political pressure. The Fed was created to be immune from the pressure of the moment. It must act on trends it identifies and helps the board of governors decide when or if to adjust interest rates … up or down!

Trump believes it’s time to reduce interest rates. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Jerome Powell is the fiscal expert here, not Trump, who is nothing more than a tinhorn politician seeking to score points with the hope of staving off what looks like an oncoming wipeout in the midterm election later this year.

Some experienced political hands are suggesting that Trump compiling impeachable offenses at a breathtaking rate. I believe abuse of presidential power fits nicely into what Trump is trying to do with Jerome Powell.

economic news, military news, national news

Trump: RINO in chief

Once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away, the American Republican Party stood for principles the party deemed to be hard and fast … not to be trifled with.

Republicans opposed adding to the national debt. They opposed deficit spending each year on the federal budget. The GOP stood firm against “nation-building” wars overseas. Republicans stood with Democratic President Lyndon Johnson in passing the Voting Rights and Civil Rights acts of 1964 and 1965. The GOP saw the Soviet Union as a national enemy and committed to the destruction of the tyranny preached in the Kremlin.

Hmmm. Those days are gone. Likely forever. Never to be seen again.

Donald Trump is now what I call the Republican In Name Only in chief. He is leading a party that bears no resemblance to the party of Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan or Richard Nixon.

I am trying to imagine President Reagan allowing the national debt to balloon to trillions of dollars. Or President Lincoln allowing the party to embrace white supremacists. Or President Nixon defending the USSR’s direct descendants, Russia, in disputes involving U.S. intelligence findings.

What we have now in charge in D.C., ladies and gents, is a party that has betrayed all those core values. It’s not just the president. He has GOP members of Congress, who are standing with him.

They all — not just Donald Trump — deserve our everlasting condemnation for the direction they have taken this great country.

economic news

Go big or go home … ya think?

Perhaps you have heard it said that one should “go big or go home,” correct?

Well, gang, the Texas Department of Transportation has taken going big to a whole new level. It is pondering construction of a new interstate highway that would stretch — and get hold of yourself — from Amarillo to Port Arthur. All in the same state! That would be Texas.

The interstate would track the course already traveled by U.S.Highway 287.

I will stipulate that there is no way on this good Earth that I will live to see this project completed. I don’t know that TxDOT even has a strategic completion date in mind. I also must stipulate that I cannot quite wrap my arms around the scope of this project.

Expensive? Yeah … it is. TxDOT is projecting 670-mile-long project to cost something exceeding $24 billion. It would employ 40,000 people to work on it. I venture to suggest that a huge portion of the cost would be in the purhase of private land. The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution stipulates that the government must provide “just compensation” to property owners who have to surrender their land to the government. Given that more than 90% of all land in Texas is under private ownership, TxDOT would have to fork over a ton of dough to complete that transition from private property to land converted for “public use.”

To be candid, this scope of this idea — and that’s all it is! — is too much for my feeble noggin to ponder. It took TxDOT, for example, more than two years to complete an Interstate 40 expansion just through Amarillo. U.S. 287 begins just east of the Panhandle city and courses through many cities and towns on its way south and east through the Metroplex and into Deep East Texas. The idea of expanding a four-lane highway into a limited-access freeway through towns such as Chillicothe, Vernon, Claude or Clarendon simply blows my mind. There are more developed communities, such as Decatur and Fort Worth that lie in the path of this enormous project. Then you find yourself in Beaumont, the Mid-County area of Jefferson County until you end up in Port Arthur.

It is way too early to pass any form judgment on this project. I am not even sure TxDOT will pursue it. The highway agency will have to determine if the expense and the enormous disruption will be worth the effort.

When will that occur and what in the world will Texas even look like when they take down the last construction cones?

economic news, local news

Signs portend driving misery

Driving south along Beauchamp Boulevard in Princeton, Texas, a day or so ago, a couple of orange signs jumped out at me as I entered the intersection with US Highway 380.

One sign had an arrow pointing west along 380 that said, “Road Work 2 miles.” The other sign had an arrow pointed east on 380 that said, “Road Work 6 miles.”

That’s when it hit me. The fun I have known would come to those of us who live in the nation’s fastest-growing city is about to commence. Actually, it won’t be fun. It’s going to be a headache, more than likely.

The Texas Department of Transportation is going to widen 380 from four lanes to six lanes. However, to do that I was told by a former Princeton city manager that TxDOT had to narrow the right-of-way from four lanes to two lanes … one lane in each direction. Thus, the “fun” begins for anyone needing to get anywhere along 380.

All of this appears to be the prelim to work on a freeway bypass around Princeton that TxDOT has been pondering since before my bride and I moved here six years ago.

This is the price of progress. I am able to pay it. Not with any great enthusiasm. But I’ll get through it. The alternative? There isn’t any!

To which I only could mutter: Aaaack!

This is one of the costs I am paying by living in a community that is undergoing a growth explosion. It’s no “spurt.” Or any other term that suggests a smallish growth pattern.

economic news

What now, Mr. POTUS, with latest job figures?

Donald J. Trump went utterly ape-dookey over Bureau of Labor Stats figures a month ago that showed the U.S. added 77,000 jobs in July. What did he do? He fired the head of the BLS.

He said the former bean counter couldn’t be trusted to produce good numbers. So he brought in his own guy. What happened in August? The non-farm job payrolls added just 22,000 jobs during the month.

The mercurial charlatan who sits in the Oval Office might offer an excuse for the paltry numbers. Maybe he’ll let this latest guy go and blame him for turning on the guy who gave him a cushy job in DC.

Whatever, the drama just won’t end. It is boring me to tears.

economic news

Wishing POTUS well carries self interest

If we’re honest with ourselves, and most Americans fall into that category, we would carry a significant self-interest load while wishing the president of the United States success as he seeks to lead the country.

Where am I going with this? Here it comes.

I want Donald Trump to succeed in the office he will occupy for the next three years and some. I want him to succeed — particularly on economic issues — because it will have a direct impact more than likely on my retirement.

I’m long in the tooth, heading soon for my 76th birthday. I am semi-retired, working part time as a freelance reporter for a group of weekly newspapers in Collin County, Texas, where I have lived for six years. I also am drawing my retirement income from Social Security.

I have entrusted my retirement account to the care of a wise investment counselor who has taken good care of me, helped in large part by the performance of the stock market, which reacts almost daily to the whims of the president, be he a Democrat or Republican. The market did well during the terms of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, but my support for their success went far beyond self-interest motivations.

So, when I declare my good wishes on the current POTUS, I do so with more than a twinge of self-interest. I detest the man for who he is, what he did before being elected to the only public office he ever has sought, for the lives he has destroyed, for the lies he has told, for his absolute lack of character, empathy and compassion.

I do wish him success as he seeks to manage the nation’s economic policy. It’s not because I have faith that his decisions will fatten my retirement investments … but because if he makes the right call — somehow! — good fortune will come my way.

business news, economic news

Tariffs come and go … and return

Donald J. Trump is in love with the word “tariff,” if only he understood what it means and who it penalizes.

He has just slapped another boost on the tariff he wants to charge India for goods imported into the United States. India now will pay a 50% tariff on everything that comes from that country into this one. So, if you want to buy a pashmina scarf from India, it will cost you basically half again the sticker price of the garment … which is pretty steep as it is!

That’s just one example of the inflationary pressure that awaits Americans who will pay for the tariffs Trump insists on leveling against the entire planet. He calls it payback for being “screwed” by the world’s nations. Good grief! You and I are going to pay for this nonsense. The weirdest part of all is that Trump is penalizing nations, such as Canada and Mexico, for engaging in trade practices that Trump himself worked out when he tossed aside the North American Free Trade Agreement. Go figure that one, ya know?

What does Trump have to pay? I don’t know nor do I care one damn bit. I am bitten by the “interest and apathy” bug.

All I can tell for certain is that when Trump gets done deciding how much of a tariff he wants to apply to this and/or that product or commodity, you and I are going to pay a hefty price for this numbskull’s obsession with a concept he doesn’t understand.