Month: August 2023

Bags o' cotton candy for sale on the Balboa peninsula. "Please Don't Squeeze!"

There are two ways of looking at the Hunter Biden tax 'n gun case:

The whistleblower view: Hunter was involved in some serious criminal acts but prosecutors let him off easy due to political pressure (i.e., the White House quietly pushing them to back off).

The prosecutor view: No ordinary person would be criminally charged for the stuff Hunter did, but he was charged anyway due to political pressure (i.e., Republicans yelling and screaming).

Savvy readers will note that the first view gets far more media exposure than the second one, even though there's essentially no evidence for it aside from the opinions of the whistleblowers, who feel slighted because prosecutors disagreed with them. This media imbalance is largely because Republicans trumpet their innuendo loudly and persistently while Democrats mostly want to keep their distance from a guy who is, everyone agrees, not a sympathetic figure.

A friend of mine expressed dismay the other day that the Hunter Biden investigation had taken so long and come up with so little. Maybe, I said, that's because there was nothing to come up with. Sleazy is not the same as illegal, after all, and it's not illegal to sit on Burisma's board or deposit payments in offshore accounts or act as a lobbyist for Chinese firms.

Even the two criminal charges that were eventually filed against Hunter are unusually weak. In particular, tax payment disputes are typically administrative, not criminal, and end up with deals for payment of the amount due plus fines. Buying a gun while using drugs is a criminal offense, but it's virtually never charged. The diversion deal offered to Hunter by prosecutors is, if anything, more severe than normal.

Maybe it will eventually turn out that Hunter committed some crimes. Perhaps he failed to properly register as a foreign agent, for example. But so far, despite the sound and fury from Republicans that endlessly implies criminal behavior, they've come up with nothing. It's funny how often that's the case.

The Wall Street Journal says auto prices are unsustainable, leading to a surge of delinquencies. I'm not so sure of that. First up, here's the average monthly payment on a new car over the past few years. This takes into account both the rising price of cars and rising interest rates:

That doesn't look so bad. Here's the flow of auto loans into delinquency. This is for all loans, not just the subset the Journal cherry picks:

The delinquency rate has been rising, but at the moment it's returned only to its pre-pandemic level. The news is a little worse for young borrowers, who have delinquency rates slightly above their pre-pandemic level, and a little better for older borrowers, who have slightly lower rates. But the differences are very small, and overall there's no surge of auto loan delinquencies.

It's a good idea to keep an eye on this, especially the 30-day delinquency rate, which is rising fairly steeply, but so far that's about it.

June's drop in Southwest border crossings is no more. In July we were back up to 183,000:

Of these, CBP reports that 132,000 were illegal crossings and 51,000 were requests for asylum. Both are up from June.

The Washington Post reports that President Biden's response to the Maui wildfire is being "scrutinized." But why? Although it's true that Biden's public remarks have been limited, Hawaii's governor sings his praises and the response on the ground has been great:

“I’ve never seen such dedication in a president, who within six hours dedicated his time to determine that this was an emergency, and to commit full repair, full reconstruction for our people here in Hawaii.”

....Indeed, The federal response effort has been substantial and multifaceted, with FEMA joining agencies including the Defense Department, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Small Business Administration to deliver aid to locals. By Saturday, more than 1,000 federal personnel were on the ground, and the rush of federal aid included thousands of blankets and cots, more than 50,000 meals and cash payments of $700.

So why the scrutiny? That finally comes in the 9th paragraph:

But as criticism, largely from Republicans, has intensified over the past week, White House officials have mounted a sweeping effort to showcase the president’s personal involvement in handling the crisis.

Of course. Republicans are pretending to be upset, so that means we have to write several hundred words about Biden's demeanor before we get to the part about how he's been closely involved behind the scenes, insuring that federal action is thorough and robust.

Of course.

Apparently grocery stores have been jammed all day here in Southern California, with lines literally snaking out the door. It turns out that people are stocking up in order to make it through the 18 hours of rain we're expecting tomorrow. This is happening all over, including places that are in zero danger of flooding—which is most of them.

Life is weird.

The Wall Street Journal reports that China's fertility rate dropped to 1.09 last year:

Fertility is down nearly everywhere, but China is in a class by itself. For some reason, starting in 2018 Chinese families simply decided they didn't want children. Fertility has dropped by nearly half over the past five years, an unprecedented decline outside of famine or war.

Why? This decline obviously poses problems from a purely demographic standpoint, but it also points to a souring mood among families. A slow, steady drop is one thing, but a sharp fall like this says something new and serious about deteriorating views of life in China—both now and in the future.

As of 2:30 pm, Hurricane Hilary is hundreds of miles away and the skies are calm here in Southern California. Sadly, my planned astrophotography mission still has to be aborted with extreme prejudice, as you can see from this up-to-the-minute picture of the sky.

I am reminded this morning of the odd contempt that conservatives have for renewable power—There's no sun at night! The wind doesn't always blow!—paired with their seemingly inexhaustible love of nuclear power, which survives even $17 billion overruns on $14 billion nuclear plants.

I myself have mixed views on nuclear. On the one hand, new Gen 4 technologies hold out the hope of reliable, modestly priced, carbon-free power. On the other hand, waste disposal can't be blithely waved away and existing construction of nuclear plants is wildly expensive. It's hardly a slam dunk for either side.

So why the endless love from right-wingers? And why the equally endless mockery of solar and wind? Even if you're deeply invested in pretending that climate change is a big liberal delusion, clean energy is still something to root for, isn't it? At the very least it reduces air pollution of all kinds, and who's against that? And it's hardly a secret that modern, utility-scale renewable installations include battery storage that allows them to provide electricity all day long.

But conservatives nevertheless jump gleefully on any reported hiccup with renewable energy. They even hate electric vehicles. Ron DeSantis has enshrined this in his "Declaration of Economic Independence," and red states are passing regulations to rein in charging stations and increase EV registration fees for no reason other than an inchoate grudge against anything "green."

The obvious answer to all this, I suppose, is that the libtards like solar, wind, and EVs, so MAGAnauts don't. Ditto in reverse for nuclear power. It seems like there has to be more to it than just this, but I sure can't figure out what it might be.

Huh:

According to a survey of 7,100 American teens last year conducted by investment bank Piper Sandler, 87% of teens currently have an iPhone, and 87% plan on sticking with the brand for their next phone.

But the stigma regarding Android phones is mostly an American phenomenon, at least to the degree to which it affects purchase habits. Worldwide, per the same Statcounter report, Androids represent the significant majority of all smartphones, holding a 71% share of sales compared with Apple’s 28%.

This article promises in the headline that American teens "have their reasons" for preferring iPhones, but it never tells us what they are aside from "all my friends have one so I want one too." Which, you know, is fair enough, I guess. It explains much of the world, after all.

Still, 87% is remarkable. That gets all the way down to families earning less than $20,000—below the official poverty level. And yet they can still spring for an iPhone for the kids? wtf?