Sierra Faith

Hold on to your hats!

We should pay attention to the outcome. Europeans are fond of telling Israelis that Israel must choose between being a Jewish state (by ending the occupation) or being a democracy; some are beginning to realize that Europe faces an even more wrenching choice. Europe can have monetary union or it can have democracy; it cannot [...]

Victor Davis Hanson: There is a liberal coastal aristocrat, but he is really not very liberal, at least in the sense of his regressive life not matching his progressive rhetoric. His views are mostly conditioned on his education, salary, and material circumstances. Put the coastal aristocrat in charge of a 7-Eleven in Stockton, and his [...]

Doom-mongering indeed: The United States is broke — fiscally, morally, intellectually — and the Fed has incited a global currency war (Japan just signed up, the Brazilians and Chinese are angry, and the German-dominated euro zone is crumbling) that will soon overwhelm it. When the latest bubble pops, there will be nothing to stop the [...]

Obama will not fund the education of our troops, but we will fund illegal aliens. Indeed, it’s an Obama world.

Just sayin’: When land powers like China attack sea powers like Japan, the initial results are often very dramatic. But the impact of even a short and “successful” campaign over the disputed islands would cause lasting economic damage to China. Would Japan’s navy interfere with China’s imports from overseas? Would war conditions halt China’s international [...]

Indeed it is.

This seems pretty obvious: The greatest fiscal challenge to the U.S. government is not just its annual deficit but its total liabilities. Our federal balance sheet does not include the unfunded social insurance obligations of Medicare, Social Security, and the future retirement benefits of federal employees. Only in the small print of the financial statements [...]

Sour grapes: [W]hen was the last time you heard a liberal—any kind of liberal—express excitement over or attribute inspiration from a liberal economist—even Keynes? Does anybody still read John Kenneth Galbraith?

This says it all: A significant portion of the public thinks it ought to be immune from the consequences of its decisions and choices. They want to keep having free stuff, paid for by mythical “other” people. We’re not so much facing strong economic headwinds as we are a great reckoning, reaping the consequences of [...]