Kevin Drum 🕸

John Eastman, the lawyer who insisted that Mike Pence had the power to unilaterally reject the Electoral College results before they were certified, suggested days after the Capitol riot that he should be on the list for a presidential pardon. https://t.co/bcXI68HxGP pic.twitter.com/AEjVkRjgBx — The New York Times (@nytimes) June 16, 2022

I've explained in passing the difference between the annual inflation rate and the annualized monthly rate, but based on some feedback it sounds like it might be a good idea to do it a little more clearly. It won't take long. It all starts with an index of price levels, calculated by whichever agency is ...continue reading "What’s the best way to measure inflation?"

In Southern California right now it's the season of mustard, a horrible invasive species that overruns our hillsides seemingly earlier every year. This year there were only a few weeks of early spring greenery before everything started turning yellow. Still, like nearly any plant, it can be made to look pretty.

Over and over I hear that the inflation metric preferred by the Fed is the PCE core chained index (the PCE measure of inflation excluding food and energy). Here it is: I'm not saying this is the inflation measure everyone should put on their front pages. Overall CPI inflation is a good measure of what ...continue reading "The inflation rate has been declining for the past year"

This is probably just a coincidence: But then again, it does make you scratch your chin and go "hmmm," doesn't it?

A friend of mine passed along the latest summer gasoline outlook from the Energy Information Administration: In spring 2021, refineries sold gasoline for 59¢ more than their crude oil cost. In spring of this year, EIA projects that the difference is $1.13. That's an increase of 54¢. A few days ago I calculated that the ...continue reading "Why are refineries charging so much for wholesale gasoline?"

If you visit Paris and haven't been to the Musée Rodin, I highly recommend it. Not only does it have lots of beautiful Rodin artwork, but the grounds themselves are beautiful too. It's a great place to admire some artwork and to relax while you're doing it. Another nice thing is that they don't screw ...continue reading "Lunchtime Photo"

Note to the Fed: going big does not make up for going late. You're already late on inflation, but there's nothing much you can do to fix this aside from cures that are worse than the disease. Stay on a steady course.

The NHTSA reported statistics today on crashes of self-driving cars over the past year. The numbers are all but useless, but here they are anyway: Tesla leads the pack among Level 2 cars, which have limited self-driving capability. Among cars with higher levels of automation, Waymo is by far the highest. But in neither case ...continue reading "NHTSA releases non-useful crash stats for driverless cars"

Now here's a chart: If Mortgage News Daily is to be believed, the interest rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage has jumped 0.73% over the course of just three business days. Since the start of the year rates have nearly doubled, from 3.29% to 6.28%. So what happened on Friday to cause mortgage rates to ...continue reading "Mortgage rates have skyrocketed to 6.28% since Thursday"

This is the Irvine Spectrum shopping center, a vast and growing conglomeration of all the usual mall suspects. As you can see, the photo was taken at sunrise via drone. After this I have one more drone picture to show you: the one that prompted me to finally buy a drone in the first place. ...continue reading "Lunchtime Photo"

Asking prices in the Southern California housing market are already starting to show some strain: The share of homes listed for sale that took recent price cuts has more than doubled since last year. During the four weeks that ended June 5, 16.2% of listings in L.A. County had at least one price cut, up ...continue reading "A housing bust is just around the corner"

The Washington Post reports today that Republican voters are eager to nominate candidates for office who repeat Donald Trump's big lie about the 2020 election being stolen: District by district, state by state, voters in places that cast ballots through the end of May have chosen at least 108 candidates for statewide office or Congress ...continue reading "Red state Republicans are eager boosters of the Big Lie"

Here is the price of Brent crude over the past couple of years. The price of Brent crude dipped at the start of the pandemic and then started recovering. This is far before the Ukraine war. The price mostly recovered by July 2020, which is where I start my chart, and then rose 130% ($60) ...continue reading "Ukraine is not the cause of sky-high gasoline prices"

The article of the moment in progressive circles is Monday's Ryan Grim piece in the Intercept that's subtitled, "Meltdowns have brought progressive advocacy groups to a standstill at a critical moment in world history." Quite so. The only surprising thing about Grim's account is that it took so long for someone on the left to ...continue reading "What’s wrong with progressive organizations? Just about everything."

The Wall Street Journal says the Fed is likely to react harshly to recent news about price levels: A string of troubling inflation reports in recent days is likely to lead Federal Reserve officials to consider surprising markets with a larger-than-expected 0.75-percentage-point interest-rate increase at their meeting this week. Before officials began their premeeting quiet ...continue reading "The Fed needs to avoid panicking over inflation"

We are officially in a bear market now. However, I'd like to show you something: There are two things about this chart that are different from most of the ones you see. First, I adjusted the S&P index for inflation. This doesn't usually make a huge difference, but if you're looking at price levels over ...continue reading "The stock market is not really in bad shape. Yet."

The top picture shows Victoria Azarenka playing at this year's French Open. A decade ago Azarenka was ranked #1 in the world but then suffered through some injuries and afterward took time off for the birth of her son. She never regained her top form after that and was ranked 15th going into Roland Garros. ...continue reading "Lunchtime Photo"

For some reason it occurred to me a couple of days ago to think about the sheer number of cranks and crackpots who roamed the White House and bent Donald Trump's ear about election fraud in late 2020 and early 2021. I don't mean people who are just a little conspiracy minded; I mean out-and-out ...continue reading "Crackpots in the Oval Office"

Here's the latest Gallup polling on abortion, conducted "mostly" after the recent leak of the Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade: Gallup reports that pro-choice sentiment is the highest it's been since 1995. But be careful! It turns out that this is due almost solely to changes among Democrats: Democrats are now more fired ...continue reading "“Pro-choice” is up — but only among Democrats"