John T. Reed’s news blog

Trump’s suggestion of using disinfectant inside the body was idiotic. His statement that he was being sarcastic is a lie..His suggestion that UV light inside the body might be safe and effective is being considered by the medical profession, but it is a matter for the doctors on his covid 19 panel, not him, to discuss..Trump went nuts over one of his covid 19 panel doctors being misquoted by the Washington Post about the Covid 19 virus returning in the fall like the seasonal flu does. The doctor said he was not misquoted in the body of the story, but...

Pennies and nickels I have already discussed US pennies and nickels at length. They are made of copper and nickel and zinc so inflation causes the metal to rise in dollar value. Deflation can cause the metal in the coins to fall in value, but from a financial standpoint, the coins cannot fall in value below the face value amount engraved on them.   Mortgaged real estate How about mortgaged real estate? In inflation, the dollar value of a house or other property rises in value. In deflation, it falls in value. But suppose you have a mortgage?   You...

I am reading an article on army ranger school today. They get 2,500 calories a day. We got one C-ration a day. Each ration were 1,200 calories. You can look it up. And they say the rangers today are hungry all the time. Wimps. . https://www.outsideonline.com/2411895/army-ranger-school?utm_source=pocket-newtab . The reporter says, “Why do they voluntarily subject themselves to this?” . Voluntarily my ass. For my West Point class (’68), if you chose a combat arm as your branch, you had to go to the damned ranger school. I wrote here recently about a recently deceased classmate of mine who deliberately flunked...

On TV and in one-on-one conversations, I keep hearing stuff along the lines of this is a “great country” so nothing really bad is about to happen. . The covid 19 shutdown closed more of the economy than the Great Depression did at its peak. . Fact. . This “great country” stuff, in contrast, is Easter Bunnyish. . The federal government took the pop of a stock market bubble in 1929 and turned it into a decade-long Great Depression through overly tight money and all sorts of nutty government experiments on business and programs like the CCC. Absent government getting...

Here is a haunting passage from general practitioner lawyer Benjamin Roth’s Depression Diary. He wrote it on February 7, 1933..“In numerous talks with businessmen I find a higher valuation than ever placed on ‘financial security’ and ‘freedom from want.’ During the boom of 1928 businessmen scorned to leave their money in safe investments yielding only 4% or 5%.”.Four years later he wrote,.“A major risk should not be taken for a minor profit.”.The two great financial investment risks are inflation and deflation. Tremendous financial catastrophes occurred in the Great Depression (deflation) from 1929 until WW II and in the hyperinflation in...