Cognitive dissonance and the flawed American democracy

Why does Donald Trump's electoral base continue the cult-like devotion to a corrupt, cruel, narcissistic and racist individual who failed in responding to the pandemic and even recommended bleach as a remedy; is a pathological liar; a failed businessman who had a history of not paying agreed prices to contractors; who views personal taxes as for the little people, and massive tax fraud as a reflection of his high intelligence; who calls citizens who join the military suckers and losers, while being an apologist for Russian dictator Vladamir Putin?

Sixty years before Trump won the presidency on a minority vote, the cultish phenomenon was explained — Trump's racism has won the support of the Religious Right but his advocacy of legalised discrimination against gay, lesbian and bisexual workers, was rejected by the Supreme Court last June. However, the followers not only bond around racism and homophobia, but a significant number also reject democratic norms.

Trump pardons criminal friends; like a tinpot dictator he calls for the jailing of his political opponents, and as the image on top shows, his devotees ape the Romans in the Colosseum in ancient times baying for blood with their yelling "lock her up," about Hillary Clinton.

Retooling Ireland's economic engine - look to Denmark & Netherlands

Ireland's indigenous exporting sector is small while about 67% of Danish goods exports are from domestic firms, as are 80% of services exports, led by Maersk which has been the biggest global container ship operator since 1996.

The National Economic Plan to be published in November 2020 will follow the Budget 2021 announcement on October 13, 2020, and is unlikely to signal a retooling of Ireland's current economic engine — typically the long term is for aspirations and while the year 2020 was the endpoint for many past reports with rosy prognostications, it inevitably became their graveyard.

Irish economy grew by a mere 1.5% in 2019

The Irish economy grew a mere 1.5% in 2019 according to data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) based on Modified GNI* (Gross National Income) at constant prices, rising by €3bn to €202bn in the year.

Donald J Trump: Racist president of White America

Satire from The Daily Show with Trevor Noah

Donald J Trump's first appearance in The New York Times was on the front page on October 16, 1973. The 27-year-old and his father Fred C. Trump were accused of being racists by the United States government. The younger Trump categorically denied the charge. It was a typical Trump lie and as president, he has racked up more than 20,000 false statements or claims according to The Washington Post.

Irish Politics — Tittle-tattle and soap opera

June 27, 2020: Micheál Martin, following his election as taoiseach (prime minister), meets President Michael D Higgins (r) at Áras an Uachtaráin, Dublin.

Kathy Sheridan, the Irish Times columnist, puts the so-called Golfgate firestorm in perspective stating facts that counter those who falsely blame the current Irish government or tar all the parliamentary representatives of the two biggest coalition parties for breaking national Covid-19 rules by attending a dinner following a golfing event in County Galway on August 19, 2020.

Economic consequences of the Pandemic Depression

Compare the performance of selected global stock indexes, bond ETFs, currencies and commodities from The Wall Street Journal for 2020, updated on Aug 12, 2020 at 5:50 pm ET. A chart of the losers is at the bottom of the page.

Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff, American economists, in their 2009 book, 'This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly,' said that the good news from their historical study of eight centuries of international financial crises was that they all ended. They noted that each time, the experts have chimed, “this time is different” — claiming that the old rules of valuation no longer apply and that the new situation bears little similarity to past disasters.

This time is different while early confidence of V-shaped recoveries is waning.

Top global 2500 R&D firms- 4 Irish include 2 banks

The 2019 edition of the EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard rankings of the top 2,500 business research and development spenders in the world range from the top-ranked Alphabet — the parent company of Google — at €18.3bn to both Japanese and Chinese companies at ranks 2,499 and 2,500 with spending of €30.7m each. Ireland has 4 entries including 2 banks and another 22 mainly American firms that are technically "Irish" as they have headquarters in Ireland for tax avoidance purposes — this process is called a tax inversion. The total on the chart above should be 26 for Ireland (22 redomiciled companies and 4 Irish firms) as Dublin-based Pentair changed its headquarters to London when in 2017 it spun-out a new firm in Dublin, named nVent.

Amazon would have been in the first place had its annual report given a figure for R&D alone. Recode, the tech news service has reported that FactSet — a data service — estimated in 2018 that Amazon’s “technology and content” were its R&D expenditure, which in 2017 was at $22.6bn, 41% more than in 2016; $28.8bn in 2018, up 27.6% on 2017, and $37.3bn in 2019, up 24.6% on 2018.

Entrepreneurship falls as reliance on high growth firms rises

Jan Hoekman, a Data Scientist, estimated the survival rates of European startup firms: After the first year 58% of startups are left, second 41%, 5th 22%, 10th 12.5%.

In Britain, fewer than 4% of startups have 10 or more employees after their first decade.

Reliable data from the United States show a secular decline in employer business startups in the last 40 years. However, the ratio of the small number of mainly young, High Growth Firms (HGF), including high tech, that account for significant job creation, began to fall after 2000 in both the US and other advanced countries.

The economic rise of the Western World

BC/AD (Before Christ/Anno Domini or 'Year of Our Lord') was adopted 500 years after the beginning of the millennium. The use of BCE/CE (Before the Common or Current Era/Common or Current Era) was first used in German in the 17th century and in English in the 18th. The latter designations have become more common in recent decades, not because of political correctness but in a global context, religious neutrality is appropriate.

The economic rise of the Western World dates from the 11^th century CE. It was a slow, but persistent, process of advancement in science, education, printing and shipping technology. It also had its negatives including slavery and genocide of indigenous populations. However, it's striking that despite colonial plunder some of the European countries with a Mediterranean coastline, in particular Spain, had poor economic outcomes for much of the last millennium.

Ireland still struggling with Leprechaun economics

In 2016 when Ireland reported that gross domestic product (GDP) had grown by 26% in 2015 Paul Krugman, the New York Times economics columnist, called the claim Leprechaun economics.

Slavery and myth of American exceptionalism

In 1501-1867 an estimated 12.5m Africans were forced to travel to the Americas

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart:
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!

William Shakespeare (1564-1616), 'Merchant of Venice'

The term American exceptionalism dates from an article in the Communist Party USA's 'Daily Worker' newspaper in January 1929. The newspaper reported that Communist International was acutely aware of "American exceptionalism" and this affected "the whole tactical line of the CI as applied to America." In May 1929, Jay Lovestone (1897-1990) [born Jacob Liebstein in modern-day Belarus], the US communist chief, visited Moscow to explain to Stalin why the American proletariat was not yet ready for revolution. The "man of steel" had no time for Marxist exceptionalism and Lovestone was ousted from his position.

Irish material standard of living per capita below EU-27 average in 2019

A proxy for per capita Irish material standard of living based on household consumption of public and private goods and services, released by Eurostat on Thursday, shows that in 2019 Ireland again trailed Italy and was 3% below the EU-27 average.

China, US and EU top global economies and share similar size

China, the US and the EU are the top global economies and despite the exit of the UK from the European Union, the bloc is similar in economic size to the other two giants.

Covid-19: Irish Times cites J P Morgan research rejected by senior executive

On June 2, Reuters reported for a second week that Covid-19 infections had risen in the United States, "Several southern US states reported sharp increases in Covid-19 infections, with Alabama, South Carolina and Virginia all seeing new cases rise 35% or more in the week ended May 31 compared with the prior week, according to a Reuters analysis."

Nationally, US infections had fallen for a fifth straight week.

Albert Camus' La Peste / The Plague and enduring pandemics

Albert Camus (1913-1960), the French Algerian philosopher, writer, journalist and playwright, had his book La Peste / The Plague published in 1947 (French version). It is set in Oran, a Mediterranean port city in northwest Algeria.

Oran as a port city has a history of plague outbreaks with the last incidence of bubonic plague (see below) in 2003.

Dutch food innovation lessons for Ireland

On December 6, 2019, King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands (left) opened Unilever’s new global Foods Innovation Centre on the campus of Wageningen University, the leading global agri-food research hub. Unilever invested €85m in the new centre, named ‘Hive’ for its location amidst leading academic research centres, startups and external partners. From Hive, Unilever said it would lead its global foods innovation programs for brands like Knorr, Hellmann’s, The Vegetarian Butcher and Calvė. Areas of research include: plant-based ingredients and meat alternatives, efficient crops, sustainable food packaging and nutritious foods. The consumer goods giant said the energy-neutral Foods Innovation Centre, was rated “Outstanding” by the Dutch BREEAM assessment body for environmental performance, putting it among the most sustainable multifunctional buildings in the world.

Rising global population coupled with climate change, present enormous challenges. According to a 2019 United Nations report, since the pre-industrial period (1850-1900), the land surface air temperature has risen nearly twice as much as the global average temperature.

Germany benefits from Euro but would also have thrived with D-Mark

Germany benefits from the euro in common with other member countries and it would pay a hefty price if the Euro System collapsed.

In 2012 the German finance ministry carried out a breakup analysis according to the Der Spiegel magazine and found that the breakup costs and the re-introduction of the D-Mark would lead to an up to 10% fall in GDP in the first year. Unemployment would rise again to its record high of over 5m in 2005.

Argentina's grim record of economic failures and debt defaults

In February 2020, Pope Francis, a native of Argentina, gave strong support to debt renegotiation at a Vatican seminar on debt owed by poor countries. Pope Francis greets Kristalina Georgieva, IMF managing director, as Martín Guzmán, the Argentinian economy minister, looks on. Ms Georgieva will likely be more forgiving by extending the payment time periods on IMF debt, than the Gnomes of Zürich and elsewhere!

"Argentina has suffered a long history of booms, busts and failed economic reform. The nation has defaulted on its debt eight times, suffered hyperinflation twice, and gone through multiple balance of payments crises as well as 20 IMF-supported economic programmes in 60 years."

Pandemics: Forgotten vaccine hero saved millions of lives

Dr Anthony Fauci (born 1940), the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984, enters the Press Briefing Room of the White House on April 13, 2020, as a member of White House Coronavirus Task Force. In April 2005, Dr Fauci paid tribute to Dr Maurice Hilleman (1919-2005) after the latter's death.

"Maurice literally changed the world with his extraordinary contributions in numerous disciplines: virology, epidemiology, immunology, cancer research, and, especially, vaccine research and development.

Maurice was perhaps the single most influential public health figure of the 20th century, if one considers the millions of lives saved and the countless people who were spared suffering because of his work. Over the course of his career, Maurice and his colleagues developed more than 40 vaccines. Of the 14 vaccines currently recommended in the United States, Maurice developed eight."

On the morning of April 17, 1957, microbiologist Maurice Hilleman was in his office at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, in Maryland, north of Washington DC, when he saw amidst other foreign news a short report from Hong Kong on Page 3 of his copy of The New York Times.

Grim Irish economic challenges from Covid-19 pandemic

Expedition 50 Commander Shane Kimbrough of NASA shared this nighttime image of Dublin on March 17, 2017, writing, "Happy #StPatricksDay - Spectacular #Dublin, Ireland captured by @thom_astro from @Space_Station. Enjoy the #StPatricksFest Parade down there!" Image Credit: ESA/NASA

Paschal Donohoe, finance minister, yesterday revealed the scale of the economic devastation in Ireland wrought by the coronavirus pandemic.

Half of ventilators in world's acute hospitals made in Ireland?

Racks of ventilators at Hamilton AG's factory in Switzerland

World medical ventilator demand during the Covid-19 emergency is about 10 times what's available and there's a scramble by countries to get supplies but sophisticated machines require 650 to 700 components and manufacturers around the world, including in China, are struggling to get supplies from about 100 companies, mainly in Asia.

An Organised Hypocrisy: Dutch relent in Covid-19 Eurozone funding

Christine Lagarde, ECB president, signs a Euro note.

Eurogroup finance ministers agreed on Thursday April 9th to present an emergency rescue package in response to the coronavirus crisis, to the heads of government of the 19-country Eurozone for approval. However long-term funding for economic recovery has not been agreed.

Italy's coronavirus battle amidst 50-years long economic crisis

Italy has a history of high debt but it had an economic miracle in the period 1950-1970 with an average annual growth rate level with West Germany's. It ended with a national labour strike and in 1971 the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) noted that "The index of production showed no increase whatsoever in the course of 1970." The succeeding 50 years have been characterised by double-digit inflation and interest rates, persistent budget deficits and low growth both before and after the launch of the Euro.

Asia Covid-19: Lessons learned from past epidemics and high income helps

Kuala Lumpur: Coronavirus data for March 30th show that Japan (including the Diamond Princess cruise ship) with a population of 127m is just behind Ireland (population 5m) with 2,578 infections and 64 deaths; South Korea with a population of 52m has 9,661 and 158 deaths; Taiwan with a population of 23m has 298 and 3 deaths; Hong Kong (Special Administrative Region of China) with a population of 7.4m has 642 and 4 deaths; Singapore with a population of 5.7m has 844 and 3 deaths.

The health per capita spending as shown in the chart above (Taiwan's spending is $2,700) highlights how low the level is in several Asian countries.

Socialism for the rich: America's $532bn bailout of big companies

The top executives of most of America's biggest corporations are adept at dodging taxes, overpaying themselves, and buying back shares that they are invested in themselves rather than building rainy day funds. The Federal government and Federal Reserve are the backstops in the mythical land of free markets while the genesis of commercial pharmaceutical and tech innovations are often in public laboratories or institutions.

Fortune magazine noted last August that more than half of all share buybacks were funded by debt.

According to a January 2020 article in the Harvard Business Review, "in 2018, only 43% of companies in the S&P 500 Index recorded any R&D expenses, with just 38 companies accounting for 75% of the R&D spending of all 500 companies....The 465 companies in the S&P 500 Index in January 2019 that were publicly listed in 2009-2018 spent $4.3tn on buybacks, equal to 52% of net income, and another $3.3tn on dividends — an additional 39% of net income. In 2018 alone, even with after-tax profits at record levels because of the Republican tax cuts, buybacks by S&P 500 companies reached an astounding 68% of net income, with dividends absorbing another 41%."