In his column at Yahoo! Finance Rick Newman identifies a number of strategies that the Biden Administration might use in trying to counter inflation:

• Fix supply chains and boost domestic manufacturing.
• Promoting competition.
• The “build back better” plan.

critiquing and, to some degree, rejecting each in turn. While I suspect that President Biden will tout BBB as inflation-fighting, I’m skeptical. I think it’s more likely to be inflation-producing. As we are learning to our sorrow, there’s truth in Milton Friedman’s lament that inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon.

When you increase consumption without increasing either production or imports by extending credit to ourselves (borrowing), it produces inflation by definition. The childcare provision of BBB promises to increase productivity but productivity and production are not the same. It could increase production but it’s as or more likely to have no effect on production.

Furthermore, Mr. Newman is confusing inflation with price increases. President Biden does have some prospective tactics for lowering prices, largely by reversing things he’s done since coming into office. For example, he could encourage additional production of oil and gas in the United States. However, the political costs to him among progressives in that are such I don’t expect him to do it.

Highly targeted tax cuts for business investment could increase production but those, too, would bear political costs and I’m concerned that as is habitual for Congress the “targeted” part will be omitted and exacerbate our present problems without materially increasing domestic production.

I think it’s far more likely that President Biden will cross his fingers and hope that the Fed pulls his inflation onions out of the fire, focusing on additional fiscal stimulus to ease the pain of inflation which IMO is precisely the wrong strategy.

A question came up in comments and as is frequently the case, it led me on a treasure hunt. The omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 is now being said to have multiple “sub-variants”. An article at The Conversation by Lara Herrero and Eugene Madzokere says this:

Errors often occur during the process of duplicating the viral RNA. This results in viruses that are similar but not exact copies of the original virus. These errors in the viral RNA are called mutations, and viruses with these mutations are called variants. Variants could differ by a single or many mutations.

Not all mutations have the same effect. To understand this better, we need to understand the basics of our genetic code (DNA for humans; RNA for SARS-CoV-2). This code is like a blueprint on which all organisms are built. When a mutation occurs at a single point, it won’t necessarily change any of the building blocks (called amino acids). In this case, it won’t change how the organism (human or virus) is built.

On occasion though, these single mutations occur in a part of the virus RNA that causes a change in a particular building block. In some cases, there could be many mutations that together alter the building block.

A variant is referred to as a strain when it shows distinct physical properties. Put simply, a strain is a variant that is built differently, and so behaves differently, to its parent virus. These behavioural differences can be subtle or obvious.

For example, these differences could involve a variant binding to a different cell receptor, or binding more strongly to a receptor, or replicating more quickly, or transmitting more efficiently, and so on.

Essentially, all strains are variants, but not all variants are strains.

while this article at The Conversation by Paul Griffin says this:

Viruses, and particularly RNA viruses such as SARS-CoV-2, make lots of mistakes when they reproduce. They can’t correct these mistakes, so they have a relatively high rate of errors, or mutations, and are constantly evolving.

When the genetic code of a virus changes as a result of these mutations, it’s referred to as a variant.

Omicron is a “highly divergent” variant, having accumulated more than 30 mutations in the spike protein. This has reduced the protection of antibodies from both prior infection and vaccination, and increased transmissibility.

and

A lineage, or sub-variant, is a genetically closely related group of virus variants derived from a common ancestor.

The Omicron variant comprises three sub-lineages: B.1.1.529 or BA.1, BA.2 and BA.3.

From which I infer several things:

1. B.2 is genetically closely related to B.1, the originally detected form of the omicron variant. It’s therefore part of the omicron lineage, i.e. a sub-variant.
2. It is not yet known whether B.2 has a behavioral difference from B.1. It might end up being designated a strain. We just don’t know yet.
3. A lot of this stuff consists of judgment calls. To some extent they’re making it up as they go along.

There’s quite a bit I haven’t written about today. The topics in the opinion pages have been inflation, Ukraine, the Jan 6 committee, COVID-19, and Trump. I’ve very nearly written everything I have to say on all of those topics. Let’s hit the highlights one at a time.

Like just about everybody else I think that inflation is too high. I don’t think it’s transitory; I do think it’s multi-factorial, and I do think that fiscal policy was one of those factors. What I wish more people were noting was that Congress is very likely to do precisely the wrong thing in response to inflation, particularly in an election year—they’re likely to appropriate more money they don’t have. There’s a risk of a positive feedback loop with monetary policy and fiscal policy at cross-purposes.

On Ukraine whatever we do we should absolutely, positively not commit troops to Ukraine, in effect treating it as though it were already a NATO member, unless Germany puts some serious skin in the game. Germany’s mugwumpery is reprehensible.

I thought that Speaker Pelosi erred in not letting the Republicans put whomever they chose on the committee. Not doing that weakened its legitimacy. The Republicans are definitely not covering themselves in glory in their public statements.

It looks to me very much as though public opinion and conduct were forcing the hand of policymakers on COVID-19. I think that people (like me) who are at risk for serious disease due to age or predisposing conditions should be fully vaccinated and boosted.

With respect to Trump’s carrying government records home with him, I think as I think about so many things. Either the law should be enforced or it shouldn’t be a law. That includes the Records Act. Performative jurisprudence is loopy. Enforcement of the law shouldn’t depend on how much you like the person. It may actually be the case that the Records Act does not apply or, at least, cannot be enforced against the president.

Any bets on when the statistics on “encounters” at our southern land border will be updated? I would not be surprised if they weren’t updated until after the mid-term elections.

Update

Forgot about Joe Rogan. I don’t much care. Never listened to his podcast. Probably never will.

As I read this post by Michaeleen Doucleff at NPR on the “family tree” of SARS-CoV-2 variants:

In many ways, viruses are like families — giant, complicated, extended families with cousins, aunts, uncles, grannies and grandpas galore.

Just as with human families, scientists can generate family trees for viruses, showing how each member (or variant) is related to the others. Children are connected to parents by branches, and cousins are connected through their grandparents.

For viruses, these family trees give biologists insights into how a virus has evolved over time and what changes to expect in the future.

During the pandemic, the family tree of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes the disease COVID-19, has produced more surprises than anyone expected.

A number of random thoughts occurred to me. The first was how much we still have to learn.

The second was that there is a major distinction between science and scientists. Scientists, being human, have a bad habit of getting out in front of the actual science. We need to be careful to distinguish between “following the science” which is only prudent and “following the scientists” which may well not be.

The third was to wonder how many other things (other than the virus’s rate of mutation) will we learn we have been wrong about in time?

Jeff Bezos’s superyacht is so big that moving it out of harbor in Rotterdam requires that the Koningshavenbrug bridge be temporarily dismantled to accommodate it, reports USA Today:

Jeff Bezos’ superyacht is too large to pass through the Dutch port city of Rotterdam, so the town decided to dismantle the bridge. In retaliation, local residents vow to egg Bezos’ yacht as it passed through.

As of Thursday, more than 14,000 people were “interested” and 4,000 confirmed they will attend a Facebook event titled “Throwing eggs at superyacht Jeff Bezos.”

The Dutch port city said it would temporarily break down the historic Koningshavenbrug Bridge because Bezos’ 417-foot-long yacht won’t fit, Agence France-Presse reported.

“Calling all Rotterdammers, take a box of rotten eggs with you and let’s throw them en masse at Jeff’s superyacht when it sails through the Hef in Rotterdam,” organizer Pablo Strörmann wrote in the Facebook post.

Why is that good news for Poland and the UK? The Netherlands is a major exporter of eggs but it’s one of the largest importers of eggs in the world. Its net imports of eggs from Poland and the UK are the largest. It imports more eggs from Germany and Belgium but it exports more to them than it imports.

If we hear more voices like Jeffrey Sachs’s in this piece at Project Syndicate:

Neither side can claim innocence at this point. Rather than trying to pretend that one side is a saint and the other a sinner, everyone should be focused on what it will take to achieve security for both sides and the wider world. History suggests that it is best to keep Russian and NATO forces geographically separated, rather than confronting each other directly across a border. European and global insecurity were at their highest when US and Soviet forces faced off against each other at short range – in Berlin in 1961 and in Cuba in 1962. Under those harrowing, world-threatening circumstances, the construction of the Berlin Wall served as a stabilizer, albeit a deeply tragic one.

Today, our paramount concern should be Ukraine’s sovereignty and peace in Europe and the world, not NATO’s presence in Ukraine, and certainly not a new wall. Ukraine itself would be much safer if NATO stopped its eastward expansion in exchange for Russia’s withdrawal from eastern Ukraine and its demobilization of forces along Ukraine’s border. Diplomacy along these lines, supported by EU and United Nations involvement, is urgently needed.

the world might be able to escape the Ukraine crisis without a catastrophe and without a complete collapse in the world order.

Against that are Germany’s desire for expanded markets and nostalgic American expansionists’ inexplicable attraction to apocalypse.

After looking new cases of COVID-19 and deaths due to COVID-19, the editors of the Washington Post encourage “us”, presumably federal, state, and local governments to ease back into “normal” life:

This time, let’s do it right. First, finish the vaccination job. About half the population eligible for a booster dose has yet to get one; about a fifth of the eligible population lacks even one shot. A major increase in vaccination would do wonders against another variant or surge. Second, jurisdictions should heed local conditions, such as the test positivity rate and cases per capita when deciding whether to lift restrictions such as masks. Epidemiologist Katelyn Jetelina of the University of Texas Health Center created a useful guide for decision-making based on cases and test positivity rates by county, suggesting that indoor masks could be removed when cases are fewer than 50 per 100,000 people and positivity under 8 percent. By this measure, Montgomery County, for example, has a case rate of 163.99 but the positivity ratio is under 5 percent — so it’s not quite ready, but it could be soon if omicron continues to retreat. D.C. and other Maryland and Virginia counties in the region are similarly not quite ready.

Third, the U.S. government should maintain pressure on companies to keep producing test kits and masks, as well as the new antivirals, so the nation is adequately stockpiled in case of a new variant. Reaching more of the unvaccinated beyond the United States will help, too.

I’m in material agreement with that although I think we should acknowledge there’s a more than a little “no true Scotsman” in those prescriptions. So, for example, I agree that empirical standards should be set for easing particular restrictions and governments should be open about them and follow through with them.

Here in Illinois and Chicago I can’t quite tell whether Gov. Pritzker and Mayor Lightfoot are leading or following. If they’re paying attention to the statistics, they’re leading. If they are just looking at what’s already happening, they’re following. Aren’t election years wonderful?

The editors of the Wall Street Journal report on an interesting development in Wellesley, Massachusetts:

Last year the nonprofit Parents Defending Education sued in federal court on behalf of three Massachusetts families over Wellesley policies and practices that they said violated the First Amendment, the Fourteenth Amendment and civil-rights law. The settlement looks like a solid win for the parents.

Wellesley’s “affinity groups” had held events aimed at specific races. School officials claimed no students or staff were excluded, but the families argued that isn’t what their children were told. The complaint quoted an email where a middle-school teacher said a specific “healing space” was “for our Asian/Asian-American and Students of Color, *not* for students who identify only as White.”

Under the settlement, Wellesley agreed not to “exclude students from affinity-based group sessions or any other school-sponsored activities on the basis of race.” The district won’t identify events “as intended only for certain racial groups.” It “will provide notice” of affinity-based group sessions “to all grade-eligible students, regardless of their race.” Announcements will feature a disclaimer saying that “this event is open to all students regardless of race, color, sex, gender identity, religion, national origin, or sexual orientation.”

The parents also challenged Wellesley’s policies regarding so-called bias incidents, which they argued were “overbroad” and could apply to “virtually any opinion or political belief.” The settlement says Wellesley has “rescinded and will not reinstate” its original bias-reporting procedures.

It’s not as though the parents of Wellesley are MAGA hat-wearing Trump supporters—Wellesley went 77.8% to Biden in the 2020 election. My point is that the political divide isn’t just Democrats vs. Republicans. It’s also radically progressive Democrats against the rest of the party.

Rana Foroohar argues that the U. S. needs a new trade policy in her column at Financial Times. She distinguishes between two “teams” within U. S. foreign policy circles:

The first, Team Status Quo, is heavy on state department and commerce types. They want to believe that we can somehow travel back to the 1990s, a time of wilful blindness about a “one world, two systems” model in which China and liberal democracies would co-operate to their mutual benefit despite maintaining fundamentally different political and economic systems.

The second, Team New Rules, includes Katherine Tai, the US trade representative, as well as other administration officials interested in labour, climate and long-term security issues. They have a more realistic approach, grasping that even if the US wanted to go back to a neoliberal trade approach that prioritised market access for big companies over better wages, the ability to make crucial products or the protection of the planet, China is going in another direction.

What is that direction?

Beijing’s so-called dual circulation plan is a decisive step away from World Trade Organization rules and multilateral agreements orchestrated by technocrats from the US and Europe. It prioritises self-reliance, indigenous innovation and the use of all strategic resources to shape a world where the US no longer calls most of the shots. That means settling more trade deals in renminbi, the better to reduce the financial leverage that the dollar gives the US. It also involves weaponising supply chains — various legislative loopholes in the US still allow states and companies to source supplies such as personal protective equipment from China.

Sadly, she does not venture an opinion on what that change should be. I infer that she leans towards “Team New Rules”, particularly from her observation that Team Status Quo is obsolete. My own preference with respect to China would be one of reciprocity. To whatever extent China imposes quotas or other resrictions on U. S. goods or services, we should impose quotas or other restrictions on Chinese goods or services. To the extent that China provides preference and support to its own companies, we should provide preferences and subsidies to our own. And so on. That, of course, would be enough to make the heads of Team Status Quo spin and cause them to spit pea soup.