I’m sure you know the allegory about the camel’s nose under the tent, right? First it’s the nose, then it’s the humps. A camel takes up a lot of room. They’re smelly, they make an appalling din and while they may be useful in their way, they are not at all amiable company. Pretty tough to do business with
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More of My Puckish-ness on the Future of the GSEs
By Rick Jones on
As I read through my last commentary on the future of the GSEs and fielded some comments from readers, I realized I glossed over hard questions about how the governmental backstop would work, sort of like envisioning a plane and assuming there’s an engine.
Before I go on, let me reiterate what I said in…
A Possibly Puckish Take on the Future of the GSEs’ Multifamily Businesses
By Rick Jones on
I am joining the hordes occupying the chatter-sphere to opine about what the GSEs should look like, post conservatorship. Having reviewed loads of opinions about the future of the Twins, I’m pretty sure the bar on looking stupid is pretty low. To be honest, I’m more instinctually a critic than a warrior on these types…
AI: Miracle and Menace for the Law Firm Business Model
By Rick Jones on
I think about AI off and on in a desultory sort of way. I wonder about its threats and promises; a sci-fi dystopia of the Industrial Revolution 2.0. One thing I share with our most recent wannabe president, Ms. Harris, I, too, know that AI stands for Artificial Intelligence.
I also suspect like almost everyone, that pretty…
You Know They Don’t Know What They’re Doing (Right?): Opportunities Abound
By Rick Jones on
With the zoftig and still mutitative Big, Beautiful Bill stumbling through an unseemly Congressional favor-trading lollapalooza, one is reminded of Ms. Pelosi’s famous quip, “We’ve got to pass this bill to know what’s in it.” That made me think about trades and strategies based upon government dysfunction. There is and always will be dysfunction and…
James Carville Was Right: It’s Good to be King – Life as the Puissant Bond Market
By Rick Jones on
Those Bond villains got it so wrong. All the time and energy they spent trying to control the world through complex and nefarious schemes involving laser beams, atom bombs, Fort Knox gold, exploding satellites and whatever the malefactor was trying to do in that stupid ice palace in Die Another Day (Pierce Brosnan, what were you…
We Are All Aflutter in the Henhouse
By Rick Jones on
It’s been a tough couple of months in the henhouse. My domesticated fowl friends and I are in a foul mood. (We’ll use “them” here, albeit I think I have a pretty good idea of how to distinguish the hims from the hers, but my bona fides among the progressive set need burnishing. Sidebar: I have no idea…
How Do You Solve A Problem Like Billy Pulte’s (with apologies to Oscar Hammerstein…I Just Couldn’t Make It Rhyme)
By Rick Jones on
Mr. Pulte is now the great poohbah of Fannie and Freddie supervising the Twins from his seat at FHFA and also now acting as chair of their respective boards. What is he going to do (assuming he has any agency here)?
Among the tsunami of orders, presidential actions and findings ( I can, at least, get…
The Huge, Enormous, Cosmic Problem with All These Adjectives
By Rick Jones on
Have you noticed the explosion of adjectival (and adverbial) usage? President Trump, perhaps our Adjectiver-in-Chief, never says someone is doing his job, it’s always a fantastic job. No one in the White House is ever in discussions, they’re always in serious and important discussions (I suspect an impartial observer would conclude that there’s more than…
The Perils of Magical Thinking
By Rick Jones on
I just finished a book by Richard Overy called The Twilight Years analyzing the dying throes of the exceptionalism of the British Empire (American clerisy, please take note). There was a fascinating discussion about the peace movement in the UK between the wars and its impact on the collective psyche of the nation. That movement was robust…