Dec
26
2024

It's That Most Predictable Time of the Year

Hope everyone had a fine Christmas. But now that it's in the rear view mirror, it's time for end-of-year retrospectives, best-of lists, predictions for 2025. So here's an example, from Gerard Baker in the WSJ; even with a few days left to go, he confidently asserts 2024 Was a Year of Excellence, Ironic and Otherwise.

It has been a memorable year, and what better way to end it than to properly honor those who have given us the highlights with some well-deserved prizes, ironic and otherwise? So indulge me this Christmas as I present:

• The Albert Einstein Award for Achievement in Technology. Nominations include Elon Musk’s remarkable rocket recapture in October and Nvidia’s ascent through the $2 trillion and then $3 trillion valuation marks, an eloquent testament to American global leadership in artificial intelligence. But there’s one obvious winner: the necessarily anonymous creators of Israeli intelligence’s Grim Beepers.

We used to think pagers were ancient artifacts, the kind your children laugh at when you describe them, like fax machines. But in September Israel’s boffins showed they still have their use. For organizing the self-selection and then elimination of Hezbollah operatives, some of the most evil men on the planet, it was technology at its best.

Gerard also reveals his choices for:

  • The Dan Rather Prize for Media Fiction.
  • The Herb Stein Award for Bafflingly Bad Economics.
  • The Yahya Sinwar Memorial Award for Ivy League Student of the Year.
  • The Al Gore Award for Convenient Untruths About the Climate.
  • The Herschel Walker Political Newcomer of the Year Award.
  • The Bruce and Caitlyn Jenner Award for Controversial Sportswoman of the Year.

You don't want to miss any of those, and that's a "gifted" link so check it out.

Also of note:

  • A belated Christmas gift from Trump II. We'll have to wait until he actually takes office, but Eric Boehm saw what he has in his bag: Trump's tariffs will shrink the economy and reduce investment, CBO says.

    President-elect Donald Trump's proposed tariffs would result in higher prices, lower economic growth, less investment in the United States, reduced productivity by American workers, and fewer exports.

    On the other hand, they would marginally reduce the federal budget deficit.

    The higher tariffs would lower the budget deficit by about $2.7 trillion over the next 10 years, the CBO also estimated. In other words, American consumers would be paying $2.7 trillion more in federal taxes over the next 10 years if Trump's tariff plans are implemented—regardless of whatever other changes to the federal tax code the incoming Trump administration and Congress might implement this year.

    And those trade-offs skew heavily towards costs, rather than benefits.

    Well, not for the first time, and probably not the last:

    Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. (Mencken)

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