Source: Independent Institute
by Alexander Williamn Salter
“Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell held interest rates steady Wednesday for a third time this year, citing inflation running above the central bank’s 2% target. Christine Lagarde, the president of the European Central Bank, has also recently warned of ‘higher inflation and lower growth’ this year, citing energy shocks, geopolitical risks, and a high degree of uncertainty. Alberto Musalem, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, cited those same forces as likely to result in ‘persistent above-target inflation throughout 2026,’ which would justify the central bank holding interest rates higher for longer. None of these bank officials have called for raising the inflation target. They don’t have to. The implication is clear: Central banks are preparing the public for a world in which inflation persistently overshoots 2%.” (05/01/26)
“The media theorist Marshall McLuhan became famous in certain circles for insisting that the real importance of a new tool can be found in ‘the medium — that is, all the side-effects, all the unintended patterns and changes.’ He was anticipated in this by Plato, who had Socrates hint in a story that ‘the person who produces an instrument of technology is not the same as the person who can judge whether it helps or harms those who use it.’ If that’s true, then we would expect to find the architects of AI struggling to predict and control the ends it will be made to serve.” (05/01/26)
“U.S. First Lady Melania Trump was instrumental in securing the return of at least 26 Ukrainian children abducted by Russia over the past several months, Ukraine’s top human rights official said. Speaking at a Bring Kids Back event in Kyiv on Thursday, Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukraine Parliament’s Human Rights Commissioner, said Trump had become an important ally in negotiating with Moscow to return children to their families from Russia and regions under Russian control. … According to Ukraine Government data, 20,570 children had been deported or forcibly displaced from Ukraine by Russia, as of May 1, of whom only 2,126 have been returned.” (05/01/26)
“To put American traffic deaths in perspective, consider the Miami Marlins. Since 2012, the baseball team has played its home games at the stadium now called LoanDepot Park. The field’s official capacity is 36,742, roughly the number of Americans who die in traffic crashes every year. America loses a baseball stadium’s worth of lives to vehicular accidents every 12 months. For the first time, there’s a way to prevent many, and perhaps most, of those deaths: self-driving cars. But self-driving cars are controversial. Some worry about safety. Others worry about jobs.” (05/01/26)
“Having seen Trump shuffle spasmodically to the Village People’s Y.M.C.A., I think we can rule out dancing as the motivation to construct a $400 million, 90,000-square-foot ballroom where the East Wing of the White House once stood. We can also rule out the most recent reason given for the construction of such a Reichskanzlei, which is that only in a Führerbunker funded by tech bros and Epstein patrons will this president ever feel safe. This leads us back to the original intent of the Trump administration with all its tariffs, foreign wars, Musk budget cuts, and endless boondoggles (like the ‘free’ Qatari airplane): graft and corruption to the sole benefit of Thirty Percenter (normally his take on the vig) Donald J. Trump, proprietor.” (05/01/26)
“Trump wants us to think that tariffs — his favorite word — are paid by exporters; you know, those crafty foreign manufacturers who’ve been exploiting us American naifs from time immemorial. Stop the presses! He’s wrong. To state what should have been known, U.S. tariffs are taxes that American importers of foreign-made goods pay to customs officials at ports of entry. While under unusual market conditions, an American importer might persuade an exporter to lower his price to offset the tariff, this did not happen with most of Trump’s tariffs.” (5/01/26)
“A metro homeowner shot an alleged intruder Friday night and sent the suspect to the hospital, according to police. … Officials said it appeared to be a first-degree burglary, possibly turned self-defense. … The homeowner was not injured in the situation, per police.” (05/02/26)
