Warren Buffett’s warning to SF spotlights the dangers of Wall Street’s “alternative investment” schemes As the process of financializing the American economy accelerates, high-flying private equity executives, venture capitalists, and hedge fund managers are increasingly reaching their tentacles into everything. From tech to energy to health care, you name the sector and a so-called alternative investment company and its profit-taking fees are…
How the ‘War on Terror’ became a war on the Constitution America has entered its third great era: the post-constitutional one. In the first, in the colonial years, a unitary executive, the King of England, ruled without checks and balances, allowing no freedom of speech, due process, or privacy when it came to protecting his…
Op-Ed How the insurance industry sees climate change Twenty years ago, I interviewed Frank Nutter, then and now president of the Reinsurance Assn. of America, on the threat climate change posed to the $2-trillion-plus global property and casualty insurance industry. “It is clear,” he said back then, “that global warming could bankrupt the industry.” But in the two…
Universal (for profit) Pre-K, DFER, and the suits Red flags began to wave for me when I went to a Seattle City Council meeting in February regarding Universal Pre-Kindergarten. Before the presentation began, in filed a line of men and women in business suits with laptops in hand. It wasn’t surprising to see people in business…
Push to impose extra fees on customers who install solar panels sparks outrage In Utah Wherever he goes, Mark Richards has people coming up to ask his opinion, expressing their frustration and concern. “I’ve never seen such a hostility from residents as I have on this issue,” said Richards, partner at Woods Cross, Utah-based InterMountain Wind…
How Big Money failed to rescue Eric Cantor Big money couldn’t save Eric Cantor. The darling of big Wall Street donors, the K Street business types, and the Republican establishment went down in flames Tuesday, all the while crushing his no-name opponent with a 26-1 cash advantage in the money race. Cantor, the House majority leader, raised…
Cantor loses, and Washington goes ape Shortly after eight on Tuesday night, Twitter went a little nuts, and so, presumably, did Eric Cantor, the second-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives. The Associated Press, CNN, and other news organizations had just called the Republican primary race in Virginia’s Seventh District for David Brat, a hitherto…
Interests, ideology and climate There are three things we know about man-made global warming. First, the consequences will be terrible if we don’t take quick action to limit carbon emissions. Second, in pure economic terms the required action shouldn’t be hard to take: emission controls, done right, would probably slow economic growth, but not by…
You have heard of ‘Big Brother’: Now meet the parents You’ve heard of Big Oil and Big Tobacco. Now get ready for Big Parent. Moms and dads from across the political spectrum have mobilized into an unexpected political force in recent months to fight the data mining of their children. In a frenzy of activity, they’ve catapulted…
There are no more honest conservatives, so stop looking for one Last November I received a friendly request from an editor at a political publication. A liberal himself, surrounded by liberal colleagues, he wanted to make sure that the journalists he was hiring were not drawn exclusively from the left. He wondered if I might…