Alexander Cockburn: 1941-2012

Jeffrey St. Clair writes a few words

coincidently I posted about him on May 23rd

John Nichols at The Nation

Nieces Olivia Wilde and Chloe Cockburn on Twitter:

Chloe Cockburn: "My uncle #AlexanderCockburn is dead. Fierce, witty, loving, gentle, brilliant to the end. http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/07/21/farewell-alex-my-friend/ …http://www.thenation.com/blog/168996/alexander-cockburn-and-radical-power-word# …"

Wilde: "My uncle, the brilliant, kind, and hilarious Alexander Cockburn, passed away last night. He was my friend, and my hero. RIP Uncle Al."

"He taught me how to make coffee in a jar, how to listen to LPs, how to ride a horse through a river, and how to drive a classic with love."

Fed Fail

I.M.F. Warns of ‘Sizable Risk’ of Deflation in Euro Zone 

The International Monetary Fund warned Wednesday of “a sizable risk” of deflation in the euro zone, and called on the European Central Bank to begin buying huge amounts of government bonds to help hold down borrowing costs for troubled countries. 

In a report on the state of euro zone policy, I.M.F. staff said there was a 25 percent risk of consumer price deflation before 2014, and that the danger was greatest in countries like Italy where growth is slow and tax increases have made inflation appear higher than it really is. 

Deflation, a destructive decline in prices that can be extremely difficult to reverse, would make it even harder for countries like Greece, Italy and Spain to get government debt under control, the I.M.F. said, because falling prices and wages would further depress tax receipts.

Bernanke to Economy: Drop Dead by Yglesias

Appelbaum on Bernanke's testimony via his Twitter account

Will Yglesias blog a post of distilled rage?

Bernanke the Unready by Ryan Avent

BEN BERNANKE is on Capitol Hill today, providing his semi-annual commentary on the state of monetary policy. The backdrop for this testimony is as dark as it's been in some time. We would expect the American economy to manage trend growth in nominal output of about 5%, corresponding to about 3% real annual GDP growth and 2% annual inflation, give or take. In the 11 quarters since the end of the recession, NGDP growth has come in at more than a 5% annual rate only twice. In 6 quarters, by contrast, it's been below 4%. Keep in mind that the American economy fell dramatically below trend NGDP growth during the recession, and we would expect consistent above-trend growth during the recovery to make up some of the lost ground.

True Blood does very bad things to our favorite monster by Meredith Woerner

Comic-con panel on Firefly

Medicaid expansion and glibertarian lies

Let’s try to stick to the real world when we talk about Medicaid by Aaron Carroll

(via Krugman)

Retail sales negative three months in a row. Such streaks are rare, and almost always occur in recessions. We'll be wearing barrels soon! by Doug Henwood


(via DeLong)

Well today the New York Times has vanished behind a paywall.* I refuse to subscribe because they run travesties like this Tyler Cown piece on Medicaid expansion. They do have good stuff somtimes though, like this interview with Dave Eggers:

Christopher Hitchens was the most erudite and eloquent human I've ever met. He could speak on any topic, and hour of the day or night, at length, and captivate anyone in the room. I didn't agree with all of his politics, but he was always an extremely warm and generous man.

 And he was very funny.

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*some stuff I can see, like Krugman's blog.