Morning Report: Steve Mnuchin for Treasury Secretary 11/30/16

Posted on November 30, 2016 by Brent Nyitray

Vital Statistics:

Last Change
S&P Futures 2210.5 7.0
Eurostoxx Index 342.4 1.4
Oil (WTI) 48.8 3.5
US dollar index 91.7 0.4
10 Year Govt Bond Yield 2.39%
Current Coupon Fannie Mae TBA 103
Current Coupon Ginnie Mae TBA 104
30 Year Fixed Rate Mortgage 4.14

Stocks are higher this morning as oil rises. Bonds and MBS are down.

Oil ministers are meeting in Vienna today and market participants are optimistic a deal can be reached to cut production. Oil is up 7.5% this morning on speculation of a deal. Ordinarily, high oil prices are bad for markets, but these days it is considered a plus.

Donald Trump has reportedly selected Steve Mnuchin for Treasury Secretary. Mnuchin is another Goldman guy, making him the third Goldman Treasury Secretary since the mid 90s. Not much is known about his position on things like the dollar and interest rates. Given Trump’s focus on manufacturing jobs, Mnuchin could be a departure from the strong dollar policy that has been in place for several administrations.

Part of Trump’s tax plan will include tax reform, where top rates will go down, however deductions will be limited. The mortgage interest deduction cap of $1 million for first and second mortgages will probably be lowered. This will probably affect only the very high end, but it is something to keep in mind for jumbo borrowers who have high DTIs to begin with. The Administration is saying that the very wealthy will get no “absolute” tax cut, but the middle class will.

Neither new Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross nor Steve Mnuchin went out of their way to defend current Fed Head Janet Yellen, saying the decision on the remainder of her term is up to Trump. Donald Trump had been critical of Fed policy on the campaign trail, saying that interest rates were too low. Now that he is an actual politician, he may become more accepting of lower rates, as most politicians usually are. Reagan was the exception, however the 1970s inflation was so bad, people recognized that something had to be done.

Mortgage applications fell 9.4% last week as purchases fell 0.2% and refis fell 16%. Purchases held up reasonably well given the short Thanksgiving holiday.

The US added 216,000 jobs in November, according to the ADP survey. The Street was looking for 160,000 on the ADP number and has forecast 170,000 for Friday’s jobs report.

Pending home sales increased 0.1% last month as tight inventory remains an impediment to sales. Tight inventory is pushing prices up at triple the rate of wage growth, which is ultimately an untenable situation. Pending home sales rose in the Northeast, Midwest and West, while falling in the South.

The Chicago Purchasing Manager Index rose to 57.6 from 52 last month.

Personal incomes broke out of their range in October, increasing 0.6% after a string of 0.3% – 0.4% increases. Personal consumption declined however to a 0.3% increase. This bumped up the savings rate to 6% of disposable personal income, the highest since March. The PCE index for inflation is up 1.4% YOY and the PCE ex-food and energy index is up 1.7%. Nothing in this report will change the Fed’s thinking regarding the next Fed meeting.

Donald Trump announced on Twitter this morning that he will be “leaving his great business in total.” Not sure if that means a blind trust or a divestiture. A blind trust run by his kids will probably not be enough to mollify his critics.

Loan officers are painfully aware that rates have been going up. Investors have been taking it on the chin as well: the 10 year has had its worst month since 2009. Bonds have lost 2.4% this month, which is about about a years’ worth of interest at these levels. That said, the increase in rates has yet to match the 2013 “taper tantrum.” Another key piece of data: the difference between Treasuries and German Bunds is the highest on record, indicating that the correlation between US bonds and foreign bonds is breaking down. This makes sense as the Fed and the ECB have fundamentally different postures at this point.

Realtor.com has its 5 trends for 2017. Millennials move to the Midwest, home price appreciation slows, and tight inventory remain the major trends.

Filed under: Economy, Morning Report |

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76 Responses

  1. Brent Nyitray, on November 30, 2016 at 11:05 am said:

    The usual suspects get the vapors over Mnuchin:

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/senate-democrats-criticize-mnuchin-treasury?utm_content=buffer3af9d&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

    Fauxcohontas calls him the Forrest Gump of the financial crisis, I guess because she thinks he got lucky by flipping bankrupt One West for a double in a couple of years. Gawd the left thinks success is strictly a matter of luck and not merit, don’t they..

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  2. jnc4p, on November 30, 2016 at 11:15 am said:

    He’s going to run rings around them.

    “After Trump pledged to keep Carrier jobs in U.S., company says it won’t move nearly 1,000 to Mexico”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/11/29/donald-trump-has-reached-a-deal-with-a-manufacturer-to-keep-jobs-from-going-to-mexico/

    Edit: And the PL liberals have become truly stupid to the core as a result of Trump’s election.

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    • novahockey, on November 30, 2016 at 11:45 am said:

      it’s like the want to make the case to be free traders, but can’t because they would be applauding a protectionist policy if it was anyone else. like, i don’t know, Elizabeth Warren. She hypothetically keeps a plant in MA and she’s a god.

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    • Kevin S. Willis, on November 30, 2016 at 6:44 pm said:

      Yeah. I really think he’s going to cream them with middle America. And the left is so busy trying to drive all the fence sitters and reluctant Trunp supporters and independents over to Trump, though it’s not their intent, that 2020 is going to be a very sad year for them, I think.

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    • Brent Nyitray, on November 30, 2016 at 12:18 pm said:

      “You can still expect Trump to ignore any facts that don’t matter, such as the exact number of non-citizens that voted for Clinton. In that case he was making the press think past the sale (that non-citizens voted) and forcing them to spend time talking about the exact number until our brains uncritically accept his central premise that lots of non-citizens voted for Clinton. ”

      Good point.

      Which will infuriate the left, the “fact checkers” and the MSM to no end, as they will parse every word he says looking for a “gotcha.” And it won’t matter.

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    • ScottC, on November 30, 2016 at 1:43 pm said:

      jnc:

      Latest from Scott Adams:

      I have to admit that I find Adams’ analysis compelling. But I also have to admit that I find it irritating because unless one is an aspiring “persuader” oneself, it provides no particularly valuable insight. It seems to me that of far more import than how to persuade people is what they are being persuaded of. And Adams adds nothing to that discussion.

      As a consumer, I shouldn’t (and don’t) care about what the best methods are of getting someone to buy a particular product. I should (and do) care about whether the product is good, and what value it will provide to me if I buy it. And as a citizen/voter, I shouldn’t (and don’t) care about how DJT is persuading people to vote for him. I should (and do) care about what he is going to do, and what he should be doing, if he is elected. And Adams provides no insight into that question.

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    • Let the mutherfuker burn!, on November 30, 2016 at 2:17 pm said:

      The second comment, by Bob Rossoue is great!

      Your’e smoking crack if you think writing for GreatFart dot com is going to make a difference. The only people who read Breitbart are KKK,Nazis, and racists.

      The whole notion of populism gaining traction is also delusional. It has peaked. The “populist” candidate NPD Trump lost the popular vote by 2.2 Million votes.

      Trump is not populism. Trump is narcissism. Trump is a demogogue that fooled a lot of angry, bigoted, racist idiots with hate speech and manipulation of the most evil kind.

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  6. jnc4p, on November 30, 2016 at 1:30 pm said:

    Surprisingly, Matthew Yglesias may get it too:

    “To critics, this kind of corrupt behavior seems to self-evidently invalidate Trump’s promises to drain the swamp in Washington and serve as the people’s champion. But Jan-Werner Müller, a Princeton political scientist who recently published an excellent little book about authoritarian populist movements, finds that Trump supporters’ indifference to Trump’s corrupt leanings is actually rather typical. Even when clear evidence of corruption emerges once an authoritarian populist regime is in place, the regime’s key supporters are generally unimpressed.

    “The perception among supporters of populists is that corruption and cronyism are not genuine problems as long as they look like measures pursued for the sake of a moral, hardworking ‘us’ and not for the immoral or even foreign ‘them,’” he writes, “hence it is a pious hope for liberals to think that all they have to do is expose corruption to discredit populists.”

    George Mason University’s Justin Gest is the author of a recent study of white working-class politics in the United States and United Kingdom, and one of his major themes is that there is a pervasive cynicism about politics and government among the people he interviews.

    “Today’s working class, Rust Belt voters are disenchanted by what they perceive to be a political and economic culture of exploitative greed and gridlock,” he writes, “and are waiting for someone to adopt their cause.”

    Per Müller, their enthusiasm for Trump doesn’t necessarily reflect a misperception that he is honest or that he will eschew greed and corruption. Rather, their view is that he is on their side and that the protestations of his opponents merely reflect the self-interested defensiveness of the establishment.

    http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/30/13767174/case-for-normalizing-trump

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    • novahockey, on November 30, 2016 at 2:07 pm said:

      “pursued for the sake of a moral, hardworking ‘us’ and not for the immoral or even foreign ‘them,’” he writes”

      he’s an asshole, but he’s our asshole.

      Liked by 1 person

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    • Brent Nyitray, on November 30, 2016 at 4:25 pm said:

      I think the left is trying very hard to frame this election as a rejection of “elitism” as opposed to a rejection of progressivism.

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      • Kevin S. Willis, on November 30, 2016 at 6:58 pm said:

        The rejection of elitism is strong, but given that so many on the left are doubling down on their elitism, I’m not sure the problems with it (or what it is) is entirely getting through to them. If they were taking the lesson to heart, they wouldn’t be persuing their current “you’re all hateful racists” strategy.

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    • Kevin S. Willis, on November 30, 2016 at 6:47 pm said:

      Exactly. Nails it. No sign that more than 10% of the left is getting it, though. Less of the MSM.

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  7. jnc4p, on November 30, 2016 at 1:37 pm said:

    I wonder if they’ll believe it if it’s in the NYT:

    “Some blue-collar neighborhoods that supported Mr. Trump have been portrayed as monocultures, the opposite of supposedly more diverse, cosmopolitan cities that favored Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic candidate. That caricature does not hold up here.

    At least half of the workers on Carrier’s assembly line are women. And dozens of Burmese immigrants have gone to work at the factory in recent years, part of an influx of nearly 15,000 refugees from Myanmar into Indianapolis since 2001.

    “It can be hard to communicate, but they work very hard,” Mr. Maynard said. “They don’t complain, and I love their work ethic.”

    And the neighborhoods around Carrier’s factory are considerably more diverse than many wealthy New York and San Francisco suburbs, where Democrats dominate.”

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/13/business/economy/can-trump-save-their-jobs-theyre-counting-on-it.html

    Liked by 1 person

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  8. ScottC, on November 30, 2016 at 2:58 pm said:

    A question:

    What is the justification for news organizations making polls such central part of their coverage during election campaigns? Assuming it is the job of news organizations to to provide citizens with information so they can make an informed decision when it comes to voting, of what value is polling data with regard to doing that job?

    Liked by 1 person

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    • Let the mutherfuker burn!, on November 30, 2016 at 3:03 pm said:

      It’s designed to shape opinion.

      Liked by 1 person

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    • Brent Nyitray, on November 30, 2016 at 3:09 pm said:

      to see how statements and events are registering with voters at any particular time.

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      • ScottC, on November 30, 2016 at 4:12 pm said:

        Brent:

        to see how statements and events are registering with voters at any particular time.

        I can see why that info would be useful/necessary for a campaign manager. But why does a media outlet think that the average citizen would care about how statements are registering with voters at any given time?

        I started thinking about this the other day after watching a youtube clip of Stephanopoulus interviewing someone from the Trump campaign before the election. The entire interview was focused on Trumps polling numbers, questioning Trumps strategy in light of those numbers, and whether or not he should change his "message". And I kept thinking to myself, apart from campaign insiders, why would anyone watching this give a fuck? As a potential voter, what useful information did I glean from this at all, that would help inform me about whether I should or should not vote for Trump? The answer was nothing at all. I think that a huge amount of political reporting that goes on is totally worthless to the average citizen. And not just because the media is incompetent. What they are doing isn't even meant to inform voters. It is designed for the entertainment of political insiders.

        Liked by 1 person

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  10. jnc4p, on November 30, 2016 at 5:05 pm said:

    Interesting take.

    http://politicalorphans.com/socialism-for-white-people/

    I don’t agree with all of it, but I think this is spot on:

    “Election 2016 has prompted a wave of head-scratching on the left. Why would economically struggling blue collar voters reject a party that offers to expand public safety net programs? The answer is simple – they don’t want these programs. Working class white voters are not interested in the public safety net. They want to restore their access to an older safety net, one much more generous, dignified, and stable than the public system – the one I and my neighbors still enjoy.

    When it seems like people are voting against their interests, you have probably failed to understand their interests.

    …

    When Democrats respond to job losses with an offer to expand the public safety net, blue collar voters cringe and rebel. They are not remotely interested in sharing the public social safety net experienced by minority groups and the poorest white families.”

    Liked by 1 person

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    • ScottC, on November 30, 2016 at 6:11 pm said:

      jnc:

      When it seems like people are voting against their interests, you have probably failed to understand their interests.

      YES!!!

      I have always marveled at the unmitigated hubris of the left which gets so frustrated when people fail to seek what the left is so sure that is in their own best interests. What’s The Matter With Kansas is the archetype of the genre.

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    • novahockey, on November 30, 2016 at 6:25 pm said:

      The word that’s missing is “pride”

      And the progressives haven’t killed it off entirely. Despite their best efforts. You can’t reshape society–their stated goal (literally – read their own works!) with a population that takes pride in its ability to manage its own affairs. And that more than anything really chaps their asses.

      Hopefully this go around we bury this wretched ideology for good.

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      • ScottC, on November 30, 2016 at 6:35 pm said:

        nova:

        Hopefully this go around we bury this wretched ideology for good.

        Not going to happen. Leftism is like tooth decay. It exists naturally, and requires constant work and vigilance to keep at bay. If you are not actively preventing it, it is naturally growing.

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    • Kevin S. Willis, on November 30, 2016 at 6:50 pm said:

      Also, because racism. Racists are more concerned about punishing minorities than their own well-being. Or so the narrative goes.

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    • Brent Nyitray, on November 30, 2016 at 7:44 pm said:

      Another leftist who thinks that because businesses deduct expenses on their tax returns they are being subsidized. As if businesses should be taxed on revenue, not profit. Gee, if I can deduct the rent I pay for my store at the mall, that means I am getting a subsidy?

      Same logic that the left uses to claim we subsidize oil companies because they are allowed to deduct depletion and dry hole expenses.

      I stopped reading after that.

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      • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 6:54 am said:

        Brent:

        Same logic that the left uses to claim we subsidize oil companies because they are allowed to deduct depletion and dry hole expenses.

        Any rationale which equates not taking money from someone with giving them money is based entirely on hardcore socialist ideology. That is not hyperbole. The conflation of a failure to tax with a government subsidy is intellectually coherent only if one assumes that all production – and by implication the labor from which it results – is owned first and foremost by the state, to be distributed how it sees fit. Only from this premise can one then claim that when the government “allows” you to keep some portion of the product of your own labor, it is “subsidizing” you. If one assumes that each person has moral ownership over his own labor – and by implication the production that flows from it – then it makes no sense to view tax deductions as a government subsidy. Under this premise, only money/value that has been taken from someone else and then given to you can be construed to be a subsidy.

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        • Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 9:19 am said:

          @scottc1: “Any rationale which equates not taking money from someone with giving them money is based entirely on hardcore socialist ideology. ”

          Socialist and not Marxist? The argument that the government is subsidizing business not with subsidies, but just by not confiscating their money or property, seems explicitly Marxist. I.e: private property is theft.

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        • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 10:09 am said:

          KW:

          Socialist and not Marxist?

          I actually debated using the term Marxist, but ultimately settled on socialist as being less specific. I am assuming that to be a socialist is not necessarily to be a Marxist. Maybe that is incorrect.

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        • jnc4p, on December 1, 2016 at 9:28 am said:

          I don’t buy that at all. Tax deductions for home mortgages subsidize homeowners at the expense of renters who pay more than they otherwise would, all things being equal.

          This is wrong:

          “That results in roughly a $500bn annual transfer of funds from the state and federal treasuries to insurers to provide coverage for the Americans least in need of assistance.”

          because in fact there is no such transfer occurring, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not being subsidized indirectly via the deduction.

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        • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 9:57 am said:

          jnc:

          Tax deductions for home mortgages subsidize homeowners at the expense of renters who pay more than they otherwise would, all things being equal.

          No, they don’t. Again, not taking something from someone is entirely different from giving them something, unless you believe that what you are not taking is not rightfully owned by the person you aren’t taking it from in the first place. Giving and taking are entirely different concepts and mean entirely different things.

          It is perfectly reasonable to argue that certain tax deductions result in an unjust situation, in that the law ends up treating certain people differently, or disadvantaging certain people, relative to others. But that is an argument about equal treatment under the law, not an argument about “subsidies”. Calling the deduction a “subsidy” is just a rhetorical strategy (perhaps one of Scott Adams’ persuasion techniques?) that totally abuses the meaning of the word, unless one adopts the premise that, as I have said, what is not being taken doesn’t actually belong to the person who it isn’t taken from.

          (I think the echo chamber is collapsing upon us as we speak.)

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        • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 9:59 am said:

          jnc:

          “subsidized indirectly” means “not literally subsidized”.

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        • jnc4p, on December 1, 2016 at 10:05 am said:

          We’ve gone down this road before. I base my argument on looking at everyone’s bottom line in a specific set of circumstances.

          The government cutting you a check because you are homeowner produces the same net result as a tax deduction for homeownership.

          Ditto all those local tax credits to specific companies for doing things like building sports stadiums.

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        • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 11:10 am said:

          jnc:

          I base my argument on looking at everyone’s bottom line in a specific set of circumstances.

          Sure, but whatever the specific set of circumstances, you are necessarily assuming that a certain amount of one’s income is rightfully owned by the government rather than the earner. Without that assumption, you can never justify the “subsidy” characterization.

          The word “subsidy” implies, and more importantly is meant to imply, that the receiver is getting something to which they are not entitled or have no right. Using it in the context of a failure to tax something is nothing but a rhetorical, framing strategy, unless one adopts socialist premises.

          The government cutting you a check because you are homeowner produces the same net result as a tax deduction for homeownership.

          Again, “cutting a check” is just a rhetorical strategy to produce an emotional response, it isn’t a reflection of the facts. (Thanks Scott Adams!) The desired implication is that I have no moral right to the money represented by the check, that it is somehow a gift. But if the government is simply giving back to me money (or, more realistically a small part of the money) that it just took from me, it isn’t “cutting a check” to me. That’s semantic BS. Unless, of course, one actually believes that the money the government just took from me wasn’t really mine in the first place.

          If you want to argue that it costs X amount for the government to provide the services that it provides, and therefore all people should pay X/Y (where Y = the population), and that anyone who pays less than X/Y is being “subsidized” with services that they are not paying for, then sure, I will agree with the characterization. But it is a corruption of the term and concept to say that a mortgage interest deduction “subsidizes” home ownership, or that the child deduction “subsidizes” child rearing, or that the corporate payroll deduction “subsidizes” corporations.

          Liked by 1 person

        • Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 10:19 am said:

          @scottc1: “(I think the echo chamber is collapsing upon us as we speak.)”

          Being pedantic, I agree with you that subsidizing is actually providing subsidy. Money you aren’t taking, but could in another set of circumstances, is explicitly not subsidy. Unless you feel the taker (in this case, the government) is somehow entitled to the money because it takes it from somebody else.

          Echo chamber restored!

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        • jnc4p, on December 1, 2016 at 3:14 pm said:

          ” But if the government is simply giving back to me money (or, more realistically a small part of the money) that it just took from me, it isn’t “cutting a check” to me. ”

          Well, unless the government didn’t take the money in the first place.

          See refundable tax credits.

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        • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 4:03 pm said:

          jnc:

          Well, unless the government didn’t take the money in the first place. See refundable tax credits.

          Agreed. A negative tax bill that gets “refunded” (another corruption of words) is a subsidy in the true sense of the word.

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  11. ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 7:11 am said:

    Jonathon Haidt embraces (unwittingly, I think) traditional, constitutional federalism.

    http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/15/13593670/donald-trump-jonathan-haidt-social-media-polarization-europe-multiculturalism

    We have to recognize that we’re in a crisis, and that the left-right divide is probably unbridgeable. And if it is, we’ll have to give up on doing big things in Washington, and do as little as we possibly can at the national level. We’re going to have to return as much as we can to states and localities, and hope that innovative solutions spring from technology or private industry.

    Polarization is here to stay for many decades, and it’s probably going to get worse, and so the question is: How do we adapt our democracy for life under intense polarization?

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    • Let the mutherfuker burn!, on December 1, 2016 at 7:51 am said:

      Apparrantly, intense polarization equates to Democrat’s being out of power or stymied in their plans.

      Liked by 1 person

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      • ScottC, on December 1, 2016 at 10:19 am said:

        McWing:

        Apparrantly, intense polarization equates to Democrat’s being out of power or stymied in their plans.

        I think that D’s are only able to recognize the existence of intense polarization when they are out of power because they operate under the delusion that government is simply the way that “we” do things together, and the only way that the delusion gets exposed by reality is when they are not controlling government, and hence find themselves not a part of the “we” that doing things “together”.

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    • Let the mutherfuker burn!, on December 1, 2016 at 7:56 am said:

      Multiculturalism and diversity have many benefits, including creativity and economic dynamism, but they also have major drawbacks, which is that they generally reduce social capital and trust and they amplify tribal tendencies.

      Will no one rid Haidt of those awful Kulaks?

      Time for some farm collectivization in the Midwest, eh?

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    • Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 9:06 am said:

      At least, that’s what I thought until I saw the program’s remarkably poor score according to IMDb’s user ratings when I analyzed the data history of HBO. “Sex and the City” has an overall rating of 7.0 on a scale from 1 to 10 — the average score of an English-language television series with 1,000 or more ratings is 7.3. So why did a show roundly considered seminal in the now ubiquitous genre of driven-New York-women-make-a-go-of-it programming score so low?

      A 0.3 point difference is a gigantic issue? Seriously? Also, men rate Firefly as a 9.0? Clearly, the numbers are worthless, as Firefly was obviously an 11. So it’s nothing but a tissue of lies, anyway.

      Anyway, the conclusion is that men are rating shows that they should not, because they aren’t meant for the eyes of men. However, I think there’s an easy explanation for this:

      Now, if men didn’t feel compelled to crap on shows that plainly aren’t aimed at them, this might not be a problem.

      And if women didn’t insist on making men watch them with them, or would be more motivated to review the things guys made them watch, then dudes wouldn’t be crapping on those shows on IMDB.

      Anecdotally, my experience has been men and women have different strategies in dealing with the male/female divide in entertainment choices. Guys are more likely not to bitch about the show directly, because it might impair their chances of getting laid to go off on Sex and the City when their girl is so clearly into it. So they express their actual opinion online. But they would have never been watching the show and felt compelled to review it had they not had to watch it in the first place (in order to placate their significant other, and thus not reduce their chances of getting laid).

      Women tend to be way more directly critically of male-centric material they do not like, turning what can be a pleasant and entertaining solo actively into a soul-crushing critique of their failures as a man. So it ends up that, while they sit through Gilmore Girls, their significant other doesn’t sit through Batman: The Animated Series with them. If I think I’m going to like something deep in the sci-fi/fantasy genre I make sure to watch it alone, because it doesn’t add anything to the experience, for me, to hear about how awful it was and what an idiot I am for liking that kind of stuff.

      While lots of women like fantasy and sci-fi, those are the ladies who will watch such material with their patriarchal oppressors of choice (and thus would not feel compelled to go review it negatively). And guys learn if genres or styles are safe. Thus, if they know she’s likely to like a Tarantino film, he’ll rent the Hateful Eight and they’ll both watch it. If he knows she’s likely to hate the film—and thus make him miserable for having dared to pick such a thing out—he might rent it and find a a few hours to watch it by himself.

      Which is to say, I’m pretty sure the Sex and the City numbers are easily explainable by who ends up making the shared TV watching decisions in a relationship. I’ve seen most of Sex and the City and, frankly, would not have watched more than an episode or two if I wasn’t married. If I’m flipping through the TV and I see something I would like to watch, but know my wife would not . . . I keep flipping until I get to the Friends re-runs (which is mutually enjoyable).

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    • Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 9:16 am said:

      Also this:

      I could just as easily have said “The Man Show,” which put Jimmy Kimmel on the map and removed Adam Carolla from it.

      Adam Carolla has had multiple bestsellers since the Man Show, has one of the top podcasts, several successful documentary films, and currently has a net worth estimated at $15 million dollars. He’s not making Jimmy Kimmel money but if that’s “off the map”, I want to get “off the map”, too.

      And then there’s “The Angry Video Game Nerd,“ a misogynistic web show whose sycophantic Wikipedia entry made me pine for hemlock in my coffee.

      WTF? That’s not even remotely accurate. There is exactly zero evidence to suggest James Rolfe is a misogynist, except the fact that he did a video saying he was going to refuse to see the Ghostbuster’s reboot because, in his opinion, everybody involved appeared to be defecating on the original, and a reboot of Ghostbusters was an awful idea.

      More on that: http://heatst.com/tech/angry-video-game-nerd-james-rolfe-still-under-attack-months-after-ghostbusters-controversy/

      it’s time to ask whether user scores are truly as objective as they purport to be

      Of course internet ratings aren’t objective. Who thinks they are? Jeeze louise. Online ratings are spammed, trolled, made-up, and entered mistakenly.

      That’s 538’s chief culture writer at work, BTW.

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    • jnc4p, on December 1, 2016 at 9:34 am said:

      What they really resent is the power sift inherent when consumers can rate these things themselves rather than having to rely on professional reviewers.

      Yet again, social media undermines the gatekeeper role that the press has aggregated for itself.

      Liked by 1 person

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      • Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 9:46 am said:

        No doubt. But it’s also true that nobody takes them as definitive. It’s just another number. 72.6% of random people on the Internet like this. Okay, that’s a number. Definitely a percentage.

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    • Brent Nyitray, on December 1, 2016 at 9:40 am said:

      The FCC should do something about this… Maybe declare that women’s votes count for 1.3x or something to even it out…

      Clearly this is a critical issue.

      Liked by 1 person

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    • novahockey, on December 1, 2016 at 9:48 am said:

      “ny reasonable person should concede that “Sex and the City” was an above-average television program (at minimum).”

      disagree. i thought it sucked.

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      • jnc4p, on December 1, 2016 at 10:02 am said:

        First season was cliched. Second through fifth were good when they started writing the men as real characters rather than just stereotypes.

        Last season sucked when they caved to the audience and wrote it as a happy ending in a way that completely violated all the character development they had done to date.

        And the movies were horrible. They make the entire project seem worse in retrospect.

        Sort of like how the new Star Trek movies and The Force Awakens ruined those brands too.

        Liked by 1 person

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        • Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 1:10 pm said:

          “Sort of like how the new Star Trek movies and The Force Awakens ruined those brands too.”

          Well, not financially. Although as I recall the 2nd Sex and the City movie did not perform very well. And also was negatively reviewed pretty universally.

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      • Let the mutherfuker burn!, on December 1, 2016 at 10:27 am said:

        There was partial nudity, that should garner at least an 80% from men.

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      • Brent Nyitray, on December 1, 2016 at 12:23 pm said:

        Sex and the City was aimed at women and gay men.

        So probably the only men that watched it were gay.

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    • novahockey, on December 1, 2016 at 9:51 am said:

      ” But there are also shows that appeal predominantly to one gender or the other; here are the shows with the most-skewed audiences:”

      This just in: Men don’t like shows aimed at women. Women don’t like shows aimed at men.

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  13. Kevin S. Willis, on December 1, 2016 at 9:44 am said:

    I get a strong sense that Trump will continue to steamroll the Democrats and the MSM, essentially using their bubble (and their tendency to way overreact to his tweets), against them.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/12/01/trumps-game-plan-use-carrier-deals-to-sell-an-aggressive-pro-corporate-agenda/?utm_term=.31ca87e6a598

    http://www.salon.com/2016/12/01/donald-trumps-carrier-deal-is-an-empty-p-r-stunt-and-a-bad-precedent-that-incentivizes-bad-corporate-behavior/

    http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/11/30/trump_saved_jobs_at_carrier_by_making_a_bad_deal_for_america.html

    Their response to Trump (before even taking office, delivering on one of his more actually important (to voters) campaign promises) having gotten Carrier to preserve jobs in Indiana? It’s a bad thing! However they finesse it, any critique comes out: Trump kept jobs in America, and that’s bad, because we want your jobs to go away because the world is flat Thomas Friedman said so shut up!

    While “Trump kept jobs in Indiana” is no doubt simplistic and critics might even have a point, that isn’t the point. The point is it’s an unqualified win for Trump, and every effort on the part of Democrats and the MSM to tear it down and make it into a bad thing just serves to make it even more of a win for Trump.

    I don’t see how they don’t get that.

    Trump now chalks up two wins on the domestic jobs front: Ford and Carrier. And he hasn’t even taken office yet.

    I continue to emphasize, it doesn’t matter to the Trump supporter, the independent voter, the swing voter, the last-minute voter, or the millions of registered Democrats that did not show up to vote for Hillary—it doesn’t matter what the real story is, or the secondary or tertiary negative consequences might be.

    A non-insignificant part of the left is, despite all the nuance they perceive, staking out a position with the American voters that says: keeping jobs in America is a bad thing. The president working the companies on the behalf of the American worker is a bad thing.

    My sense it there will be small victories for the left in the midterms, maybe even a takeover of the Senate, but I don’t think even that will do much to hurt Trump. I really think it’s going to be a very difficult 8 years for them. Mostly self-inflicted.

    I mean, just read the Slate and Salon pieces. Holy crap. It’s like they want to provide Trump supporters with material to circulate, saying: “This is how Democrats feel about your job: they don’t care!”

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