Brent Nyitray
Fairlington Blade
Let the mutherfuker burn!
jnc4p
Kevin S. Willis
Michigoose
lmsinca
markinaustin
Arcanaut
novahockey
quarterback
ScottC
yellojktVital Statistics:
Stocks are higher this morning as earnings continue to come in. Bonds and MBS are up.
Housing starts rose 15.8% MOM to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.499 million. This was 4.3% below December 2023’s rate. Building permits fell 0.7% MOM to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.483 million units. Both numbers were well above Street expectations.
Homebuilder sentiment improved modestly to kick off the new year, according to the NAHB. “NAHB is forecasting a slight gain for single-family housing starts in 2025, as the market faces offsetting upside and downside risks from an improving regulatory outlook and ongoing elevated interest rates,” said NAHB Chief Economist Robert Dietz. “And while ongoing, but slower easing from the Federal Reserve should help financing for private builders currently squeezed out of some local markets, builders report cancellations are climbing as a direct result of mortgage rates rising back up near 7%.”
Despite the affordability issues, the use of incentives and price cuts has remained steady since last summer. Sentiment remains strongest in the Northeast and Midwest, while the South and (especially) the West are struggling.
Fed Governor Chris Waller said that the Fed Funds futures might be too hawkish if inflation comes in as expected this year. “As long as the data comes in good on inflation or continues on that path, then I can certainly see rate cuts happening sooner than maybe the markets are pricing in,” Waller said during a “Squawk on the Street” interview with Sara Eisen.
Asked how many that could entail, he responded, “That’s all going to be driven by the data. I mean, if we make a lot of progress, you could do more,” which he said could mean three or four, assuming quarter percentage point increments.
“If the data doesn’t cooperate, then you’re going to be back to two and going maybe even one, if we just get a lot of sticky inflation,” he said.
Right now, the “maybe even one” scenario is the baseline according to the Fed Funds futures.
Interesting quote about how homebuyers are adjusting to the new normal: “My average first-time homebuyer now says $3,500 is comfortable, compared to the $2,000 to $2,500 range previously. Those looking for a family house now say $6,500 to $7,500; previously, $4,500 was the primary target. I’m also seeing more people more comfortable with $8,000 to $10,000 mortgage payments than ever. Honestly, for the first 20 years of my career, I don’t believe I ever had a mortgage payment offered over $10,000, and now I have a few of those each quarter.”
Industrial production rebounded smartly in December, according to the Federal Reserve. For the full year, industrial production rose 0.5%. Capacity utilization rose from 77% to 77.6%.
Filed under: Economy |
All Things in Moderation 
It’s hard to decide if it’s more hilarious or pathetic that the media waited until after the election was over to actually engage in some critical coverage of the Biden administration:
https://www.vox.com/politics/395339/biden-border-immigration-record-legacy
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Well, I think everybody knew but believe that the bureaucracy exists to run the government and POTUS is merely a figurehead. What concerns “journalists”, I think, is anything threatening the status quo.
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The key word being “some”. The analysis is still light compared to what will be done and is being done to Trump, I feel like the amount of real research and shoe-leather reporting is still feather-light, and some of it may only be getting done in order to position themselves as “objective and dispassionate, so let’s us decide what truth is and set the narrative” when the negative torrent of coverage of the Trump admin starts and continues throughout his term.
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Adam McKay says the fact that Netflix claims 400 million people to 500 million people, none of whom were bots to drive up to watch count, watched his THOUGHT-PROVOKING MOVIE, Don’t Look Up . . . that supposed watch-count proves that everybody knows Global Warming is totally real, a huge crisis, and that only evil far-Right Wing people like Donald Trump and Glen Greenwald deny it–and EVEN THEY KNOW THEY ARE LYING.
Because the science is settled and there is an expert consensus and only mouth-breathing knuckle-dragging Nazis don’t believe we will all be killed by the Climate Gods if we keep sinning against the Expert Class (by driving and buying things and owning property when we aren’t enlightened globalist elites like him, where it’s okay if he does these things because he made Don’t Look Up).
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/adam-mckay-says-don-t-look-up-being-watched-by-400-million-shows-viewers-know-they-re-being-lied-to/ar-AA1xmKm6?ocid=BingNewsSerp
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Its got that make-a-wish foundation vibe to it
https://x.com/VP/status/1880334350044012843
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Always love this:
“Readers added context to this image”
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See also:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/17/us/politics/equal-rights-amendment-constitution-biden.html
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The ABA and Georgetown Law are claiming it too.
Someone quipped that Georgetown is embarrassing Patrick Ewing.
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Willing it into exist no is pretty impressive.
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Goddamn
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I’m not sure what the gameplan is for this. Is it simply fodder for lawsuits going forward? Or just a symbolic bone for the slappies?
And the ABA and law schools go along with it? Do they want to confirm people’s belief that the legal system is biased?
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They also haven’t thought through the implications of the President just “declaring” things part of the Constitution.
Even if Biden had successfully pressured the archivist to publish the ERA as the 28th Amendment, a good half the country wouldn’t view it as legitimate and in so doing, he would have destroyed the consensus on how an Amendment is added to the Constitution.
Trump can play Calvinball too. First up, birthright citizenship.
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And looks like he’s going to try it.
“The U.S. government will no longer recognize the citizenship of children born in the United States to immigrants who lack legal status, one of 10 immigration-related executive orders President Donald Trump plans to sign Monday, an administration official told reporters.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/2025/01/20/trump-immigration-executive-orders/
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It’s an earthquake if SOCTUS upholds it. I give it a 2% chance of happening.
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Agree, but at least he’s making sure it gets a judicial hearing. And then there is a real question—why should he allow gaming of the system? We’re not talking people here with a green card; why should their children get birthright citizenship? Why can’t the government constrain that?
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It will be interesting if they try to parse non-citizen immigrants with a valid travel visa vs completely unauthorized.
Birth tourism is still alive and well.
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There can be a legal argument that if you are here illegally, constitutional rights don’t apply to you are your children. Greencard baby? Sure. Crossed illegally and you’re here illegally? Why does your baby get citizenship? If you want your new baby to be a citizen, come here legally.
Although yes I would get rid of it entirely.
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I wouldn’t. It’s one of the distinguishing characteristics of the United States and it solves more problems than it creates.
Illegal immigration can be addressed without having to mess with the 14th Amendment.
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Perhaps. I still don’t believe birthright citizenship should be given to the children of people here illegally, and it would be an incentive to do it legally if you knew the citizenship of your child at least required you to be here on a visa or with a green card.
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jnc:
It’s one of the distinguishing characteristics of the United States and it solves more problems than it creates.
I’m not sure if you saw my response at substack, but I am wondering what problems exactly you think it solves? For example, what problem does the UK have in the absence of birthright citizenship that is solved in the US due to birthright citizenship?
Illegal immigration can be addressed without having to mess with the 14th Amendment.
I think the most that can be said about Trump’s EO is that he is messing with Supreme Court precedent. And with regard to illegal immigration, he isn’t even doing that. As I pointed out, Wong quite explicitly did not directly address the issue of children of illegal immigrants, and to the extent that it addressed it tangentially, it implied that children of illegal immigrants were not covered by birthright citizenship.
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“I am wondering what problems exactly you think it solves?”
Constant re-litigating of citizenship either by statute or EO. The definition of who constitutes a citizens strikes me as foundational enough that it should require amending the Constitution to change.
I saw your piece. You definitely argue Trump’s position better than the DoJ lawyers did.
I don’t think this is quite accurate though:
“it implied that children of illegal immigrants were not covered by birthright citizenship.”
Wong’s parents weren’t US citizens and went back to China if I recall correctly. To the extent that the concept of “illegal immigrants” was conceived of in that way during the debates on the Amendment itself and the arguments in the Wong case, I’m persuaded that it was intended to cover their children born in the US.
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jnc:
Constant re-litigating of citizenship either by statute or EO.
That sounds like a reason for how the policy should be implemented, but not for the substance of the policy itself. If there was a Constitutional Amendment definitively ending birthright citizenship, and declaring that citizenship upon birth is determined by parentage rather than location, would you object to that? I am genuinely interested in the case for birthright citizenship as a matter of substance. I just don’t see why anyone would want such a thing in the 21st century.
To the extent that the concept of “illegal immigrants” was conceived of in that way during the debates on the Amendment…
Well, the point I think is that it wasn’t. The idea of illegal immigration simply didn’t exist at the time. People were literally unrestricted in coming to the US, so I don’t think the 14th Amendment can be said to have contemplated that eventuality. The “it” that I was talking about when I said that it implied that the children of illegals were not covered was the ruling in Wong, not the 14th Amendment.
The majority in Wong explicitly established that the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction of the US” meant owed allegiance to and was owed protection by the US. And it also stated explicitly that even non-citizens were themselves “subject to the jurisdiction of the US”, ie owed allegiance to and were owed protection by the US, but only provided that they were “permitted by the US to reside here”. Thus the notion of whether or not someone is “subject to the jurisdiction of the US” was clearly conditioned on whether or not they were permitted to reside here. So, based on the logic of Wong, before we can establish whether a baby born in the US is “subject to the jurisdiction” of the US, we must first establish whether it is residing in the US legally.
And it cannot be the case that the mere fact of being born in the US means it is residing here legally, because that would be circular, ie it is permitted to reside in the US because it is a US citizen, and it is a US citizen because it is permitted to reside in the US. Thus, we must look to something other than its presumed citizenship to see if it is residing in the US with permission. And the only logical means of establishing this, indeed the only means at all as far as I can tell, would be to look to whether the parents were residing in the US legally.
Again, if Wong is considered authoritative on the issue of birthright citizenship, I think it excludes children of illegal immigrants just as clearly as it includes children of non-citizens residing in the US legally.
Of course, you could argue that Wong is not controlling, but then that just throws the whole thing back up for grabs entirely.
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jnc:
Another point to make about illegal immigrants re the 14th Amendment itself rather than just Wong.
The 14th says:
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.
Note the final part: …and in the state wherein they reside. Residency in a state was assumed. This would implicitly exclude people who are not residents of any state, such as tourists and illegal immigrants, neither of which has residence status.
This issue never came up in Wong because there was no dispute that he was a resident of California when he was born. And, of course, at the time of the passing of the 14th Amendment there was no formal permission needed to establish residency in any state or the US in general. There were no travel restrictions, and so anyone was free to travel to and settle in any state, automatically making them a resident. But with the later advent of immigration laws, residency status was no longer automatically conveyed simply by the fact of being present, which implies that citizenship, being dependent on residency, also is no longer conveyed automatically simply by being present.
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Prior to the passage of the 14th amendment, citizenship was established by state law. I don’t know the answer to this, but it would be instructive to know whether state citizenship was granted to children of citizens of other states that happened to be born while travelling in a given state. That is, suppose a pregnant woman with Virginia citizenship happened to be visiting North Carolina, and she gave birth while still in NC. Was the baby automatically granted NC citizenship? If not, then pretty clearly birthright citizenship did not have any historical tradition within the US, and it would therefore seem odd to think that the ratifiers of the 14th decided to suddenly impose it. It would make far more sense that they were tying citizenship to residency at birth, not to mere location at birth.
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Good read:
How Democrats Drove Silicon Valley Into Trump’s Arms
Marc Andreessen explains the newest faction of conservatism.
Jan. 17, 2025
https://archive.ph/GaJ61
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As cynical as I am about the democrats, I didn’t realize it was that bad.
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I’m fascinated at Pelosi’s butthurt over this.
https://redstate.com/nick-arama/2025/01/19/pelosis-daughter-just-decimates-jill-biden-n2184534
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Trump telling off the Establishment to their faces is pretty amazing.
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what did he say?
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Early in his speech he talked about how corrupt the government is and can’t do anything, even for those in NC and California. Also about how he will reverse the decline and destruction brought by the previous Administration. You should read the speech when it’s available.
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TDS 2.0
https://www.politicalorphans.com/hell-is-empty/
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They are not taking this well
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This will never not make me smile. It’s the taco bowl on Cinco de Mayo of 2025.
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It’s a thing I don’t get, would never have thought of prioritizing at all, but I’m betting the outcome will somehow show it was an intuitively genius move.
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Wasn’t this whole thing just a troll of Biden’s blocking offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico
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See, it’s different. We’re getting pardons because we’re innocent. They’re getting pardons because they’re guilty.
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Whatever else you can say, at least Trump ran on pardoning the January 6th rioters.
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He’s not fucking around anymore:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/01/20/immigration-courts-officials-fired-trump-doj/
Or as the classic movie puts it:
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For Alderan, he was right.
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Round 2:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/01/21/justice-trump-removes-senior-staffers-national-security-criminal/
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Analysis of overreach with the EO’s.
https://reason.com/volokh/2025/01/20/trumps-illegal-first-day-executive-actions/
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The crazy bastard did it.
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I wonder if he will pardon Edward Snowden.
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