RJB

Traveler, Hockey Player, Engineer;
Strategy - play the long game, patience pays off

[Jeanne Ives @JeanneIves]

Governor DeSantis and Governor Pritzker each just signed their 8th state budgets. The contrast couldn't be starker. And the lesson is that who you elect matters. Change out the politicians and you get different policies.
For reference, Florida is 1.8x more populous than IL, 23.37m people compared to 12.71m people. Now consider these points:
1. FL general revenue budget is $52B, IL is $56B. Because state's have different ways of budgeting, lookimg at the total FY27 budgets, FL =$117B, IL=$130B. This doesn't make sense.
2. Pritzker advocated for and signed the largest budget in state history this year and in previous years. DeSantis has lowered the amount spent every year for the last four years and vetoed over $10B in spending during his time in office. Pritzker's budget is up $16B since he took office.
3. Pritzker brags about his credit upgrades, but IL has the worst state credit rating, FL has the best credit rating.
4. FL has a rainy day fund of $18B. IL rainy day fund is $2B.
5. FL is pushing $78B in road programs and moving planned projects ahead 5-15 years. IL can't even get projects planned, permitted and built in a timely manner, so many projects are left undone and money sits in an account collecting interest. And now that surplus interest is being sent to the CTA to bail them out.
6. DeSantis has given back over $9B in taxes. Pritzker has raised taxes every year for a total of over $77B according to IPI.
9. FL is giving $5,000 signing bonuses for police officers. IL politicians want to defund the police.
10. FL is on the cusp of eliminating property taxes for 60% of home owners and they have no state income tax. IL has the highest property taxes, plus individial income and estate taxes, high corporate taxes, and there's been no attempt to meaningfully lower property taxes.
Yes, elections have consequences. But, it can all ve reversed. DeSantis barely got elected 8 years ago. Your vote matters.

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

tldr: age old playbook - soft default by weakening the dollar and inflate the debt away as long as gov can thread the needle to avoid hyperinflation or recession

https://t.co/EH8VGYogdH

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

Close but no cigar on 5M steps this year. Can’t recommend enough though to get a dog (or two) and go for walks. Does wonders for your physical and mental health.

2017 - 3.15M
2018 - 2.86M
2019 - 3.50M
2020 - 4.03M
2021 - 3.73M
2022 - 3.90M
2023 - 4.63M
2024 - 4.34M
2025 - 4.98M

[Ray Dalio @RayDalio]

History shows us that having too much debt during an economic downturn leads to a classic, self-reinforcing cycle where:

1) The empire can no longer borrow the money to repay its debts
2) It prints a lot of new money, which devalues the currency and raises inflation
3) Living standards decline, leading to the rise of political extremism
4) Turbulent economic conditions undermine productivity and there is conflict about how to divide the shrinking resources
5) Populist leaders emerge pledging to take control and bring about order

[Devon Eriksen @Devon_Eriksen_]

1. Have capitalism. Life is good for 90%.
2. Find the 10% who can't thrive even in ideal conditions.
3. Tell them socialism would fix their problems. Use their support to implement some socialism.
5. Have mostly capitalism. Life is good for 80%.
6. Find the 20% aren't thriving.
7. Tell them socialism would fix their problems. Use their support to implement some more socialism.
8. Have some capitalism. Life is good for 70%.
9. Find the 30% who aren't thriving...

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

#WSJ sums it up well here. TLDR is we need to do things differently, and it's not going to be politically popular for anyone.

https://t.co/gjs4qQrviP

[World of Statistics @stats_feed]

🇺🇸 USA budget deficit:

2000: $236 billion
2001: $128 billion
2002: $158 billion
2003: $378 billion
2004: $413 billion
2005: $318 billion
2006: $248 billion
2007: $161 billion
2008: $459 billion
2009: $1.41 trillion
2010: $1.29 trillion
2011: $1.30 trillion
2012: $1.07 trillion
2013: $680 billion
2014: $485 billion
2015: $442 billion
2016: $585 billion
2017: $665 billion
2018: $779 billion
2019: $984 billion
2020: $3.13 trillion
2021: $2.77 trillion
2022: $1.38 trillion
2023: $1.70 trillion
2024: $1.83 trillion

Note: A budget deficit occurs when money going out (spending) exceeds money coming in (revenue) during a defined period. In FY 2024, the federal government spent $6.75 trillion and collected $4.92 trillion in revenue, resulting in a deficit. The amount by which spending exceeds revenue, $1.83 trillion in 2024, is referred to as deficit spending.

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

End the penny, nickel, and dime. Saves hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars and simplifies loose change to just the quarter. #DOGE

https://t.co/yCKOABH0II

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

Its math. Gov spending must be cut drastically. Politics should be just the what. #DOGE #WSJ "In the absence of radical reform.. the only plausible way that the US can come back within the limits of Ferguson's Law is.. through a productivity miracle."

https://t.co/ZsYFnSn96N

[Thomas Sowell Quotes @ThomasSowell]

Notice the difference.

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

(2/2)
Ultimately less government will result in less of all types of taxes. If any of these countries continue to maintain these levels of gov involvement in GDP, then it will end in a debt spiral catastrophe. Gov needs to be less than 20% GDP. Grow the economy and lower taxes

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

🧵 (1/2)
Let’s level set. Tariffs are taxes. Governments have two options: tax the people (income, capital gains, property, sales, etc etc) or tax other countries in the way of incoming good (tariffs). In the end, they all promote different behaviors and outcomes in the economy.

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
-Tacitus

[Pray The Rosary @PrayTheRosary]

Learn to Pray the Rosary in Latin

[The Culturist @the_culturist_]

Ancient Greek thinkers like Socrates and Plato hated democratic elections.

They saw democracy as part of an endless cycle of regimes — destined to slip into mob rule.

But Polybius knew how to break the cycle... (thread) 🧵

[Heritage Foundation @Heritage]

Same energy.

[ThinkingWest @thinkingwest]

Tytler writes:

“the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship”

[Gerald F Seib @GeraldFSeib]

What Republicans Used to Believe: My essay for the Saturday WSJ on the profound shifts in Republican policy views since the days of Reagan, Bush and friends. https://t.co/JKO4tIpWPQ

[Judianna @Judianna]

For all the fans of “It’s A Wonderful Life” and Jimmy Stewart . . .

Just months after winning his 1941 Academy Award for best actor in “The Philadelphia Story,” Jimmy Stewart, one of the best-known actors of the day, left Hollywood and joined the US Army. He was the first big-name movie star to enlist in World War II.

An accomplished private pilot, the 33-year-old Hollywood icon became a US Army Air Force aviator, earning his 2nd Lieutenant commission in early 1942. With his celebrity status and huge popularity with the American public, he was assigned to starring in recruiting films, attending rallies, and training younger pilots.

Stewart, however, wasn’t satisfied. He wanted to fly combat missions in Europe, not spend time in a stateside training command. By 1944, frustrated and feeling the war was passing him by, he asked his commanding officer to transfer him to a unit deploying to Europe. His request was reluctantly granted.

Stewart, now a Captain, was sent to England, where he spent the next 18 months flying B-24 Liberator bombers over Germany. Throughout his time overseas, the US Army Air Corps' top brass had tried to keep the popular movie star from flying over enemy territory. But Stewart would hear nothing of it.
Determined to lead by example, he bucked the system, assigning himself to every combat mission he could. By the end of the war he was one of the most respected and decorated pilots in his unit.
But his wartime service came at a high personal price.

In the final months of WWII he was grounded for being “flak happy,” today called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

When he returned to the US in August 1945, Stewart was a changed man. He had lost so much weight that he looked sickly. He rarely slept, and when he did he had nightmares of planes exploding and men falling through the air screaming (in one mission alone his unit had lost 13 planes and 130 men, most of whom he knew personally).

He was depressed, couldn’t focus, and refused to talk to anyone about his war experiences. His acting career was all but over.

As one of Stewart's biographers put it, "Every decision he made [during the war] was going to preserve life or cost lives. He took back to Hollywood all the stress that he had built up.”

In 1946 he got his break. He took the role of George Bailey, the suicidal father in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” The rest is history.

Actors and crew of the set realized that in many of the disturbing scenes of George Bailey unraveling in front of his family, Stewart wasn’t acting. His PTSD was being captured on film for potentially millions to see.

But despite Stewart's inner turmoil, making the movie was therapeutic for the combat veteran. He would go on to become one of the most accomplished and loved actors in American history.

When asked in 1941 why he wanted to leave his acting career to fly combat missions over Nazi Germany, he said, "This country's conscience is bigger than all the studios in Hollywood put together, and the time will come when we'll have to fight.”
This weekend, as many of us watch the classic Christmas film, “It’s A Wonderful Life,” it’s also a fitting time to remember the sacrifices of Jimmy Stewart and all the men who gave up so much to serve their country during wartime. We will always remember you!

Postscript:

While fighting in Europe, Stewart's Oscar statue was proudly displayed in his father’s Pennsylvania hardware store. Throughout his life, the beloved actor always said his father, a World War I veteran, was the person who had made the biggest impact on him.

Jimmy Stewart was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1985 and died in 1997 at the age of 89.
H/T @mustangmarine

[RJB @forsanethaec5]

"Good things happen to those who hustle. Pressure is something you feel when you don't know what you're doing." - Chuck Noll