Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, and Debt:

Beating Bitcoin: Why some traders don't care about USD prices

Inflation, asset and consumer prices

Along with other central banks, the Fed is trapped. We will assume that rather than face this reality, governments and central banks will continue with their money printing until both their fiat currencies and financial systems face collapse. All precedent points to this choice.
That being the case, an examination of how a collapse in the purchasing powers of fiat currencies is likely to affect asset and consumer prices is timely. This article draws on theories of money as well as empirical evidence in search of some answers. The answers will surprise and discomfort many of its readers.

High Inflation is Always “Transitory” and Always Ends in Recessions or Depressions

‘Bitcoin will go all the way to $160,000 this year,’ says Celsius CEO

Coronavirus News, Analysis, and Opinion:

Trump’s Coronavirus Infection Was Much Worse Than We Knew: By lying about it, he led others to their deaths.

We’re Not Ready for Another Pandemic

After an inept coronavirus response, will the United States do better when the next pandemic strikes? Experts generally agree that America learned from the past year, and that the next public-health crisis won’t be quite as bewildering. But America’s pandemic preparedness still has major gaps, some of which are too big for any one administration to fix. In recent weeks, I’ve called back many of the experts I interviewed over the past 18 months about masks, testing, contact tracing, quarantine, and more. I asked them, “Are we ready for another one?” The short answer is “Not quite.” The long answer is that being truly “ready” will be harder than anyone realizes.

Politics:

Can Congress Insure Fair Elections?

I think the best place to start is to differentiate between election subversion and voter suppression. We’ve been hearing for many years about voter suppression: things that make it harder for people to register and to vote, like the provision of the Georgia law that says you can’t give water to people waiting on line to vote. That’s a different concern than this idea of election subversion, which is trying to manipulate the rules for who counts the votes in a way that could allow for a partisan official to declare the loser as the winner.…
In terms of election subversion, the biggest concern I have right now is what happened in Georgia, where as punishment for Raffensperger standing up to Trump, the secretary of state has been taken out of any authority as to how the state election board does its job, to be replaced by someone handpicked by the Republican legislature. This board now has the power to do temporary takeovers of up to four counties. You could easily imagine the state boards taking over how the election is run in heavily Democratic Fulton County, and then imposing rules or messing with election counts in ways that could affect the outcome in the now very purple state of Georgia.

Barr Knew Election Fraud Claims Were ‘Bullshit’ But Wanted To Appease Trump

Ghani: Afghanistan having '1861 moment' amid U.S. troop withdrawal

Politico of All Places

…AP and WaPo completely ran with Senate Republicans’ absurd claim that Biden somehow double-crossed them. Politico Playbook did pretty much the same thing, though in Playbook argot. But Politico itself, or the regular edit team published the first account of what happened here that more or less captured what happened. Republicans woke up Friday angry about what they’d agreed to Thursday. And their best argument, to the extent they had one, is that Biden said too clearly what they knew and what they had just agreed to.

Trump Kicks Off His Revenge Tour

The Supreme Court’s Conservatives Issued a Decision Too Extreme for Clarence Thomas

The Most Crucial Part of the New Georgia Lawsuit Is Proving GOP Intentionally Targeted Black Voters

Helicopter carrying Colombian president and senior officials hit by gunfire

He Saved 31 People at Sea. Then Got a 142-Year Prison Sentence.

Classified Ministry of Defence documents found at bus stop

Trump's big lie about 2020 results suffers legal and political blows in key swing states

Belarus dictator floods EU with migrants in retaliation for sanctions

A GOP blueprint emerges

The blueprint: Republicans tell us the work-in-progress plan argues that Biden Democrats are soft on crime, soft and ineffective on illegal immigration, and reckless and wrong with government spending.
The big picture: Each topic can be backed by actual policies, instead of drafting off Donald Trump’s cultural grievances and fanatical allegations of stolen elections, top officials tell us.
The hitch: Um, Trump. He’s still the Pied Piper of modern Republicanism — and fixated on litigating the past, not legislating the future.

Serendipity:

Climate Change Could Fuel the Spread of a Flesh-Eating Parasite

^{Badge thanks to @arcange}

^{Meme credit: Giantsquonk (source)}