Some more random thoughts #67

Some more random thoughts #67

More on the “firing” of Lisa Cook

Trump said “you’re fired!” Cook essentially said “go pound sand – you can’t fire me you big bully!.” The drama unfolds. When Trump fired the two democrat members of the NCUA board, he did not give a reason. They were not fired “for cause”. They were fired “because” – because they were democrats. The FBI showed up at NCUA headquarters and escorted them from their offices leaving the remaining (republican) board member to conduct agency business as a quorum of one. The two ousted board members sued and were reinstated by the courts. That was anticipated because NCUA’s board is legally similar to that of the Fed’s. Their members can only be fired “for cause” or impeached by the senate. As to Lisa Cook, Trump insists he can fire her “for cause” but Cook says it is “because” and that she is not going anywhere. Will Trump have the FBI invade the Fed’s headquarters to escort Dr Cook out? I think the odds are positive but low. What is interesting is that the president didn’t ask his chief minion in the senate Bernie Moreno to institute charges of impeachment. With majorities in the house and the senate maybe he could dislodge Dr Cook that way. I also have cautioned Fed governor Philip Jefferson to watch his back. You know that the president has his people digging for stuff on Jefferson and we all know that a determined prosecutor can find something to indict on regardless of the odds of a conviction.

Trump now says that he may nominate Cook’s replacement soon. Well that woulld be interesting wouldn’t it?

Elon hates me. 

Obviously I have done something to tick off Elon Musk. I may be the only person on the planet who cannot create either an X account or a Grok account. Every time I try regardless of email accounts (I have several) or device (iphone, ipad, macbook or imac) I get the “Oops something went wrong. Try another time.” Ok Elon, so I thought the regulatory credits were a boondoggle. So I said that the cybertruck was weird and needed pimping. So I said the whole EV thing would be on life support were it not for all the subsidies. So I said that Tesla had a look that only a mother could love. So I said that Tesla owners were a cult. So I questioned the safety of the vehicles in a crash. So I asked that with the lithium batteries was it safe to take a Tesla through a car wash. So I said the whole DOGE thing was not necessary because of better alternatives. Did you get upset because I said the open door to the South African Boers was a bad look? So I said that you didn’t know how to build cars with all the recalls and defects. So I questioned why you would allow your young son to pick his nose on camera in the White House. Are any of these the reasons why I am banned from X? Well since my father drilled into us that we should never apologize (only pledge to do better next time) I am not sorry for anything that I have said about you. However, I do admire your genius and ability to do stuff. So is that enough to get me on X?

Nope.

Bye Bye erstwhile democrats (flip floppers)

Despite their media dominance democrats lost 2.1 million registered voters between 2020 and 2024. Republicans gained 2.4 million. I think that all the embracing of the wrong side of issues is driving voters to leave the democrat party and that the republicans are the only place for them to go. If all these folk came over to the republicans with this president imagine all the shift if the republicans had a president that embraced free trade, entrepreneurship, free markets, capitalism and government with a small “g”. But the electorate is fickle having flipped from Bush to Clinton to Bush 2 to Obama to Trump to Biden and back to Trump.

Hi Intel, I’m from the government and am here to help you

What does the government do well? Precious little and running a chip company is not one of them. As a matter of fact, running any company is beyond the competence of the federal government. I presume that the stake in Intel is in exchange for the “grants” awarded by the CHIPS legislation. Intel reminds me of IBM, getting fat, happy and complacent and letting upstarts clean their clock. What is the government getting for its stake? A voice in management? That would be a joke. Is the government’s stake just to bolster the company with no strings? Not likely. But if the government has a $37 trillion debt burden what’s another little old $10 billion?

I thought Trump was taking a whack job to federal employees. Isn’t he going to have to greatly expand those who deal with tariffs? Accountants, border officials, and everyone else involved in counting importing goods, assigning the right tariff for each country and each imported good and all the other stuff involved need to be added to the federal payroll. His former Commerce secretary said “there undoubtedly would be a need to hire more customs people, because if you’re having dozens and dozens of more products, and those products have hundreds of thousands of elements to them and 40 or 50 or 100 jurisdictions from which they’re coming, you’re going to need more customs people.” Do tell? Well that will at least keep the jobs numbers high

The Cracker-less Barrel-less logo

Confession: I am no fan of Cracker Barrel. We are not restaurant patrons and only stop at them when we are on the road. We stopped once at a Cracker Barrel for breakfast and left when I found out they did not serve omelets. A breakfast menu without omelets? Guess they think we want waffles and beer. Say it ain’t so.

Why did Cracker Barrel change its logo.? Taking out both the barrel and Uncle Herschel makes the new denuded logo look bare and just plain weird. Out goes the barrel and dare I say out goes the cracker too? Forty-three percent of Cracker Barrel’s customers are over 55 while only 22% are under 34. In contrast Applebee’s (my least favorite restaurant) 80% are under 55. But Cracker Barrel’s sales are flat and the demographics don’t look good with older customers dining out less and younger customers not quite buying into the country thing. Cracker Barrel’s stock has dropped by 70% over the past 5 years. It ousted the CEO and hired one from Taco Bell (another least favorite “restaurant”) to change its image and attract a younger clientele. So Uncle Herschel in his bibb overalls had to go (did you know that bibb overalls originated at Bibb Mills in Macon, Ga – near Gray?) and the interiors had to change from that cluttered country look to something more modern chic. Will it work? I doubt it The older clientele will be turned off and the younger ones won’t come. The younger folk like Starbucks (not exactly a restaurant), Chick-fil-A (not exactly a restaurant) and First Watch (must be the avocado toast). Well good luck morphing into something that you are not Cracker Barrel. But then the new nude logo says that you are no longer “Cracker Barrel”. Seriously how about Cracker-less Barrel-less?

I’ve got an idea: didn’t Hooters go bankrupt? How about a merger of Cracker Barrel and Hooters? Wouldn’t that lower the age of the average Cracker Barrel customer? We could put a Hooters girl in bibb overalls on the logo with a chicken wing instead of Uncle Herschel and the barrel. Cracker Barrel’s CEO came from Taco Bell and aren’t in some locations Taco Bell share a building with KFC? So why not Cracker Barrer and Hooters? Just saying.

Lastly, why do attractive women like Jasmine Crockett and Kristi Noem wear all that eye makeup and hair extenders?