For Everyone, Not Just Investors

Over the years I've subscribed to not less than a dozen different weeklies and/or monthlies, but over time have gradually whittled back to just one: The Wall Street Journal. There is one exception: I still get the weekly BloombergBusinessweek but somehow that is an "error." I tried canceling but was told I still owed $8.95 on an introductory offer a year or so ago, so I paid it, although I didn't think I owed it, and then I never got another issue for several weeks. I wrote them and now it is arriving regularly. I have no idea how long the subscription will last. But I digress.

I can't remember why I first subscribed to The Wall Street Journal. I first subscribed in 1984, when we were living on Spruce Street, Grand Forks Air Force Base, North Dakota. My earliest recollection is reading it simply to find the P/Es, closing prices, and yields of stocks, pretty much on the NYSE. I was surprised how good the writing was in general, and like those folks who subscribe to Playboy for the articles, I stayed with The Wall Street Journal for the non-business news and the excellent writing.

Occasionally I enjoy the op-eds, but as I get older, I find that even op-eds in The WSJ no longer interest me all that much.

So, I really shouldn't have to post the disclaimer (Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment decisions based on what you read here or what you think you may have read here.) but some folks may think there is a hidden agenda to my posting these links, so I post the disclaimer. But there is no hidden agenda.

Smart move: the GOP moves away from its own health plan. Not even worth reading. The headline says it all.

Environmental concerns remain, but California is pressing on with massive $25 billion project to bypass and restore "the Delta." I guess if one can slice and dice the national emblem, the endangered smelt "and other fish" don't stand much of a chance.

A contentious project to divert water supplied to Southern California past an ecologically sensitive river delta moved a step closer to fruition Monday, as state and federal officials unveiled a draft final environmental analysis. 

 Under the $25 billion plan, which is backed by Gov. Jerry Brown, two 30-mile-long tunnels would bypass the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in Northern California. The area often serves as a choke point for water destined for more than 20 million people and farmland in semiarid parts of Southern California and the Central Valley because of pumping restrictions to protect endangered smelt and other fish.

This may be the most interesting business story to follow right now: where Boeing decides to build the 777X. One has to read the article to see how big these incentives have gotten:

Washington's legislature last month approved sweeteners valued at $8.7 billion over 16 years—which experts say is the largest corporate-incentive package in U.S. history—in an effort to keep the jobs in what has been Boeing's primary manufacturing base for commercial jets. But Boeing then began looking elsewhere after its largest union rejected an eight-year contract deal that would have made significant changes to employees' wage structure and retirement and health-care benefits.