The Marche, in Italy (Photo by Rod Dreher)
Many years ago, when I was in college, or maybe had just graduated, I was reading the latest issue of Vanity Fair on a flight to Europe, and read Bill Buckley’s answers to the Proust Questionnaire, a fun feature the magazine used to run (does it still? I haven’t read VF since Dominick Dunne died). Bill was asked, “What is your favorite journey?” And he answered: “Home.”
Whether or not Donald Trump ultimately succeeds in winning the White House, historians are likely to rank him as the most consequential presidential candidate of at least the past half-century. He has already transformed the tone and temper of American political life. If he becomes the Republican nominee, he will demolish its structural underpinnings as well. Should he prevail in November, his election will alter its very fabric in ways likely to prove irreversible.
In 1990, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher exclaimed her opposition the common currency and European integration very simply: "No! No! No!" Perhaps it is time to revisit her thoughts as Britain considers leaving The EU.
Don’t look now, but Barclays just joined the chorus of European banks reporting horrific results.
Shares plunged by double-digits on Tuesday after the bank said it swung to a £1.9 billion pre-tax loss in Q4 and moved to cut the dividend and shed its African subsidiary.
With markets happy to put February in the history books because it marked the fourth consecutive monthly decline in global stocks, we move on to March 1st, which doubles down as 'Super Tuesday' in the US when Trump's presidential candidacy will almost certainly be sealed and a day in which stocks decided to join the super fun by super surging overnight on nothing but bad global macro and economic which however was promptly ignored and instead the focus was on ongoing central bank intervention and even more jawboning.