Hospitality

The first train connecting China to Iran via the ancient Silk Road has arrived in the Iranian capital Tehran after traveling for 14 days in a journey of over 10,000 kilometers The train, which was launched in an effort to revive the ancient road, was carrying 32 containers of commercial products originating from China’s eastern province of Zhejiang, according to Iranian media Press TV reports: The trip from China to Iran has taken 14 days over 10,399 (about 6,500 miles), taking the cargo train through Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, Fars news agency reported.

Today’s Presidents’ Day edition of the Liberty Report returns to Ivan Eland’s excellent book Recarving Rushmore, where he ranks all the presidents according to whether their policies promoted peace, prosperity, and freedom. Who was best? Who was worst? What is a “great” president?

The other day several of us were bothered by the fact that the medieval Peterborough Cathedral in England now rents out its nave for social functions, most recently an insurance company dinner. It seemed vulgar and sacrilegious to us. Well, I just came across this passage from Universe of Stone by Philip Ball, a history of the 12th century Chartres cathedral. Here he’s speaking of medieval cathedrals in general:

Stunning ‘rainbow clouds’ have been spotted in the sky over Ireland and Scotland. These rainbow-coloured clouds, also known as mother-of-pearl or polar stratospheric clouds, are usually seen around the Arctic circle but can be created by severe winds and storms. Storm Henry led to the creation of the multi coloured nacreous clouds which were were spotted by people in a number of places, including Dublin and Belfast, Tayside and Fife. Polar Stratospheric clouds over Dublin Ireland! A very rare sight!

Coming to Japanese bank stocks soon...

European bank stocks are down almost 40% from the day Draghi unleashed NIRP in Europe. Today's plunge takes out recent lows, pushing prices back to almost "whatever it takes" lows.