What We Read Today 26 June 2014

Econintersect: Every day our editors collect the most interesting things they find from around the internet and present a summary “reading list” which will include very brief summaries of why each item has gotten our attention. Suggestions from readers for “reading list” items are gratefully reviewed, although sometimes space limits the number included.

• Aereo Loses In Supreme Court, Deemed Illegal (Jordan Crook, Tech Crunch) Aero had been selling equipment allowing users to receive online broadcast materials and to record them in the company’s online DVR for later playback. The SCOTUS ruled 6-3 that an antenna on the internet was not the same as an antenna receiving broadcasts made through the air. See GEI News for more background.

• Records show how Iraqi extremists withstood U.S. anti-terror efforts (Hannah Allam, McClatchy Washington Bureau) Hat tips to Roger Erickson and Chick Spinney. ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) developed from a mostly self-funded corporate-style operation which was in place and growing before the U.S. left Syria in 2011. Before the current leader, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, took charge in 2010 the organization already had control of some of Iraq’s oil wealth through retail operations, smuggling and extortion from industry contractors. All this happened at a time when “U.S. officials believed, incorrectly, that the group had been vanquished“. Can we add a new term to the oxymoron lexicon? U.S. intelligence?

• Maybe We Really Will Revert To A Planet Of The Apes, Populated By Fiat Deficit Rangers Keeping A Lid On Human Fiat (Roger Erickson, Mike Normal Economics) Roger Erickson contributes to GEI. David Walker (Peter G. Petersen Foundation) is tweeting about lack of spending for maintenance and improvements on the crowded interstate highway he travels in Connecticut while spending all his efforts on reducing government spending. Roger marvels at the contradiction.

• Roosevelt-era bank faces Tea Party assault (Barney Jopson, Financial Times) The Tea Party wants to shut down the U.S. Export-Import Bank, a government agency set up in 1934 to arrange financing for U.S. exports. The agency has its charter up for renewal. Opponents claim that it is a misuse of taxpayers’ money to make loans to foreign corporations who are buying exports from the U.S.. Supporters claim that nations with exports competing with U.S. companies have similar or more extensive government support and to abandon the U.S. agency would put those U.S. company exports at a disadvantage in the global marketplace. Supporters also say out that the ExIm bank doesn’t cost the government anything and returns a profit to the treasury. Opponents say the function would be better served by “market forces” while supporters say that the market would not engage in the low margin operations carried out by the government and U.S. exporters would be under-served.

Today there are 16 articles discussed ‘behind the wall’.

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