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Weather: Areas of fog in the morning. Sunny. Highs in the lower 80s. Northwest winds around 5 mph. Wednesday Night: Mostly clear. Patchy fog after midnight. Lows in the mid 50s. Southeast winds around 5 mph in the evening, becoming light and variable.
- Daily weather briefing from the National Weather Service in Jacksonville here.
- Drought conditions here. (What is the Keetch-Byram drought index?).
- Check today’s tides in Daytona Beach (a few minutes off from Flagler Beach) here.
- Tropical cyclone activity here, and even more details here.
Today at a Glance:
In Court: Leigha Mumby is in court for a 1:30 p.m. pre-trial before Circuit Judge Dawn Nichols. Mumby faces two second-degree felonies and one third-degree felony, including a charge of vehicular homicide, in the car-crash death of Daniel Waterman on I-95 in Palm Coast on Feb. 9, 2025. See: “Leigha Mumby, 24, Now Faces Vehicular Homicide Charge in Crash Death of Boyfriend Daniel Waterman,” and “Critical After February Crash, Daniel Waterman, 22, Died on Oct. 8. His Pregnant Girlfriend Is Accused of Causing the Crash.”
The Flagler County Contractor Review Board meets at 5 p.m. at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell. Staff liaison is Bo Snowden, Chief Building Official, who may be reached at (386) 313-4027. For agendas and details go here.
Flagler County’s Technical Review Committee Meeting at 9 a.m., first floor Conference Room, at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell. The Technical Review Committee (TRC) is a quality control committee that provides technical review of project plans. Staff Liaison is Simone Kenny, 386-313-4067.
The Palm Coast Planning and Land Development Board meets at 5:30 p.m. at City Hall.
The Flagler County Industrial Development Authority meets at 2 p.m. at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell.
Scale & Thrive 2026: Growth Strategies for Local Business Owners, 1 to 4 p.m. at the 31 Supper Club, 31 W. Granada Blvd., Ormond Beach. Hosted by Stephanie Hines, the event will combine city leadership insights with practical marketing strategies and AI tools designed to help small businesses capture opportunities in the growing local market. Ormond Beach Mayor Jason Leslie and Economic Director Brian Rademacher will speak. Register at the Eventbrite registration link.
The Circle of Light Course in Miracles study group meets at a private residence in Palm Coast every Wednesday at 1:20 PM. There is a $2 love donation that goes to the store for the use of their room. If you have your own book, please bring it. All students of the Course are welcome. There is also an introductory group at 1:00 PM. The group is facilitated by Aynne McAvoy, who can be reached at [email protected] for location and information.
Storytime: Jean Stafford’s “The Echo and the Nemesis” is about the tepid, transactional friendship between two 21-year-old American university students in Heidelberg. It is also about morbid obesity’s entombment of a young human being. Sue Ledbetter is the echo, the meeker, poorer, less worldly opportunist of the two who hangs around Ramona Dunn in hopes of meeting her brother. “She was often bored by Ramona’s talk.” But she has manners. Ramona is from a super-wealthy family. She appears super-arrogant, calling everyone Philistines and hanging out with Sue because “I need a rest from the exercitation of my intellect.” She studies philology, the study of languages. She is “fat to the point of parody. Her obesity fitted her badly, like extra clothing put on in the wintertime.” She could spend all she wanted. “She was the sort of person who seemed, at twenty-one, to have fought all her battles and survived to enjoy the quiet of her unendangered ivory tower. She did not seem to mind at all that she was so absurd to look at, and Sue, who was afire with ambitions and sick with conflict, admired her arrogant self-possession.” While they’re having coffee and a chat as they did every morning, served by a “mean-mouthed waiter,” Bach’s Minuet in G plays on the radio. Stafford does not specify whose minuet. She was writing for an audience presumed to know, having herself some of the Ramona in her: if you had to ask, you were a philistine. The New Yorker published the story in the December 16, 1950 issue, back when The New Yorker didn’t even bother telling you what stories by what authors appeared in the issue. The table of contents was always a cursory brief of about five or six lines highlighting the main articles. It made you hunt through the magazine’s 166 pages of advertising, half of it for booze (it was Christmas). The 1950 publication is notable. I don’t know if The New Yorker would publish a story with that theme, or at least with such lines as “from the envelope of fat emerged a personality spirituelle” or “changed from a swan into an ugly duckling,” in our wokier flapping ‘20s. The lines might go, the theme would not, especially with more contemporary–and at the time, avant-garde–lines such as “Please let me tell you what it is that makes me the unhappiest girl in the world,” and “I would not any longer offend that long-suffering family of mine with the sight of me.” Or the way Ramona “ground out a cigarette on one of her downy wrists” in self-loathing atonement for having eaten 12 cherry tarts in a single sitting, breaking her deal with Sue. For they had made that deal after hearing the Minuet, which sent Ramona on a melancholy binge and reminded her of her twin sister, the more beautiful Martha, who died of a terrible illness. Ramona asks Sue to be her food monitor, and promises to bring her along on vacation to Switzerland to meet the family and her brothers, and a prospective catch for Sue. Of course both promises are broken especially after Sue discovers that Martha was none other than Ramona in her younger days, as beautiful as could be, the death of that Ramona having been subsumed under her middle name of Martha, as her former twin. “In a sense,” Sue supposed, “the Martha side of Ramona Dunn was dead, dead and buried under layers and layers of fat.” Again, the sort of line that would probably not survive a contemporary editor’s pen, though for the same reasons that I am uncomfortable with the sanitizing of history in textbooks, in public parks or on street signs, I’d be uncomfortable with that sort of censoring in the name of sensitivity today. But would it be? Republishing the Stafford story–the Library of America published her complete stories in 2021, and Farrar Straus Giroux published the collected stories in 2017–with the sort of sanitary cuts applied to Mark Twain and Faulkner books for coddled students would be a problem. But no one is doing that. I just read that story in its original form, in the LOA edition. There is a difference between removing a Confederate monument of long date and installing one today. A new installation today would be pure revanchism. We’re seeing it. But an editor getting a story written in 2025 about a fat person and choosing to rephrase certain lines would simply be part of the editing process that has taken place since the Cave paintings of Lascaux. We write to our day’s sensibilities, unless there is a certain intention to buck those sensibilities, as Tony Tulathimutte does in Rejection, his 2024 collection of short stories written at least in good part to shock us out of these sensibilities and show us how the other half lives–incels, fat people, morbidly inclined fetishists. I’m a long way from Jean Stafford now. But “The Echo and the Nemesis” to me seems as much about the ache at the heart of the story as it is about the timing of its publication at a midcentury mark in a nation so clearly self-satisfied with itself, and so clearly delusional: the fat back then were part of that mass of minorities the country’s established philistines bypassed, at least until the Civil Rights movement was building, and who now form its majority. At this rate, the obese who are “only” 42 percent, will become the majority as well by the time the country is no longer a majority-white nation, sometime in the next couple of decades. As the friendship between Sue and Ramona ends, now that Sue has nothing left to get from Ramona, and Ramona nothing left to need from Sue, the meek Sue attempts an “I’m sorry.” Ramona’s response: “I’m not sorry. It is for yourself that you should be sorry. You have such a trivial little life, poor girl. It’s not your fault. Most people do.” You know she’s not wrong.
—P.T.
The Live Calendar is a compendium of local and regional political, civic and cultural events. You can input your own calendar events directly onto the site as you wish them to appear (pending approval of course). To include your event in the Live Calendar, please fill out this form.
December 2025
Holiday Plant Class Series
Flagler Beach United Methodist Church Food Pantry
Weekly Chess Club for Teens, Ages 10-18, at the Flagler County Public Library
Flagler Beach Library Writers’ Club
Flagler Beach Planning and Architectural Review Board
Palm Coast City Council Meeting
Bunnell Planning, Zoning and Appeals Board
Rotary’s Fantasy Lights Festival in Palm Coast’s Town Center
Flagler Beach United Methodist Church Food Pantry Evening Hours
Random Acts of Insanity Standup Comedy
In Court: Ex-Firefighter James Melady Docket Sounding
In Court: Kristopher Henriqson
Palm Coast Code Enforcement Board Meeting
Separation Chat: Open Discussion
Flagler Beach Library Book Club
For the full calendar, go here.
“If she ever got fat, she thought, or if she ever said anything fat, she would lock herself in a bathroom and stay there until she died,” thinks the young protagonist Molly Fawcett. “Often she thought how comfortably you could live in a bathroom. You could put a piece of beaver board on top of the tub and use it as a bed. In the daytime, you could have a cretonne spread on it so that it would look like a divan. You could use the you-know-what as a chair and the lavatory as a table. You wouldn’t have to have anything else but some canned corn and marshmallows. . . .”
–From Jean Stafford’s Boston Adventure (1944).
Laurel says
Okay, y’all have to get it now. This man is *selling* our best, stealth fighter jets to the Saudis. He’s*selling* to them our most advanced chips. This could be given, or sold, to the Chinese, or any of our enemies, and we could do nothing more about it. Any, or all of itt could be used against us! He is making business deals, oh, not for himself, but for his family, with the Saudis. He made excuses for the Saudi prince, who had an American reporter murdered and dismembered.
He told a reporter to “Be quiet, piggy” when she asked about the Epstein files. He is threatening to pull the license of ABC network because they asked about the Epstein files.
The list of lies, law breaking, threats, name calling and offences is nearly unlimited. In my opinion, the man is flat out evil. Even Epstein, a child sex trafficker, has written as much!
Trump, and his lying cabinet, hiding behind crosses, should be escorted right out of Washington DC right now! And those of you who insist on covering for them, and making excuses for them, are complicit. You are dancing with the devil. Make no mistake, or no further mistakes in your decision making. You still have a choice.
You let Fox Entertainment know you will no longer stand for it, and watch them turn on their heels, because they will.
He is not your retribution, you are his.
Ed P says
Multiple foreign nations already fly F35s and many more have ordered.
Laurel says
“F-35 Stealth and Secrecy
Overview of Secrecy
The F-35 Lightning II is considered one of the most advanced and secretive fighter jets in the world. Its design incorporates cutting-edge technology that enhances its stealth capabilities, making it difficult for adversaries to detect.
Key Aspects of Secrecy
Restricted Technology: The F-35 features advanced systems that are closely guarded. The U.S. only shares this technology with select allies that meet strict criteria.
Operational Limitations: The U.S. prohibits the deployment of F-35s in regions where Russian S-400 air defense systems are present, reflecting concerns about the aircraft’s security.
NATO Access: NATO allies are gradually gaining access to sensitive information about the F-35, which helps them integrate the aircraft with their own military operations.
Importance of Secrecy
The secrecy surrounding the F-35 is crucial for maintaining its operational effectiveness and ensuring that adversaries cannot easily counter its capabilities. This level of confidentiality is a standard practice for advanced military technology, particularly in the realm of stealth aircraft.”
– AI Assist, India.Com News, Wikipedia
So, the Saudis, who murdered and dismembered an American journalist, is our close, trusted ally. About that murder, Trump said “Things happen.”
Another “ally” of ours, Russia’s leader Putin, gets the red carpet, while Ukraine’s democratic leader, Zolenskyy gets f**ked over.
Sure, I trust Trump to look out for our best interests.
Dennis C Rathsam says
Biden was smart. { cant believe I said that but} he wanted no part of Epstien. He looked the other way, as Epstiens poured money into the democratic party. Fools gold! Now the GOP has solid proof of Epstiens money trail. Even Hakeem Jefferies, took him out to dinner, to get a contribution to his campaign. Now the horse is out of the barn! 17 times Bill Clinton was there, along with his buddies Summers & Gates…. { Now you know why, Ms FRENCH, threw him out of their house} As Bondi & Patel round up Democrat after Democrat, for thier roll in Russia colloostion. They now have papers & Epstiens guess list, with more dirty donkeys on it! Looks like Bidens not the only pervert in the Democratc party.
Pogo says
@Epilogue
https://www.google.com/search?q=all+in+the+family+sound+of+flushing
Ray W. says
Thank you, Pogo.
Pogo says
Likewise, sir.
Laurel says
Thank you, Pogo! I so miss Obama. That period of time did feel like hope, and that ad feels like love. Today, politics feel like hate, lies and corruption, and the Christian cross has been turned upside down. It’s baffling to me, that some people prefer that. Some folks feel so lost, that they will protect the worst President we’ve had yet, just to feel like they have some sort of control, which they don’t.
We do need change, we do need to listen to the American public, but it should not feel like we are conquering our neighbors, friends and family members. That’s the wrong direction, and that’s where Trump is trying to lead us, while gaining personal wealth, and acceptance from the wealthiest of society. He doesn’t understand that old money will never accept him, but will use him as he uses us. All the gold filigreed foolishness in the world will never showcase a person of substance.
Ray W. says
Yesterday, a West Texas District panel of three federal judges ruled the Texas mid-decade gerrymandering effort illegal. The state’s 2021 redistricting map, drawn in accord with Constitutional commands, was reinstated. Those five hoped-for new Republican House seats are gone, at least for now, pending appeal.
The ruling applies only to the Texas gerrymander, so California’s redistricting effort, prompted by the Texas effort, stands, also pending court challenge.
A Washington state U.S. House Republican member, Dan Newhouse, told Politico:
“I was never in favor of doing all this redistricting stuff anyway. … Should not have opened that box.”
A California-based Republican strategist, in the reporter’s analysis, described the Texas gerrymandering effort a “possible debacle”, should the USSC uphold the Texas court ruling, adding, “[t]his will have been a ready, shoot, aim exercise by Trump.”
Make of this what you will.
Me?
We are a long way from finality on this redistricting issue.
I remain cognizant of the economic theory of “externalities.” No one person can ever contemplate, much less prepare for, every possible event that is external to the original plan. There exists in the philosophy of science a maxim holding that the human mind can create more hypotheses that can ever be tested, so be careful in what you hypothesize.
Can it be argued that had President Trump never called on Texas Republican politicians to perform a mid-decade redrawing of federal House district maps, then California Democrats might never have called for a mid-decade redrawing of their own state’s federal House district maps?
There remains the possibility that Texas will not provide an opportunity for any new Republican House members and that California might add five new Democratic House members.
Externality, indeed.
I am reminded of a passage describing the role of externalities confronting Winston Churchill in the first months of his premiership, as described in Volume VI of Martin Gilbert’s family-authorized biography of Churchill.
In the chapter titled “The Glow of Mount Sinai”, Gilbert wrote of the impossibility of anyone, no matter how well prepared, to predict the future. In that moment, Gilbert emphasized, the threat of German invasion of Great Britain loomed:
“Churchill had now been Prime Minister for more than two and a half months. No one could predict, nor could even the most secret Intelligence foretell, the pattern of events to come. But a system of work and response had emerged whereby Churchill was able to maintain a vigilant watch over the essentials of war direction. In this watch, the efforts of Churchill’s Defense Office were indefatigable and essential. On July 28 Colonel Jacob, upon whom much of the organization of the work had fallen, sent Churchill charts of the tides and moon for August. It was these charts, prepared by Captain Morgan at the Admiralty, which had already shown the most likely points of a German invasion during July. The August dates were now on Churchill’s desk: the south and west coasts of Ireland being at their most vulnerable for invasion on August 2, Berwick to Flamborough Head on August 4, Harwich to Dover on August 8, Dover to the Isle of Wight on August 10, and Cromer to Harwich on August 12. For the third week of August, the danger dates were August 14 from Flamborough Head to Cromer, August 15 from Portland to Start Point, and August 16 from Start Point to Newqway.
“With these dates and vulnerable points in front of him, Churchill studied the growing number of decrypted German signals received from Bletchley. These signals provided information which, while seldom decisive at this stage, did enable those at the cenre of policy making to form a much clearer view of German intentions than would have been possible without them. Thus, on July 29, Churchill learned that the German Air Force had been ‘reminded of the order to avoid at all costs’ the attacking of quays in harbours along the south coast. This implied, as interpreted by Military Intelligence, ‘that the Germans intended to use certain of these quays in the invasion of this country’, Which quays were involved might also be found out: as it was clear from this order that a previous order had not been complied with, the German section of Military Intelligence was making enquiries ‘with regard to which port or ports on the coast have been bombed recently.'”
The author went on to describe how so very few outside of a small government circle actually knew what was going on:
“The information acquired through Enigma, and sent to Churchill each day and every day, gave him knowledge which was shared by only a small number of those involved in policy making. Those not in the secret often had no inkling whatsoever of the reasons behind a decision. Almost daily, decisions, instructions and enquiries which seemed at the time irrational or absurd, derived from the knowledge obtained from Enigma. Yet often Enigma decrypts did not lead to action, the knowledge gained from them being too fragmentary. Meanwhile, decisions had to be made under pressure of continuing air attacks, and with British production of essential munitions still incomplete. These decisions, and the reasons leading up to them, could not always be based on the Intelligence needed to be certain that all relevant factors were understood. Again and again, time was the enemy of an ideal response; a close second in enmity was the lack of resources.”
To me, these three Gilbert paragraphs encapsulate much of today’s hazardous Ukrainian position.
Outmanned and outgunned, the comparatively tiny Ukrainian military initially recoiled upon invasion and then stiffened. Shortly after the unprovoked invasion, Russian boots, as Putin once described the measure of Russian sovereignty, controlled as much as 26% of Ukrainian soil.
The Ukrainians then drove the Russians out from vast swathes of their countryside.
After a few months, Russian holdings dropped from 26% to 16% of the Ukraine, the latter figure being up slightly from the 14% previously gained during the 2014 invasion. Now, the extent of Russian holdings straddles 18%.
February 2026 will be the fourth anniversary of the Russian slaughter. Many military analyses hold that at the rate of conquer and destruction accomplished by Russian forces over the past nearly four years it will take Russia more than a century to complete its initial goal, which was complete sovereignty over all the soil of the Ukraine.
This resistance by the Ukrainians was a miracle of leadership, courage, and application of scant resources driven by Intelligence, both American and Western, plus their own intelligence sources. Continuous innovation continues to play its part. Husbanding of munitions and manpower and the response of Ukrainian heavy industry cannot be overestimated.
The once-vaunted Russian land army has been shown a “paper tiger.” Russian ground forces, once attacking while escorted by tanks and APCs, no longer have the tanks and APCs with which to attack. Now, soldiers often advance unescorted on foot, or on electric bicycles, or on cheap Chinese motorcycles, or in commandeered civilian cars. Mules play an increasing role in bringing food and ammunition to the front.
Who among us all could see this coming?
Upon invasion, western leaders, including President Biden, offered help in moving the Ukrainian government into exile, thinking it militarily beyond the Ukrainian Army’s capacity to stop the might descending on it. Zelenskyy replied that he didn’t need evacuation; he needed ammunition.
Only time has proven him correct.
Pogo says
@Hello Ray
Putin was, and is, dragging out the war — waiting for, and encouraged by, Trump. The entire world is my witness.
Ed P says
There was a scathing dissent. 2-1 decision. Judge Jerry Smith rejected the majority ruling on Texas’s redistricting. “Judicial Activism “ driven by partisan politics.
If the Texas appeals fail, what do you think the chances that California’s newest redistricting plan where they converted 5 existing Republican held seats into Democratic leaning districts will be scrapped? It’s rhetorical.
Ray W. says
Haaretz, an Israeli news outlet, reports that two Jewish youths left the Israeli quarter of Jerusalem to enter the Armenian Christian quarter. Video-cameras captured their movements.
An Armenian Christian man born to the Christian quarter, Georgie Awad, became the target of the Jewish youths. Mr. Awad told investigators that as he walked toward his wife to help her park their car, the Jewish pair began pounding on it and threatening his wife.
Mr. Awad told the reporter:
“I went to see if my wife was okay; I didn’t lay a hand on anyone. .. Someone struck me in the head and another choked me. … I’ve lived here my whole life and never had a problem with anyone.”
Video reviewed by the reporter shows Mr. Awad opening one of the car’s doors before he was shoved down and beaten by the youths. When his wife exits the car, one of the youths pushes her. Armenian Christian passersby rescued the husband and wife.
Police responding to the scene seized the two youths before they could return to the Jewish quarter.
According to an entity called “Hotline”, described in the story as a project devoted to documenting harassment of Christians who live in the Armenian quarter, thus far in 2025, there have been 144 recorded events of harassment, mainly spitting and verbal assaulting. Physical attacks have been rare, but they do exist.
In a separate story, Haaretz reported that a sentence of nine months of community-service originally imposed on Imri Hoffman for his striking an Arab resident on the head with a stick, was raised to two years in prison after the appellate court decided that the original court had failed to take into account the “racist motive behind the attack.”
The appellate court wrote:
“[E]verything was done solely because of the victim’s ethnic affiliation. Under such circumstances, a community-service sentence cannot stand.”
Make of this what you will.
Ray W. says
Riverside, California police recently arrested an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent on charges of assault with a deadly weapon, child endangerment, and assault by a public officer arising from his stop, allegedly for speeding, of a 17-year-old American citizen who lives on the same street on which the ICE agent lives.
A local TV news outlet, KTLA 5 obtained “footage” of the incident, in which video the agent is shown advancing on an SUV while brandishing his sidearm:
“Freeze, police”, that agent can be heard saying. “Put the car in f—ing park. Get out of the car. Turn it off, get out. You’re speeding in the f—ing neighborhood. Come over here, sit down, get your a– down. You have a driver’s license?”
The juvenile complied with the agent’s commands and was released to his parents.
Make of this what you will.
Ray W. says
As foundation for this comment, the Federal Open Market Committee has 12 members. Seven of the twelve are Fed governors. One of the remaining five is the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Of the 11 other regional Fed presidents, four serve one year terms in a rotation of Fed presidents.
All 19 governors and presidents meet eight times each year to discuss whether to cut, raise or keep the same the Fed’s lending rate. While all nineteen can speak, only the 12 listed above possess voting privileges. A majority of the 12 determines the outcome.
As an example, at last month’s meeting, one of the 12 voting members opted to keep the lending rate unchanged. 10 of the 12 voting members opted to cut the lending rate by 25 basis points, or .25%. One of the 12 opted for a 50 basis point cut, or 0.5%.
I am commenting about this because changing any one member of the 12 voting FOMC members would not have effected any change in last month’s decision. Six changed votes in one direction would have been needed to change the vote’s outcome.
Yesterday, according to an Alternet article, President Trump issued a profanity-laced attack on Fed Chair Powell during a podium announcement at the U.S.–Saudi Investment Forum:
“He’s [Powell] got some real mental problems. … He’s — something wrong with him. … I’d be honest, I’d love to fire his a–. He should be fired. Guy’s grossly incompetent. … And he should be sued for spending $4 billion to build a little building. I’m building a ballroom that’s gonna cost a tiny fraction of that, and it’s bigger than the whole thing put together. … You [Scott Bessent] gotta work at him, Scott. … The only thing Scott’s blowing it on is the Fed. Because the Fed, the rates are too high, Scott. And if you don’t get it fixed fast, I’m gonna fire your a–, okay?
The Wall Street Journal offered its own take on the issue of cutting lending rates.
On Monday, Fed Vice Chair Philip Jefferson spoke at a Kansas City Fed gathering.
“The evolving balance of risks [between stubborn inflation and weaker employment conditions] underscores the need to proceed slowly”, he said, re: rate cut discussions, which the Journal reporter characterized as potentially “unusually contentious.”
An Axios story focused on a “murky” Fed policy outlook due to a lack of official data.
As the Axios reporter put it, Boston Fed president Susan Collins said today that there are “several reasons to have a relatively high bar for additional easing in the near term.”
Reuters, too, offered its own take on the upcoming Fed meeting.
Per the reporter, Cleveland Federal Reserve President Beth Hammack said during an appearance before the Pittsburgh Economic Club:
“This is a difficult time for monetary policy. … But when I look at both of those things [inflation and job mandates], on balance, I think we need to remain somewhat restrictive to continue putting pressure to bring inflation down towards our target. … It seems to me likely that to maintain a restrictive stance of policy, we need to keep rates around these levels. … [W]hen I look at the overall performance of the economy, it’s not obvious that monetary policy should be doing more right now.”
Make of this what you will.
Me?
I see three cautious positions taken by three different senior Fed members, plus one reckless position taken by our president.
It’s been more than a year since the Fed voted to lower the lending rate by 50 basis points, or 0.5%. At that time of that first rate cut, the year-over-year inflation rate had dropped to 2.3%. At each of the next two FOMC meeting, cuts of 25 basis points, or 0.25%, were approved.
Immediately after the three 2024 lending rate cuts, as many economists expected, later in 2024, year-over-year inflation began to rise. The Fed held off cutting rates again for about a year. During that time, year-over-year inflation retreated back to year-over-year 2.3% inflation. But in April 2025, year-over-year inflation began to rise again. Over the three months of May, June and July, inflation rose an average of 3.62% per month. Between August and September, inflation rose 0.31%, for an annualized rate of 3.79%. There is no official inflation data for October. Company executives told the Cleveland Fed that they expect 3.3% inflation over the next 12 months.
Despite these numbers, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, both on Sunday and Tuesday, suggested vaguely that inflation was coming down, or that it would soon begin curving down, or that it would start coming down in the first and second quarters of next year. He repeated the mantra that President Trump had inherited “terrible” inflation from the Biden administration.
President Trump, in his own way, said this past Saturday that, “prices are coming down very substantially on groceries and things,” and that “they’re already at a much lower level than they were with the last administration.
Does bluster and threat and vague commentary constitute a viable lending rate policy? Would removal of Fed Chair Powell change the balanced position taken by the FOMC at the October Fed meeting, or would a greater change in FOMC membership be needed to change perspectives?