Today we care about budgets more than anything. Our American future hangs on the ability of government to cut budget.

Coolidge and his treasury secretary Mellon loved new technology. Like JFK, C.C. divined that a new technology could lift the nation out of its doldrums; the only difference was that JFK's new technology was space travel, and Coolidge's travel by airplane.

Disillusionment can come as fast as a gust, but building faith that the government won't inflate again is like building a new sailboat, a project of years.

Anyone who experienced World War I close-hand was grossed out by it forever. It just was so awful.

Europe unified its monetary policy through the euro before it unified politically, therefore sustaining member countries' abilities to pursue the kind of independent fiscal policies that can strain a joint currency.

The difference between recession and depression is simple. Recession, goes the saying, is when you lose your job; depression is when I lose mine.

In the end, all new schools, public or private, snobby or not, add value to the education market, making it bigger and more efficient, in the same way that Zuckerberg added wealth to the economy even for non-Facebook fans.