Thursday, May 23, 2019

Book-sharing idea spread from Wisconsin to front yards and school yards around the world


A child cannot love, for it doesn't know what it means not to love.

Heavens induced anxiety, screaming into the heavens.

A Cabbalist who has no idea about Cabbala.

The life-long battle with one's whole life.

Sydney braces for water restrictions as dams drop

Cordeaux Dam is sitting on 40 per cent full, while the overall network of Sydney's dams is just below 54 per cent full.
The Berejiklian government will review planned water restrictions for Sydney with the possibility that curbs on use will be tougher than detailed in the city's Metropolitan Water Plan.
From Róbert Gál, On Wing

The New Kiddie Tax Needs a Better Fix Pt. 1


The Kiddie Tax Needs a Better Fix Pt. 2



Heather M. Field (UC-Hastings), Tax Lawyers as Tax Insurance, 60 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. ___ (2019):
Transactional tax lawyers, by rendering tax opinions, provide a version of insurance to clients. This insurance is clearly incomplete, but by providing a tax opinion, a lawyer conditionally agrees to indemnify the client for at least part of the potential loss the client incurs if the favorable tax treatment described in the opinion is successfully challenged. Although insurance is not the primary function of transactional tax lawyers, and although this Article does not argue that tax opinions should be regulated as insurance, indemnification — a key element of insurance — is an important part of the economic relationship between a client and a lawyer who provides a tax opinion. Surprisingly, this insurance-like function has been largely overlooked in the literature. Thus, by identifying and exploring the insurance-like aspect of the transactional tax lawyer’s role, this Article fills a gap in the literature and offers a new framework for understanding the value of tax lawyers.

Tom Wheeler, via the Brookings Institution
Today’s changes may be happening faster than ever before, but our ancestors were just as bewildered by rapid upheavals in what we now call “networks”.
 
Ex-cop sees 'red flags' after $908k goes 'missing' from family bank account - 9news.com.au

Washington Post – In 10 years, Little Free Libraries have made a big impact – “Want a book? Head to a rocket ship in Boulder, Colorado, a fairy-tale cottage near Ghent, Belgium, or a tree in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. These are just three of the more than 80,000 Little Free Libraries in more than 90 countries. Unlike traditional libraries, these typically small structures aren’t buildings where people check out books from a librarian. “A Little Free Library is a box full of books that, when you find one, you can take a book home with you,” explains Margret Aldrich, Little Free Library spokeswoman. “Or if you have a book to share, you can leave it for someone else to read.” Little Free Libraries are everywhere: outside homes, inside recreational centers, beside coffee shops. The first was set on a post in front of Todd Bol’s home in Hudson, Wisconsin, 10 years ago. The miniature schoolhouse Bol built held free books anyone could enjoy


Bound To Win’: Jill Lepore On The Evolution Of The Presidential-Candidate Memoir


“Before the nineteen-sixties, the books Presidential candidates wrote weren’t usually memoirs; they were collections of speeches.” Now? “Sometimes Presidential candidates write books about their vision for the country; sometimes they write books about themselves. And then, sometimes, their vision for America is a vision of themselves.” – The New Yorker