The Week has a little section called "Boring but Important." Golden showers? That shit'll pop up every week from now until the end of time. Pakistan's currency exchange vehicle? Good luck. The United States still has the world's largest economy, the world's largest refining capacity, and is the world's largest agricultural exporter. We're not going to become Portugal. For better or for worse, though, the position we enjoy is a position we have to maintain. We missed a lot of maintenance in 2017. 2018 doesn't look much better.
I think I'll put "Boring but Important" in my news rotation. One of my PBS stations recently changed their format and late at night, they're nothing but news. They have, in no particular order, BBC, DW, and NHK news programming as well as other random stuff like Nightly Business Report and it's all so much of a breath of fresh air. They literally make NPR's morning news sound sensationalist. Last night, because literally nothing else was on, I watched ABC's World News Tonight and it was awful. It was five minutes worth of commercials with two to three minute breaks of inane crap with splash graphics. At least, that's what it felt like. I'm gonna watch it again tonight to actually get a commercial to news ratio. I'm betting my estimate is not too far off. I don't know what 2018 is gonna bring for any of us. I'm gonna hope for the best and just in case, do what I can to batten down the hatches on the home front.