URLs du Jour

2022-02-10

  • <voice imitation="professor_farnsworth">Good news, everyone!</voice>

    Well, another streaming service subscription to add to the pile… More information here: 'Futurama' Revived By Hulu


  • Or they can just tell you what they think you want to hear. Kevin D. Williamson wasn't expecting honesty, and he didn't get it: Democrats Can Have Cheap Gas or They Can Have Radical Climate Policy

    Senators Mark Kelly (D., Ariz.) and Maggie Hassan (D., N.H.) are proposing to suspend the federal gasoline tax for the rest of 2022. This profile in cowardice comes from two Democrats whose party is facing a possible midterm wipeout thanks to high inflation that has been made worse by its spendthrift policies.

    This tax cut is, of course, precisely the wrong idea — particularly from the Democratic point of view.

    Treating inflation with a tax cut is like treating high blood pressure with meth. The problem we have comes from too much money sloshing around the economy chasing too few goods and services as supply chains struggle to reassemble themselves. The conventional Keynesian view, to which Democrats ordinarily swear allegiance, is that you should raise taxes when you have an inflation problem, taking money out of consumers’ pockets, and thereby putting some deflationary pressure on economic activity.

    It's an NRPlus article, so unless you're in that blessed state of subscription (and you should be) you probably won't want to Read The Whole Thing. I'll toss in another KDW dig at Maggie:

    “To combat climate change,” Senator Hassan insists, “we must build a cleaner energy future.” Fair enough. But then there’s the silent addendum: “as long as nobody in my state has to pay a nickel for it.”


  • Reply hazy, try again. Nobody at Reason expects to get the whole truth from politicians, so Jacob Sullum's headline is unsurprising: Partisan Politics Cloud the Capitol Riot’s Significance.

    You may have heard that the Republican National Committee (RNC) described last year's Capitol riot as "legitimate political discourse." Although that is what The New York Times and other news outlets reported last week, it is not actually true.

    It is true, however, that the RNC, which used that phrase when it censured Reps. Liz Cheney (R‒Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R‒Ill.) for participating in the House committee investigating the events of January 6, 2021, did not explain what it meant until after its misbegotten resolution generated a predictable storm of criticism. The episode illustrates why neither Republicans nor Democrats can be trusted to give an honest account of what happened that day or what it signified.

    RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel pointed out (somewhat correctly) that the January 6 committee has actually started investigating "circumstances"; those circumstances include engaging in perfectly legal activity protected under the Constitution.


  • Just say "nope" to Snopes. David Harsanyi has a bone to pick with a ‘Fact-Checker’ on Crack.

    The Biden administration is funding the distribution of “safe smoking kits” — colloquially known as “crack pipes” — to help reduce substance abuse. Perhaps this is a helpful program, though maybe not. I couldn’t say. What I do know is that increasingly people are having a difficult time distinguishing between “things that are untrue” and “things conservatives say that annoy me.”

    Example: “Did Biden Admin ‘Fund Crack Pipes’ To ‘Advance Racial Equity’?” asks a fact-checker at Snopes. The verdict? “Mostly False.”

    Except, as David points out, it's literally true.

    Or was. Snopes has since changed its rating to "Outdated", based on the Biden Administration's backtracking.

    At Snopes, "Outdated", apparently means "You know the thing we said they weren't doing? Well, they've stopped doing it"

    Also see: Ann Althouse for additional comments.


  • First, good news about "Futurama". And now this! Scott Lincicome thinks This ‘Libertarian Moment’ Could Be More Lasting.

    A common jibe in the pandemic’s early days was that it had eradicated all the libertarians. This “no libertarians in a pandemic” dunk was misguided even back then (see my March 2020 rebuttal for why), but it did have a bit of a point: 2020 saw not only multiple spurts of unprecedented, emergency state action, but also a significant increase in Americans looking to the government for help. At the same time, there were signs of supposed “market failures”—empty store shelves, overcrowded hospitals, etc.—everywhere. Given that expansions of government power often remain long after their impetus has disappeared—a classic “ratchet effect”—it wasn’t so hard to believe that the COVID-19 crisis would usher in a new American era of big, activist government.

    But a funny thing happened on our way to democratic socialism: America pushed back. Across the country, in all sorts of ways, Americans reacted to the state’s activism, overreach, incoherence, and incompetence and… kinda, sorta, embraced libertarianism. Some writers are now starting to notice. “It’s too soon to call this a libertarian moment,” says the Wall Street Journal’s Gerard Baker, using the frequently invoked term for the sudden onset of fiscally conservative, socially liberal policies that just as suddenly retreats after invocation. “But we seem at least to have reached a point where doubts about the wisdom of growing state control are salient.” Conservative columnist Sam Goldman sees something similar: a “new libertarian moment” that’s arrived in the form of “opposition to restrictions on personal conduct, suspicion of expert authority, and free speech for controversial opinions have become dominant themes in center-right argument and activism.”

    Dispatch non-subscribers will be able to read a lot of Scott's analysis, but not all.