"OK. And the answer is: 'What storm of bullshit occurs every four years in the US?'"
And an acceptable response would be the title of our Amazon Product du Jour. Which is reviewed by Elle Purnell at the Federalist: Book Tells Kids GOP Hates Immigrants, Dems Are Party Of Lunch. She is particularly bemused by…
In a two-page spread, the book’s author, Douglas Yacka, presents kids with 10 sentiments and then tells them, “If you answered ‘Yes’ to more of the odd-numbered questions, you agree with many ideas held by Democrats.” If you answered “Yes” to even-numbered statements, you might be a Republican, Yacka explains.
What kind of sentiments are Democrat-coded? Spending more tax dollars on “education and improving schools,” ensuring “businesses can’t pollute the environment,” government-provided “affordable health care available to all Americans,” government efforts to “see that all Americans have a home, a job, and a decent education,” and taxing those “wealthy people and big businesses” to provide “school lunch programs for children whose families don’t have much money.” Does your 8-year-old like free things, trees, lunch, and his teacher? Congratulations, he’s a Democrat.
Your kid is a Republican, on the other hand, if he doesn’t “believe in letting immigrants into our country,” a blatantly false mischaracterization of Republicans’ (and most Americans’) concerns about the open border crisis that has seen millions of people and hundreds of thousands of convicted criminals cross into the United States illegally. Those immigrant-hating Republicans are the same greedy people who want lower taxes just so they can “have more money in their pockets,” Yacka informs your kid.
Odd and even numbers? We're asking kids to read and do math? Good luck with that.
And let me just check the Portsmouth NH website… well, what do you know, yes of course this pile of partisan propaganda is waiting on the shelves of the Portsmouth Middle School Library, the better to indoctrinate impressionable young minds.
Do I advocate "banning" this biased book from that library? Interesting question. Nah. But I'd want to know: Do they have any equivalent pro-Republican books on their shelves?
I bet the answer to that question is no. You don't have to "ban" books that never make it into the library.
So, anyway, what's the haps on the election betting this week? Here you go:
Candidate | EBO Win Probability |
Change Since 9/29 |
---|---|---|
Kamala Harris | 50.3% | -1.3% |
Donald Trump | 49.0% | +1.6% |
Other | 0.7% | -0.3% |
Not to sound like a broken record, but: "The bettors seem to think the outcome is close to a coin-flip. Kamala's still a slight favorite, but Trump did some catching up this past week."
Yes, that's exactly what I said last week.
And even the WSJ's weekly columnist Peggy Noonan seems to be at a loss for words:
Jump ball, deadlock, coin flip, tossup. We’re running out of election metaphors.
As long as we don't go into sudden-death overtime. That would be tedious.
Also of note:
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Wrong answers being provided by both candidates. David R. Henderson's anodyne headline: How To Lower Costs For Consumers.
Both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have said during their campaigns for president that they want to bring down costs for consumers. It’s an admirable goal and, if done right, can be achieved.
Unfortunately, both have been sparse on details about how to do so. In his September 6 speech to the Economic Club of New York, Trump engaged in a lot of exaggeration and bluster, but didn’t give details. In response to a sympathetic Philadelphia reporter’s question about how to do so, Harris started by telling how she was born into a middle-class family. She then segued to a mention of how people in her neighborhood were very proud of their lawns. She did propose a $25,000 subsidy for first buyers of housing, but that would increase, not decrease prices. She never answered his question.
That’s the bad news. The good news is that economics gives us some tried and true ways of making consumers better off. They mainly have to do with allowing competition and allowing increased supplies. Trump did some of that while president. Harris as vice president showed no signs of moves in that direction. Yet many of the policies that both propose would do the opposite.
Henderson advocates an obvious policy for lowering costs: free trade. Somewhat less obvious: increased immigration.
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Iron law of bipartisanship: When opposing parties agree on an issue, they're probably both wrong. Christian Britschgi notes a confirming example of that from the veep debate: Contra J.D. Vance and Tim Walz, Housing Should Be a 'Commodity'.
Tuesday's vice presidential debate included a surprising amount of agreement between the two candidates on stage. Sen. J.D. Vance (R–Ohio) and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) competed on who would produce more oil, keep the border more secure, and support Israel the most.
They also were both in alignment on the notion that housing shouldn't be "a commodity."
"The problem we've had is that we've got a lot of folks that see housing as another commodity," said Walz, criticizing the influence of Wall Street on the housing market.
"We should get out of this idea of housing as a commodity!" concurred Vance, saying that the way to make it not a commodity would be to crack down on illegal immigration.
Actually, as Britschgi points out, the best possible thing to happen in housing policy would be ignoring the nostrums peddled by both Walz and Vance. The free market does a very good job of supplying "commodities", bringing together willing buyers and sellers in mutually beneficial transactions.
But you knew that. Too bad our politicians don't.
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What's the degree of difficulty on her performance so far? Imagine Elizabeth Nolan Brown as a judge at a gymnastic competition as she observes Kamala Harris' Freedom Flip-Flop.
Kamala Harris' most consistent political trait may be a lack of consistency. Over the course of her long career, first in California and then in Washington, D.C., the Democrats' 2024 presidential nominee has been plagued by plausible allegations that she's hard to pin down and lacks a stable ideological core. She's a flip-flopper—or, if you want to be charitable, she evolves quickly.
Over the summer, Harris' evolutions kept on coming, with her campaign issuing rapid-fire disavowals of many of her previous positions. Because she ran her failed 2020 presidential primary bid on an ultraprogressive, big-government platform, many of her new positions are noticeably more oriented toward the mainstream—and freedom.
To slightly adapt what Jonah Goldberg memorably quipped about Mitt Romney: if you hit the mute button on your TV during a Kamala speech, she seems to be saying: What do I have to do to put you in this BMW today?
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I assume the above will be classified as "disinformation" in the Harris/Walz Administration. James Freeman notes that there's one issue they haven't flipped on, and that's their understanding of free speech. So, as James Freeman advocates: Criticize Harris and Walz While You Still Can.
It’s a curious thing that Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate Gov. Tim Walz (D., Minn.) are enjoying generally friendly media coverage even as they set modern campaign records for avoiding media scrutiny. Odder still is that while avoiding discussion of the policies they will employ to govern us, they’ve clearly expressed contempt for the bedrock liberty that allows all of us to criticize government policies.
Recently this column noted Ms. Harris’s history of hostility to free expression. Now we know that if voters give her the promotion she seeks, we can’t expect her vice president to serve as a moderating influence.
Gee, I noticed that myself a few days ago. Freeman doesn't quote Pun Salad, but instead goes with Robby Soave, Jonathan Turley. And this tweet from Todd Zywicki:
It is ironic that Walz saying there’s no First Amendment protection for “misinformation” is itself misinformation.
— Todd Zywicki (@ToddZywicki) October 3, 2024Yes, irony can be … pretty ironic sometimes.
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I'm feeling a warm glow inside… Because Eric Boehm's headline (in print Reason) references a great little movie from the 1980s: The Brave Little (American) Toaster. But it's about JD Vance's know-nothingism about appliance manufacturing:
The nationalist conservative obsession with blue-collar manufacturing jobs often ignores the interests of workers and the will of consumers. Sen. J.D. Vance (R–Ohio) provided a perfect illustration in an early August campaign speech in Nevada on "the American dream."
In it, Donald Trump's protectionist running mate declared that "a million cheap, knockoff toasters aren't worth the price of a single American manufacturing job."
On its face, that's just rhetorical silliness. Common sense says anyone should be willing to make that trade: Affordable and abundant appliances are part of the reason that 21st century America is the best place to live in the history of the human race. Jobs are abundant too—there were 7.6 million unfilled jobs in August, per the Department of Labor—and the loss of a few should not worry vice presidential candidates.
But when right-wing populists such as Vance make this argument, they mean something less literal: that America would be better off if the nation manufactured more and imported less, and Americans would be better off working in metaphorical toaster factories than doing whatever job they have now.
Boehm's article is marvelous. See if you agree with his answer to the question he poses near its end:
How many Americans living in the year 2024 aspire to work—or see their children and grandchildren work—in a toaster factory?
"I'll take "Very Small Numbers" for $400, Ken."