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Let’s curb the kangaroo court of sources

The anti-Trump media have already congratulated themselves for destroying the Matt Gaetz nomination for attorney general and are now attempting to destroy the Pete Hegseth nomination for secretary of defense. Vetting the records of cabinet nominees is a legitimate journalistic function. It is not a legitimate journalistic function to kill a nomination based on hit pieces stuffed with anonymous sources. Someone with responsibility at media outlets should ensure that their hit pieces include some sources who are named. Networks who eagerly spread anonymously sourced hit pieces are also ...

Monopoly on the Black vote is over

Dean of the nation’s political analysts, Michael Barone, sat down with The Wall Street Journal to discuss the 2024 election. The headline that emerged from that discussion was “Donald Trump’s Rainbow Coalition,” noting that the monopoly of the Democratic Party over the nation’s Black vote seems to be over. If this is true, and it indeed seems to be, the implications for the political dynamics of our nation’s future are profound. In 2024, Trump picked up 13% of the Black vote compared to 8% in 2016, and 21% of Black men voted for Trump. Also, among Black voters, as in ...

End sanctuary-for-migrants madness

There are over 660,000 illegal migrants already convicted of felonies or facing charges who have come across the southern border and been released into the U.S., according to newly released federal data provided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Some are in jail — on the taxpayers’ tab, of course — having been nabbed for committing more crimes once they got here, but many are walking free, spreading their criminality across the nation. Over 58,000 of these known criminals have come to New York City alone, including 1,000 known members of South American gangs, like Tren de ...

Why media won’t stop telling same lie

The American media has a bootleggers-and-Baptists problem. “Bootleggers and Baptists” is one of the most useful concepts in understanding how economic regulation works in the real world. Coined by economist Bruce Yandle, the term describes how groups that are ostensibly opposed to each other have a shared interest in maintaining the status quo. Baptists favored prohibition, and so did bootleggers who profited by selling illegal alcohol. And politicians benefited by playing both sides. There’s an analogous dynamic with the press today. Across the ideological spectrum, from the ...

Institutions vs. We the people

New York Times columnist David Brooks, who is about as close to a conservative as that liberal newspaper publishes, wrote something last week that gets to the heart of why Democrats, especially, but also some Republicans, fear a second Trump administration. After extolling what he believes to be the personal virtues of some Republicans (he mentions Mitt Romney, whose personal virtues are undeniable, but who lost to Barack Obama in 2012), Brooks worries about what he regards as Donald Trump’s lack of virtues and the president-elect’s “department of government efficiency” and its ...

Trump likely to stiff workers

Working-class voters put Donald Trump over the top, thinking he would look out for their interests. How does the administration he’s putting together look for them? Not great. Roman emperors maintained control over the populace by giving them “bread and circuses” — free bread and lavish entertainment to distract them. Trump appears to be following that strategy except that “the bread,” that is, economic benefits, seems destined for the billionaire elite. The masses, however, get a three-ring spectacle. Note that Trump chose a respected financier, Scott Bessent, to run ...