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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 ...

How to be grateful despite Trump

How is everybody coping with the decline of America? I’ll tell you how I’m doing in a bit, but first I have a few observations about Thanksgiving. I wish I had a dime for every time I’ve heard someone declare that Thanksgiving is their favorite holiday. I used to say it myself, before I realized that it’s so commonplace. What makes it so special? There’s the indulging, of course. Humans have been celebrating big events — weddings, religious holidays, births — with feasts for more than 10,000 years. Preparing and consuming a festive meal satisfies eternal human needs. ...

Making Gabbard director isn’t smart

The furor about the real risk to American national security posed by President-elect Donald Trump’s choice of Tulsi Gabbard as the next Director of National Intelligence has obscured what is the even greater risk, and that’s the one posed by the president-elect himself. It’s somehow all but forgotten that Trump was indicted for intentionally pilfering classified military secrets on his way out of the White House, intentionally secreting them, intentionally retaining them and intentionally deceiving the United States government about the pilfering, the secreting and the retaining. ...

The collapse of the DEI push

DEI is a bad idea whose time came with a vengeance several years ago, but now its continued ascendancy is in doubt. Perhaps the most important event this year outside of the presidential election is the intellectual collapse of so-called diversity, equity and inclusion, which is poisonous hokum that is finally being exposed as such. DEI has been one of the most morally perverse and damaging fads in recent American history. We’ve been spending an estimated $8 billion a year telling Americans in training sessions, workshops and educational material that they are, depending on ...