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A Few More Observations

I wonder how many people in Harris’ ads are actors. In some commercials there is a line that says “actor portrayal”. Maybe they should do the same in political ads. In one Harris ad is a woman who said she voted for Trump but will now vote for Harris. Is she a real person and if so why did she flip? Was it because of the wonderful economic environment during Biden-Harris compared to what existed under Trump?

Speaking of Trump, the democrats blame Trump for everything, including their bad economy. Yet despite all the negative press on the side effects of the COVID mRNA vaccines, there is total silence. The democrats continue to push the vaccines and the boosters. They mandated them for the military and tried to mandate them to the general public. Yet there is solid evidence of an increase in myocarditis, inflammation of the heart muscle. There is also statistical evidence of increased transverse myelitis and acute disseminated encephalomyelitis. I have two close friends who almost died after taking the second shot. I wonder why the dems just don’t say they were duped and all these side effects are Trump’s fault?

Are you going to get any of the boosters?

Liz Cheney was in a “Town Hall” with Harris. I put Town Hall in quotes because it was not an open forum. One member of the audience wanted to know if they could ask questions and was told by the “moderator” Maria Shriver “You are not, unfortunately, we have some predetermined questions.” What! This is more damning evidence that Harris cannot think on her feet and has to be given questions beforehand so she can memorize the answers. By the way, she botched one of the answers. Again, it is no wonder that she continues to refuse to hold a press conference.

Harris, being magnanimous, said that she would appoint a republican to her cabinet. Hum. I wonder who that might be?

As to Liz Cheney, most republicans despise her so she won’t sway many republicans to drop all their principles and vote for Harris. Most will hold their nose and vote for Trump. Cheney is also intensely disliked by the Muslim community for her support of her father who was Bush’s vice president during the use of waterboarding of Muslim terrorists. A coalition of Muslim groups issued the following statement “Vice President Harris should have never hosted a campaign event alongside Liz Cheney, an anti-Muslim bigot and far-right war hawk who continues to openly endorse the crime of torture, including waterboarding.”  “The Harris campaign’s decision to platform Cheney is an insult to every American who worked to oppose the Bush-Cheney administration’s criminal policies and to everyone around the world who died due to those policies.” Oops.

Liz Cheney said at the Town Hall “If you wouldn’t hire Trump to babysit your kids, don’t make him president.” Isn’t that a weird comment made before Harris whose husband impregnated his first wife’s nanny? 

Obama continues to insult black men lecturing them as to why they should support Harris. Does anyone pay any attention to Obama anymore? His Ivy League education and million dollar villas are far removed from the life of the average black man. Anyway, 77% of black men are voting for Harris. In any other world, 77% is a landslide.

Twenty-eight percent of Americans say that the country is on the right track. Who are these people? Likely members of the Biden administration and those getting the Green New Deal handouts.

Is Harris capable of giving a speech on the greatness of America? 

It is estimated that 41 million Evangelist Christians will not vote in this election. 41 million! Is it they won’t vote democrat because that party ridicules them and because of their stance on abortion? Is it they won’t vote for a Trump because of his profane nature and past history with women? Forty-one million sitting this one out is amazing.

Trump surrogates are saying that he is using the threat of tariffs to secure better trade deals. Recall that he wrote “The Art of the Deal.” In his Chicago interview Trump used the example of when France was going to impose additional taxes on American firms, Trump threatened to impose a 100% tariff on French champagne and wine. France immediately dropped the tax.  The question that came to my mind is why didn’t he keep the 100% tariff on to protect the American champagne and wine industry and protect American jobs? Isn’t that essence of his argument for tariffs?

Harris’ parents were legal immigrants. Her mother from India and her father from Jamaica. Both were PhDs. Her mother was a breast cancer researcher at Berkeley with a doctorate in endocrinology. Her father was an economics professor at Stanford. Yet unlike her younger sister, Harris did not attend these schools. Rather she went to Howard University and then to Hastings Law School. Unlike the “elite” law schools, Hastings accepts about 50 percent of all applicants. With an acceptance rate that high one wonders why Harris was admitted under a DEI program intended for students for disadvantaged economic and educational backgrounds. She was neither. This somewhat reminds me of a white student in one of my classes who was South African. He told me that when it suited him he put “African-American” down on applications.

In April Maine passed the National Popular Vote Compact. In case you had this one slip by you, the NPV is an agreement that a state will award all its electoral votes to the candidate for president who wins the popular vote regardless of who won the state. This would effectively put an end to the Electoral College. In the Electoral College the winner needs 270 votes. To date, the NPV has garnered 209 votes and won’t go into effect until enough states join that total 270 votes. Maryland was the first state to pass the NPV and not surprisingly only those states with the democrat majorities in their legislatures and the governorship have passed the NPV.

It is not clear whether the NPV is constitutional. Certainly, there will be lawsuits and residents in a state carried by the losing candidate but whose electoral votes are awarded to the one with the most votes would have standing. Currently there are 27 republican governors and it is highly likely that all would veto any NPV bill that reached their desk – unless it is someone like Larry Hogan who did nothing about the NPV while he was Maryland governor. As to the government trifecta where one party has both the governorship and both legislatures, 23 are republican and 15 are democrat with 12 states with divided government.

Look at the map. The green states have enacted the NPV. It is pending in the yellow states and not being considered in the gray states. It is surprising that the NPV has not been passed in Michigan where the democrats control both legislatures and the governor’s office. North Carolina has a republican legislature and a democrat governor (which is unlikely to change). Virginia has a republican governor and a democrat legislature. Nevada has a republican governor and a democrat legislature. Michigan’s 15 electoral votes would bring the NPV total to 224. Although there is a mathematical chance that the NPV might reach 270, the odds are slim.

It is clear that the left hates the Electoral College. Not surprisingly Hillary Clinton has called for the elimination of the Electoral College. But although she got more votes than Trump, she only won 48% of the popular vote. To date I have heard no one on the left saying that to be elected president a candidate must have 50 plus 1 percent of the popular vote.

An MSNBC commentator said that it is “Just a wildly dangerous institution that undermines democracy but also creates all manner of rube-goldberg machinery to be attacked by bad actors.” Jaime Raskin, democrat from Maryland who was on the Jan 6 inquisition said that the Electoral College was an “obsolete system from the 18^th century that is deadly for Americans”. He said that the Electoral College “can get you killed.” I presume he was referring to the death of Ashli Babbitt, shot by a Capitol policeman on January 6, 2021.

During my lifetime, five republicans (Eisenhower, both Bushes, Reagan and Nixon) have won the popular vote. Note that George W. Bush lost the popular vote to Al Gore but won it when he ran for re-election against John Kerry. Can you imagine Al Gore as president? Or Hillary Clinton for that matter. That alone makes some of us thankful for the existence of the Electoral College

Some more random thoughts

My University of Georgia Bulldogs welcomed the University of Texas into the Southeastern Conference going into Austin as an underdog against the number one team in the country and winning 30-15 despite the best efforts of the referees. In addition to the outrageous overturning of a pass interference penalty I counted at least three holding calls and one hands to the face call that were missed. There were also two video reviews that went against the Dawgs despite evidence to the contrary. The pass interference call was overturned after the Texas fans showered the field with bottles and assorted litter leaving the impression as Kirby Smart noted that the referees “tried to rob us.” He also said “But I will say now we have a precedent that if you throw a bunch of stuff on the field and endanger athletes, that you’ve got a chance to get your call reversed.” Sic’ em.

I am sure that he will be fined. The SEC fined Texas $250,000 for its fans’ demonstration. $250,000? You have got to be kidding. That’s probably what they pay their back up punter. If the SEC had any guts it would have fined them $1 million plus docked them 3 scholarships. Don’t mess with Texas?

The University of Tennessee beat Alabama. The Vols’ fans ran onto the field demonstrating that they must have thought it was a fluke. I wonder if Alabama fans ever storm the field? 

Did you see Trump’s interview at the Economics Club of Chicago? That interview should be enough to convince people to vote for him. That Harris declined their interview is no surprise. If she had agreed, her performance would have been worse than Biden’s at the debate and she would lose the election in a landslide. Trump was asked tough questions about the economy, about tariffs, foreign affairs and domestic social issues. He answered them all without equivocating or being evasive. He may be a bully, a cad and amoral but in this election, he is better for the country than Harris. If Harris were subjected to exactly the same set of questions, her responses – or lack thereof – would frighten even her supporters into considering to vote for Trump.

I didn’t think Bret Baier was rude to Kamala Harris just because he kept trying to get her to answer his questions. I actually thought he kept throwing her soft balls.

Isn’t it amazing that she has still not held a press conference and the media is letter her get away with it?

Only the blind could ignore that Trump and Vance will agree to be interviewed by anyone with a microphone while Harris only talks to Oprah and the View.

The democrats are campaigning only on abortion and Jan 6 saying that Trump wants to be a dictator. They are also running ads in Georgia saying that Trump wants to cut social security which is a lie. Trump has repeatedly said that he will not cut social security.

As to being a dictator, isn’t that what Joe Biden has been, ruling the country by executive order and having his administration enact an agenda opposed by the majority of Americans?

Democrats actually love dictatorships if they are the dictators. All their efforts to establish one party rule shows that for a fact. They want to abolish the Electoral College, they want to pack the Supreme Court, they want statehood for Puerto Rico and DC. All would entrench the democrats as the majority party and let them impose their dictates on the rest of us. Isn’t that a dictatorship?

Harris did not go to the Al Smith dinner. Along with her stance on abortions, one wonders why Catholics would vote for her.

What happened to all those stories about Harris being difficult to work for and having high turnover in her staff? Did all of a sudden, she became a wonderful sympathetic boss?

Harris is trumpeting that economists say that Trump’s economic agenda will be more costly than hers and have a higher rate of inflation. Trump was asked about that in the Chicago interview. He rightly stated that those economists did not take into account that his program would create more economic growth and was not a simple add on to the existing economy. I wonder how Harris would have handled such a question. Another word salad?

Trump going to McDonald’s and working in the drive though was brilliant and funny. One wonders why the Harris camp didn’t do it first since she claims that she once worked at McDonald’s during college?

Apple News loves Costco. Every day there are several stories on Costco and occasionally one on Trader Joe’s. I have yet to see one on Sam’s Club (which I prefer to Costco). I guess Sam’s does not have the hip left coast cache of Costco and Trader Joe’s. Strange. So they are being ignored despite the Walton heirs all being guilt ridden democrats. 

If I were dictator for a year (I need more than a day)

Make the federal government including the military more cost efficient

End wokeness and equity throughout the federal government including the military

End Title IX gender inclusion

Take DEI out of the military academies

Institute cross the board reduction in federal budgets by 5% per year

End all duplicate federal functions

Eliminate federal minimum wage

Raise the full “retirement” age on Social Security to 70.

End all automatic escalators in entitlement programs

Phase out mandatory social security private accounts and replace with IRAs.

Restrict the growth in the federal budget to the rate of growth in the previous year’s GDP

Institute a flat tax with no exemptions and no deductions regardless of income 

Scuttle the Green New Deal

Make America energy independent

Adopt an all-in energy policy with solar, nuclear and fossil fuels.

End windmill energy

Repeal all green energy subsidies

End the new industrial policy of picking winners and losers in “green” energy

End all tariffs and quotas when reciprocated

Require all federal agencies to review on a periodic basis all regulations and conduct a cost/benefit analysis of each

Build a “porcupine” defense around Taiwan

Aid Viet Nam and the Philippines in their confronting Chinese aggression in the South China Sea

Reopen all energy pipelines

Reopen energy sources off shore and in Alaska

Fully support Israel and Ukraine (provided they get their act together)

Isolate Iran and support Israel’s war on Iran’s proxies

Withdraw from the United Nations and expel them from New York

Make active duty military pay fully tax free

Fully restore natural gas exports

End all foreign aid to governments that do not fully support us

End support of foreign wokeness

Fly only the US flag at government buildings and installations worldwide

Get government out of the climate change business (leave it only to private enterprise)

Get the Department of “Justice” out of the lawfare business

Free the political prisoners of Jan 6.

Ensure that voting in federal elections is free from fraud

Ensure that only citizens vote in federal elections

Fully support school choice

Provide incentives to eliminate differences in reading and math proficiencies. 

Fully support small business

Reduce regulatory burdens on all businesses but especially small business

Limit the number of new pages in the Federal Register

Remove constraints such as the Davis-Bacon Act which regulates federal wage contracts and the Jones Act which hinders maritime trade

Eliminate the corporate income tax

Abolish the capital gains tax

Eliminate all disincentives from Federal programs

Establish third party boards to negotiate labor contracts with the federal government

Move most of the federal agencies out of Washington

Have federal salaries not to exceed those in the private sector

End all federal welfare and transfer payments and replace them with block grants to the states

Abolish discretionary federal reserve monetary policy which leads to irresponsible tinkering by the Fed. Impose Friedman’s monetary rule of allowing the money supply to grow at the long run GDP growth each year – removing uncertainty

Abolish public sector defined benefit plans and replace them with defined contribution plans.

Repeal health care “reform”. There are market solutions that will work including those designed for pre-existing conditions.

Abolish the departments of education, energy, and agriculture (for starts) and allocate their funding (where appropriate) to the states via block grants.

Abolish all agricultural subsidies. 

Encourage and reward risk taking. Ensure that all programs provide positive incentives to be productive rather than negative ones that discourage work.

Close the border to all illegal migrants and expel all those who enter illegally after closing the border

For those already in the country, require all to have work permits and deport able bodied illegals who do not have work permits

Do not deport illegal criminals. Rather give them mandatory minimum prison sentences

Tie school grants to the teaching of economics, civics, American history and the elimination of woke curricula such as woke mathematics and queer history

Require all teachers to be proficient in the subjects that they teach. Too many would fail exams in their subject matter

Subject the anti-Semitic pro Hamas protestors to hate crimes prosecution

Eliminate the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and send its functions back to the regulatory agencies

Have a third party evaluate the FBI and eliminate it if it no longer serves its purpose

Make the Federal government reimburse those that it sues if it loses in court. Currently many companies settle because of the cost of litigation

Make all changes in regulations and the tax code require a 60 percent approval in both houses of congress

Make chocolate chocolate chip the national ice cream

Note: What did I leave out?

Dictator for a year and other thoughts

Liz Chaney, who openly and vehemently hates Trump, is now campaigning with Kamala Harris. I don’t know what this accomplishes. Cheney, who is thoroughly disliked by republicans, is not going to convince other republicans to vote for Harris because a vote for Harris is a vote for four more years of Biden’s disastrous policies. Of course, most democrats think that those policies were wonderful and not a disaster. So what if we had record inflation, high energy bills, foreign failures, record low enlistments in the military. That’s a small price to pay for increased gender awareness, equity and the Green New Deal.

I encourage all the so-called republicans who will vote for Harris to leave the party and become democrats. 

I am not a Trump republican. Trump’s economics run counter to my beliefs and empirical findings. Yet as much as I dislike Trump, I dislike the leftist democrats even more. While it is true that If Trump were elected and his policies implemented, that the economy would likely go downward, a Harris election would mean that and more. The democrats would move to eliminate the electoral college, to pack the Supreme Court, to take control of elections from the states and to threaten the foundations of the country.

Again I think that the democrats should split into two parties: the leftists versus the moderates. Sometimes I wonder if there are any moderate democrats left. But then I have several close friends who are old time democrats like JFK, Bill Proxmire and Scoop Jackson. I also think that the republicans should split as well. Trump by picking JD Vance has cemented in that wing of the republican party – call it the isolationist wing. There are others, like me, who are free trade (no subsidies or tariffs), laissez faire, government with a small g. I’ll never be a Trump republican and will only vote for that ilk if and only if the democrats keep nominating socialists.

In a conversation I had with a prominent economist who has had nice things to say about both Trump and Harris, he contended that Trump was using the threat of tariffs as a bargaining tool. Personally, I don’t believe that but this economist actually talks to Trump. He pointed out that at a conference of G-7 countries, Trump offered to remove all tariffs if the others did the same. He had no takers.

China is a mess. Its real estate market has collapsed. There are 90 million unoccupied apartment units in the country. 90 million! Its economy is slowing. Their response is to add more stimulus to the economy even though government spending is what has caused the mess in the first place. Xi’s policies are making things worse. He is a died in the wool Marxist (or is it Maoist?) and hates capitalism. He is committed to his mercantilist ways in subsidizing exports and discouraging imports while limiting capitalistic ventures. With its population collapsing and the economy slowing, China is in serious trouble. Don’t forget that it is still a third world country with a GDP per capital less than Mexico’s.

That FEMA doesn’t have enough funds for hurricane season while paying millions to care for illegals is scandalous. Not only should Mayokas be impeached (again) the Senate should convict him. If something similar would have happened under Trump, he would be fired. Has Biden fired anyone?

Speaking of the Senate, all those democrats who want to get rid of the Electoral College should also want to reconstruct the House of Representatives and get rid of the Senate. Recall that the Electoral College’s membership is determined by adding a state’s representatives with its senators. Therefore, if the Electoral College is a threat to democracy then so are the House and the Senate.

One of my progressive socialist friends who hates Trump to the point of irrationality and wishing him dead insists that despite his denials Trump is in favor of everything in Project 2025. She says that Trump is lying and wants to abolish NOAA. She says that he actually would stop forecasting hurricanes and their tracking of storms. If she read that section of Project 2025 she would see that the writer does not want to abolish the hurricane center but does favor getting rid of those parts of NOAA that are shills for climate change. I asked her if Harris was lying when she claims her positions have changed on the Wall and fracking. Then is Harris contradicting herself when she says that she can’t think of a thing that she would do differently than what Biden has done? She said that it doesn’t matter so long as she gets elected.

I asked three of my progressive friends that if they could, how would they change the country. I told them I would not critique their answers. One had responded that she would impose a single payer health system and put the pharmaceuticals under government control but she still favored private ownership of private property. One said she had to give it some thought. The other has not responded. But I am genuinely curious. I know that if I were dictator for a year what I would do. What would you do?

The undecided, the uninformed American voter

Last week I was in Georgia at the farm bow hunting. As usual because it was deer season I was overrun with wild turkeys. I wish Georgia would have a fall season because in the spring when it is legal to hunt turkeys I am always overrun with deer.

You can tell that Georgia is a crucial state in this election by all the ads. Not so much in Tennessee. One of the Harris ads that plays every ten minutes or so is that Harris “will make billionaires pay their fair share” and that Trump will give his fellow billionaires a tax cut. One ad features a man who endorses Harris while putting gas in his car. Strange, because the price he is paying at the pump is much higher under Harris than it was under Trump. Also (I haven’t verified this) at a lecture a few weeks ago one of the leading tax economists stated that historically when the tax on billionaires is increased, the well being of the lower 5 percent falls and vice versa. If true, then Harris should be campaigning for a decrease in the taxes on the wealthy in order to help the poor.

Did you know that Harris wants to cut taxes to the middle income households while Trump has proposed a national sales tax that will costs those households $4,000 per year? Well that is what another Harris ad says.  It is from her acceptance speech at the Democrat National Convention. The so-called “national sales tax” is what Harris’ ad is labelling Trump’s pledge to impose across the board tariffs on imports.

Another Harris ad says that Trump will impose a nationwide ban on IVF treatments. Of course Trump has said that he wants IVF treatments to be paid for by the government (another of his pandering). To date I have seen no Trump ads refuting either claim of a national sales tax or on IVF. The one Trump ad that is constantly played is of Harris advocating transgender surgeries to inmates. Personally I think an ad on Title IX would be more effective especially one in which biological males are allowed in girls dressing rooms and displacing girls on athletic teams.

Barack Obama is chastising black men for their lack of enthusiasm for Harris. In the real world if 72% supported a candidate, it would be called a landslide. But not in Obama’s world. Speaking of Obama, is he ill? He looks awful.

There have been some of the usual accusations that Harris is not appealing to some voters because she is a woman of color, implying that if she were a white male, the same group would vote for her. Really? That would imply that the same group supports Bernie Sanders but not Harris. Only a fool would think that because the Bernie bros are all in for Harris.

I wonder if the lack of interviews and total absence of press conferences is actually hurting Harris. This would assume that the electorate is actually paying attention. I strongly suspect that the number of people who are undecided is so small in number that they will not make a difference. There are two challenges for Trump. The first is to get people who normally do not vote (see evangelistic Christians) to vote. Note: that evangelistic Christians do not embrace Trump should be no surprise. It would be akin to black voters in Alabama voting for George Wallace – oh wait, didn’t Wallace get 90% of the black vote when he ran for governor in 1982? The second is to motivate the uninformed voter to go to the polls. In the 2020 elections, voter participation was 66% meaning that 81 million eligible voters did not vote. To me that is astounding. Trump’s strategy is to get these slackers to the polls by scaring the hell out of them. To wit: illegal gangs are taking over apartment buildings; illegals are raping your women; illegals are eating your pets; illegals are murderers with bad genes; “If we lose this election, the country is finished”; Trump’s opponents are no longer incompetent, they are mentally impaired; Harris is now called “stupid”; Walz is now a “total moron”; We now need “one rough day” against criminals. The democrats have long argued that Trump is a threat to democracy. Trump has countered by saying that if Harris is elected then Israel will cease to exist.

Whether Trump will be successful in scaring the uninformed and the indifferent eligible voter to go vote is an empirical question. Post election see if the percent of eligible voters who vote is increased.

Kamala Harris and the politics of envy

Kamala Harris is running as the “candidate of change” promising a “new way forward.” Has she forgotten that she was Joe Biden’s vice president? Since the majority of voters says the country is heading in the wrong direction, she thinks the electorate must have amnesia. The polls indicate that she might be right. Again, any candidate but Trump would be 20 points ahead and have a landslide victory rivaling that of Nixon’s over McGovern who managed to eke out 17 electoral votes.

Kamala Harris, who as you know, grew up a poor girl forced to ride school buses and flip burgers at McDonald’s and could not afford to go to her parent’s schools (Berkeley and Stanford) like her younger sister, is your typical working class person of color.

Harris is running ads saying that she will make billionaires “pay their fair share” whatever that is. What is fair? The US tax code is one of the most progressive in the world. In 2020, the top 1% of taxpayers paid $42% of all federal income taxes despite earning only 22% of taxable income. The bottom 90% paid only 26% despite earning 50% of income. Is this fair? By the way, 34% of all tax filers paid no income taxes at all. Is this fair? I think not. I think that all earners should pay a minimum tax regardless of income as part of the price of residency.

Let us suppose that their fair share is the max tax bracket of 37%. Of course, one problem is that some billionaires may have very little income. Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffet have a salary of about $100,000 a year which puts them in the 22% tax bracket. This is where Biden’s proposed tax on unrealized capital gains comes in. Of course, most billionaires including the democrat ones oppose such a tax. Even Mark Cuban who has been acting as a Harris surrogate telling us what she really means, is against the tax. Another problem is how to treat unrealized capital losses. For example, last year Elon Musk “lost” $24 billion when Tesla stock fell 9%. Does this mean that Musk who as a result was worth only $232 billion would be due a tax refund?

What about Elizabeth Warren’s wealth tax? She wants a 2% tax on every dollar of net worth over $50 million and an additional 1% on every dollar of net worth over $1 billion. Instead of impacting just the 500 or so billionaires in the country, it would affect over 75,000 households. Some European countries have instituted such a tax and it has been a flop. In France, before Macron killed it, 42,000 millionaires left the country. As a result, wealth taxes raise less revenue than anticipated. Warren’s proposal would tax people regardless of where they lived. If they were to change citizenship it would levy an exit tax of 40 percent of wealth over $50 million. However, one problem is for the government to estimate yearly the market value of all of person’s assets. The high administrative costs of such a task caused Austria to end their tax. Again, let the billionaires who back Warren lead by example. Let them donate 2% of every dollar of net worth over $50 million and 1% of every dollar of net worth over $1 billion. It would be only fair!

What is fair? The US tax code is one of the most progressive in the world. In 2020, the top 1% of taxpayers paid $42% of all federal income taxes despite earning only 22% of taxable income. The bottom 90% paid only 26% despite earning 50% of income. Is this fair? By the way, 34% of all tax filers paid no income taxes at all. Is this fair? I think not. I think that all earners should pay a minimum tax regardless of income as part of the price of residency.

Here is a better idea, let the billionaire democrats voluntarily donate a certain percent of their wealth each year to the federal coffers. So Cuban, Bloomberg, Soros, Steyer, Jobs, Pritzker, Schultz (Starbucks), Gray (Blackstone) and the rest should, in addition to buying influence, could then have Harris change her campaign spiel from making billionaires pay their fair share to “make republican billionaires pay their fair share too”.

Random Thoughts #44

The Chinese economy is a mess. Recently their overlords have started allowing mortgages to be refinanced due to cuts in the central bank’s lending rates. Mind you, this is in the face of a four year contraction in the real estate market. The question is what took so long? The government also announced that the minimum downpayment has been reduced from 25% to 15%. No word if they are also going to adopt Harris’ plan to give first time homebuyers $25,000.

The Chinese are faced with a declining population that will shrink by 240 million by the end of the century. They have hundreds of thousands of empty housing units as a result of state planning, leading to their real estate bust. Their national debt is probably unsustainable eventually leading to a severe economic contraction. China is becoming the poster child on the effects of a planned economy and the folly of heavy subsidization of industry.

As part of its stimulus package, the Chinese government is also lending money to companies for share repurchase in an effort to stimulate its stock market. In this country the left hates stock repurchases and proposed a 2% stock buyback tax. In fact the so-called Inflation Reduction Act contains a 1% excise tax on buybacks. I guess Biden, Schumer and Sanders forgot to consult with Xi on this one.

Showing that they can throw dirt like the leftist media, some conservative outlets are filling their pages with talk about Doug Emhoff, Kamala Harris’ husband. They are reporting that he impregnated his first wife’s nanny and physically assaulted an ex-girlfriend by “slapping her so hard she spun around.” I wonder if this is fair game given all the press on Trump’s peccadillos.

Did you watch the vice presidential debate? I didn’t. I watched a baseball game instead. One, I hate political speech. Two, I like baseball. Even though the Braves have been eliminated, I will still watch. I am one of the few people that if a baseball game and a pro football game are on, I will watch baseball regardless of what team is playing. 

Isn’t it interesting that the best player in baseball is Japanese?

Isn’t it also interesting that since there are so few American blacks playing baseball that the baseball teams at HBCUs are often predominately white?

Why are there so many Australian punters in college football?

As is the case with college baseball, it seems that most of the place kickers at HBCUs are also white.

There are so many things I miss about not having my parents alive. One of them is the annual rivalry between Fort Valley State (Mother’s alma mater) and Savannah State (Dad’s alma mater). This year Fort Valley won 30-0. I can just see Dad having to wear Fort Valley’s colors to church after the loss. Mother would be relentless in her critique of the game highlighting every Savannah State misstep. Poor Dad.

Have you noticed that in the reporting of the war in Gaza that many of the news outlets have stopped saying the phrase after they report that “tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed” that “most of whom are women and children”?

School is back in. I have not seen any reports of student encampments on college campuses and anti-Semitic rallies or attacks on Jewish students. Have you?

I have always read that vice presidents don’t matter. I guess they don’t matter so long as the president is living. But do you think that Tim (Little Bernie) Walz is causing Harris to lose some voters?

I am in the camp of those who are voting against a candidate, rather than voting for one. I do know some ardent Trump supporters. I appear monthly on a local talk show and there is one regular caller who idolizes Trump. I have two close friends who hate Trump and would vote for my German Shorthaired Pointer first. But both really like Harris. Both are progressives and are excited about getting the first progressive president. Ilhan Omar is excited too saying that once Harris is in office, it won’t take much to push her even further to the left. Bernie Sanders has said much the same.

Has Biden fired anyone? Trump had a steady stream of cabinet members but to my knowledge Biden’s cabinet is still intact.

Alan Dershowitz left the democrat party due to its anti-Semitism. He is now an independent who if he were a politician, I would presume would still caucus with the democrats as do Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema. The other “independents” in the senate, Bernie Sanders and Angus King also caucus with the democrats. I wonder if the takeover of the republican party by the anti-trade protectionist Trump wing will cause some republicans to become “independents” yet continue to caucus with the republicans. I would be in that camp.

Trump’s tariffs: A Primer

Trump who calls himself the Tariff Man loves tariffs. He wants a 60% tariff on Chinese goods, an across the board 20% tariff on imports, a 100% tariff on Mexican goods produced by US firms and in some cases 200% tariffs on other goods. Trump calls tariffs “the greatest thing ever invented.” He has asserted that tariffs will save factory jobs, force companies to produce domestically, shrink the federal deficit, lower food prices and promote world peace. For some reason he did not include cure cancer and the common cold. He has also suggested replacing the income tax with the revenue from tariffs. Penn should rescind Trump’s economics degree.

Trump is making a common political mistake. He is assuming that behavior will not change when there is a change in prices. If imported goods are subjected to a tariff then the price of those goods will increase, decreasing the quantity of goods demanded domestically. Trump is assuming that the decrease in the goods imported will be replaced by domestically produced goods. He ignores two things. First, the decreased imports mean less money flows to the government from foreign goods. Second, he forgets the reason why the goods are manufactured in foreign countries in the first place, comparative advantage. For those goods to be produced domestically would mean a significant increase in the cost of production, meaning higher prices to consumers. In either case, the real income of consumers fall. Notably, the poor and working class families will suffer the greatest fall in real incomes since they consume greater proportions of imported goods than do higher income households.

Can tariffs replace the income tax? In a word, no. Given the predilection of the press to scrutinize every utterance of Trump, I am surprised, shocked, that they have failed to do the math. In 2023, the federal government collected $2 trillion in personal income taxes. The amount of imported goods was around $4 trillion. If Trump enacted a tariff of 20% it would raise “only” $800 million assuming perfectly inelastic demand for all imported goods (no change in demand when prices change). In order to completely replace the income tax, a tariff of 50% would have to be enacted. However, since the demand for imported goods would fall as prices increased by 50%, much less would be collected, necessitating an even larger increase in tariffs. I wonder if Trump learned about the Smoot-Hawley Act at Penn? It was enacted in 1930, signed by President Hoover and placed tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods. Our trading partners retaliated resulting in a 70% reduction in imports and exports. Mind you, this was during the Great Depression which shows that stupidity amongst politicians is endemic regardless of era. Let us assume that a similar reaction would take place today and there would be a 70 percent reduction in US imports and exports. Imagine the impact on those domestic manufacturers who rely on imported raw materials. Imagine the impact on consumers – especially low income households. Imagine the impact on prices and on jobs. And Trump thinks tariffs are “the greatest thing ever invented”?

Clarence Thomas is 76 and is the longest serving member of the Supreme Court having been on the court since 1991. When will he retire? I doubt if he will retire if there is a democrat president and would as soon die on the bench. However, if Trump gets reelected I would not be surprised if he decided to retire. The question would then arise whether Trump would appoint another black to the court. Recall that Thomas succeeded Thurgood Marshall and some – especially on the left – consider it as the blacks’ seat. How about Condoleeza Rice or Tim Scott? If Trump wanted to appoint a sitting judge then there are 11 black federal judges he appointed during his first term. If Trump were to appoint a Latina there is Barbara Logoa who is on the court of appeals of the eleventh circuit and was a justice on the Florida Supreme Court.

Did you see the Georgia Alabama game? It has been called an instant classic. It aged me at least 10 years. Georgia’s overtouted quarterback conspired to keep both teams in the game and at the end managed to underthrow a ball in the end zone to an Alabama defender which ensured an Alabama victory. They may play two more times (SEC championship game – beware of Texas – and in the playoffs). Although I admit I am biased, I think Georgia would win those two games.

A friend pointed out the EV fires caused by Helene. I once wondered if it were safe to drive an EV through a carwash. It seems that salt water and lithium batteries do not get along. There were 20 EV fires reported due to Hurricane Ian. In advance of Helene, Florida owners were told to get their EVs and golf carts to high ground. Tampa with 40,000 EVs reported at least several EV fires with one destroying an upscale home. A fire department spokesman said that they had received many reports of e-bikes exploding. Although a fire may not immediately result, salt water causes corrosion and the chemical reaction that causes the fire could occur weeks later. I would not want that time bomb sitting in my garage.

How do panhandlers get to their corners? The only time I give one money is if they have a dog with them. Have you noticed that regardless of how the beggar looks, the dog is always healthy and happy? I knew a guy who always carried cans of dog food in his vehicle. He would give the beggar a can for his dog. If the beggar didn’t accept the dog food graciously, he would drive off. If the beggar was genuinely appreciative, he would give him $5. 

Do you believe the polls? I don’t. Statistical analysis shows that most polls overestimate the performance of democrat candidates. There are all sorts of lame excuses such as “They undercount voters who did not go to college” or “Republican voters tend to hang up”. Never do they same that their sampling is lousy or that they are biased for the democrat. The polls oversample democrats. I wonder why? Is it that they are trying to discourage republicans from voting by indicating that the democrat is going to win? There is evidence that polls do discourage people from voting. One pollster when asked why his polls were so lousy said, I presume with a straight face, that they were accurate “if you doubled the margin of error”! 

But let’s assume that the composite of all polls is correct. If all the states that are thought to be in the republican and democrat columns are correct, then there are only four “tossup” states, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia and Arizona. How do either Trump or Harris get to 270 Electoral College votes? If Harris wins all the states in which she is a statistical favorite plus Pennsylvania, she wins. If Trump wins all the states in which he is a statistical favorite plus Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia, he wins. So Pennsylvania is the key. I wonder if Harris now regrets not picking Josh Shapiro instead of the statistically useless albatross Tim Walz?