Month: May 2019

An Under Served Market

Dave Davis Policy, Uncategorized

Can you think of anything anywhere there are 36 ready and willing buyers for everyone offered and no one is doing much to meet the demand? Something there’s at least a 2 to 7-year wait? We couldn’t either. In a capitalist country, supply would simply rise to meet the demand. Unless it’s a short-range disruption, generally it’s the government doing something wrong (think Cuba or Venezuelan) and/or not providing the proper legal framework to allow markets to do their job.

So it is with the shortage of babies for adoption. Right now, more than 2 million couples are waiting in line to for a baby. Families waiting to be completed. How many more are too discouraged by the incredible gauntlet of our adoption system to even try, have dropped out or are looking elsewhere is unknown? If you are among the few not having a family member or friend that has gone through the adoption misadventure, go online to read the endless stories of woe. We feel for a much lower number of transgenders wanting to get on with their lives, but we ignore the stress these millions are going through for just wanting to have a family.

Even if you can’t get worked up over what these couples are going through, you just might be over the possibility of our declining national population. Countries with declining populations such as Japan or Russia are locked in very slow growth with less young people supporting an ever-growing aged population. This will only get increasingly untenable in the future. So how do we maintain or increase our working-age population down the road? We can allow much greater numbers of immigrants. This, however, is a great bone of contention between our two major parties with no resolution anywhere on the horizon.

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Maybe Not So Wrong

Dave Davis Commentary, Uncategorized

Back in April 2015 in our post ALL IN THE PLAN? we theorized President Obama’s justice department would sideline Hillary Clinton and a weaker candidate would go on to lose the 2016 presidential election. This would leave the party in a favorable state for the Obamas. Michelle would go on to become governor of Illinois, putting her on a launching pad for the Democratic 2020 nomination. However, James Comey first wounded Hillary but didn’t prevent her nomination and then mightily contributed to her defeat in the general election but reopening the investigation just before the election. We gave our take on all this at the time in our post Election Recap. . In any case, the Democratic candidate lost.

Meanwhile, even with an unpopular Republican governor in a deep blue state, the state’s problems were so acute it was seen as “the sick man of the Midwest.”  A superhero couldn’t fix this state. Faced with the likelihood of being tarred with failure, the Obamas wisely decided to stay in D.C. far from the Illinois political cesspool.

Looks like we really got this one wrong.  Well, maybe we got some details of the path wrong but maybe not the ultimate result. The point of our post was Obama’s return to the White House.  If anything we think it will be even easier than we thought.  As we pointed out in our earlier post, the Democratic party was starved and neglected during the Obama presidency and has only has started to be recovered with the 2014 midterms.  Not enough time to produce a really top rate group of candidates. The lack of governorships hurt because executive experience is highly valued in a candidate for the nation’s top executive position.  Worse, the perception Trumps election was a fluke and anyone could beat him has brought forth old warhorses and a plethora of uninspiring younger candidates.  For example the 37yr old Mayor of South Bend, Indiana, Pete Buttigieg is doing better in the polls than most of the younger contingent even though his only executive experience is as mayor of a very small moribund city.  Sitting in Phoenix, Az, we’re surrounded by vibrant small cities such as Scottsdale, Tempe, and Chandler, all much larger and growing.  Yet no one would even think of any of the mayors of these much more successful cities as presidential contenders. The Democrats have brought forth a legion of minimal candidates.

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