It Gets Worse

It’s hard to believe, but both presidential campaigns keep getting worse. Have we learned anything? As I’ve pointed out in my series, “The Long Journey to More,” settled societies were run by the ruling elites for their benefit, while the masses were left to subsistence. Kings and emperors picked winners and losers. It was better to align with the ruling powers than rock the boat with innovation.

From the Pharaohs in ancient Egypt to Louis the Fourteenth in France, rulers dictated who got what. However, the fifteenth century ushered in changes undermining elite arbitrary authority, resulting in markets, not masters dictating actions. More people participated in making, trading, and benefitting from new goods used in innovative ways. A new system replaced the old great for the few but bare sustenance for most with “More” for those allowed to partake.

Moral philosophers began to take notice. The author of “The Theory of Moral Sentiments” proposed that markets, rather than potentates, making decisions on prices and what to produce and sell would bring widespread benefits. The “invisible Hand” of markets was the moral way to “The Wealth of Nations.” At the time, no one thought of this Scotsman as an “economist” because, in retrospect, he was the father of this “science.” He and his contemporaries thought of Adam Smith only as a philosopher.

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The Forgotten Issue

Nothing is more determinative about how well your life will go economically than acquiring valuable skills. Our ability to learn starts with the schooling we get early in life. Basic competence in reading and math allows us to follow our natural curiosity. We measure the success of our educational efforts by how well we impart the tools our children need to achieve their life goals. Understanding that education is the key to economic success and empowering individuals and communities is crucial. We must strive to realize this potential.

Education, a cornerstone of economic success, should be a top priority in any election. Yet, it receives less attention than other issues such as inflation, the economy, the border, or abortion. This disparity is a cause for concern and a call to action. Education is not just a local issue but also carries national implications, as evidenced by the existence of the Department of Education. Our ability to compete globally hinges on the expertise of our people, making it all the more crucial to urgently prioritize education in political agendas.

We hear about this group or that some others fail to do as well economically. Rather than putting down differences in outcomes to things such as discrimination or class, we need to ascribe it more to differences in educational opportunities. The two most identified lagging groups are blacks and Hispanics. Both heavily populate our inner cities, and even though high per capita educational funds are expended, the results are abysmal. Whether it’s Chicago, New York, D.C., Philadelphia, or California cities, all have something in common. They’re ruled by Democrats. On the other hand, Red State, Florida, provides uniformly good schools with solid results even in its big cities.

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 The Mouse Doesn’t Like You

Two takeaways from the debate: Trump is still Trump, and we have irrefutable confirmation the bulk media has crossed over to the dark side. Somewhere along the line, it became part of MAGA dogma that Trump is a great debater. The facts never supported this contention. He lost debates with Hillary Clinton in 2016 and failed to win against Joe Biden in 2020. Trump scored a solid victory in a presidential debate only against a feeble Biden in the recent one. You must return to the Republican primary debates in his first run, where Trump appeared to dominate. However, then he could belittle his opponents on a very crowded stage.

Trump, unprepared and drawn into rehashing his 2020 loss, failed to effectively present his case in a debate ripe with opportunities. On the other hand, Kamala Harris delivered many carefully vague, rehearsed answers, mainly unrelated to the questions asked. Her first question was, “Are you better today than four years ago?”‘ It was left unanswered in favor of a planned opening statement, setting the tone for the night’s rest. The ABC moderators’ failure to follow up and press her for an answer was consistent throughout the debate.

In judging the debate, it’s helpful to note what issues Americans care about most:

Before the event, Trump said Disney’s ABC was biased against him, so why agree to a debate where it might be three against one? Possibly, CNN’s recent Biden-Trump debate gave him a false hope of even-handedness. but that time, Biden’s removal was the target.,not him. It might’ve been hubris; maybe he didn’t comprehend how far Disney would go to ensure a Harris victory. Even though we’ve seen moderator bias in Presidential debates before, such as Candy Crowley erroneously intervening to back Barrack Obama over Benghazi Terrorism, severely damaging Mitt Romney when he was about to win his second straight debate.

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Maybe Nobody Wants To Win

Let’s see. Donald Trump cemented in J.D. Vance, the only vice-presidential candidate bringing nothing to the ticket but with considerable downside. All that is necessary to spring the trap on the GOP is to get old Joe Biden to bow out of the race in a wide-open convention that would anoint one of the several Democrats polling well enough to bring home the presidency. Instead, Joe drops out and endorses the one person Trump can beat, Kamala Harris. All the Democrats fall in line behind her. Huh?

It’s as if we’re telling Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse to go fishing and leaving the Little Big Horn battle to Little Chief Cackling Hen. Why devise such an intricate plan if you won’t execute it when victory is within reach? Believing that a Kamala Harris candidacy was the intended outcome is challenging. If she was the best choice, why not replace the already fading Joe Biden a year ago and have the “most qualified person” leading the charge, with all the advantages of incumbency?

Harris has been a terrible campaigner with horrible favorability ratings. She seems to have patterned her vice presidency on “Veep’s” Selina Meyer. She’s to the left of Bernie Sanders. No wonder no one was in a hurry to pull the rug out from under Biden to replace him with someone likely to prove worse.

So why are Democrats rallying around a weaker candidate this late in the game? Maybe they’re so giddy they’re no longer saddled with Old Joe that anyone else seems great. With only about 100 days to the election, they can cover up her record and give her a whole new persona, figuring there will be little time for voters to catch on.

Gaslighting the public has become an art form for the Democrats and their media allies. Russian collusion, the Wuhan wet market, the laptop coverup, and Biden being sharp as a tack, even though they were all false, have lasted far longer than truth and logic would dictate. These falsehoods benefitted the perpetrators, so why stop.

The one area clearly delegated to Kamala is the border, where she is widely known as the “border czar.” The epic failure to stop illegal immigration is a massive collapse by the probable Democratic candidate. Not to worry, the Donkeys and their media fellow travelers claim she was never the administration’s border lead player.

By the same token, a watchdog group named Harris the most liberal Senator when she served there. Remove the findings from your website. None of this stuff ever happened. Republicans are just making it up.

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Orange Hair Rides To His Little Bighorn

Just like General George Armstrong Custer, known as Yellow Hair to the Cheyenne, led his 7th Calvary to defeat, the Republican’s orange-haired leader ignores all the signs he needs to change his plan. The rash, self-promoting Custer refused to believe his Crow Indian scouts when they told him he was riding into a trap. The overconfident General even divided his forces. The outcome was one of the worst defeats in U.S. military history.

Since April of last year, I’ve been sounding the alarm about a carefully laid election trap for the GOP. The Democrats, through lawfare, managed to secure Trump’s nomination. The weak cases against him garnered sympathy for him and diverted attention from the more viable younger contenders. Lawfare was the Democrats’ tool to handpick their weakest opponent, Trump. Their goal was never to halt him, but quite the opposite.

Now that they secured the feeblest Republican ticket most Democrats could beat, dumping their losers in favor of younger winners is happening. Even with the near miss on Trump’s life holding back calls for Joe to go for a couple of days, the last two weeks have gone as I forecast. The Biden-Harris ticket is now history. As soon as the Republican V.P. nominee was announced, it was just a matter of days.

Somewhere, the trap planners were cheering when Trump selected J.D. Vance. With only a few percentage points apart, the one who can add even a little to the total will win.

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