Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Copilot AI as an editorial assistant:  meh

A few days ago Microsoft Copilot showed up in Word.  It offers to rewrite stuff for me.  So I tried it out on a few paragraphs.  I have to admit it’s not blowing me away. Let’s have Copilot rewrite that paragraph: Recently, Microsoft Copilot has been integrated into Word. It provides an option to rewrite […]

Three reasons Ezra Klein will not become a libertarian

Over at Cato, Michael Cannon tells us that Ezra Klein will become a libertarian.  As evidence, he cites the following passage by Klein: The thing I’ve changed my mind most on in politics in recent years is how destructive bad regulations can be and how seriously I take it now when I hear that regulations […]

The conflict between preventing harm and winning elections

When is it okay to “heighten the contradictions”, to allow bad things to happen for the sake of instigating political change?  I’ve been noodling on this problem for decades without making much progress, and Trump’s victory has forced me to dig in once again.  This is my current thinking, for what it’s worth.  Democrats have […]

Is Jay Bhattacharya a libertarian?  Does it matter?

Is Jay Bhattacharya a libertarian?  Does it matter? Jay Bhattacharya was an author of the Great Barrington Declaration, which argued that we should let covid spread freely among healthy people to reach herd immunity as quickly as possible.  The elderly and those whose health made them vulnerable to covid should be given “focused protection”.  Bhattacharya […]

The Hegseth dysfunction

It seems that Hegseth may be forced to end his bid for Secretary of Defense due to his alcoholism and history of sexual abuse and mismanagement of nonprofits.  On one level this is as it should be.  I could probably live with Hegseth if he was well qualified for the job but got quietly soused […]

Six thoughts about the election and democracy

The Trump problem is not – and never has been – the electoral college The problem is that Donald Trump is a competitive presidential candidate in the United States, despite his manifest unsuitability for office.  There are various reasons for Trump’s competitiveness.  Some of these reasons are structural (the weakness of our parties and our […]

The Media and Trump’s Second Term Agenda

Harris has been criticized for giving vague answers to policy questions, but the fact is we have a reasonably good idea what policies a President Harris would pursue.  If elected, she will behave as we expect a Democratic president to behave. On the other side of the aisle, it is easy to overlook how uncertain […]