Here is Donald Trump's apparent governing plan so far:
Enact 20% tariffs on all imports.¹
Cut $2 trillion from the federal budget.²
Let RFK Jr. "go wild" on health, food, and medicine.³
Mass deportation of illegal immigrants.¹ ²
Big tax cuts for corporations and the rich.¹
Abandon Ukraine. Maybe Taiwan too.4
Use the military to fight "the enemy within."5
Build a strategic Bitcoin reserve.³
Fire thousands of nonpartisan civil servants so he can replace them with MAGA drones.6
Repeal any and all efforts at combating climate change, which is a hoax.³
Implement "concepts of a plan" to repeal Obamacare, including its provision that protects people with preexisting conditions.7
Take unspecified revenge against Meta and Google.³
Blow up the federal deficit.¹
How is it possible that there are lots of people who actually want this? Do even conservatives really want this? Even if Trump loses, it's apparent that we've lost our collective mind.
¹Would wreck the economy and spike inflation.
²Not actually possible, thank God.
³Come on, man. 4Would encourage two-bit dictators worldwide and make it clear that nukes are a country's only real protection. 5Obviously unconstitutional. 6Delusions of grandeur, anyone? 7Would hurt lots of people for no perceptible reason except retribution against Obama.
In an apparent attempt to lose whatever international support they still retain, Israel voted overwhelmingly yesterday to kick out UNRWA from Gaza. UNRWA distributes the vast majority of aid to Gaza, and no other organization has the know-how and the personnel to take its place. They're indispensable. But everybody's most loathed prime minister just shrugged:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said on social media on Monday that it was essential that “sustained humanitarian aid” remain available in Gaza. He gave no details of how that should be accomplished. But Mr. Netanyahu’s office released a statement saying that the government was ready to work with “our international partners to ensure Israel continues to facilitate humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza in a way that does not threaten Israel’s security.”
Technically, Israel has merely banned UNRWA from any contact with Israeli officials, but since that's essential to delivering aid it effectively puts UNRWA out of business. For good measure, Israel also banned UNRWA from activity in Israel's "sovereign territory," which might or might not include Gaza. But the message is crystal clear regardless.
Why did Israel do this? Allegedly it's because they believe UNRWA is basically an arm of Hamas. But that's absurd. In an organization of 13,000 people there are bound to be some Hamas sympathizers, but there's no evidence those numbers are even 1% of the total. The real reason for the ban can be gleaned more simply from UNRWA's full name: the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees. Israel dislikes the very mention of refugees, since it implies that someday they might return to family homes lost in the 1948 war—an ironclad no-no in Israeli politics. The allegation of a Hamas partnership was little more than a convenient excuse for doing something they've wanted to do for a long time.
The ban takes effect in 90 days, so nothing will happen immediately. But food is mostly delivered to Gaza from a dozen UNRWA depots stocked from hundreds of UNRWA trucks driven by thousands of UNRWA drivers. It's a massive undertaking, and not one that can be replaced in 90 days:
Along with the Palestinian Red Crescent, Unrwa handles almost all aid distribution in Gaza through 11 centres across the enclave. It also provides services to 19 refugee camps in the West Bank. Unrwa director William Deere told the BBC that on a practical level, the ban on interacting with Israeli officials meant it would become almost impossible for the agency's staff to operate in the country.
"We won't be able to move in Gaza without being subject to possible attack, international staff won't be able to get visas any longer," he said.
The executive director of the UN's World Food Programme said without Unrwa's presence in Gaza, aid agencies will be unable to distribute essential food and medicine. "They do all the work on the ground there," Cindy McCain told the BBC. "We don't have the contacts. We don't have the ability to get to know the contacts, because things are so intensely difficulty there."
Everyone understands all of this, which makes Israel's action little more than a gratuitous attempt to amp up the brutality and make Palestinian lives even more miserable than they already are.
To what end? It's hard to think of one aside from pure retribution.
In reality, this chart shows that nobody is right. Here's the actual crime trend since the start of the century:
Violent crime dropped steadily through 2012 and has been flat ever since. Property crime dropped through 2020 and has since been flat. Compared to the previous year, there was essentially no change in 2023.¹
So in the most recent few years crime hasn't gone down, but that's largely because crime never went up in the first place. Murder did, but that's all.
At the same time, big majorities of both Democrats and Republicans thought crime was up from about 2005 through 2015 even though it was declining steadily the whole time.
The media does an absolute crap job of covering crime, and that's not even counting the deliberate misinformation peddled by the likes of Fox News. Every upward blip gets big headlines. "If it bleeds" still leads local news broadcasts around the country. Social media sites like Nextdoor amp up the fear even more.
Obviously I can't fight that. But for those who care, (a) crime is way down over the long term, and (b) nothing much has happened over the short term. Since 2020, crime is neither up nor down.
¹There's some early evidence that crime has dropped substantially so far in 2024, but it's too early to say for sure.
POSTSCRIPT: In case you're curious, here's the trend in the murder rate. It spiked up temporarily in 2020 but is now back down. Recent evidence suggests it's down even more in 2024.
Despite the Fed's September rate cut, along with promises of more, 30-year mortgage rates began rising abruptly in early October and spiked above 7% today:
First, the strong economy is even stronger than anticipated, causing investors to re-think how quickly the Fed will cut rates. Equally important is investors’ rising expectation that former President Trump will win re-election (look at betting markets). Investors are taking Trump at his word and believe if he wins it will lead to higher tariffs, immigrant deportations, and deficit-financed tax cuts in a full employment economy, all of which means higher inflation and more government borrowing. The recent surge in mortgage rates is a clear indication what investors believe a Trump victory would mean for the economy and the nation’s fiscal outlook.
This is apparently what the MAGA cultists want. Trump has been crystal clear about his economic plans, and it's equally clear what those plans would lead to. Trump already produced one inflationary surge—justified by the pandemic—and now he plans to follow the same playbook again, but with no justification at all this time around. Anyone who votes for him should be careful what they wish for.
The Atlanta Fed has published its final forecast of third-quarter GDP before the official numbers are released tomorrow. Following a disappointing export report this morning, their model now projects a Q3 growth rate of 2.8%.
This is Schönlaterngasse in Vienna ("Street of the Beautiful Lantern") near the Jesuit church and the Gutenberg monument. The Truth and Dare bar is up ahead, and it was a nice night so people were congregating outside.
The job market continued to normalize in September:
Unfilled job demand—openings minus hires—has receded from its 2022 peak and dropped another 430,000 last month. It's now close to its normal pre-pandemic level.
Note that unfilled job demand is the main driver of migrant surges into the US, so this is good news for the likelihood of illegal immigration remaining low.
The white working class has been trending Republican for a long time, but Donald Trump seems to be doing especially well with them this year—and especially among men. Why? A bunch of reasons, but this is probably one of them:
