There’s a problem for Kamala Harris: Most people don’t actually like her economic policies. Recent polls showed 52% of Americans do not think America should move in the direction of California, and yet the same polls are showing that 52% of Americans are going to vote for Kamala Harris.
What’s the disconnect? She’s hiding her policies. She’s hiding herself and smearing it over with a pastiche of “joy.”
The reality is that she’s attempting to distance herself from Joe Biden while embracing even stronger communist and socialist policies.
At a rally on Thursday, she bragged about her tie-breaking vote on the Inflation Reduction Act. She doesn’t want to own the inflationary record of the Biden administration, but she brags about being one of the people who was the deciding factor in the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, which was one factor in the 40-year high in inflation.
As of Friday, she’s going to call on Congress to pass a federal ban on price gouging as part of her economic platform, according to Politico.
This is a policy for idiots. The reality is that in the grocery industry, profit margins are well under 2%. There is very, very little profit margin in the grocery industry because it’s really competitive. There are tons of groceries and supply. There is no shortage of food in the United States.
The idea that monopolistic companies are price gouging people and that’s why the prices have gone up is insane.
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First of all, the idea of price gouging in general is almost always garbage because the reality is that prices are determined by supply and demand. You can’t be gouged on prices unless there is only one supplier available in a really wide radius and no competition is available — and you are willing to buy at the price the one supplier sets. That is the only way one can “price gouge” you.
But there is no actual definition for price gouging because it turns out that, according to Democrats, price gouging is simply prices they don’t like because it makes them look bad politically.
If Harris believes she’s going to bring down prices through price controls, this has been tried. It is Soviet-style policy. It is Cuban-style policy. It is Venezuelan-style policy.
Simply declaring that the price of a product shall be X does not guarantee the widespread availability of that product. In fact, what it leads to is a spur in demand and a reduction in supply. That is what price controls do.
Price controls mean more people want the thing because now it’s cheaper and fewer people are willing to produce the thing because now there is no profit in producing the thing. Very often there’s actual loss in producing the thing — and people do not produce things at a loss. This is why price controls lead to bread lines.
Every economist — every economist — understands that price controls are some of the worst policies you could possibly have.
But Harris is pushing it because she thinks Americans are too stupid to understand what price controls are and so dumb that they think that the federal government can, by passing a law, simply make prices go down.
Kamala Harris is not that stupid.
It’s a political move. Elevated everyday costs have plagued the Biden-Harris administration since Americans grocery bills spiked during the pandemic. Even with some promising recent polling, most major voter surveys show President Biden and Harris well behind former President Donald Trump on the economy.
Politico reported:
Harris’ proposals show how she would expand Biden’s focus on price gouging and food costs, according to the plans detailed by her campaign. In addition to her push for the first-ever federal ban on price gouging by food corporations, she would also direct the Federal Trade Commission and state attorneys general to investigate and levy penalties on food companies that violate the federal ban.
This is insane.
Food is not more expensive because the bread companies decided randomly to raise the prices in collusion with one another. Food is more expensive because the Federal Reserve pumped money into the economy at a rate unprecedented in human history, and then the Biden-Harris administration decided to jack more money into the system. They thought it was good.
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When you helicopter money on people, it doesn’t make things worth more inherently. It just means the price of everything goes up. If I give everybody in the United States ten extra dollars, no one is any richer. It just means the prices go up by $10.
They know exactly what they’re doing.
And then, in the middle of an inflationary spiral, she has another proposal. This one is on housing. Guess what it is?
Wait for it. Wait for it.
It’s free money.
I know you weren’t expecting it. Free money from Democrats in the middle of a $30 trillion national debt? They would never do such a thing.
Our national debt currently runs at roughly $35 trillion. The actual truth in terms of unfunded liabilities like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid is more like $156 trillion.
Yet Harris and company are ready to dump more money into the system. She proposes to provide up to $25,000 in down-payment support for first-time homebuyers, helicoptering $25,000 of cash to people who want to buy a first home.
I have no idea what the provisions on credit worthiness are here because it turns out they’re going to flush a bunch of that money down the toilet. If you are simply giving people money who cannot afford to actually pay for the mortgage, the down payment is only part of what you pay. When you pay for a house, there’s upkeep; there’s a mortgage. Owning a home is expensive, which is why a lot of people rent right now.
But according Harris, it is time for the federal government to simply helicopter cash over people. She is supposedly pairing this with tax credits to entice people to build three million new units.
The problem, of course, is that she will presumably attempt to impose rent control on all of those units.
Interventionism is simply a sop to people who want freebies from the federal government.
And by the way, it is not free. We all get to pay for it. Or rather, all our children get to pay for it.
All of this is simply giving people cash. Not her cash. She’s never earned a dime. She’s been a completely useless person on the taxpayer dime for virtually her entire career.
What this is about is using your money to pay off her political constituents. That’s what this is about. Always and forever.
It’s terrible economic policy. This sort of stuff is for stupid people.
It is economic policy that was dropped on its head as a baby.
Harris has a plan. You’re not going to hear any answers about this. You’re going to know nothing about this because she’s got one thing: “Joy.”
I know that when you think of Kamala Harris and that rictus smile that she likes to lay on the American people, you don’t think “joy.” You think more of Joaquin Phoenix as The Joker with a pathological, bizarre laugh that breaks out at all the wrong times.
But the media have recast her campaign as a campaign of “joy.”
It’s all stupidity and it’s all meant for the consumption of morons. H.L. Mencken suggested, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.”
If this is what people want, that’s what they are going to get.
But we should mention something about this whole “joy” routine: You should not find joy in your politicians. You should not.
That is not where joy comes from. Joy comes from your family. Joy comes from your community, from your religious commitment. Joy comes from your virtuous action in the world with meaning and purpose. That’s where joy comes from.
Movements that seek joy via politicians are really, really ugly. The joy is a cover for control. In fact, they mandate joy. It’s mandatory fun.
That’s how it feels with Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. It’s mandatory fun. You must smile. It’s like the Simpsons; they have the wires that connect to the corners of your mouth and pull them upward.
The “joy” will be required. And if you are not joyous enough, if you don’t feel the “joy,” you’re not doing it right. If you ask questions, you’re violating the “joy.” If you want to know about the economic policies, you’re violating the “joy.” This is not a campaign about policy. It’s about vibes and “joy.”
It is a long-time mainstay of totalitarian movements to paint over their evil and horrifying policies with a mask of joy. It is a main propaganda point for every fascist and Stalinist regime, every single one.
There’s a poster of Joseph Stalin from the Soviet Union, who killed 20 million people, showing him with numerous smiling children.
The caption on the photo reads, “We are warmed by Stalin’s affection.” The way that he was promoted in the Soviet Union was with “joy.”
Do you feel the joy? Don’t you feel the joy?
Unidentified artist, We are warmed by Stalin’s affection … (мы сталинской лаской согреты,…) 1949
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