ISRAEL BEGINS "LIMITED" GROUND INVASION
Israel's Lebanon ground raid stirs U.S. fears over past Mideast wars (axios.com)
Longshoremen (dock workers) begin strike
The International Longshoremen's Association (ILA) began their strike today. It's likely to negatively impact the economy and President Biden has said he will not use his powers to require them to go back to work. (And the union president, in the remarkable video below, says that even if Biden did so the workers would work so slowly that it would be almost like not having them there.)
Some good info here: US port strike: Over 45,000 dockworkers from Maine to Texas hit picket lines | AP News
Read about this gem of a human who's running the union: Harold Daggett: How union leader who fought mob tie allegations is holding the US economy to ransom (telegraph.co.uk)
Just One Thing: The insane scale of income redistribution cannot continue
A new study by the non-partisan Economic Innovation Group fines that “today the majority of counties in America rely on transfers for a significant portion of their income, while low-transfer places have gone from the norm to nearly extinct.” This is hard to imagine but the total amount of income transfers to Americans in 2022 would, if split evenly among all residents, among to $11,500 per person, and amount to almost 18% of total personal income in the country, up from 8% fifty years ago. The primary reason is the aging of the population and rising health care costs, not a large increase in the number of poor people. If the US doesn’t fix this situation, we face a very bleak financial future but it’s unclear that any leading politicians have the courage even to talk about it.
The Great Transfer-mation Project 2024 - Economic Innovation Group (eig.org)
Great analysis by Roger Pielke: The American Growth Imperative - by Roger Pielke Jr. (substack.com)
Don't forget Stein's law: “If Something Cannot Go on Forever, It Will Stop“ (cepweb.org)
(I may not actually talk about this on the show much because I'm going to try to get a guest from EIG to discuss it.)
One More Thing: Pete Rose, RIP
My question for you, esp for baseball bans: Do you think he should continue to be barred from entry into the Hall of Fame? As far as I can tell, he only ever bet on his own team(s).
Embattled MLB legend Pete Rose, all-time hits leader, dies at 83 - ESPN
Today's Guests
Trey Yingst is a war correspondent for Fox News and author of the new book (published today) Black Saturday: An Unfiltered Account of the October 7th Attack on Israel and the War in Gaza:
He joins us to talk about the "limited" Israeli ground invasion of southern Lebanon.
Craig Ferguson is one of the biggest names in comedy over the past couple of decades. He's playing at Comedy Works Downtown at Larimer Square on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights but last time I checked the Saturday shows were sold out already.
Craig Ferguson | Live in Denver | Comedy Works
Blythe Figurelle (awesome name!) is Vice President of Fraud Education, Experience & Advocacy at USAA. We'll discuss the newest trends in online scams, who's most at risk, what to look out for, and how to avoid being scammed.
Amber McReynolds is a former election official who has also done work with the US Postal Service. We'll discuss some recent claims by Heidi Ganahl and others regarding claimed risk to election security. I think one of them is probably nonsense (WiFi cards in tabulating machines), one of them might be real (USPS handling of undeliverable ballots), and one of them is legit (insufficient camera coverage, both in terms of closeness and picture resolution, of ballot dropboxes.).
Other Stuff
Less than expected but still bad (for China, which doesn't bother me.) The question is whether it will impact export prices (meaning import prices for America.) Of course, with stupid politicians like Biden and Trump, they'll impose tariffs to prevent Americans from getting the benefit of lower prices.
A truly remarkable (and excellent) shift in energy policy from Democrats. I bet some of the stupidest environmentalists are shaking with faux anger: United States approves $1.52B loan to restart Michigan's Palisades nuclear plant - UPI.com
Interesting story, and then FASCINATING update:
What do you think explains this? America’s Young Men Are Falling Even Further Behind - WSJ
What's your gut reaction? "I'll give it a try." "Oh, hell no!" Or "I'm so excited!" M&M’s first new flavor in years has some candy lovers feeling less than sweet: ‘F–k that’ (nypost.com)
These numbers are staggeringly large: NRF | NRF and Appriss Retail Report: $743 Billion in Merchandise Returned in 2023
Target quietly changes store returns policy to battle customer abuse (nypost.com)
I think there’s a good chance the judge gets overturned, but we’ll see…and could it impact the presidential election? Judge strikes down Georgia ban on abortions - POLITICO
A speech worth reading from the prime minister of Italy: Italy’s Giorgia Meloni: Why the West Is Worth Defending | The Free Press (thefp.com)
For Android nerds: Epic Games sues Google and Samsung over phone settings | AP News
If you vote in CD3, here's the final debate between Jeff Hurd (r) and Adam Frisch (D). It starts about about 1:15 into this video (one hour and 15 minutes, not 1 minute and 15 seconds.)
This is an insane number: How Helene and other storms dumped 40 trillion gallons of rain on the South | AP News
And another effect of Hurricane Helene: Hurricane Helene puts U.S. hospitals at risk of IV fluid shortage (axios.com)
I guarantee you there are political people asking "Are the areas hardest hit by the hurricane mostly Republican-leaning or Democrat-leaning?" Helene adds stress to election in North Carolina (axios.com)
Today's Videos
This is actually kinda interesting (as well as being funny)
Doesn't everyone need a cute cat video today?
MUCH MORE IMPORTANT