Pun Salad

Proverbs 29:26:

Many seek an audience with a ruler, but it is from the LORD that one gets justice.

This may be Proverbs gently suggesting that I'm wasting my time tweeting at my Congresswoman and my state's Senators. Maybe just pray my ass off instead.

• A lot of people liked President Trump's address to Congress Tuesday night. But Kevin D. Williamson found it to be Wishful Thinking, Again. His three-word summary: "gross fiscal irresponsibility."

  Populism does not mean putting the American people first. Populism means telling the American people whatever it is they want to hear, even if it is bull and everybody knows it.

  Trump is a populist, and we're in deep fiscal doo-doo.

• Also unimpressed was Veronique de Rugy, who detected Trump's Economic Illiteracy on Display in Address to Congress.

  Many agree that Donald Trump came across as presidential during last night's speech to a joint session of Congress. He even came across as somewhat coherent. But if being presidential and coherent means raking up more debt, being a nationalist protectionist who believes in destructive "Made in America" and import-bashing policies, and railing against immigrants as if they were responsible for all of the crimes and welfare spending in the country, then it's hard to see any value whatsoever in being presidential and coherent.

  Mister, we could use a man like Calvin Coolidge again.

• Can you take another one? Try Ryan Bourne (at Cato), who descibes Trump’s Bad Economic Reasoning on Infrastructure. He finds two problems: (1) Trump's invocation of the Interstate Highway System was a poor example, because that was a "one-off". There's little evidence that there are any comparable infrastructure projects on the table today. (2) Holding up “creating millions of new jobs” isn't actually a good thing, if resources and opportunites are diverted from more productive application in the private economy. Good anecdote:

  Upon visiting an Asian country in the 1960s, Milton Friedman is frequently quoted as reacting to the absence of heavy machinery in a canal build by asking why the project was being undertaken by men with shovels. Upon being told it was a “jobs program,” he is said to have remarked: “Oh, I see. I thought you were trying to build a canal. If you really want to create jobs, then by all means give these men spoons, not shovels.”

  Also, you know who else was a big believer in "infrastructure creating jobs".

• Do you know exactly what Joe Biden does at UPenn? If so, please contact the proper authorities, because No One Knows Exactly What Joe Biden Does at UPenn.

  […] Biden’s spokesperson says he isn’t teaching any classes, and the University itself isn’t sure what his plans are. UPenn spokesperson, Stephen MacCarthy, told the [student] newspaper that administrators weren’t able “to have conversations around [Biden’s] specific role until he left office four weeks ago, so details are still being ironed out.”

  I'm pretty sure he won't be teaching any math courses.