Sep
26
2025

I Don't Think I Have That Excuse

Jeff Maurer accepts an article contribution from President Donald J. Trump, who confesses: Tylenol Is Why I’m Like This.

“Don’t take Tylenol.” I said that at my press conference. RFK Junior was there, he’s doing a great job, and he’ll tell you: This is bad stuff, this Tylenol. There are studies — millions of them, some of the most…best, greatest studies anyone’s ever ever seen — showing there are problems. Mothers take these things, and their kids — yikes! You do not want to see these kids.

The doctors and scientists…the so-called experts…promoted by the failing New York Times, and other places that are full of lies, full of lies and hatred for Trump, are telling you this stuff is fine. “There are scientists,” they say, “other scientists than the first scientists, and they don’t agree that Tylenol is bad — ‘take it by the handful!’” they say. But it’s bad, very bad. “How do you know?” they say. Well here’s how I know: Tylenol made me like this.

When I was born, they’d give pregnant women anything. “Here, have some cigarettes,” they’d say, “Enjoy your flipper baby” — do you remember the flipper babies? They were on TV, with the arms — they play ping-pong with their feet, it’s incredible — but they’ve got arms like little chicken wings, very sad. And my mother — she always had a big thing of Tylenol, it was like a mayonnaise jar — big thing of Tylenol in the cabinet. And now I’m like this, and you’re telling me that’s a coincidence? No. No coincidence. No way.

I'm not sure about the article's authenticity. There's no Random Capitalization, and it doesn't end with "Thank You for Your Attention to This Matter!" But otherwise, it kinda sounds like him.

Also of note:

  • Just a reminder that we dodged a bullet last year. Billy Binion notes that, in her just-released campaign post-mortem: Kamala Harris slams Trump for 'fentanyl dealer Ross Ulbricht' pardon.

    I confess I haven't read 107 Days, Kamala Harris' new memoir about her short-lived presidential campaign, cover to cover. But I did read at least one sentence, and it was a doozy.

    "The Justice Department is going after Trump's enemies list," the former vice president writes, "while Trump supporters have been pardoned and released: January 6 rioters who attacked police, the fentanyl dealer Ross Ulbricht, numerous tax cheats."

    Ah, Ross Ulbricht, the fentanyl dealer who was not convicted of actually dealing fentanyl—or any drug—himself.

    Ulbricht was sentenced to life in prison for his role in operating the Silk Road, an online marketplace where people could buy and sell illicit drugs. "By punishing Ulbricht as if he personally distributed narcotics, the government set a dangerous precedent for internet platforms and personal liability in the digital age," wrote Editor in Chief Katherine Mangu-Ward in the April issue of Reason. "Pressure to hold platform operators liable for everything from misinformation to sex work has grown in the past decade as Ulbricht and his supporters—especially those in the libertarian and cryptocurrency communities—fought for his freedom."

    It's one of the good things Trump has done. If only…

  • I heard you wondering: Can Trump fix the deficit by attacking the Federal Reserve? Well, Jessica Riedl has the answer for you, Bunkie: Trump Can’t Fix the Deficit by Attacking the Federal Reserve. (And, really, were you seriously wondering about that?)

    President Trump has declared war on the prized independence of the Federal Reserve in an attempt to essentially run monetary policy out of the White House. He has attempted—illegally and on dubious grounds— to fire Fed Gov. Lisa Cook, threatened to fire Chairman Jerome Powell, and installed a top White House economist into a key Federal Reserve position. This White House pressure surely drove the Fed’s decision to reduce rates by 0.25 points on September 17.

    Going to war against the Federal Reserve seems baseless when current interest rates—while above the anomalous 2010s levels—are not high by historical standards. Moreover, rates are not holding back the current economy, and they may even be too low to combat the recent inflation uptick. However, President Trump has offered an additional argument: Lower interest rates would reduce Washington’s interest on the national debt, “saving us $1 Trillion per year” in reduced budget deficits. This sacrificing of Federal Reserve independence to help the Treasury sell cheaper debt is known to economists as “fiscal dominance.”

    Setting aside legitimate concerns over central bank independence and the illegal firing of Fed officials, would fiscal dominance really provide substantial budget deficit savings? The clear answer is no.

    Jessica points out that it's the buyers of US government bonds that determine the interest Uncle Stupid has to pay to fund his past and present deficit spending. Trump must know this, right? I mean, … right?

  • Speaking of promulgators of bullshit… Samuel J. Abrams detects one at the helm: When the American Association of University Professors President Pretends There’s No Evidence, Academia Loses Credibility.

    The president of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), Todd Wolfson, was recently asked a straightforward question by the Chronicle of Higher Education: Why are there so few conservatives in the professoriate? His response should trouble anyone who cares about the future of higher education. “It depends on the field,” Wolfson said, before adding, “I would love to see the data on that. If there is actually data, I’d really love to see it.”

    This wasn’t curiosity. It was evasion. The evidence Wolfson pretended not to know about has been gathered for decades, replicated across methodologies, and published in countless outlets. To act as though it may not exist is either willful ignorance or deliberate denial. In either case, it’s unacceptable for the leader of an organization whose very historic mission has been to safeguard academic freedom and integrity.

    My only gripe with Samuel's headline is that it seems to presume that adcademia has any credibility left to lose.

  • "Occasionally he stumbled over the truth but he always picked himself up and hurried on as if nothing had happened." A quote often attributed to Churchill, and it's what comes to mind reading Art Carden's Daily Economy article: 'Abundance' of Contradiction: Progressives Discover Public Choice.

    Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson is not a book for libertarians or conservatives, and I had to remind myself of that frequently. Its implied reader is a member of the left in good standing who parks a Subaru Outback or Toyota Prius with a fading “Biden/Harris” bumper sticker on it in front of a house with one of those “In This House We Believe” signs in the front yard. Abundance is a book for those for whom the important word in “public transportation” and “public education” is not “transportation” or “education,” but “public.” It is a message from people who love government to people who love government.

    And while it’s a pretty good message, on the whole, I read it with mixed feelings. I would have welcomed a much more full-throated defense of classical liberal institutions, but Klein and Thompson are progressive liberals, not classical liberals, and so I’m left to take what I can get. I therefore welcome their effort to put “market progressivism” on the political map. Could the left have picked a better book of the moment? Yes. Could they have done much worse? Also, yes.

    I still have my eye out for the Klein/Thompson book at the Portsmouth (NH) Public Library. I left my ideological comfort zone in my last library pick (see below), and felt I should read something less contentious. Maybe in a couple weeks…

Recently on the book blog: