Opinion: Every time I think the inflation discourse can’t get dumber, I’m proven wrong

Republicans and right-wing media have argued, for instance, that President Biden has driven up energy prices as part of his supposed war on fossil fuels. Specifically, they blame him for shutting down the Keystone XL pipeline. They don’t mention, however, that this pipeline was only 8 percent built when Biden revoked a U.S.-side permit for its construction. So Biden did not actually shut down any existing supply. (It’s also not clear that the canceled XL pipeline would have much effect on U.S. gas prices, even if it were eventually built someday, given that most oil passing through it likely would be exported.) Or, Republicans say the real way Biden raised gas prices was by ending drilling for oil and gas on public lands. This didn’t actually happen, even if Biden’s campaign pledges and executive actions suggested it would. The Associated Press reported in July that the Biden administration was on track to approve more oil and gas drilling permits this year than were approved any year of the Trump administration — actually, more than any year since 2008. And last month, just a few days after the global climate conference known as COP26, the Biden administration conducted the largest offshore oil and gas lease sale in U.S. history. The main reason price growth is up has to do with constrained supply not keeping up with booming demand. That is, the pandemic has resulted in worker shortages, supply-chain disruptions and other bottlenecks in the United States and abroad. These problems are happening at the exact same time that cooped-up consumers are eager to buy even more stuff than they did pre-pandemic. Arguably, recent U.S. fiscal policy may have exacerbated this dynamic: Biden and the Democrats enacted stimulus payments and other government transfers earlier this year, which gave consumers more cash to spend. Now consumers are spending that cash. That could be one reason inflation is higher here than it is in, say, the euro zone — though inflation has reached record highs there, too. Aside from some vague rhetoric about Democrats’ “big spending” habits, though, those checks are not really what Republican politicians are criticizing Biden for. Perhaps with good reason: The spring stimulus checks were extremely popular, including among Republican voters. Plus, this line of attack might also implicate former president Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers, since they too passed multiple rounds of stimulus payments last year. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/12/02/every-time-i-think-inflation-discourse-cant-get-dumber-im-proven-wrong/

The exhausting, soul-sapping meanness of Lauren Boebert

From article But trolling is exhausting. It can take the wind out of you even if you aren’t the instigator or the target. Mean-spiritedness changes the atmosphere and the mood of the room. It’s not an invigorating intellectual argument that informs even as it enrages. It’s not an energizing and graceful debate that forces you to see someone’s beliefs in a new way. Trolling is hollow and cheap. It steals your appetite for engagement. It leaves you empty. It deadens us all. https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/11/30/exhausting-soul-sapping-meanness-lauren-boebert/

Why Everyone Is So Rude Right Now-In the minds of some of the individuals, snapping at the flight attendant is not rude, it’s civil disobedience.

Some people may have thought that, having been prevented from mingling with other humans for a period, folks would greet the return of social activity with hugs, revelry and fellowship. But in many ways, say psychologists, the long separation has made social interactions more fraught. The combination of a contagious, life-threatening disease and a series of unprecedented, life-altering changes in the rules of human engagement have left people anxious, confused and, especially if they do not believe the restrictions were necessary, deeply resentful. “We’re going through a time where physiologically, people’s threat system is at a heightened level,” says Bernard Golden, a psychologist and the author of Overcoming Destructive Anger. This period of threat has been so long that it may have had a damaging effect on people’s mental health, which for many has then been further debilitated by isolation, loss of resources, the death of loved ones and reduced social support. “During COVID there has been an increase in anxiety, a reported increase in depression, and an increased demand for mental health services,” he adds. Lots of people, in other words, are on their very last nerve. This is true, he adds, whether they believe the virus is an existential threat or not. “Half the people fear COVID,” says Golden. “Half the people fear being controlled.” Heightening the anxiety, the current situation is completely unfamiliar to most people. “Nobody expected what happened. We didn’t have time to prepare psychologically,” says Cristina Bicchieri, director of the Center for Social Norms and Behavioral Dynamics at the University of Pennsylvania. Then, just as it seemed like the danger had passed, other limitations arrived; staff shortages, product shortages, longer delivery times. “People think, ‘O.K, now we can go shopping and go out,’ and they find that life is not back to normal,” Bicchieri says. “There is an enormous amount of frustration.” It’s not a coincidence, psychologists say, that much of the incivility occurs towards people who are in customer service industries. “People feel almost entitled to be rude to people who are not in a position of power,” says Hans Steiner, emeritus professor of psychiatry at Stanford University. “Especially when they come at them, and remind them of the fact that they have to do their piece to get rid of this pandemic.” The workers who are now in charge of enforcing rules are traditionally regarded as caregivers and servers. The power dynamic has been completely upended. And of course, it’s always easier to punch down. “It’s displaced anger,” says Bernard. “They’re angry about other things but they take it out in those encounters.” It wasn’t like Americans were exactly overlooking their differences before the pandemic. Some researchers point to the increase in crude public discourse, both from political leaders and in online discussion—which encourages outsized emotions—as the gateway rudeness that has led to the current wave. “We don’t filter ourselves as much as we used to,” says Bernard. “On the internet, people feel like they can say anything. They no longer guard themselves. And I think they transfer that lack of filter into public life. I think from leadership that we’ve had in the last number of years, that’s only been more encouraged.” But it goes deeper: Impolite interactions are not the only thing that’s on the rise; crimes are too. “We’re seeing measurable increases in all kinds of crimes, so that suggests to me that there is something changing,” says Jay Van Bavel, associate professor of psychology and neural science at New York University, and co-author of a book on social harmony, The Power of Us, that came out in September. He suggests the reasons for the rise in both are structural and profound; America has lost sense of social cohesion, as a result of the widening gaps between the wealthy and working class. “The more inequality you get—which has gotten really bad in the last few decades—the less of a sense of cohesion there are across socioeconomic classes,” he says. “That’s something that if that’s not addressed is going to continue to cause turmoil.” There’s some international agreement that the situation may not just be one where people have forgotten their manners, or are out of practice because everyone had to stop shaking hands for a while. Matteo Bonotti and Steven T. Zech, both of the politics department at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, who wrote Recovering Civility During Covid 19, conclude that even if the people were initially bamboozled because they had to communicate using a new set of rules, that soon wore off. “At the very beginning [of the pandemic] people just didn’t know how to be polite,” says Zech. It was hard to communicate a smile, and it became necessary to avoid rather than embrace people. But after a certain point, the unintentional rudeness became intentional and deliberate. “It’s meant to call attention to what they see as this kind of unjust policy, some discrimination, or some infringement on some other right,” says Zech. In the minds of some of the individuals, snapping at the flight attendant is not rude, it’s civil disobedience. If the rash of bad behavior is not just short-term impatience with the unique situation and actually a symbol of something much deeper, then unwinding it will be more difficult than merely giving flight attendants more training on what to do with with mid-air contretemps, although that can’t hurt. Meanwhile psychologists suggest that people slow down, breathe out more slowly and lower their voices when encountering difficult social situations or irate people so as not to make any situation worse. “All of anger management,” says Golden, “involves pausing.” https://time.com/6099906/rude-customers-pandemic/

Day of The Dead Pandemic 2021

How Trump Steered Supporters Into Unwitting Donations

By Shane Goldmacher Published April 3, 2021Updated April 5, 2021 Stacy Blatt was in hospice care last September listening to Rush Limbaugh’s dire warnings about how badly Donald J. Trump’s campaign needed money when he went online and chipped in everything he could: $500. It was a big sum for a 63-year-old battling cancer and living in Kansas City on less than $1,000 per month. But that single contribution — federal records show it was his first ever — quickly multiplied. Another $500 was withdrawn the next day, then $500 the next week and every week through mid-October, without his knowledge — until Mr. Blatt’s bank account had been depleted and frozen. When his utility and rent payments bounced, he called his brother, Russell, for help. What the Blatts soon discovered was $3,000 in withdrawals by the Trump campaign in less than 30 days. They called their bank and said they thought they were victims of fraud. “It felt,” Russell said, “like it was a scam.” Mr. Trump’s hyperaggressive fund-raising practices did not stop once he lost the election. His campaign continued the weekly withdrawals through prechecked boxes all the way through Dec. 14 as he raised tens of millions of dollars for his new political action committee, Save America. In March, Mr. Trump urged his followers to send their money to him — and not to the traditional party apparatus — making plain that he intends to remain the gravitational center of Republican fund-raising online. A small yellow box and a flood of fraud complaints The small and bright yellow box popped up on Mr. Trump’s digital donation portal around March 2020. The text was boldface, simple and straightforward: “Make this a monthly recurring donation.” The box came prefilled with a check mark. How Trump Steered Supporters Into Unwitting Donations - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

The U.S. must punish sedition — or risk more of it

Stopping this rot in the political order will require accountability. That begins with the president, who deserves every legal and constitutional consequence our system offers. He should be impeached for sedition. He should be prevented from holding any further elective office. He should be stripped of all the perks of the post-presidency. He should be prosecuted for insurrection against the U.S. government. But the responsibility does not end with a single man. Many elected Republicans enabled the president’s political rise. Trump could only attempt the occupation of the Capitol because he had already occupied the Republican Party — in that case, with little resistance. Elected Republicans who cheered that takeover deserve to lose, and lose, and lose, until their party is either destroyed or transformed. There are also harder cases. Some elected Republicans did more than spread the lies that empowered the insurrection. They voted to confirm those lies after the Capitol had been assaulted. Not even physical danger — not even the humiliation of their country and the attempted murder of their colleagues — could overcome their moral cowardice and political ambition. That justifies ethics investigations of people such as Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and McCarthy, leading to their possible expulsion. These legislators urged surrender to the pernicious lies and seditious demands of violent insurrectionists who had just left the building. That is the betrayal of the oath they took to defend the Constitution. This is the sad reality of our beleaguered democracy: If the United States does not punish sedition, we will see more of it. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-us-must-punish-sedition--or-risk-more-of-it/2021/01/11/97907746-5438-11eb-a931-5b162d0d033d_story.html

Let the anti-constitutional Republicans reveal themselves

This attack on the constitutional order has led Republican populism into direct conflict with conservatism. Those who once claimed to endorse law and order have come to endorse lawless attacks on the public order. Those who once called themselves constitutionalists now treat the constitutional system with contempt. Those who once warned against tyranny now submissively serve a president with authoritarian pretensions. Those who once stood for federalism now demand that the federal government invalidate state-run elections. Those who once demanded judicial restraint now want courts to overrule democracy on a breathtaking scale. This is a movement fueled by high-octane hypocrisy. ~Michael Gerson, Conservative writer for President George W. Bush https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/let-the-anti-constitutional-republicans-reveal-themselves/2021/01/04/d3fafee0-4eb6-11eb-83e3-322644d82356_story.html