Pity the landlord. In communist China in the 1940s and ’50s, landlords became “class enemies” and were publicly denounced in “speak bitterness” campaigns. An estimated one million to two million of them were murdered.
Today Chairman Mao has morphed into the friendlier face of Mayor Mamdani. Government isn’t murdering landlords, but even as Zohran Mamdani denies that the democratic socialism he champions is communism, he has embraced the same vilification and targeting of landlords.
In mid-July, the New York mayor released a report with 23 policy actions on everything from building inspections to combating mold. The report’s title gives away the game: the “Rental Ripoff Hearing Report.” Reading it, you would think there isn’t a single landlord in the city who treats his tenants decently and keeps his buildings in good repair.
There’s a method to Mr. Mamdani’s madness. Even the barest acquaintance with the record of rent control and other government efforts to keep housing costs down by subsidizing rents or artificially capping them shows they usually end in failure. The mayor will need to deal with the coming failure or distract attention from it.
Enter Saul Alinsky, the community activist in Chicago who wrote “Rules for Radicals.” For Mayor Mamdani, rule 13 offers a path forward: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
Reason‘s Jacob Sullum explains that “Trump keeps pushing legally dubious tariffs.” A slice:
According to a lawsuit that the Liberty Justice Center (LJC) filed last Friday on behalf of the U.S. businesses that will have to pay the Section 301 tariffs, the findings underlying Greer’s list are woefully inadequate. By and large, they fail to specify exactly how each of these countries has fallen short, how their supposed failures burden U.S. commerce, or why the new tariffs, which make no distinction between forced-labor products and other imports, can be expected to ameliorate the problem that the administration claims to be addressing.
Incumbent Republicans, you could have been running for reelection in a roaring economy, but a president addicted to tariffs wouldn’t let you.
Early voting starts in Minnesota, South Dakota, and Virginia on Friday, September 18, just 52 days from now. The cement is hardening in Americans’ perception of the economy, and that perception is negative. In fact, forget Democrats and independents for a moment; the most recent Pew Research survey found “the share of Republicans who say Trump’s policies have worsened conditions has risen from 18 percent to 28 percent, while the share saying they have improved conditions has fallen from 57 percent to 42 percent.” Overall, 60 percent of U.S. adults say Trump’s policies have made the economy worse, while just 20 percent say Trump’s policies have made the economy better.
Jessica Riedl tweets: (HT Scott Lincicome)
Notable that those churning out the “everyone was so much richer in the 1950s-1970s” oppression narrative overwhelmingly: 1) are too young to have experienced that era, and 2) have no serious economic or statistical qualifications to analyze that era. It’s empty rage bait.
The department rescinded guidance last week that treated statistical disparities between racial groups as sufficient evidence to trigger civil rights enforcement, even if there was no evidence that any particular person was intentionally mistreated.
The approach has made schools across America less safe by deterring administrators and teachers from disciplining certain disruptive and violent students out of fear that they would be accused of racial discrimination.
Rachel Lu reviews Howe’s and Patterson’s Why Postliberalism Failed.
