“Politics,” political consultant Bill Miller told (reminded?) us in 1991, “is show business for ugly people.”

The last couple of weeks of a presidential election cycle always put that timeless truth on steroids, especially but not only when one of the candidates is a billionaire former “reality TV” star whose idea of closing the deal is having himself filmed looking befuddled by the process of donning an apron (someone else eventually tied it for him) before glad-handing a few carefully selected “customers” at a (closed) McDonald’s  in a desperate attempt to generate “regular guy” vibes.

That candidate’s major party opponent could have used a few weeks of intensive training with a drama coach to help her move beyond carefully curated answers to softball questions and cackles on cue.

If Kamala Harris manages to come off as ever so slightly less cognitively impaired than Donald Trump, she also comes off as a great deal more boring.

The whole show would represent a ratings bomb if we didn’t let it get under our skins and sell itself as far more important than it really is.

So, a reminder: Outside the political circus tent, the real world still exists.

As an anarchist, one thing I like to point out to friends who still maintain an attachment to the whole idea of political government is that the biggest parts of most of our lives are already separated from that idea.

On a day-to-day basis, how much does it REALLY matter, to your life and how you live it, who the president is or which party controls Congress?

Does Donald Trump tell you what to eat for breakfast?

Does Kamala Harris whisper recommendations in your ear for bets on next week’s football games?

Do you care what the Speaker of the House thinks about music, or which dramedy the Senate Majority Leader can’t wait to see?

Do you love your partner, parents, or children any more or less because some politician lectured you on the matter?

For better or worse, I chose a career related to politics several decades ago. Most of you didn’t.

Most of you are factory workers, fry cooks, engineers, truck drivers, etc., 40 hours a week or more (I’ve been the first two myself).

Most of you are parents, children, siblings, partners, etc. 24/7/365, no matter which politician occupies which office.

If you can’t bring yourself to turn away from and stop staring at the combination train wreck / dumpster fire that we know as politics, at least make sure you don’t forget those other things.

They’re far more important and, really, far more interesting.

The current show will end. Unfortunately, it always gets rebooted. Whether you watch, and how intently, is up to you.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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The last few weeks (sometimes the last few months) of a presidential election cycle always leave me feeling somewhat burnt out. As a political columnist, I prefer to focus on events, policy, and principles rather than on the horse race. I’m really not very invested in which “major party” politician lies convincingly enough, to enough voters, to get hold of the One Ring and attempt (with little success, thankfully) to rule us all for the next four years.

Unfortunately, a political columnist lives and dies by the news cycle, that news cycle dominates the last few weeks, and at this point even stories about other subjects tend to turn back to their possible election effects. That leaves me without very much of interest to write about unless I want to talk nuts and bolts politics.

Fortunately, one of the hats I wear other than political columnist is election outcome predictor, and I’m fairly good at it. I’ve correctly predicted the winner, and the outcomes in 48 of the 50 states, three presidential elections in a row now.

So let’s do this. My prediction (issued on September 21) is:

Kamala Harris: 319 electoral votes, Donald Trump 219.

At the time of that prediction, my main focus was on “who’s in the driver’s seat?” Harris was scoring field goals and plodding toward victory while Trump kept making long “Hail Mary” passes hoping for touchdowns and failing to complete. That remains the case.

At this point, it would take a heck of an “October surprise” to change the trajectory. We’re down to two closely related factors.

The first factor is turnout. Most voters have decided who they like best. It’s all about getting those voters to actually fill out ballots. Harris enjoys the support of a long-existing, very successful Get Out the Vote machine. Trump handed his turnout operation to an outside group with little experience and it showed, although Elon Musk is trying to help out with tens of millions of dollars for last-minute direct mail and door-knocking.

The second factor, which tends to reduce Musk’s ability to impact things, is early voting.

As of October 18, according to the University of Florida’s Election Lab, more than 12 million Americans had already voted and another 56 million mail ballots had been requested (many of which are likely already on their way back via the Postal Service).

To the extent that those votes can be tracked by party registration, Democrats have cast more than half again as many early votes as Republicans. Early voting is heaviest in the “swing states” where relatively few votes will likely determine the outcome.

A vote in the hand may not be worth two in the bush, but it’s worth more than one.  Election Day votes may never happen due to flat tires, emergency trips out of town, etc. Early votes aren’t in the bush, they’re in the bank.

Harris has momentum. Trump’s stuck with inertia.

So there you have it — my writer’s-burnout-induced human sacrifice to this year’s election news cycle gods. You’re welcome.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

In early October, the US Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Garland v. VanDerStok, a case disputing the Biden administration’s attempts to regulate “ghost guns” — firearms built at home, often from pre-supplied parts kits, rather than manufactured in mass quantities and sold with individual serial numbers.

The issue, Justin Jouvenal writes at the Washington Post, is “whether weapons parts kits that can be readily assembled count as guns under the Gun Control Act, and whether a partially completed frame or receiver … can be regulated under the same law. The case does not directly implicate Second Amendment rights.”

Except, of course, that it does. Like a forlorn stood-up date, the Second Amendment continues to exist even if those who pretend they’re going steady with it pretend it doesn’t. It’s part of “the Supreme Law of the Land,” and its grammatical and historical meaning is unambiguous: Any law or regulation which infringes “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” is unconstitutional and, therefore, void.

The Supreme Court’s job isn’t to determine whether an unconstitutional regulation conforms to the meaning of an unconstitutional law.

The Supreme Court’s job is to forbid enforcement of the unconstitutional.

When the court ghosts the Second Amendment, it does the opposite of its job and empowers criminals to impose their law-violating ways on the rest of us.

Cute repartee — like justice Samuel Alito’s leading question of whether an assortment of uncooked ingredients constitutes an omelet, and just Amy Coney Barrett’s smug retort (“Would your answer change if you ordered it from Hello Fresh?)” doesn’t change that.

While it’s true that a box containing an unfinished receiver and a kit for completing that receiver is, by definition, not a firearm and therefore can’t be regulated under the Gun Control Act, it’s also true that the Gun Control Act isn’t a law because it conflicts with a higher law that forbids its existence and enforcement.

When the  justices avoid that issue and  instead spend time entertaining specious arguments over word meanings in unconstitutional regulations, they’re not “working” — they’re loitering and kibitzing. If they were honest about what they’re doing, they’d resign, or at least dock their own pay for the wasted time.

It’s also true that even if the Second Amendment and the Supreme Court didn’t exist, all human beings would still enjoy an unalienable right to create (or acquire through voluntary purchase, trade, or gift) and possess any weapons  it pleased them to have.

Fortunately, neither the Biden administration nor the Supreme Court have any actual power to make Americans’ hundreds of millions of guns disappear. They can get away with verbally ghosting us — but we can, and certainly will, physically ghost them and their diktats.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY