On March 23, the US Senate passed a $1.2 trillion spending bill, presumably bringing an end to months of congressional combat, “stopgap” measures, etc., by accepting the House version of that bill without amendments that would require renegotiation.

As is usual with big government spending bills, it’s hard to get one’s mind around the total without dividing it by the number of people expected to pick up the tab.

In this case, my rough calculation (based on the round number for the total and the latest estimates of US population is that the US government just ordered every man, woman, and child in America (yes, this means you) to cough up about $3,600.

Not all at once, of course. Much of it just will be borrowed and added to the “national debt” — currently about $35 trillion — with you as collateral. You didn’t apply for a loan, or co-sign the loan, but when the US government borrows money, it implicitly offers up your future earnings as guarantee of payment.

As I write this, Congress owes its creditors about $35 trillion, leaving you on the hook — or so they claim, anyway — for more than $100,000.

And no, they’re not making any effort to pay that debt down. They’re continuing to borrow, and continuing to let the borrowed principal increase even as interest payments on that principal constitute an ever-growing portion of their annual spending.

As economist Herbert Stein noted in 1986, “if something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”

The borrowing can’t go on forever, for two reasons:

First, ever-increasing “debt service” — payments of interest which never reduce the principal still owed — will eventually grow to more than the size of any plausible federal budget.

Second, as it becomes more and more clear that that principal will never be honestly repaid (at best, some kind of “trillion-dollar coin” scam might be contrived to screw creditors while supposedly “paying” the bill) and that even paying interest is getting questionable, fewer and fewer potential creditors will be willing to buy US government debt.

The borrowing will end sooner or later. It will end with, at the very least, de facto default, and possibly with the dissolution of the US government as we know it.

On the whole, I think that’s good news along the lines of finally kicking out a housemate who keeps stealing and selling household items to cover his gambling losses.

But, make no mistake, most Americans will end up much poorer than we believe ourselves to be at the moment. The fallout may make the Great Depression look like the Good Old Days.

When that time comes, make sure you have something in your wallet besides Federal Reserve Notes. “The full faith and credit” of the US government is only worth the paper it’s printed on because most people still don’t understand that they’re being conned.

When they DO start understanding that, they’re going to start demanding gold, silver, or cryptocurrency on the barrelhead. There’s no time like the present to start moving in that direction yourself.

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 2022, The Daily Beast reports, Adaptive Driving Beam (ADB) headlights for automobiles became legal in the United States — but still aren’t available because, the Alliance for Automotive Innovation says, conflicting National Highway Traffic Safety Administration regulations make their implementation “practically impossible.”

ADB headlights arguably save lives in two ways:

First, they reduce the glare of oncoming high-beam headlights. If you’ve been driving for long, you’ve probably found yourself momentarily blinded when an approaching driver forgot to dim his lights. That’s dangerous.

Second, they provide adequate light in situations where a driver might not otherwise see a pedestrian or cyclist. According to the American Automobile Association, 77% of pedestrian deaths occur at night, and 64% of drivers don’t regularly use their high beams.

ADB headlights adapt to put the right amount of light in the right places — less light in an oncoming driver’s eyes, more light on a pedestrian crosswalk next to a burnt-out street light.

Even with instant approval, the long life of the average car means that ADB headlights would take years to completely supplant “traditional” headlights … and NHTSA pettifogging keeps pushing that time further and further out into the future.

As of 2022, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association, moving vehicles killed more than 7,500 pedestrians — more than 20 per day.

Not all of them at night, not all of them due to low visibility or improper headlight technique, of course, but let’s conservatively assume that widespread adoption of ADB headlight technology would knock the number down by 10%. That’s two lives per day, 730 per year, saved.

I suspect the impact would be much larger, but saving even 730 lives per year by GETTING OUT OF INNOVATION’S WAY seems like a better outcome than causing 730 unnecessary deaths per year by needlessly stalling.

Unfortunately, ABD headlights are far from the only innovation that gets caught up in the cycle of government approval:

1. Something’s invented that might make things better; but
2. The US government forbids its adoption; until
3. The US government allows its adoption, but only under arbitrary and irrational conditions; after years of fighting,
4. The US government finally allows its adoption; then
5. The US government requires its universal implementation without regard to whether producers or customers actually want it.

Steps 1 and 4 make your life better. They make you safer, healthier, and wealthier.

Steps 2, 3, and 5 negatively impact your life, your health, and your bottom line, no matter how much “for your own good” lecturing accompanies them.

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

Depending on whom you listen to about the constantly shifting horse race we call a US presidential election, either Joe Biden or Donald Trump is always ahead or behind by a nose … nationally. For example, a March 7-13 Ipsos/Reuters poll has Biden at 39% and Trump at 38%, while a March 10-12 Yougov/Economist poll shows Trump at 44% and Biden at 42%.

Among the many problems with national polling the single biggest one is that presidential elections aren’t national. Winning a state by one individual vote brings with it as many electoral votes as winning it by a million individual votes. It’s theoretically possible to win the presidency with only 23% of individual votes  cast nationwide. In practice, the differential between popular and electoral victory is never THAT wide, but it remains the case that national polling tells us little about the likely outcome.

Presidential elections almost always come down to a handful of states, and often to razor-thin margins in those states. In 2000, one state (Florida) and 537 individual votes (officially, anyway) settled the matter. The last two US presidential elections have been decided by less than 100,00 individual votes each in a few “swing” states.

Based on “solid,” “likely,” and “leaning” numbers, the site 270 To Win shows Joe Biden with 267 electoral votes pretty much in pocket, Trump with 219. Whoever hits 270 wins the election.

Unless something changes dramatically in the next eight months, which is quite possible, the election will be decided in four “toss-up” states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Biden can win the election with any one of them. Trump has to take all four.

There’s every chance that this election, like the previous two, will come down to a pool of voters ranging from “fairly large town” to “fairly small city” in size. It’s also quite possible that the winner will receive fewer votes nationwide than the winner.

If you’re thinking that doesn’t sound much like “democracy,” feel free to moan about the unfairness of the electoral college system. It won’t do you any good, but feel free anyway.

When you’re done moaning, consider this:

None of the candidates, nor anyone else, is qualified to rule “the United States,” or the people who live here.

That’s true regardless of HOW the ruler is chosen, and it doesn’t really matter much WHICH ruler is chosen.

Instead of worrying about who wins the presidency, we should be figuring out how to do away with the whole circus.

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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