Sunday School 8/18/19

As I've just returned from a vacation to an undisclosed location, I only had time to pop in on one classroom today. And when it's Sunday and there's only time for one, it's time for Fox News Sunday (sorry, Chuck).

Dana Perino sat in for Chris Wallace today, and guests were White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow and Democratic presidential candidate Steve Bullock.  Let's look at highlights from Kudlow first.

• He doesn't see a recession coming and says the administration will stick with the ones it brung to the dance - regulation rollbacks, opening up the energy sector, and trade wars  - er, trade reform.
• New initiatives include "a good beef deal" with the EU and progress with Japan on agriculture and telecom stuff.
• The administration is looking at what Kudlow referred to as "Tax Cuts 2.0" which may be the 10 percent middle class tax cut that Trump promised last year. And he referenced an idea from Florida Senator Rick Scott about taking all the money we're getting from the Chinese tariffs and giving that back to taxpayers as tax cuts. When Perino questioned whether that was the money that Trump was using to shore up farmers (what is it up to no, $28B in farmer welfare payments?), Kudlow says there's room to do both.  They didn't discuss who is actually paying the tariffs, which seems to be American consumers and importers.
• Trump apparently likes to give us Christmas presents; he's delaying some tariffs that were supposed to go into effect next month until December 15th, mostly those impacting "big American consumer companies."
• Trade, security, Hong Kong are all part of our negotiations with China. 
• And yes, the conversations about Trump wanting to buy Greenland are serious. 

Moving on to Bullock, who's the only Western governor in the race since John Hickenlooper dropped out (blowing my Buttigieg-Hickenlooper wrap-around bumper sticker idea right out of the water):

• He sees himself as the 'get stuff done' guy, the one who has made progress and can do that again, in comparison to some of the progressives. 
• He thinks it's wrong that someone can buy the votes needed to get qualified for the September debate (Tom Steyer), versus actually talking to voters and getting the word out and having donors make small contributions (everyone else).
• Trump is messing with something that's always been bipartisan - US support for Israel - and he shouldn't be (and this is me talking, not Bullock, but Dems are falling right into his trap, like they do all the time).
• "Putting Ken Cuccinelli (Acting Director of USCIS) in charge of immigration would be like putting Putin in charge of election security." Bullock disagrees with using immigration as a divisive tool (another Trump success).
• He says that America First under Trump really means America Alone, and among other things, farmers don't want aid, they want trade - pushing back against Perino's assertion that the farmers are being made whole by the $28B in welfare going to them because of the trade wars.
• He's not running for Senate.
• The idea that Trump wants to purchase Greenland is a wild idea, no matter that Harry Truman had the idea first. You can go to the website Bullock created, isgreenlandgorsale.com for more information.

There was more, including a panel discussion about whether or not Barack Obama will make a Biden  endorsement, and whether or not Elizabeth Warren will take the progressive lead, leaving what's his name, the non-Democrat, in the dust.

See you around campus - hopefully we'll have a full slate of classroom updates next week.