Goodman Institute

At his ill-fated press conference last week, President Biden threw out a challenge to his Republican critics. Biden said, “Think about this: What are Republicans for? What are they for? Name me one thing they’re for.” Asked what his agenda would be if Republicans regained control of Congress, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell replied that it was “a very good question. And I’ll let you know when we take it back.”

Is that the best response the GOP can muster? What about being for no inflation, no shortages, no more lockdowns, safe neighborhoods, secure borders, energy independence and a foreign policy that doesn’t confuse our allies and embolden our enemies?

It’s the one thing that both the left and the right agree on: Democracy is being threatened as never before. The problem: Each side thinks the threat is coming from the other side. Evidence suggests that it is the threat from the left that should be the most worrisome, however. From using the FBI to spy on their enemies to using the IRS to release individual individual tax returns to criminalizing political differences and trying to imprison their opponents – it’s the anti-Trump forces that threaten to turn us into a banana republic.

The Build Back Better proposal is a 2,466-page bill with a realistic price tag of $4.7 trillion. Although it appears to be dead on arrival in the Senate, its backers hope to revive most of it. John Goodman says there are good reasons to hope they fail.

One reason is drug price controls. With lower returns to new drug development, there will be fewer lifesaving drugs. University of Chicago economist Tom Philipson estimates that the resulting loss of life would be 31 times as great as Covid-19 to date.