Scott Bessent Tells Kristen Welker When Americans Should See Lower Prices
'Some are going to come down in weeks'
In Defense Of The Penny (Because Nobody Would Pay A Nickel For These Thoughts)
The penny’s detractors nickel and dime us to death with their arguments for efficiency over and against tradition.Trump Should Learn From J.D. Vance When It Comes To Talking About Prices And Affordability
If his vice president can do it, so can Trump.Explaining Mamdani’s appeal to the young, with polling
It’s a sad week for the de facto capital of the world, New York City. The epicenter of American finance, media, and dynamism now enters a self-imposed trajectory of decline.
But those of us on the populist right should not merely shake our heads and bemoan the extremism of Zohran Mamdani, frightening though it is. Instead, we must understand his appeal, so that we might effectively counter his un-American ideas and continue to build on our 2024 triumph by earning further big gains nationally among young voters.
We have much to learn from Mamdani, even though he is a dangerous Marxist. Establishment Republicans have no effective answer to this kind of populism.
Polling shows the pathway to that success.
First, the great news. Young voters have swung massively to the right over the last three presidential election cycles. President Trump won young men in 2024, and overall, voters 35 and under shifted materially from a +37% preference for the Democrats in 2016 to only a +13% preference in 2024, cutting the young adult margin by two-thirds in just over eight years. It represents a massive macro shift.
In addition, a new national poll of 2,100 voters ages 18-25 shows a substantial rejection of Democrats’ radicalism on key social issues, especially transgenderism and free speech. Simultaneously, young voters express extreme frustration with the current economy, creating a clear opening that Mamdani drove a campaign truck right through.
So, backed by data, here are the three lanes of success that Mamdani exploited.
‘Affordability’ is key
Even though all of his Marxist answers are wrong and immoral, Zohran is laser-focused on the issue that matters most to voters, especially younger ones. Most young citizens have not benefited from the massive run-up in asset prices in recent years. Without substantial holdings of equities or real estate, they struggle to afford the staples of life amid sky-high costs. Even worse, the job market got substantially tougher for young adults, adding even more angst.
These voters correctly blamed the Democrats for the pain of Bidenomics, but that anger has now shifted over to Republicans, fair or not.
Right now, per TIPP Insights polling, only 24% of young adults rate Trump’s performance on the economy as “good” or “excellent,” while 54% rate it as “poor” or “unacceptable.” On inflation, using letter grades, only 6% of young independents give the president an A, while 44% deliver an F.
Mamdani smartly dove into this issue. All his proposed solutions will only make inflation worse, of course, from “free” public transit to lavish benefits for illegal aliens. But regardless, he fixated on what matters to voters, especially young ones.
Media skills
After watching Mamdani throughout the campaign, it’s clear he hates the founding principles and history of the United States. He exemplifies how America’s immigration system — even its lawful pathways — too often imports people who reject the nation’s heritage rather than embrace it.
That said, as a media professional, I can only respect his acumen in front of the cameras.
In this new digital age, which President Trump helped create, successful politicians must be able to perform effectively. Mamdani exudes charisma and likeability. His youth and enthusiasm captivated voters, especially those in the streaming/TikTok spaces.
Media savvy combined with lots of ludicrous promises of freebies is a pretty powerful approach in this populist age. Young people are especially receptive to the heavy use of new/alternative media. TIPP Insights shows that only 31% of independent young adults have positive sentiment for legacy media, and only 34% of young women.
Focus on home
Perhaps the most compelling moment of the campaign for Mamdani was during the July debate, when all candidates were asked where their first foreign visit would be as mayor of New York. All of them said Israel, with Ukraine thrown in as well. But Mamdani gave a truly “New York First” answer instead, one that might well have been uttered by a MAGA partisan. He said, “I would stay in New York City.”
That answer clearly appeals to young voters, who are decidedly non-interventionist abroad. For example, a whopping 69% of young men think we “intervene too much in foreign conflicts.” Only 26% of young adults think the United States should remain involved in Ukraine if Putin and Zelenskyy cannot reach a settlement soon.
RELATED: The kids aren’t all right — they’re being seduced by socialism
That non-interventionism seeps over into a very negative view of Israel among young voters. Survey results found that only 25% of them have a positive view of Israel, versus 52% negative. Among young independents, only 18% have a positive view of Israel.
Therefore, Mamdani probably did not generate the blowback he deserved for extremist postures, such as embracing a pro-terror jihadi who was implicated, but unindicted, in the 1993 World Trade Center bombings.
We have much to learn from Mamdani, even though he is a dangerous Marxist. Establishment Republicans have no effective answer to this kind of populism, because their default is always “cut taxes for the wealthy and go to war.”
The MAGA movement has a very different vision — one that can appeal to reasonable young people in increasing numbers — to continue this patriotic, populist surge for decades to come.
Editor’s note: This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.
Jamie Dimon’s ‘cockroach’ economy is eating Main Street alive
Jamie Dimon has been running JPMorgan Chase for nearly two decades. The business press still hails him as the man who steered the bank through the 2008 financial crisis.
I’m less impressed. It’s easy to look steady at the helm when you’re floating on a $29 trillion sea of taxpayer bailouts.
This is what half a century of bipartisan corruption produces: a crony capitalist system that privatizes profit, socializes loss, and lets the rest of us drown.
Yes, Dimon saw the 2008 crash coming and made some smart adjustments ahead of the collapse. Credit where it’s due — barely. But once the dust settled, JPMorgan rewarded itself handsomely for surviving the storm.
JP Morgan said yesterday that its earnings "fell short" of their potential last year — but it still felt able to hand its investment bankers a 22 per cent increase in their bonuses.
Kicking off what could be a stormy reporting season, America's second-largest bank paid them $9.3bn, compared with $7.7bn in 2008. Total pay for its 222,315 employees came in at $26.9bn — 18 per cent from $22.7bn the year before — largely because of a sharp increase in bonuses paid throughout the bank. The announced sparked outrage among critics who described the figures as "obscene."
"Obscene" doesn’t begin to cover it.
So when Dimon made headlines a couple of weeks ago with his “cockroaches” comment, I didn’t rush to celebrate another round of supposed insight.
“When you see one cockroach, there are probably more, and so everyone should be forewarned of this one,” Dimon told analysts, referring to the bankruptcies of subprime auto lender Tricolor and auto-parts maker First Brands.
Dimon’s metaphor was awkward enough — he mentioned two cockroaches while warning about seeing just one. But worse, he got caught by the same kind of subprime rot that tanked the global economy in 2008.
“Dimon said that JPMorgan is reviewing its controls after the Tricolor bankruptcy and said the $170 million loss is ‘not our finest moment.’”
No kidding. His “cockroach detector” still doesn’t work.
Now Dimon is back in the headlines again for another round of supposed “foresight.”
“JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon warned in an interview that the stock market could be in line for a significant correction within the next few years amid heightened uncertainty. Dimon told the BBC that there is an elevated risk of a stock market correction in the next six months to two years, saying, ‘I am far more worried about that than others.’”
Glad to meet you, Mr. Dimon. Some of us have been worried for decades.
RELATED: America’s debt denial has gone global
Back in 1989, when my high-school history teacher asked the class to name America’s biggest problem, I said “the federal debt.” Not just because debt is bad, but because Washington was pretending deficits didn’t matter — and voters let them.
Nearly 40 years later, nothing has changed. The numbers are bigger. The lies are the same. Ignore a problem long enough, and it grows until it devours you.
Our economy isn’t a Mr. Potato Head toy, where government spending sits neatly apart from everything else. It’s one big pile of money — and the federal government keeps shoveling from the productive side to the wasteful side.
Every dollar borrowed for political vanity projects is a dollar you can’t use to start a business or buy a home. As the federal machine consumes more and more of the pool, it’s not the elites who get crowded out. It’s everyone else.
Poor people’s home mortgages are down 46%. Rich people’s art-collection loans are up 30%.
This is what half a century of bipartisan corruption produces: a crony capitalist system that privatizes profit, socializes loss, and lets the rest of us drown.
Look at Walmart. The company pulls tens of billions of taxpayer dollars a year through the SNAP program — the same program many of its employees rely on to eat because Walmart won’t pay them enough to live.
Independent research confirms it: Thousands of Walmart workers depend on Medicaid and food stamps.
Big government lets big business pocket our tax money on both ends — profits in private, losses in public. Even their labor costs get offloaded to us.
So when politicians wail about a “government shutdown” disrupting SNAP payments, remember who they’re really worried about. It’s not the families at the grocery store. It’s the corporations cashing in.
RELATED: Trump admin blames Senate Democrats for SNAP debacle: ‘The well has run dry’
A system this warped can’t last. You can call America the greatest nation in history if you like, but greatness doesn’t square with more than $38 trillion in government debt and record levels of personal debt.
Household debt, credit-card debt, mortgage debt — all at historic highs. Nearly a quarter of Americans are buying food on layaway. And 42% have zero emergency savings.
Meanwhile, Washington keeps inflating Wall Street’s floaties.
Main Street drowns while Big Government keeps Big Business comfortably above the surface.
Jamie Dimon thinks he’s just spotted the first cockroach. But the infestation started long ago — right inside the marble halls of Washington, D.C.
And if no one finally fumigates the place, the rot will force-condemn the entire country.
If Republicans Don’t Focus On The Economy, They’ll Lose In The Midterms Too
If Republicans don’t pass a tangible agenda over the next 12 months, they will face another electoral reckoning next fall.Stop feeding Big Tech and start feeding Americans again
America needs more farmers, ranchers, and private landholders — not more data centers and chatbots. Yet the federal government is now prioritizing artificial intelligence over agriculture, offering vast tracts of public land to Big Tech while family farms and ranches vanish and grocery bills soar.
Conservatives have long warned that excessive federal land ownership, especially in the West, threatens liberty and prosperity. The Trump administration shares that concern but has taken a wrong turn by fast-tracking AI infrastructure on government property.
If the nation needs a new Manhattan Project, it should be for food security, not AI slop.
Instead of devolving control to the states or private citizens, it’s empowering an industry that already consumes massive resources and delivers little tangible value to ordinary Americans. And this is on top of Interior Secretary Doug Burgum’s execrable plan to build 15-minute cities and “affordable housing.”
In July, President Trump signed an executive order titled Accelerating Federal Permitting of Data Center Infrastructure as part of its AI Action Plan. The order streamlines permits, grants financial incentives, and opens federal properties — from Superfund sites to military bases — to AI-related development. The Department of Energy quickly identified four initial sites: Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee, Idaho National Laboratory, the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Kentucky, and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
Last month, the list expanded to include five Air Force bases — Arnold (Tennessee), Davis-Monthan (Arizona), Edwards (California), Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst (New Jersey), and Robins (Georgia) — totaling over 3,000 acres for lease to private developers at fair market value.
Locating AI facilities on military property is preferable to disrupting residential or agricultural communities, but the favoritism shown to Big Tech raises an obvious question: Is this the best use of public land? And will anchoring these bubble companies on federal property make them “too big to fail,” just like the banks and mortgage lenders before the 2008 crash?
President Trump has acknowledged the shortage of affordable meat as a national crisis. If any industry deserves federal support, it’s America’s independent farmers and ranchers. Yet while Washington clears land for billion-dollar data centers, small producers are disappearing. In the past five years, the U.S. has lost roughly 141,000 family farms and 150,000 cattle operations. The national cattle herd is at its lowest level since 1951. Since 1982, America has lost more than half a million farms — nearly a quarter of its total.
Multiple pressures — rising input costs, droughts, and inflation — have crippled family farms that can’t compete with corporate conglomerates. But federal land policy also plays a role. The government’s stranglehold on Western lands limits grazing rights, water access, and expansion opportunities. If Washington suddenly wants to sell or lease public land, why not prioritize ranchers who need it for feed and forage?
The Conservation Reserve Program compounds the problem. The 2018 Farm Bill extension locked up to 30 million acres of land — five million in Wyoming and Montana alone — under the guise of conservation. Wealthy absentee owners exploit the program by briefly “farming” land to qualify it as cropland, then retiring it into CRP to collect taxpayer payments. More than half of CRP acreage is owned by non-farmers, some earning over $200 per acre while the land sits idle.
RELATED: AI isn’t feeding you
Those acres could support hundreds of cattle per section or produce millions of tons of hay. Instead, they create artificial shortages that drive up feed costs. During the post-COVID inflation spike, hay prices spiked 40%, hitting $250 per ton this year. Even now, inflated prices cost ranchers six figures a year in extra expenses in a business that operates on thin margins.
If the nation needs a new Manhattan Project, it should be for food security, not AI slop. Free up federal lands and idle CRP acreage for productive use. Help ranchers grow herds and lower food prices instead of subsidizing a speculative industry already bloated with venture capital and hype.
At present, every dollar of revenue at OpenAI costs roughly $7.77 to generate — a debt spiral that invites the next taxpayer bailout. By granting these firms privileged access to public land, the government risks creating another class of untouchable corporate wards, as it did with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac two decades ago.
AI won’t feed Americans. It won’t fix supply chains. It won’t lower grocery bills. Until these companies can put real food on real tables, federal land should serve the purpose God intended — to sustain the people who live and work upon it.
Bitcoin and the return of honest money
Bitcoin. Cryptocurrency. Blockchain. A decade ago, most Americans hadn’t heard those words. Even now, many don’t fully grasp what they mean. Some still dismiss Bitcoin as an internet fad — yet with one coin worth roughly $119,000, the joke is wearing thin.
The real story isn’t the price. It’s what Bitcoin represents: freedom, trust, and control over your own money. Those are conservative principles — and conservatives should embrace them.
Honest money for a dishonest age
In Denton County, Texans understand independence. We work hard, save what we can, and expect our money to keep its value. But Washington keeps printing dollars to solve political problems, and every new round of “stimulus” steals a little more of what Americans earn. That’s a big reason groceries, gas, and housing cost so much more today.
At its heart, Bitcoin isn’t about tech or speculation. It’s about trust — and keeping financial power in the hands of citizens instead of bureaucrats and corporations.
Bitcoin doesn’t play that game. Its supply is capped at 21 million coins forever. No bureaucrat or central banker can “stimulate” the economy by diluting your savings. It’s steady, transparent, and immune to the inflationary habits of modern government.
That’s not radical — it’s a return to honest value. Early Texans traded cattle, crops, and tools, and a handshake sealed the deal. Bitcoin is a digital version of that same trust: value backed by proof of work, not political decree.
Freedom in your own hands
Bitcoin is, at its core, a conservative idea. It rewards effort, limits government control, and protects personal liberty. You can own every rifle and round of ammunition in the world, but if the government freezes your bank account, you’re stuck. With Bitcoin, you control your money. Nobody can seize it.
The network itself is decentralized — millions of computers around the globe share the ledger. No single government, company, or regulator can shut it down. If one node fails, the others keep the system alive. It’s built to endure.
Lessons for a digital age
That model should guide how we build other technologies. Take artificial intelligence. Meta just poured $14 billion into one massive data center — a single point of failure. One cyberattack or natural disaster could wipe it out. America should follow Bitcoin’s example: distribute computing power, build smaller centers across the country, and bring skilled jobs to local communities like ours.
RELATED: ‘Lipstick on a pig’: How printing cash is destroying America — and crypto could be next
Bitcoin also saves money. Send $1,000 through a credit card processor and you’ll lose $40 in fees. Send it through Bitcoin and it costs about four cents. That difference matters to small businesses, churches, and local campaigns. Political donations in Bitcoin should be legal nationwide — transparent, secure, and independent of the big banks that profit from the current system.
A return to honest value
At its heart, Bitcoin isn’t about tech or speculation. It’s about trust — and keeping financial power in the hands of citizens instead of bureaucrats and corporations.
Here in Denton County, we understand that kind of freedom. It’s the same spirit that settled Texas: work hard, hold what’s yours, and keep government out of your pockets.
Bitcoin isn’t the future of money. It’s the return of honest money — and conservatives should lead the charge to make it America’s next great success story.
Big Government Locks Young People Out of the American Dream
Socialism, regulation, and other government policies are what have caused the affordability crisis that has arisen across the United States.The American dream now comes with 23% interest
You may not know Steve Eisman’s name, but you should. He was the investor who bet against Wall Street in 2008 and won big — to the tune of $800 million, with a current net worth in the neighborhood of $1.5 billion. If you saw “The Big Short,” Steve Carell played him as Mark Baum.
Americans are past living paycheck to paycheck. They’re living loan to loan.
These days, Eisman hosts “The Real Eisman Playbook” on YouTube. And like in 2007, he’s warning again — this time about the fragile state of the American consumer.
He isn’t alone. In a recent episode, Eisman spoke with Lakshmi Ganapathi of Unicus Research, who shares her grim view of the U.S. economy. Their conversation, combined with the data, paints a picture more alarming than most headlines dare admit.
Consumers are broke
“If you deduct the AI expenditures,” Eisman said, “... the U.S. economy is not even growing, really, 50 basis points, outside of AI.” In plain English: Without the artificial-intelligence boom, growth would be nearly flat at around 0.5% growth — likely even lower — not the 3.8% the Bureau of Economic Analysis reported for the second quarter of 2025.
Ganapathi didn’t mince words either. “Consumers are broke,” she said. “The monthly budget math no longer works.”
That’s what happens when Washington spends decades pretending math doesn’t matter. During COVID, federal “stimulus” checks poured roughly $800 billion into households. The cash wave briefly made millions look creditworthy — even as the underlying economy collapsed.
“Subprime consumers became prime,” Ganapathi explained. With reporting on student-loan and credit-card delinquencies suspended, millions suddenly looked like perfect borrowers. Credit scores soared to 700 and 800.
“They got a check that made them look richer than they actually were,” Eisman noted.
Banks then bundled those inflated loans into asset-backed securities — the same shell game that fueled the 2008 meltdown. The illusion of “prime credit” returned, this time wrapped in COVID relief and moral hazard.
The debt pyramid
Ganapathi described auto loans now stretching to 84 months — seven years — at 22% to 23% interest, which is credit-card territory. Americans collectively carry $1.2 trillion in card debt and $676 billion in car loans.
Add mortgages and student loans, and the numbers turn grotesque. Americans owe $20.83 trillion on homes, with an average interest rate of 6.37% on a 30-year note, and $1.81 trillion on student loans. We pay roughly $1.6 trillion a year in interest alone.
And since Washington nationalized student lending under Obama, it can now garnish wages indefinitely. “If you file for bankruptcy,” Eisman said, “your student loan stays with you.” A debt you can never escape — courtesy of your government.
The federal government owes $38 trillion but somehow pays a third less in interest. Fairness, D.C.-style.
Kicking cans and eating debt
Ganapathi noted that 90-day-plus credit-card delinquencies have doubled since 2021. Consumers are defaulting on car loans. Banks, desperate to avoid repossession losses, simply “modify” the loans and call them current — the same can-kicking that defines Washington’s budget process.
At this point, 69% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Nearly a quarter of them now use “buy now, pay later” services to pay for their groceries.
RELATED: Jerome Powell proves the Fed’s ‘independence’ is a myth
Yes — groceries.
Eisman spelled it out: People are literally financing food. They buy a week’s worth of groceries, then spend the next two or three months paying for them — often at interest rates that can hit 36% after a single missed payment.
Americans are past living paycheck to paycheck. They’re living loan to loan.
The illusion of prosperity
This is the real economy hiding beneath Washington’s sunny numbers — an economy where debt props up demand and borrowed time props up debt. It’s 2008 in slow motion, but this time it’s ordinary households, not hedge funds, holding the toxic paper.
When the middle class needs “by now, pay later” to eat, the “strong economy” line collapses into farce.
America’s consumers are tapped out, overleveraged, and fresh out of illusions. The only question left is how long the lenders — and leaders in Washington — can pretend otherwise.
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