The Policy Trap

 I've been writing about the press' double standard for a while now, and as if on cue, we are about to have another example. Elections are NOT about policy, they are about "vibes". They always have been. 

What's more, the media do not care about policy as policy. What they want is to be able to play gotcha or to parse the problem with specific plans. Trump famously does not have any plans. He blathers on about "building a wall" or "stopping inflation" and the media just shrugs. 

Harris is planning on supporting a bill or administrative rule to stop price gouging at the grocery store. I presume the target will not be the grocery stores themselves, but the wholesalers and agribusiness that hold near monopolies and seemed to inflate prices for the purpose of padding their revenue, rather than responding strictly to their increased costs.

That proposal is going to get ripped to shreds by economists and experts as being akin to price controls, which are, in fact, bad. Whether or not it actually IS price controls is as yet unknown, but there will likely be some aspect of it and it will be savaged by the press for including anything resembling those price controls.

Meanwhile, Trump staged a photo op with breakfast cereal, said absolutely nothing of substance or merit and the news channels carried the whole thing live. I have yet to see the Times editorial board come out and rip Trump's nonsense to pieces. He even denigrated Medal of Honor winners, and they can't be bothered.

Here's Jon Chait taking a version of this approach. He's being fair in that some of Harris's ideas are not likely to make much of a dent in inflation, because inflation is largely cured. It's a way to harness anger against popular targets and represents smart politics but poor policy (though he does note she has some good policy ideas). This is probably as good a take as you are likely to see, but even so it comes in the form of a criticism.