Pondering the Pundits

“Pondering the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

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Paul Krugman: Delusions of Chaos

Last year there were 352 murders in New York City. This was a bit higher than the number in 2014, but far below the 2245 murders that took place in 1990, the city’s worst year. In fact, as measured by the murder rate, New York is now basically as safe as it has ever been, going all the way back to the 19th century.

National crime statistics, and numbers for all violent crimes, paint an only slightly less cheerful picture. And it’s not just a matter of numbers; our big cities look and feel far safer than they did a generation ago, because they are. People of a certain age always have the sense that America isn’t the country they remember from their youth, and in this case they’re right — it has gotten much better.

How, then, was it even possible for Donald Trump to give a speech accepting the Republican nomination whose central premise was that crime is running rampant, and that “I alone” can bring the chaos under control?

Iesha Evans: I wasn’t afraid. I took a stand in Baton Rouge because enough is enough

It was 1am in Queens, New York. I was 18 years old. My roommate and I just wanted to buy some juice on our journey home from working night shifts in Manhattan. But as we came up to the busy corner store, a white police officer stopped me. He searched me and asked for my identification. I didn’t understand why.

“I just need to make sure that you’re not a prostitute,” he said, projecting his voice so that all the customers in the store could hear. Their jaws dropped. I was so embarrassed. We went home without the juice.

Would this have happened if I were a white woman? I don’t think so. I wasn’t dressed in a provocative way. You have the right to wear whatever the heck you want – in New York, it’s legal for women to go shirtless – but still: I was wearing a knee-length skirt and a dark blazer. I wasn’t hanging on a corner. My head was not stuck inside a guy’s car.

I had been blinded to the fact that this, and so much worse, was going on in America. That racism, whether subtle or blunt, is systemic.

Robert Kuttner: Can Hillary Unite Center-Left And Left?

Hillary Clinton’s selection of Tim Kaine confirms that we’ve always known about her. Like her husband and like Barack Obama, Clinton is a creature of the center-left, and not the left. In an ordinary year, that would be just the ticket for winning the White House. This year, with anti-establishment sentiment at a boil, center-left may not quite be enough.

The differences between center-left and left can be charted in several distinct respects – ideology, policy, personnel, and passion. This year the Democrats will need to bridge all four. Can Hillary do it?

Her bet is that passion will take a care of itself. The threat of Donald Trump to core Democratic voting blocs (and to the Republic) ought to produce faithful support and high turnout. Tim Kaine is nobody’s idea of a radical, but the picture of Kaine as boring was wrong; he gives a rousing speech.

Barack Obama and Elizabeth Warren, no slouches, will be with Clinton-Kaine on the campaign trail.

There is some latent passion — the excitement of the first woman president — to be roused, if Clinton can find her best voice. Passion minus hate should be the high ground of this election.

What remains to be seen is whether Clinton can rouse the kind of excitement that Sanders, preaching drastic change, produced in the 2016 primary season; and that Obama, as a figure of the center-left, achieved in 2008 as a figure of hope and as a breakthrough African American president. Clinton lost to Obama that year in large part because she was not his match.

American has yearned for an outsider president, because the insiders have not delivered for regular people. And it is hard to get more insider than the Clintons.

This brings us to the role of ideology. The center-left story is that American capitalism needs adjustments around the margins. The left story is that the system is not delivering for most people, and needs what other countries would call social democracy if not some outright socialism.

James Cockayne: Way before the DNC maybe tried to sway the convention, the mob did

After a dramatic Republican National Convention in Cleveland which saw Donald Trump finally become the party’s official nominee, Hillary Clinton will this week accept the formal nomination of the Democratic Party.

US national conventions have always been big business opportunities. As one long-time ally of the Bush family reportedly said, “For people who operate in and around government, you can’t not be here.” Although some of the usual donors to the Republican National Convention, like Ford and UPS, stayed home this year, the host committee was able to raise nearly $60m from American businesses. Yet historically the “people who operate in and around government” are not only legitimate businesses but also, sometimes, less-than-legitimate ones.

Richard Wolffe: Hillary Clinton’s choice of Tim Kaine shows she’s the grown-up in this contest

One candidate paraded his veep choices through Twitter and openly mused about their qualifications. The other kept her shortlist confidential and her opinions private.

One had instant regrets about his decision. The other always seemed to be heading towards the same destination.

One needed a safe pick to balance his own volatility. The other chose a safe pick because they are kindred souls in earnest wonkery.

Both in the manner of their selection and the content of their character, the veep picks of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton open yet another chasm between the Republican and Democratic nominees.