Way Too Soon To Say January 24, 2022January 23, 2022 The Democrats Can Still Prevail in the Midterms. It’s way too soon to say. One thing I’m looking forward to: Republicans voting for lower prescription drug prices (that would be great!) or, more likely, against — which would help us unseat them. Republicans voting for universal pre-K (that would be great!) or, more likely, against — which would help us unseat them. Likewise, all the other Build Back Better components most voters would love to see that Republicans in the House and Senate block. Likewise, too, all the measures to make voting easier. I don’t think most Republican voters support longer lines for blacks than whites, even though their elected representatives emphatically do. If the outcome of the mid-terms is uncertain, as it surely is, one thing I think we do know for sure is that wealth (and after-tax income) inequality have hurtled through the guard rails. If there ever were any. . . . While the wealth of the world’s 10 richest men more than doubled during the pandemic — increasing from approximately $700 billion to $1.5 trillion between March 2020 and November 2021 — the incomes of approximately 99% of people around the globe fell during that time, and more than 160 million people have been forced into poverty . . . The new Oxfam report attributes one death every four seconds to this inequality. Even if that’s a gross exaggeration and it’s only one death every ten or twelve seconds, it may still be a problem for people of good will to consider. One such person is Abigail Disney, profiled on yesterday’s CBS Sunday Morning.* I don’t believe there should be any absolute limits on income or wealth; but I do think taxes on extreme income and wealth should be high — far more difficult to avoid. (But that the more you pay, the more effusive should be the thanks of a grateful nation. Thanks, I would argue, are deserved. But in any event cost us nothing — and might at least marginally help the medicine go down.) *The best weekly show on broadcast TV; set your DVR. BONUS: Solar-assisted cars are coming!