OLD AND BUSTED: Partying Like It’s 1999.

The New Hotness? Partying Like It’s 2020! People are panic-buying toilet paper because of the port strike. There is no need for that.

Toilet paper shortages in stores across America are giving folks nightmarish reminders of the pandemic era. But the lack of toilet paper isn’t a direct result of a major port strike Tuesday. It’s because of panic buying.

Reports of shortages filled social media Tuesday, showing empty shelves where toilet paper and, to a lesser extent, paper towels were supposed to be.

“They cleaned out the toilet paper at my local Walmart in Virginia. Toilet paper hoarding 2.0!,” wrote one person in a post on X, along with a photo of empty shelves.

“Shelves at Costco & Target running low or out of paper towels in Monmouth County NJ,” posted another X user. “Seeing people buying TP & water too in reax to port strike. Costco employee told me they were sold out of TP/paper towels this am.”

But the strike at ports from Maine to Texas will have absolutely zero impact on the supply of these products.

The overwhelming majority — more than 90% by some estimates — of U.S. toilet paper consumption comes from domestic factories. Most of the rest comes from Canada and Mexico, which means it most likely arrives by rail or truck, not ship.

Jim Geraghty calls the longshoremen strike the “Self-Inflicted Dagger to America’s Economic Heart:”

In about as vivid an example of the “MacGuffinization of American Politics” as you’re ever likely to find, this morning the New York Times writes, “Scenes of striking workers, hurricane devastation in the Southeast and missiles over Israel represent a rare moment of turbulence for Kamala Harris.”

Yes, but this is also a “moment of turbulence” for everyone else, and perhaps a lot longer than a moment. For Harris, the International Longshoremen’s Association strike that has shut down every port on the East and Gulf Coasts is a political headache to overcome. The Democratic candidate has to finesse the reflexive, unthinking pro-union stance of Joe Biden and the ludicrous demands — a 77 percent raise for workers and zero automation — coming from Harold Daggett, the ILA boss. The guy who enjoys a $900,000 salary and drives a Bentley boasted that his strike would “cripple” the economy. (More on him below.)

* * * * * * * * *

The irony is that the dockworkers’ strike is just about the best friend Donald Trump could ask for right now and, as the Times suggested, a major headache for the Harris campaign. If everybody’s frustrated by higher prices and empty shelves in the coming weeks, does that make voters feel happier or less happy with the incumbent party? The strike is terrible for the hurricane victims, terrible for the economy, and terrible for the country as a whole. But as if that wasn’t bad enough, it’s terrible for the Democrats.

Why can’t the almost-82-year-old president see the logic of this? What’s it going to take to slap some sense into him?

Doug Emhoff?

Heh, indeed. Read the whole thing, if only for Daggett’s views on the E-ZPass automated toll collection system, which explains much about his Luddite worldview.

FL STATE GUARDSMAN: What The Media Is Telling You About Helene Is Complete Bullsh*t, Politicians Don’t Have A Clue And Are Lying. “Jonathan Howard with Florida State Guard Special Missions Unit assisting with aerial recovery in North Carolina following the damage of Hurricane Helene, delivered a video message explaining what is really happening on the ground…‘I don’t know why they’re doing it,’ Howard said of the federal response. ‘I don’t know what kind of conspiracy I’ve heard so many things, whatever you want to come up with, but they are literally allowing these people to f*cking die in the mountains right now because we can’t get helicopters. They got money for everything else in the f*cking world right now.’”

WHEN PEOPLE TELL YOU WHO THEY ARE, BELIEVE THEM: Biden-Harris: Ukraine and Illegal Immigrants First, Hurricane Helene Victims Last.

Even voices from the left are scratching their heads over the lack of engagement by both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

“To show this level of cavalier indifference just literally takes my breath away,” former Bill Clinton advisor Doug Schoen told Fox News on Tuesday.

The administration, likely trying to save face in light of the criticism, has since tried to appear more engaged, just barely. For example, the Biden-Harris administration announced Wednesday that a mere $750 would be provided to residents in states devastated by Hurricane Helene. Kamala Harris herself announced this federal aid herself.

“The president and I have been paying close attention from the beginning to what we need to do to make sure the federal resources hit the ground as quickly as possible, and that includes what was necessary to make sure that we provided direct federal assistance,” she said Wednesday. “And that work has been happening.”

She added, “And the federal relief and assistance that we have been providing has included FEMA providing $750 for folks who need immediate needs being met, such as food, baby formula, and the like. And you can apply now.”

Wow. Imagine losing your home, your livelihood, and possibly much more, only for the Biden-Harris administration to hand you a meager $750 if you apply. It’s a slap in the face—plain and simple.

This kind of “relief” is not only insulting, but it begs the question: how much more could have been done if we weren’t pouring taxpayer dollars into giving illegal aliens free housing and rent, or sending billions overseas to Ukraine? Priorities are clearly out of whack, and hardworking Americans are the ones paying the price.

Biden-Harris will question the patriotism of anyone who opposes more aid for Ukraine but can’t give more money to American citizens who’ve lost everything. Biden-Harris has unlimited resources to fly illegals across the country and give them free housing, but offers people who have lost everything less than the average weekly pay for middle class Americans.

Exit quote:

Related: Once again, America’s Newspaper of Record is doing straight-up reportage: North Carolina Asks Zelensky For $100 Billion In U.S. Funding.

ALL THIS AND WORLD WAR II: Having attempted to rehabilitate the Nazis and denigrate Winston Churchill last month, Tucker sets his sights on more immediate world events: Tucker Carlson: Do You Really Believe Iran Is a Threat?

I asked whether he meant the FBI’s assertion that there were teams of Iranian-backed groups in the US trying to kill Donald Trump. “You don’t really believe that, do you?” he interrupted. I denied it. “Okay, good. Because, you know, I’ve been around the block, and since 2003 it seems like everyone in the intel community shouts ‘Iran, Iran, Iran,’ every time there is a national security threat,” he said. “It’s truly shocking that people, especially those on the right, still believe that Iran is our greatest national security threat.”

I asked Tucker for his reaction to Mark Levin’s recent suggestion that the United States should treat Iran’s speculated involvement in the assassination attempts on Donald Trump as an act of war. He scoffed, “That’s truly deranged. Hard to believe and take seriously. Anyone who is repeating this line about Iran is a liar. Realistically, Iran does not want a hot war with the United States and has tried to avoid one for the last year. It is one of the most sinister lies out there.”

I asked him whether he thought, despite Donald Trump’s anti-war posturing and his selection of J.D. Vance as a running mate, the neocon/hawkish wing of the Republican Party had been fully ousted from influence of the electorate. “Are you kidding me? We haven’t exorcized the neocon establishment at all!” he said with a laugh. “You have to understand though that this is not a right/left thing. Just look at the second guy who tried to kill Trump. Fundamentally, he believes the same exact things that someone like Bill Kristol, David Frum, and Victoria Nuland believe.”

“That’s the scary thing. You have all of these people telling us that Iran, Russia, North Korea, are the greatest threats to our national security and I just simply don’t believe that,” he continued. “It really seems at this point that the Democratic Party and the national security establishment are in fact our greatest threats to national security.”

I know this is crazy talk, but maybe both could be worrisome in 2024.

Earlier: What Happened to Tucker Carlson?

Becoming a TV superstar can have deranging effects on anybody, as Carlson noted in his 2003 book. “If running for office can encourage you to imagine millions of supporters [who don’t exist], hosting a show can entirely separate you from reality,” he observed. “If you’re not careful, you can permanently lose all critical distance from yourself. One morning you wake up, and you’re living in your own irony-free world.”

That could be the world Carlson is living in today.

Could be.

OLD AND BUSTED: The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books. To read a book in college, it helps to have read a book in high school.

—The Atlantic, yesterday.

The New Awfulness? This Hartford Public High School Grad Can’t Read. Here’s How it Happened.

When 19-year-old Aleysha Ortiz told Hartford City Council members in May that the public school system stole her education, she had to memorize her speech.

Ortiz, who was a senior at Hartford Public High School at the time, wrote the speech using the talk-to-text function on her phone. She listened to it repeatedly to memorize it.

That’s because she was never taught to read or write — despite attending schools in Hartford since she was 6.

Ortiz, who came to Hartford from Puerto Rico with her family when she was young, struggled with language and other challenges along the way. But a confluence of circumstances, apparent apathy and institutional inertia pushed her haphazardly through the school system, according to Ortiz, her attorney and district officials.

Those officials, in statements that her attorney says display “shocking” educational neglect, have acknowledged that Ortiz never received instruction in reading.

Despite this, she received her diploma this spring after improving her grades in high school — with help from the speech-to-text function — and getting on the honor roll. She began her studies at the University of Connecticut this summer.

Ortiz can’t read even most one-syllable words. The words she can read were memorized during karaoke or from subtitles at the bottom of TV screens and associating the words she saw with what she heard, she said.

“I was pushed through. I was moved from class to class not being taught anything,” Ortiz told The Connecticut Mirror during a series of interviews. “They stole something from me … I wanted to do more, and I didn’t have the chance to do that.”

Ortiz was diagnosed with a speech impediment and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in early childhood and has been classified as a student with a disability for “as long as I can remember,” she said.

I have to give whoever diagnosed Ortiz with ADHD for being an early adopter to what is an increasingly universal trend: Is ADHD overdiagnosed and overtreated?

Yes to both. Next questions?

UPDATE:

‘AMAZING!’ Politico Explains Tim Walz’s Debate ‘Eye-Popping’ and It’s Something Else.

Quality control has slipped very badly when it comes to German-made propaganda in recent years.

YES, THESE ARE CERTAINLY PRESIDENTIAL-QUALITY OPTICS IN THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH OF A DEVASTATING HURRICANE: Harris hails striking dockworkers, swipes at Trump’s record.

Vice President Kamala Harris on Wednesday embraced striking dockworkers and bashed former President Donald Trump’s labor policies in her first public comments since a work stoppage at ports across the East and Gulf Coasts began Tuesday.

She said in a statement that “foreign-owned shipping companies have made record profits” and the union workers “deserve a fair share” of that money. As tens of thousands of members of the International Longshoremen’s Association hit the picket line, Harris also sought to use the moment to draw a contrast with Trump on his labor record.

“As president, he blocked overtime benefits for millions of workers, he appointed union busters” to the National Labor Relations Board, she said, “and just recently, he said striking workers should be fired.”

Trump had previously tried to wield the strike against the Democrats. In a statement Tuesday, he said “American workers should be able to negotiate for better wages” and blamed the strike on “inflation brought on by Kamala Harris’ two votes for massive, out-of-control spending.”

Trump has long benefited from an image among some voters as a successful businessman who is well-equipped to manage the economy. Trump leaned into that impression when he was running this year against President Joe Biden, whom many Americans blame for inflation and high prices.

But after Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Harris managed to shake off some of that baggage, and opinion polls have shown her narrowing the gap with Trump about who can handle the economy better. If this strike drags on, though, the economic fallout from spiking prices and commodity shortages could imperil that progress.

As Ward Clark writes at sister site Red State: October Surprise! Kamala Harris Embraces Striking Port Workers, Owns Any Resulting Economic Damage.

Here’s the problem with her embracing the strikers: She now owns, whether fairly or unfairly, all of the economic fallout of this strike. All of the rising prices, all of the empty store shelves, all of the layoffs due to supply chain disruptions; she owns it all. She has chosen this, and in a month she may well learn that when you dine at the devil’s table, you don’t get to choose the menu. And it’s not just commodities that will be affected; if this strike drags on, there are indicators that it will affect the energy sector, too.

Then there’s the other endorsement Harris just tacitly made: Union boss who threatened to ‘cripple’ economy lives in luxe 7,000 square-foot mansion.

Harold Daggett — the union boss who has vowed to “cripple” the US economy if ports don’t ban automation and raise dockworkers’ wages sharply — had a Bentley convertible parked outside his sprawling mansion in New Jersey this week, exclusive photos obtained by The Post reveal.

Photos taken by drone on Tuesday show the British luxury car parked with its top up outside what appears to be a five-car garage that’s connected to his 7,136-square-foot, Tudor-style home by a covered skyway.

The hulking, two-story mansion — located on a 10-acre property in Sparta, a leafy enclave 50 miles west of New York City — encircles a spacious backyard patio with an amoeba-shaped pool. A covered outdoor bar is situated next to what appears to be a massive, brick pizza oven.

A gate on the far side of the patio opens toward what looks like a free-standing sauna surrounded by a spacious wooden deck. A expansive swathe of forest surrounds the property on all sides.

The posh compound is nestled in a picturesque section of the Garden State near the Delaware Water Gap, where five-bedroom homes list for as much as $6 million, according to Zillow.

One realtor who spoke to The Post said that Daggett put the four-bedroom, six-and-a-half bathroom property on the market in 2004 at a listing price of $3.1 million before reducing it to $2.9 million. He eventually took it off the market.

Daggett, who has been alleged to have ties with the mafia, is president of the International Longshoremen’s Association, a job that comes with a salary of $728,000 annually on top of an additional $173,000 from ILA-Local 1804-1.

Kamala-approved! Because it’s good to be in the nomenklatura. As Clark writes, “That’s not a good look, not when people are having trouble meeting their monthly grocery bills. It’s hard to feel much sympathy for a union boss bringing in damn near a million a year when you just had a mayonnaise sandwich for lunch.”

AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD:

School Shooters Distance Themselves From Tim Walz https://t.co/nFHmdFVTJT pic.twitter.com/Z4yXHWweDn

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) October 2, 2024

The ghost of Michael O’Donoghue, the father of “cut and slash humor,” smiles.

DISPATCHES FROM THE “VIBES ELECTION:” September consumer confidence falls the most in three years.

#HIMTOO? Kamala Harris’s husband Doug Emhoff ‘forcefully slapped ex-girlfriend for flirting with another man’ and was accused of ‘causing’ nanny mistress’s miscarriage during their affair.

As Ed Morrissey writes, “Well, the oppo-research files have opened up right on time. I usually take any such extraordinary claims this close to an election with skepticism, but then again, both Hunter’s laptop and the Access Hollywood tape turned out to be on the level. Will this penetrate into mainstream American media outlets? And will ‘Jane’ come forward to refute or corroborate these accounts? Until the latter happens, I’d advise caution.”

Related:

And:

As to the likely silence of the DNC-MSM regarding the above Daily Mail story, as John Nolte likes to say, Democrats sure got it good:

Doug Emhoff timeline:

2009: Impregnated his chiId's nanny
2012: Physically assauIts his girlfriend
2023: Lectures us on toxic masculinity
2024: Hailed for redefining masculinity pic.twitter.com/Ow18xQpHlI

— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) October 2, 2024

JIM GERAGHTY: Tim Walz Loses His Bubble Wrap.

On the menu today: J. D. Vance fans, last night your man won his own personal Super Bowl. Tim Walz fans, your guy may not be ready for the major leagues. The good news for the Minnesota governor is that there’s not a single smudge on any of his timepieces, and he can clearly see what time it is . . . because Vance absolutely cleaned his clock.

Walz Seemed Small on the Big Stage, and He Knew It

Being a Democratic statewide official in a deep-blue state ranks among the easiest jobs in America. Once you’ve won your primary — which can be hard fought and nasty — you’ve got that job until you choose to retire, or until you are term-limited out. It’s extremely unlikely you’ll lose a subsequent primary, because while neither party tosses out incumbents much, Democrats almost never do it. (That’s usually the case down ticket as well; of the 2,214 Democratic state legislators who ran for reelection this year, 98.5 percent won their primaries.)

What’s more, your state’s media will often be a wind at your back. Your gaffes will rarely matter; scandals, mistakes, and policy failures will be explained away; you’ll always have the fundraising advantage unless you’re challenged by a self-funding billionaire; and no matter how bad you are, the biggest names in your state’s media world will always endorse you for reelection. What are they going to do, vote for a Republican?

Democratic statewide officials in deep-blue states lose their jobs so rarely, they might as well have tenure. They play the game of politics on easy mode.

* * * * * * * * *

That CNN report that Walz was nervous might not have been expectation-setting spin after all.

The Minnesota governor looked like a guy who had no expectation of being on a nationally televised debate stage three months ago, and who realized early in the night that the moment was too big for him. His default facial expression is one of worry; he does not have a commanding presence. He looked down to take notes so often, someone on social media asked if he was working on a crossword puzzle.

Perhaps if most journalists weren’t Democratic Party operatives with bylines, they would have fewer not ready for primetime politicians. But then again, don’t discount the person who advances them to the big leagues:

BIG APPLE CONTINUES TO ROT: “New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, the elected official who would replace Mayor Eric Adams if he resigns, accepted political contributions from a businessman who is accused of orchestrating illegal donations to Adams.”

Earlier this year, Williams’s re-election campaign received a total of $5,000 in donations from Brooklyn construction contractor Tolib Mansurov and two of his company’s employees, city campaign finance records show.

A federal indictment unsealed last week against Adams alleges that Mansurov illegally reimbursed four of his employees who each donated $2,000 to Adams 2021 mayoral campaign. Mansurov, who also directly contributed $2,000 to the mayor’s 2021 campaign, later received favors from Adams, prosecutors said.

The contractor, an Uzbek American, got help from Adams and his assistants in arranging events celebrating the national heritage of his ethnic community, according to prosecutors. The mayor also helped to resolve a stop-work order that the city Buildings Department had imposed on one of Mansurov’s building projects, according to the indictment. Records show Mansurov also donated $1,000 to Adams’ re-election campaign last year.

Mansurov is referred to only as Businessman-4 in the Adams indictment and hasn’t been charged with wrongdoing. He didn’t respond to requests for comment. State and city campaign finance records show he has only donated to the campaigns of Adams and Williams.

As Glenn wrote yesterday in the New York Post, “Adams isn’t even the tip of the iceberg: He’s more like one of the little frozen chunks floating around it. Because in truth, American politics, all the way to the top, is riddled with corruption and foreign cash on a scale that dwarfs Hizzoner’s alleged misdeeds.”

UPDATE: Seen on Facebook:

FINALLY:

It’s been a long time coming: CBS’s Scott Pelley Loses a Fight Rigged in His Favor.

And since Dan Rather’s Rathergate implosion was a key mile marker pointing towards today’s result, note this Mediaite story from today: Dan Rather Rips His ‘Spineless’ Former Network for Refusing to Fact-Check During the VP Debate.

But only to fact check Vance, of course.

Former CBS News anchor Dan Rather tore into his former network on Tuesday for refusing to fact-check its first vice presidential debate between JD Vance and Tim Walz.

In an article published to Substack, Rather predicted Vance would tell “more than one lie” during the debate, before adding, “Who’s going to fact check you? Well, apparently not CBS News.”

He continued:

Please allow me to pause here and say that I am always reluctant to criticize CBS News. I spent 45 years there. Loved every minute of it, even the worst times. I still pull for the important institution that it is, and for the many good people who work there.

With that as background, it is necessary to report and comment on the fact that CBS News has decided not to fact-check the candidates in real time. I would love to know what went into this decision, because it feels spineless, especially after ABC’s Linsey Davis and David Muir effectively and correctly fact-checked Trump during the debate with Kamala Harris.

Naturally, there is no mention of any aspect of RatherGate or why CBS is now Rather’s former network in the Mediaite piece.

UPDATE: So much for no “fact checking:” “And… they just cut Vance’s mic because he was fact-checking Margaret Brennan’s fact-check.”

JOSEPH CAMPBELL: What can we learn from election prediction failures of the past?

These cases together remind us that error stalks even the most confident of forecasts and that elite opinion is not always astute or discerning. In such reminders, there is no small value.

Likewise, they emphasize that impressions, “vibrations” and polls signaling landslides can be unsound bases for forecasting outcomes of presidential elections, especially in these days of a polarized U.S. electorate.

They also reveal something about the appeal of prognostication despite the prospect that forecasts will often go sideways. Offering an election prediction implies that this time will be different, that this time the prediction won’t fail. But as these cases attest, that’s not necessarily so.

Hence the continued reminders to forswear all modalities of the cockiness.

DISPATCHES FROM OBAMA’S SECOND TERM:

Dispatches from Obama’s Third Term:

My favorite part of the Biden-Harris presidency is all the peace, prosperity, and stability. https://t.co/tj01oVeXXi

— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) October 1, 2024

The world can’t handle his fourth term.

THIS IS THE WAY:

NEW: Rep. Byron Donalds shuts up journalist Angela Rye after baiting her into a trap on Kamala Harris' record on inflation.

Brutal 🔥

Donalds: Inflation was brought to us by Kamala Harris.

Rye: *Laughs*

Donalds: Kamala Harris was the tiebreaking vote in the United States… pic.twitter.com/gVkFqGXbCN

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) October 1, 2024

QUESTION ASKED AND ANSWERED: Will artificial intelligence lead to greater appreciation of ‘working class’ jobs?

The professions we were discussing were accountancy and law, though the medical profession is most immediately at risk of losing work to robots: in diagnostics, prescription and surgery. AI in medicine is already in the news. But consider accountancy. At first the use of AI will come as a boon. Think of all the fairly mindless legwork, the retrieval of records, the processing of data, the assembling, charting, calculating and presentation of accounts; the discovery and reconciling of discrepancies. AI can do a lot of this. Important questions of inspection and judgment will remain (at least for the time being) the preserve of humans, and in the short term this will make accountancy a more stimulating job by removing much of the drudgery. But drudgery means time; and time, at present, means human labor. Look at what happened to bank clerks.

We should not assume that computers will automatically replace humans: they may compete with them. Might white–collar workers’ salary levels stagnate, for fear of being priced out of the number-crunching market by AI? How many small businesses could now manage without the services of an accountant unless the latter lower their fees?

Next, our conversation moved to the legal profession. One of us thought it will prove easier with AI to get a legal opinion cheaply; lawyers — able now to use AI themselves — may have to lower their fees. My own view is that researching possible precedents in case law may require a grasp of abstract reasoning not yet given to computers, but I may be wrong.

In summary, AI will be able — is already able — to remove millions of man-hours from a wide range of white-collar work, flooding the labor market with redundant human operatives. But what of tradesmen? Plumbing, heating, wiring, roofing, domestic repair and renovation? Housebuilding, electricians’ work, gardening, mowing, plastering, bricklaying, tiling, furniture removals, road-mending, ditch-digging, vehicle maintenance and repair? What of the catering trades, cooking and waiting-on-table? What of cleaners, nannies, nurses, hairdressers, roofers, bouncers, dustmen, foresters and dog-walkers?

As Glenn wrote in the New York Post in January: The white-collar class derided mass layoffs among the blue-collar workers. It’s about to feel their pain.

People losing their jobs to AI is just the tip of the iceberg.

In the next decade, lots more people — possibly (gulp) including professors like me — will be facing potential replacement by machines.

It turns out that using your brain and not your hands isn’t as good a move as it may have once seemed.

People who work with their hands have some advantages.

If you want something done in the material world, you still need people.

(I replaced a toilet seat some time back while pondering these issues and reflected that neither an AI nor a worker in Bangalore could have taken that job.)

A lot of young Americans, especially males, are forgoing traditional college to enter the trades, as welders, plumbers, HVAC technicians and the like.

That’s probably smart. AI won’t be able to replace those jobs.

As Brian Wang notes, robots probably will, one day — but that day is nowhere near as close.

There is however, one group of blue collar workers who may be talking themselves out of a job much quicker than they ever imagined:

The dockworkers are worried about the ports getting automated and losing their jobs in the long term. And reports indicate they want assurances that there will be a total ban on automation.

In other words, no robots when it comes to loading and unloading freight. That includes cranes, gates and moving containers.

Unfortunately, I’ve got bad news for these folks.

Automation and AI are coming whether they like it or not. The proverbial horse has left the barn.

If we were to ban automation at our ports, it would put the U.S. economy at a major competitive disadvantage. I doubt the Chinese are going to ban automation at their ports, for example.

The fact of the matter is AI is going to completely reshape our world in the months and years to come.

Unfortunately, plenty of companies – thousands of companies – will fail to adapt. They’ll be rendered completely obsolete as AI technology reshapes the business landscape.

AI technology will usher in sweeping societal changes… just like the personal computer, the internet, and the smartphone did. Only the changes this time will be even faster and more disruptive.

And robotic automation is one of them.

The reality is robots don’t sleep. They don’t take vacations. They never need a break. They’re more efficient. And they don’t go on strike, either.

Union bosses who mutter phrases such as “I will cripple you, and you have no idea what that means. Nobody does,” could well be exponentially speeding up their men’s obsolescence, and not exactly building up John Henry levels of sympathy for them for when the inevitable happens:

The Longshoremen aren't trying to shoehorn zero automation into their contracts because their jobs are so important, but because their jobs are already borderline obsolete and in fact make our ports worse off https://t.co/628FGjoy6s

— Mason (@webdevMason) October 1, 2024

QUESTION ASKED AND ANSWERED…WITH A MEANINGLESS WORD SALAD:

WATCH Kamala Harris' response to: "Should folks stand for the National Anthem?"pic.twitter.com/fL8owFTxmC

— Resist the Mainstream (@ResisttheMS) October 1, 2024

DISGRUNTLED JOE BIDEN DISAPPOINTED AS KAMALA HARRIS TRIES TO DISTANCE FROM HIS RECORD, REPORT CLAIMS:

President Joe Biden is disappointed at how quickly his influence is dwindling as Vice President Kamala Harris is trying to move beyond him, according to an NBC News report.

Biden has noticed that Harris is not referring to him very often in her campaign speeches, the report notes, citing six people familiar with his comments.

He was also saddened when Harris specifically distanced herself from him, insisting in the presidential debate that she was ‘clearly’ not Joe Biden and offering a ‘new generation of leadership.’

A Harris campaign official tried to ward off rumors of an upset Biden by noting that the president has repeatedly told Harris to do whatever she needs to do to win.

Harris and Biden also had lunch together on Thursday for the first time in a while, an official confirmed, as they both went to the White House for a meeting with Ukrainian president Voldymyr Zelensky.

Harris met separately with Zelensky at the White House, however, and delivered separate remarks from the president.

The White House dismissed the report as ‘uninformed claims’ that were ‘the polar opposite of the truth.’

And they may be right, based on their detailed, carefully laid out Middle East policies they’re sharing with the American media, and by extension, the rest of the world:

Shot:

Welp. The “Don’t" Doctrine didn’t seem to work. pic.twitter.com/blOeTF0zlZ

— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) October 1, 2024

Chaser:

Reporter: "What's your message to Iran?"

Kamala: "Don't."

You'll be shocked to learn this diplomatic strategy did not work out. pic.twitter.com/0aOMFOJ23v

— Match Point (@MatchPoiint) October 1, 2024

Related: “You might be asking, ‘Why didn’t they make Biden step aside already, and elevate Kamala before the election?’ A sensible question, but if she became president now, she inherits directly the legacy of the unpopular Biden policies. She would now have to start fixing problems on her ‘Day One.’ It wouldn’t fit her strategy of trying to present a ‘fresh start’ and enable some distance between herself and Biden. Of course this is absurd, but it seems to be working to some extent.”

RIP: John Amos, ‘Good Times’ Dad, Dies at 84. He played Gordy the weatherman on ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show’ and earned an Emmy nom for his turn as the older Kunta Kinte on ‘Roots.’

QUESTION ASKED AND ANSWERED: What Happened to Tucker Carlson?

Carlson hides his worst rhetoric behind a “just asking questions” and anti-cancel-culture pose. He faced only a modest backlash from his allies over the Darryl Cooper interview. Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts posted a tweet defending Winston Churchill, then appeared at a Tucker Carlson Live event the next day. A “Dear Fellow Patriot” Heritage fundraising email was sent out under Tucker Carlson’s name on September 12—just 10 days after Carlson called Darryl Cooper “the most important historian in the United States.”

There were calls for Trump to distance himself from Carlson after the Cooper interview, but no such distancing occurred. “The fundamental idea here is Republicans believe not in censorship; we believe in free speech and debate,” GOP vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance said on September 6. Vance appeared at a Tucker Carlson Live event in Pennsylvania on September 21.

The Tucker Carlson Live tour has the trappings of a presidential listening tour, with the potential candidate surrounded by MAGA elites like Vance, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Tulsi Gabbard. The tour wrapped up on Saturday night with a joint appearance with the former GOP president’s son, Donald Trump Jr. Earlier this year, Don Jr. said he wanted his father to pick either Vance or Carlson as his running mate, and there’s no question that Carlson is the more charismatic of the two.

HARRIS AND BIDEN FACE THEIR OCTOBER SURPRISE: Major Longshoremen Strike Hits East Coast Ports.

Thousands of dock workers at ports along the East and Gulf coasts went on strike early Tuesday morning amid a contract dispute, halting the flow of goods with a potentially costly work stoppage.

Their union, the International Longshoremen’s Association, failed to reach a new six-year agreement with the United States Maritime Alliance, the group representing employers at ports from Maine to Texas. Workers walked off the job just as their previous contract expired.

It’s unclear how long the strike will last and how expensive it will be, but a prolonged shutdown could deal a significant blow to the economy since the workers who handle shipping containers control major commercial choke points.

The showdown also presents a political problem for President Joe Biden, who has the power to suspend the strike. Doing so would take away workers’ leverage and could hurt the union-friendly president’s relationship with organized labor.

Exit quote from Harold J. Daggett, the union’s president, and gold chain enthusiast (language warning):

This video is better if you play the music from ‘The Godfather’ underneath it. https://t.co/A2P4bSfG8Y

— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) October 1, 2024

UPDATE: As Iowahawk tweets, “The entire US supply chain is controlled by a bunch of stock gangster movie extras from the 1936 Warner Brothers casting office…There is literally no group on Planet Earth that could be so easily and deservedly replaced by robots.”

Threats of strikes are a powerful incentive for American docks to “learn to code,” to coin a phrase:

WAPO SAYS TA-TA TO TAY-TAY: Taylor Lorenz Exits Washington Post to Launch ‘User Mag’ on Substack.

UPDATE: No word yet on what role ageism played in Lorenz leaving the Post:

More here: ‘Nature Is Healing!’ Taylor Lorenz Out at Wapo and Hoo Boy, X Has Brutally Hilarious Thoughts About That.

IS OUR CHILDREN LEARNING? The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books. To read a book in college, it helps to have read a book in high school.

Nicholas Dames has taught Literature Humanities, Columbia University’s required great-books course, since 1988. He loves the job, but it has changed. Over the past decade, students have become overwhelmed by the reading. College kids have never read everything they’re assigned, of course, but this feels different. Dames’s students now seem bewildered by the thought of finishing multiple books a semester. His colleagues have noticed the same problem. Many students no longer arrive at college—even at highly selective, elite colleges—prepared to read books.

This development puzzled Dames until one day during the fall 2022 semester, when a first-year student came to his office hours to share how challenging she had found the early assignments. Lit Hum often requires students to read a book, sometimes a very long and dense one, in just a week or two. But the student told Dames that, at her public high school, she had never been required to read an entire book. She had been assigned excerpts, poetry, and news articles, but not a single book cover to cover.

“My jaw dropped,” Dames told me. The anecdote helped explain the change he was seeing in his students: It’s not that they don’t want to do the reading. It’s that they don’t know how. Middle and high schools have stopped asking them to.

As Ray Bradbury wrote in the introduction to the 50th anniversary edition of Fahrenheit 451, “There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running around with lit matches.”

LISTEN SUG, DON’T FORGET TO SAY YOUR PRAYERS: US Says Iran Preparing to Attack Israel With Ballistic Missiles.

The US has indications that Iran is preparing to imminently launch a ballistic missile attack against Israel, according to a senior White House official.

The US is actively supporting preparations to defend Israel against the possible attack, which would carry severe consequences for Iran, said the official, who asked not to be identified.

The warning comes after Israeli forces moved into southern Lebanon in an escalation of its campaign against Tehran-backed Hezbollah.

More here: Pentagon chief says US supports Israel’s ‘right to defend itself’ — while warning Iran of ‘serious consequences’ if it attacks.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said the US supports Israel’s “right to defend itself” with its ground invasion of Lebanon — while vowing “serious consequences” for Iran if it attacks the Jewish state.

So will that mean even larger, or perhaps slightly smaller pallets of cash airlifted into Iran during the waning days of Obama’s third term?

UPDATE: “Israeli media reported 102 ballistic missiles — capable of reaching Israel in 12 minutes — were headed toward the Jewish state.”

UPDATE (1:27 pm): “The Jerusalem Post has updated its earlier report to set the number of ballistic missiles at 500. If accurate, it’s clearly an attempt to overwhelm Israel’s defenses — and a clear provocation now to launch a devastating response. Now we’ll see if the Mossad has as good an idea where IRGC and regime leaders are as they did with Hezbollah.”

UPDATE (8:51 pm): Linking to an Axios report that the only death so far in the Iranian missile attack was “One Palestinian civilian [who] was reportedly killed in the West Bank,” Ed Morrissey adds, “Res ipsa loquitur. It appears that the earlier reports of 500 missiles were an overestimation, but 180 ballistic missiles is still a full-scale attack. And Israel plans on retaliating soon, too.”

(Classical reference in headline.)