Public transportation

Monday

Ross Clark

The Europe of American imaginations no longer exists

Since the United Kingdom left the European Union five years ago, the pair have been in battle to prove who has performed better. But the real story of the past five years is not a stagnant UK falling behind a buoyant EU, but of Britain and Europe being trapped in the same cycle of relative decline. It’s America that has quietly raced ahead of Europe this century. Following the pandemic it has become impossible to ignore the gulf in economic vitality between the US and Europe, the former growing by 16.3 percent per capita since 2008. There are very good reasons for America’s success, or rather, Europe’s decline. The EU and the UK increasingly treat their industries as pieces of heritage which must be preserved against disruptors and foreign competition.

Europe

Monday

Dave Seminara

Climate warriors are trying to make parking more difficult

Progressives have long sought ways to get us out of our cars. In recent months, a little-reported trend has emerged in furtherance of this goal: the elimination of parking minimums for new housing developments. A host of cities has done this, either citywide or in select districts, among them Anchorage, San Jose, Raleigh, Minneapolis, Nashville, and Sacramento. California’s Gavin Newsom recently became the first governor to sign legislation prohibiting parking minimums statewide for projects within a half mile of a major transit stop. Liberal policymakers contend that parking minimums are bad for the climate and make housing needlessly expensive by forcing everyone, including those who don’t own cars, to pay for parking.

Thursday

Matt Purple

One nation under the CDC

For a brief moment, America was the cheering mission control room in every action movie. You know the one: the flight controllers stand there nervously, waiting to hear from the wayward rocket. Then, suddenly, the radio crackles: “Houston,” says a voice, “this is Gemini One...we did it. A federal judge in Florida just struck down the mask mandate.” And everyone goes wild. From out of claustrophobic plane cabins and sterile airports this week came unlikely scenes of jubilation as passengers tore off their masks and breathed freely once again.

rochelle walensky mask

Tuesday

Paul du Quenoy

The night the masks came off

My wife and seven-year-old son were halfway to Boston to catch a connecting flight to Ireland on Monday when the news came down. Or, as it were, went up, as Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle voided the Biden administration’s widely reviled but recently extended mask mandate on public transportation. After receiving instructions from the ground, the pilot on their plane emerged from the cockpit and announced that masks were no longer required. He then invited the passengers to “go ahead and throw them in the trash.” There was a swell of cheers as the passengers and crew were overcome by a euphoria of deliverance from the tyranny of overzealous Washington.