Two takes on the upcoming midterm elections: John McLaughlin and Jim McLaughlin at Newsmax, and Henry Olsen at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

In the "read it here first," department, from my September 18 post, "Klarman Funds The Democrats":

even for someone like me who supports political speech rights, the idea of Michael Bloomberg and Seth Klarman, in the name of "democracy," together spending $100 million so that the House of Representatives tilts toward their urban centrist values rather than the values of Trump Republicans who might otherwise get elected is something to behold. There's enough time between now and November for the Republicans to field some television or direct mail in rural districts about how billionaires like Bloomberg and Klarman are trying to buy the election.

From Kevin McCarthy, a top Republican in Congress who is currently the majority leader, on Twitter last night: "We cannot allow Soros, Steyer, and Bloomberg to BUY this election! Get out and vote Republican November 6th." His tweet links to a video making that point.

Andrew Ross Sorkin reports on Paul Volcker's new book, Keeping At It: The Quest For Sound Money And Good Government:

while President Trump has complained in recent months about the Fed's plan to raise interest rates, he isn't the first to try to influence the independent Federal Reserve. Mr. Volcker recounts being summoned to meet with President Ronald Reagan and his chief of staff, James Baker, in the president's library next to the Oval Office in 1984.

Reagan "didn't say a word," Mr. Volcker wrote. "Instead Baker delivered a message: 'The president is ordering you not to raise interest rates before the election.'" Mr. Volcker wasn't planning to raise rates at the time.

One more concrete sign of the scale of the opioid epidemic that we mentioned here earlier this month: The city of Lowell, Mass., plans to add a full time city employee to "collect discarded syringes across the city," the Lowell Sun reports. The used needles are littering the city's parks and "other public areas," the newspaper reports. The link came via the "MASSter List," an aggregator newsletter focusing on Massachusetts.

The ongoing federal trial of Harvard College's admissions practices is the topic of my column this week, which also covers the Red Sox and Stephen Schwarzman. Please check out the full column at the New York Sun (here), Newsmax (here), and Reason (here).

Princeton professor Paul Starr, writing in the New York Times, describes the disappearance of the center right:

Mr. Trump's purges continue the Republican march to the right that began in the 1980s. At that time, many leading Republicans were economically conservative but socially liberal or moderate. Often from elite backgrounds, they called for balanced budgets, free trade and other pro-business policies, while also supporting abortion rights, racial inclusiveness, immigration reform and environmental protection. Republicans had little hope of congressional majorities without them. But as the center of gravity in the party shifted south and west, the moderates became a dwindling and dispensable minority, increasingly forced to adapt to the new orthodoxy or to quit the party.

A New York Times news article by Charlie Savage and Mitch Smith reports: "The Trump Justice Department's aggressive use of criminal charges to pursue officials suspected of making unauthorized disclosures to the public is a continuation of a practice that developed during the Bush administration and accelerated under the Obama administration."

The Drudge Report this afternoon is leading with a Hillary 2020 story, or trial balloon, or something. Let me just say that you read it here first. If the Democratic presidential campaign is among Bernie Sanders, Michael Bloomberg, and Joe Biden, or if the strongest woman candidate the Democrats can muster is Elizabeth Warren, why would Hillary Clinton stay out?

David Brooks writes in his New York Times column:

What is new is how cultish this dispute has become. The researchers asked a wide variety of questions, on everything from child-rearing to national anthem protests. In many cases, 97 to 99 percent of Progressive Activists said one thing and 93 to 95 percent of Dedicated Conservatives said the opposite. There's little evidence of individual thought, just cult conformity. The current situation really does begin to look like the religious wars that ripped through Europe after the invention of the printing press, except that our religions now wear pagan political garb.

Thanks for all those who became paying subscribers or members of FutureOfCapitalism during our recent drive. Before returning entirely to our regularly scheduled programming, let me mention that are also ways to help that are non-monetary. Spreading the word by telling your friends about the site, particularly friends that you think might enjoy it, helps us grow. So does sharing FutureOfCapitalism content on social media, if you use social media. Commenting by using the comments function helps, too, not only if you have something interesting to say (though that's great), but also because comments help signal to algorithms and to other readers that there's a community of engaged readers here.

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The Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by Sears Holdings is the topic of my column this week. Please check the column out in full at Reason here, at the New York Sun here, and at Newsmax here.

Thank you to those who have already responded to our drive for paying subscribers. The link to pay is here. For those who haven't yet joined up, here are ten more reasons in addition to yesterday's ten:

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The mismatch between two numbers — the amount of money Beto O'Rourke, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Texas who is running against Ted Cruz, has raised, and the amount of support he is getting in recent polls — is generating some lively commentary.

The editor of the Washington Free Beacon, Matthew Continetti, commenting on O'Rourke's haul of $38.1 million in the past three months, observed, "The media may have made a strategic mistake in creating the Beto phenomenon, drawing away tens of millions of dollars from more competitive races."

Nate Silver, the election forecaster, acknowledged that O'Rourke's numbers have been slipping: "he's gone from a deficit of 3-4 points at his peak to 5-6 now. That's not great; TX has gone from 'Lean R' to 'Likely R'." Silver writes that the race is "not to the point where Dems should be donating 60 zillion $$ to his campaign."

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