Mike King’s latest comments about the relationship between alcohol and mental health – according to King, alcohol does more good than harm – raises red flags once again about this organisation, and the quality of the “counselling” it provides. Here’s what the scientific research says.

The latest example of King’s blowhard incompetence comes in the same week that the Police have begun reducing their callouts to incidents involving people with mental health problems. Reason being as one mental health expert told Newsroom:

The main reason that police have become inundated with mental health call-outs is because of the chronic lack of investment in pro-active mental health services by successive governments. The bar is now so high to enter secondary mental health care that many people are turned away until they reach crisis point. Only a very small proportion of people with mental health conditions should require an emergency police response but, because of the lack of available care, families are finding they have few alternatives to calling 111.

In other words, the scarce government funds set aside for mental need to be allocated to people and to organisations who know what they’re doing. Yet lest we forget, Gumboot Friday got a $24 million handout of taxpayer money through what the Auditor-General called an “inconsistent and unusual” procurement process. This example of political patronage and conspicuous waste – championed by Prime Munchkin Christopher Luxon himself – has been allowed to happen even while 190 organisations with track records in mental health treatment are being defunded by Oranga Tamariki.

Peddling the politics of panic

Yes, let's all make America great again. Let's go back to the days when America was the Great Melting Pot, and Americans fully embraced the inscription on the Statue of Liberty that urges the world to send America “its tired, its poor, its huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Truly, that was the attitude that made America great.

For the past eight years though, Donald Trump has been selling a stunted vision of America. The tens of millions of Americans who comprise Trump Nation have been told to cower in fear of immigrants, depicted by Trump as “the worst criminals...vicious...bloodthirsty” hordes who are “over-running” the border areas and “conquering” American cities. If they’re Mexicans, they’re “rapists.” If they’re Haitians, they’re eating your pets. If they’re Puerto Rican, they’re trash.

This fear of migrants is Trump’s ticket to re-election. So much so that he has repeatedly torpedoed efforts by Congress to fund and implement procedures to limit and manage the influx of asylum seekers at the border. Earlier this year, Congress tried to provide a pathway to residence for the spouses and children of US citizens. Again, Trump ordered his minions to defeat it.

Trouble is, every legislative attempt to resolve America’s immigration problems at its borders – first in 2018, again in 2021, and the bi-partisan solution of February 2024 - has been treated as an existential threat to the political interests of the Republican Party. (Biden has had to resort to limited regulatory measures to improve immigration procedures.)

The reality of course, is that immigrants pose no serious criminal threat to America. If anything, they’re more of an asset than a danger. Undocumented migrants from Mexico and Central America have long been a source of cheap labour for the US economy – in agriculture, in healthcare and in the hospitality sectors in particular. Ageing Americans already rely on migrants to care for them, a dependency that will only increase over time.

In reality, if Trump ever did follow through on his campaign promise to carry out mass deportations of undocumented aliens, this would tank the US domestic economy, and send food prices through the roof.

As the prestigious Brennan Center has also pointed out, the claims of a migrant crime wave are a myth:

Substantial research has assessed the relationship between immigration and crime. Numerous studies show that immigration is not linked to higher levels of crime, but rather the opposite. Studies have also examined the impact of the concentration of immigrants in a community on crime patterns, finding that immigration is associated with lower crime rates and an increase in structural factors — such as social connection and economic opportunity — that are linked to neighborhood safety.

And moreover:

....Numerous studies show that undocumented immigration does not increase violent crime; research examining crime rates in so-called sanctuary cities also found no discernible difference when compared to similarly situated cities without sanctuary policies. One study that focused on drug crimes and driving under the influence found that unauthorized immigration status was associated with reductions in arrests for those offenses.

If anything, the conviction/incarceration rates for migrants has been lower than for native-born Americans, a pattern evident for the past 150 years:

For example, one study found that undocumented immigrants are 33 percent less likely to be incarcerated than people born in the United States. Indications of a negative relationship between immigration and crime also emerge when looking at conviction rates. In a Texas study, undocumented immigrants were found to be 47 percent less likely to be convicted of a crime in 2017 than native-born Americans. More recently, a study looked at census data over a 150-year period; since 1870, incarceration rates of immigrants are actually slightly lower than U.S.-born people and that gap widens in recent years with immigrants 60 percent less likely to be incarcerated than U.S.-born citizens.

Despite such realities, Trump and his enablers have been able to spook the easily frightened members of the MAGA cult into finding their own safe place, safe and sound in the arms of Daddy Trump, and his Republican Party.

Messages from the front

It is easy to forget that Joe Biden was the challenger in 2020, the change advocate standing against the chaos of the first Trump presidency. As the incumbent vice-President, Kamala Harris begins with the handicap of having to ask the American public to vote for more of the status quo. In addition, her stance on Gaza – while more nuanced than the mindless defence of Israel peddled by Joe Biden – has cost her support among young voters, and among Arab-Americans.

Domestically though, the Biden administration can point to solid achievements. It has driven unemployment below 4% for the past 28 months, the longest stretch in over 50 years. Some 16 million jobs have been created since Biden took office. In 2023, the administration’s investments in crime prevention culminated in one of the lowest national rates of violent crime in 50 years. The expansion in child tax credits has reportedly led to the lowest child poverty rates in US history.

Moreover, the Biden/Harris administration has provided 11 million emergency rental assistance payments, as part of a national eviction prevention programme. More new housing is under construction than at any other time in 50 years, and new housing starts are up 17% on the last year of the Trump administration. Home ownership rates are higher than before the pandemic.

While the Biden administration has poured tens of billions of military aid into Israel and Ukraine, it also ended the US military involvement in Afghanistan, and has destroyed its last declared stocks of chemical weapons. 

Not much of this (incomplete) list of achievements has been getting cut through, since the media seems more interested in chasing the ratings to be gained by airing Trump’s latest verbal outrage. Both candidates would make the country’s debt situation worse – Trump’s policies would raise debt to 116% of GDP – from the current 99% – while Harris’ policy mix would raise it to 109%.

Neither candidate is addressing climate change adequately, but at least the Democrats have made a start:

The Biden administration’s most important climate action to date was signing the Inflation Reduction Act into law in August 2022, the most comprehensive climate legislation the U.S. has even seen. The law invests hundreds of billions of dollars in clean energy, electric vehicles, environmental justice and more... In the two years since its enactment, the administration has focused on developing tax credit guidance and launching programs to implement its many clean energy provisions.

Finally, relatively little media attention has been paid to the implications of Trump’s tax reduction plans. Logically, the tax cuts package that Trump has in mind – it includes cutting corporate tax from 21% to only 15% for firms that make their products within the US – will require Congress to impose significant cuts to the federal government’s social security and healthcare safety nets. Poor Americans (and many of Trump’s MAGA faithful) currently access the Medicare programme, on which 67 million older and disabled Americans depend. A Trump victory will jeopardise its continuance in anything like its current shape.

Winding up

In the home stretch of the campaign, Harris – in unison with Republican moderate Liz Cheney – has been targeting the moderate centre-right vote in suburban Philadelphia, by reminding them of the totalitarian threat that Trump poses to American democracy.

That same message enabled Biden to eke out a narrow victory in Pennsylvania in 2020. Biden won this crucial battleground state by just over 1 percentage point, or only about 80,000 votes among the 7 million votes cast in Pennsylvania for President.

At this point in the race, Harris is not going to win over any wavering voters with policy wonk details. Ever since Biden withdrew, Harris has been issuing policy plans in far more extensive detail than anything the Republicans have managed. Little of it seems to have registered. Harris still needs to (a) win over moderate suburban voters across the country and(b) mobilise the various nodes of Democratic support among young, and black, and Hispanic voters. All of these groups were essential components of the Democratic victory last time around.

At this point, her reminding those groups what they stand to lose will be more effective than trying to tell them what they might stand to gain.

Halloween, Ever After

Hope you enjoyed Halloween last night. From 30 years ago, here come Steve Wynn and the Dream Syndicate putting on their best Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground costumes, and stepping out into the night.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69wxeAJJlw0

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