From the right: Liz’s Health-Care-Dodge ‘Plan’

Elizabeth Warren says she has “a plan for that” on nearly every issue, but her plan on health care is to evade “tough questions about the single-payer health-care scheme she now endorses,” argues Christopher Jacobs at the Federalist. Her Web site consists of a health “plan” that’s half the size of Joe Biden’s and ignores the problems of a transition to single-payer. “Rather than making specific promises related to single-payer health care — which she knows she cannot possibly keep — she wants to conduct her campaign on the issue solely in platitudes.” It’s an “implicit admission” that “the left cannot be upfront” about all the consequences of universal health care.

Defense beat: The Real Robot Threat

“For decades, science fiction has speculated on the theme of robot servants rising up to overwhelm their human masters,” notes Robert Zubrin at National Review. “Such scenarios remain fantasy,” but not so the coming advent of drone weapons that “control themselves using ‘artificial intelligence’ ” — which would “allow whole armies, obedient without the limiting constraint of human thought, to be commanded directly by tyrannical elites.” And the same tech can be directed at civilians. Vaclav Havel noted that a key weakness of tyrannies is that “conscience may be suppressed, but it cannot be eliminated.” Beware, says Zubrin: “Autonomous weapons have no such weaknesses.”

2020 watch: Beto’s Alternative US History

At last week’s Democratic presidential debate, the once-moderate Beto O’Rourke embraced a deeply radical view of America and its history, points out Ben Shapiro for Creators Syndicate. O’Rourke’s retelling, “cribbed from ‘The 1619 Project’ by The New York Times,” claims that American history is “a story rooted in white supremacy” that undergirds “capitalism, criminal justice, lack of universal health care, traffic patterns, [and] Donald Trump’s election” — all of it basically a “warmed-over” version of Marxist historian Howard Zinn’s take. This view is factually incorrect, but worse: “O’Rourke’s pathetic rewriting of American history” will only deepen our divisions. Certainly, “we must recognize the evils of American history” — but also that, “to survive as a nation,” we need to “align with our founding principles, not oppose them.”

Conservative: The Civil-Forfeiture Cash Grab

Through civil asset forfeiture, government officials can “take your property or cash if they suspect it’s been involved in criminal activity, without getting a conviction or even charging you with a crime,” Missouri state Rep. Tony Lovasco explains at the Washington Examiner — and, if you want it back, the burden isn’t on the government to prove your guilt, but on you to prove your innocence. Worse, “civil asset forfeiture is about the money, full stop.” Prosecutors intentionally file federal cases so that state laws against forfeiture don’t apply, allowing them to reap the proceeds from forfeitures. Forfeiture runs contrary to the Constitution’s principle of “innocent until proven guilty” — and should be ended on every level.

Media critic: Why Are Journalists So Gloomy?

“Most journalists tell us everything’s terrible” — but they’re wrong, John Stossel snaps at Reason. Worldwide, “there is less war and more food. We live healthier and longer lives. HIV will soon be history. We are increasingly free to be whoever we are and love whom we want. Even work has become more pleasant.” Why are the media so negative? Journalists get “clicks and rating points by hyping whatever makes us afraid,” even if outlets like Reason report the good news along with the bad and point out that “we live in a world of reliable miracles.” For these miracles, thank free markets, which “allow every individual a choice,” unlike politics, which “gives us just two choices” and “forces everyone to obey whatever the majority chose.”

— Compiled by Karl Salzmann