Be less crazy. As the sun set on Election Day, 2021, it became clear — to anyone who wasn’t literally paid to not understand — that America was pissed. After a year of Democratic control, both political and cultural, Republicans not only swept Virginia, but regional seats throughout New Jersey, where Governor Murphy nearly lost a race no one bothered to follow, and Democrat Steve Sweeney, a twenty-year incumbent in the State Senate, lost to a truck driver who ran his campaign for 153 dollars. Up in antifa country, Ann Davison, a law-and-order Republican, won Seattle’s DA race, and in Minneapolis, the epicenter of our national defund movement, voters rejected a ballot measure to replace the city police department with social services. According to polling data, which could not have been more clear, voters had two requests: 1) “unfuck the economy” and 2) “be less crazy.” Alas, our national commitment to crazy runs deep, and this month’s sprawling conversation on the economy saw not an answer to the concerns of voters so much as a convergence of their worst anxieties.

Let’s talk about inflation.

First of all, it’s happening. This is an important point, as questions pertaining to inflation were considered something of a vaguely conspiracy-sounding right-wing talking point as early as this summer.