In 1982, the year after we graduated college, 26,173 Americans died in drunk-driving accidents — 60 percent of all automobile deaths that year, in a population of some 231 million souls.

A generation later — in 2010 — the drunk-driver death toll was down to 10,228, or 31 percent of the total carnage. In a nation that had swelled to 308 million.

Also in 1982, 32,957 Americans died from firearms, the vast majority homicides and suicides. By 2009, that had plunged to — well, 31,347. Certainly a reduction if you grade on the population curve, but not a two-thirds reduction.

We chose the starting date for a few reasons.

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“The suspect in a shooting that killed a Brazos County constable and one civilian died from injuries during a shootout near the Texas A&M University campus Monday afternoon. Three other people were injured in the gunfire, including two College Station police officers and a civilian.” [WFAA]

Our guest columnist is Matthew Yglesias, exhibiting the first documented case of Paul Ryan Derangement Syndrome.

Let me apologize. I originally had a too-credulous item here linking to a piece at The Richmonder alleging that Paul Ryan has sold bank shares after a closed door meeting with Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke on the financial crisis in 2008. As Eric Platt explains he certainly seems to have sold the shares on the same day as the meeting, but the meeting happened in the evening by which time the markets would have been closed. One can perhaps construct a scenario by which the Richmonder’s theory of the case holds up, but they don’t have the goods and I shouldn’t have passed their analysis on with no qualification and so little scrutiny of my own.

As Brad DeLong writes, for one reason or another Ryan did quite a lot of trading of individual bank stocks in 2008 so the timing of this particularly transaction isn’t particularly noteworthy when put in that context. For posterity’s sake the original item is below now in strikethrough.

Paul Ryan’s Bank Stock Trading [Slate]

Paul Ryan Insider Trading Rumor Quickly Debunked [TPM]

We’re being told by starry-eyed political commentators that with the selection of Paul Ryan, the election has become a civics geek’s wet dream: a stark choice between Governing Philosophies.

To which we laugh, and laugh, and laugh.

It would be nice if that were the case. It would be nice if Americans were offered an Honest Choice, instead of one side doing its darned best to keep the other side from voting. It would be nice if one side had the courage of its loudly proclaimed convictions, instead of cravenly stacking the deck every chance it gets.

But that’s not why we laugh.

We laugh at the suggestion that Paul Ryan offers anything approximating a Governing Philosophy. We laugh at the insistence that Paul Ryan holds the real power among Republicans, and that Mitt Romney is just a figurehead.

We laugh, because Paul Ryan is a Toady.

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Title: “The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson”

Author: David Barton; foreword by Glenn Beck

Rank: 59

Blurb: “America, in so many ways, has forgotten. Its roots, its purpose, its identity — all have become shrouded behind a veil of political correctness bent on twisting the nation’s founding, and its founders, to fit within a misshapen modern world.”

Review: “So many scholars found factual errors with the book that on 8/9/12, the publisher ceased publication and distribution of the book, and is actually recalling it from retailers.”

Footnote: “David is author of numerous best-selling works and a national award-winning historian who brings a fresh perspective to history.”

The Jefferson Lies [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon Kickback Link]

Doesn’t compare to being a homophobic bully, but Paul Ryan’s high school classmates had his number.

[via @RyanLizza]