Monthly Archives: December 2016

Archive of posts published in the specified Month

Best of Kevin Williamson 2016

I collected excerpts from the blog for the best of 2016 and so may came from Kevin Williamson at National review that I broke his out to a separate post: People Aren’t Widgets by Kevin Williamson But every expensively miseducated jackass

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Doing Stupid Shit at the UN

from Mona Charen at National Review, A Stupid Anti-Israel Policy “There are 2.75 million Palestinians living in the West Bank,” Kerry thundered, without explaining why their misfortune is more urgent than that of 4.8 million Syrian refugees who are living in

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The Gear Askew

“Because most reformers conceived the world as an orderly affair where societies, like planets, normally functioned according to rational laws, they had customarily looked for that one gear askew, that one fundamental rule violated, as an explanation for America’s troubles. 

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Three Nails for the Democrats’ Coffin

Republicans still have a chance to cement better relationships to the minority community by pushing issues that are philosophically tuned to their beliefs and in sync with the minority communities. Eliminate the asset forfeiture laws.  These laws allow police to

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Juden Free Palestine

The UN resolution, allowed to pass by the abstention of the United States vote, makes Israeli settlements in The West Bank illegal under international law.  It is not easily reversed because a veto from China or Russia would block it. 

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The Point of an Election

An old post from The Grumpy Economist, John Cochrane, Why the Electoral College Is a Great Idea But every theorem has assumptions. The median voter theorem assumes that political outcomes can be placed on a one-dimensional line, and that preferences are “single

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Progress and Pain

from the WSJ Notable and Quotable: The Human Side of Trade by Russ Roberts Suppose a scientist invents a pill that once you take it lets you live until 120 with no health issues whatsoever. Once you turn 120, you

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Beware Intellectuals

from the Wall Street Journal, Daniel Johnson’s review of the book, Public Intellectuals in the Public Arena. On a personal note: In the introduction to this book my father, Paul Johnson, is quoted warning in 1988, “One of the principal

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The Hollywood Handicap

While the average voter may not be well versed in economic policy and global political nuances, there is much we do understand.  We understand basic math; we know what happens when you consistently spend more than you make. We understand

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Failure to Face Reality

The Jill Stein recounts ended up increasing the vote for Donald Trump. The urban areas in Michigan around Detroit that overwhelmingly supported Hillary had more irregularities than the areas that supported Trump.  It was a desperate and shameless attempt that

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Paving the Road to Hell

from Reason Magazine, Trump and the Power of the Presidency by Katherine Mangu-Ward Every time Obama made a recess appointment, or issued an executive order on gender-neutral bathrooms, or limited the comment period on a new regulation, or denied a

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Pragmatism and Morals

from an interview with Penn Jillete in the January Reason Magazine When I talk about the death penalty to people, there are a zillion pragmatic arguments to make that the death penalty is more expensive, that you could make mistakes

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Ideology and Pragmatism

from Peggy Noonan at  The WSJ, What Trump Got That Romney Didn’t: “Americans are not ideologues,” I wrote. “They think ideology is something squished down on their heads from on high, something imposed on them by big thinkers who create systems

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The Substance of Populism

“William Jennings Bryan, whose electrifying oration on silver at the national convention had convinced the uncertain Democrats to nominate a man of thirty-six, came out of the beleaguered communities of Nebraska.  He understood the powerful pull of village values because

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Prosperity and Inflation

from Steve Forbes, The Fed Needs A New Leader–And New Policies, Too: Yellen openly and unapologetically made clear that our central bank still hews to the discredited theory that prosperity causes inflation. “The economy is operating relatively close to full

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Hacking Ironies

Russian intervention in the election is the latest addition to the growing list of excuses as to why Hillary lost. It does not seem that they hacked into the voting system and caused false votes, but that they released incriminating

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Fractured Identity

We have been a politically fragmented country since its founding. That is the nature of a Federalist republic where power is dispersed and checked, and it is the genius of our constitution. A two-party system requires a coalition of interests,

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An Afterthought or a Relic

from Jonah Goldberg in The National Review, Democrats’ Dumbest Complaint The whole point of the Constitution is to prevent the concentration of power. The Founders understood that the only thing that can reliably check power is power. If too much

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History Does Not Have Sides

From National Review and Michael Barone, After Its Ascendency Was Proclaimed, the Political Left Is Collapsing Overall, history is not bending toward happy acceptance of ever-larger government at home, nor is it moving toward submersion of national powers and identities

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Ideas Need Competition

from Michael Salon at The Wall Street Journal,  What 1980 and 2016 Have in Common, Since 2008, the largest developed economies, in an effort to build financial stability and economic prosperity, have engaged in unprecedented coordination of financial regulation, monetary

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