Monthly Archives: October 2019

Archive of posts published in the specified Month

Peter’s Wall

When you rob Peter to pay Paul you can count on Paul’s approval, but you can also count on Peter moving to another more friendly place.  When you try to build a wall to keep Peter in, you also discourage Peters from moving here, and you encourage young and enterprising Peters to move away BEFORE they become wealthy enough to be worth robbing.

Warren’s policy is as destructive of our long term financial health as any policy we can imagine. 

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The Problem With Big Political Ideas

Big ideas that expand the government’s power and domain into aspects of our lives where they possess neither the knowledge nor ability to succeed leaves them with only one tool; raw power. Big ideas that come at the expense of bigger and better ideas proven over time is not a sign of progress.

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When the Parties Abandon Ideology

A political party is a coalition of interests designed to convince a majority to trust it enough to let it govern. The Progressive Era in its aim to neuter the constitutional speed bumps to majoritarian democracy pushed for democratic primaries. Initially the parties retained some ideological commitment, but in the age of instant outrage media, they have descended into tribal warfare where emotions rule over ideas. The two sides do not share common information or common narratives that define us as a nation.  There is no mere disagreement on how we arrive at common goals; we no longer agree on who we are.

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Elizabeth Warren’s Wall

Warren uses ‘rich people’ as a scapegoat in the same way the classical bigots of history used religious and ethnic  vulnerable minorities and the ‘others’.  It is a form of intellectual bigotry and is clouded in the same lethal combination of ignorance and dishonesty.

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The Morality Tax

“Because Sweden is well-governed, it treats its tax regime as a question of revenue rather than a question of so-called social justice…”

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The Battle of the Bastards

The big question when Trump won in 2016 was whether his victory was the result of the rejection of the ideology of the left or the rejection of the deeply flawed Hillary Clinton.  The question few of us considered was if it was the attractiveness of either the character or policies of Donald Trump.  

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The Madisonian Insight

“This was the Madisonian insight,” he contends: “that you can make all sorts of promises on a piece of paper, and call it a ‘bill of rights,’ and it’s not worth the paper it’s written on unless you have some means to enforce it. Like any good contract, it’s only worth the enforcement mechanism it stands on.”

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Of the Elites, By the Elites, and for the Elites

“Progressivism was exactly a doctrine of the elites, by the elites, and for the elites. They said–I mean, their objection to market society was that markets function so annoying well, without the supervision of intellectuals.”

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The Political Corruption of History

Politics can pollute science, religion and – in this case- history.  We are all the sum of our decisions- good and bad.  Progress comes from the recognition of both; recognition and correction of our sins, but also the recognition of how we overcame them and the value of our institutions that prevented other evils and promoted the stunning progress we have achieved in spite of our sins.   The 1619 Project only wants to recognize our sins and ignore our redemption, virtues, and progress.

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Another Failed God

“the worst forms of tyranny very much include majoritarian tyranny. One might think that the Trump presidency would cause progressives to think twice about what William F. Buckley Jr. dismissed as “the authority of political truths arrived at yesterday at the voting booth.”

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Reconciling Flaws with Success

Even supporters have trouble reconciling Trumps flaws with his success.  Half of Trump supporters like him as he is, and half just like him more than the Jacobins running for the Democratic slots.  They prefer Trump’s character flaws to the bad ideas of the Democrats which pour forth uncontrollably.  The mobocracy fo the Kavanaugh hearing scares them more.

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A Watery Ceasarism

“Hence, there is such a thing as a human nature that is fixed and settled, not plastic to the touch of culture or government. That, we are more than culturally-acquiring creatures that take on the coloration of whatever social situation we are in. And third, from this flows the most important principle, which is separation of powers, to make government strong enough, to protect our natural rights, and not so strong that it threatens them. “

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