“As is so often the case in our contemporary politics, what we are talking about matters mostly because it is a way of not talking about something else.”
Read MoreWhile distrust of media has led people to even less reliable sources we are misled as much by the omission of stories that are true as we are by the acceptance of stories that are not. Facts, incomplete or out of context, can also be used to mislead.
Read More“The more elite institutions fail to do their basic jobs, and the more they abuse their positions at the commanding heights, the more room they create for populist demagoguery..”
Read More“The rising authoritarianism of our time is not an aberration but the ordinary natural fulfillment of mass democracy when it has overflowed its constitutional restraints”
Read More“Being poor is the worst kind of competitive advantage to have, and only two kinds of people pursue that advantage as a matter of national policy. “
Read MoreBoth sides refuse to re-examine the proper role of the presidency, and focus on the president in power. It may seem unrealistic to return to constitutional norms, but the alternative seems to be an escalation of the bitterness of our politics.
Read More“But politics in a republic is almost never about unity. Rather, politics is the art of negotiating differences. Democracy is about disagreement, not agreement. When politicians say: “The time for debate is over” or “Let’s put politics aside,” they’re really saying “shut up” to those who disagree.”
Read MoreThe federal government can put Social Security and Medicare on the credit card for as long as demand for U.S. Treasuries is high. States and municipalities don’t have that luxury. There is an upper bound to what even the most progressive mayors and governors can grant the lobbies that mobilize voters for their campaigns. But it’s a glass ceiling. Public sector unions are eager to break it.
Read MoreWarren 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.
Read More“Because Sweden is well-governed, it treats its tax regime as a question of revenue rather than a question of so-called social justice…”
Read More“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.”
Read MoreFrom National Review, Kevin Williams’ China’s Population Problem: Governments always operate in ignorance, and authoritarian governments suffer from this more than the governments of liberal societies. That is because in liberal societies, the spontaneous orders of markets, civil society, and
Read More“The third problem is that socialism, following Marx’s dialectical theory of history, lends itself to a theory of inevitability or preordination that leaves no room for dissent, and that leads in consequence to the elevation of a political class that responds to failure by searching for wreckers and dissenters to punish. “
Read More“It is reasonably well understood in this country that to place the word “democratic” in front of, say, “speech restrictions” or “warrantless searches” or “juryless criminal prosecutions” would be in no way to legitimize those things or to make them more compatible with the preservation of a free society.”
Read More“Young people have the patina of affluence, with an array of electronic appurtenances and lifestyle choices, but not so much else when it comes to finding good jobs, affordable homes, and freedom from debt — especially tragic when so many got so little from the university in exchange for their borrowed money.”
Read MoreIdentity politics and its accusation of “privilege” is collective guilt. It is the opposite of individual rights. In the case of Kavanaugh it is used to undo due process and the basis of our legal system. The illusion of social justice is used to destroy the reality of legal justice, the justice that truly counts and protects all of us from the mobs feared by our founders.
Read MorePopulism on the right has risen from the neglect of the values that uphold the market and lack of recognition of the market’s effect on our social values.
Populism on the left has risen from an unfulfilled promise of more democracy and then frustrating it with the administrative state, executive orders and judicial decrees.
Read More“What do you imagine would happen to the price of a Honda Civic if the federal government gave every young person in the country ten grand and a subsidized loan that could only be used for the purchase of a Honda Civic? “
Read More“Putting markets under economic discipline is where progressivism, socialism, fascism, and nationalism all intersect, each of those ideas being based on the superstition that the nation has interests distinct from those of the people who compose the nation.”
Read More“Diversity among different “kinds” of people is celebrated everywhere, but intellectual, ideological, and political diversity among those groups is demonized.”
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