There will be no resolution of America’s many social problems if free thought and free speech are no longer upheld in our public sphere. Without them, honest deliberation, mutual learning and the American problem-solving ethic are dead.
Read More“Properly understood, the “1619 Project” isn’t about black history. It’s about today’s racial disparities. It’s about applying current ideologies to past events, in the continuing attempt to blame the past actions of whites for the current problems of blacks.”
Read MoreThe passion for equality and social justice often obscures the best way to achieve it. This is the epitome of virtue signaling; policies and results matter more than intent,
Read More“The Depression and FDR transformed the Democratic Party. It adopted as an article of faith, held to this day by every Democratic presidential candidate, that any tear in the social fabric should be mended with permanent entitlements or subsidies. The competing idea is that subsidies are a poor substitute for finding and holding a job in a vibrant private economy.”
Read More“It’s an understandable temptation, in the sense that changing, say, tax credits is far less daunting than repairing a culture. But then, who are the real materialists, if the answer to a cultural meltdown isn’t to address the human soul but to say, “Don’t worry, we can engineer it all through regulation and the tax code”?
Read More“To the contrary, it’s because they don’t believe politicians recalibrating the tax code in the name of the common good will bring about the moral economy. It’s because they don’t believe technicians redirecting capital investment will work, or that it can be had with no costs or unintended consequences. Above all, it’s because they believe that trusting Washington to give us a new and improved capitalism by repurposing private companies to serve the priorities of the government rather than those of their owners requires a faith far greater than any ever demanded by the Lord.”
Read MoreRelative poverty is a very different problem from absolute poverty. If you were sitting in a room with a 100 executives making a six figure income and Bill Gates walked in, the inequality would skyrocket. Is that a problem?
Read MoreThe 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.
Read MoreThe data counters the false refrain of the Trump cuts only benefiting the rich. While I have repeated this refrain for years, the actual tax rates matter more than the statutory rates. The difference is the Special Interest Spread- SIS- a term I coined in this article: Save the Swamp.
Read MoreHalf of Trump supporters like his anti-elite, control the narrative, fearless and aggressive posture. Half of his supporters have great problems with his style, lack of diplomacy, thoughtless tweets, and divisive rhetoric; but fear the radical ideas that are pouring from the barrel of Democratic candidates like liberal tourettes.
Read MoreIf it had appeared in Breitbart or a similar political tilt, the airwaves would be jammed with condemnations and no apology would suffice. Its proximity in time to the recent shooting at the Chabad in Poway near San Diego would have made it unforgivable. That is how the New York Times treated far less offensive remarks from Republicans; Sarah Palin’s use of the word ‘cross hairs’ in a political speech was enough to blame her for the Gabby Giffords shooting.
Read MoreAdvocates of single payer and free benefits prove to be ignorant of the price system, profit, productivity and how they function. While they claim to allocate resources better than the ‘greed’ of the market (a claim easy to totally refute), they are clueless on how the wealth is generated in the first place.
Read More“Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has pointed out that Jew-hatred is usually justified by appeals to a culture’s highest authority. During the Middle Ages, that was religion—so the Jews were charged with killing Jesus. During the Enlightenment it was science, so Jews were deemed an inferior race. Today’s highest source of authority is human rights—so Israel is portrayed as the worst violator.”
Read MoreThe danger of excess regulation or central planning is not frustrating the natural organic order, but undermining the institutions that control our baser instincts.
Read More“Political correctness is the enemy of art. Self-censorship is a killer of art. Censorship applied from outside, through organized pressure, is an assassination of art.”
Read MoreKeynes suggested the use of government to make more efficient allocations of capital but was often critical of the incompetence of government officials. He seems to unknowingly refute himself. The weak accountability in government action is what distinguishes it from market solutions. The worst solution is the pairing of select firms to partner with government actors. When the results fail capitalism is faulted, bur corporatism is not capitalism.
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