"Outliers" are not politicians who lie even more than other politicians. It is a term used by statisticians to describe some data that are far away from the average-- data on seven-foot women or freezing temperatures in Los Angeles, for example....
POLITICS
Random Thoughts for December 2008
Random thoughts on the passing scene: Maybe the current bailout fever is Congress' way of getting into the spirit of the season-- saying in effect, "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus." They will undoubtedly also be saying, "Yes, New Jersey, there is a Santa...
Another Great Depression?
With both Barack Obama's supporters and the media looking forward to the new administration's policies being similar to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's policies during the 1930s depression, it may be useful to look at just what those policies were and-- more...
Counterfeiting versus Monetary Policy
Congress is on a spending binge. With all the calls for bailouts, economic stimulus and other assorted handouts, there is a real risk of inflation in our future. If we do have a rapid inflation, it's likely that Congress, as they did in the financial meltdown, will...
Postponing Reality
Some of us were raised to believe that reality is inescapable. But that just shows how far behind the times we are. Today, reality is optional. At the very least, it can be postponed. Kids in school are not learning? Not a problem. Just promote them on to the next...
Bailout Parade Panic and The Benefits of Bankruptcy
Let's not allow Congress and members of the bailout parade panic us into allowing them to do things, as was done in the 1930s, that would convert a mild economic downturn into a true calamity. Right now the Big Three auto companies, and their unions, are asking...
O.J. Simpson and The High Cost of Favoritism
O.J. Simpson has attracted less attention by being declared "guilty" in Nevada than he did by being declared "not guilty" in California. Yet his story is more than the tragedy of one man. O.J. is not the first star athlete-- or movie star, political leader or...
Capitalism and the Moral High Ground
Economists from Adam Smith to Ludwig von Mises to Henry Hazlitt to Thomas Sowell have elucidated the general mechanics of a free market and demonstrated the unassailable practicality of capitalism. They have shown how freer markets provide better and cheaper health...
Reason or Faith: The Republican Alternative
The presidential election of 2008 was more significant than the mere defeat of John McCain; it was a resounding defeat of the Republican party. Conscientious Republicans are now faced with the question: Why? Why did so many Americans either not vote, or vote for...
The Meaning of the Terrorist Attacks in Mumbai
Will the horrors unleashed by Islamic terrorists in Mumbai cause any second thoughts by those who are so anxious to start weakening the American security systems currently in place, including government interceptions of international phone calls and the holding of...
The World’s Leading Climate Scientists, in Their Own Words
Lawrence Solomon, a longtime environmental activist, began wondering a few years ago how it could be that some scientists were questioning the apparently solid consensus that humans are causing a global warming crisis. He began seeking them out, and interviewing them...
The High Cost of Washington’s Price Manipulation Policy
For decades Washington has been manipulating prices to encourage homeownership and "steer" the economy. To "incentivize" you to buy a house, it made mortgage payments tax deductible, largely exempted homes from capital gains taxes, and created Fannie Mae and Freddie...
Ignorance Reigns Supreme
How about a few civics questions? Name the three branches of government. If you answered the executive, legislative and judicial, you are more informed than 50 percent of Americans. The Delaware-based Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI) recently released the...
Freedom from the FDA
It took the Food and Drug Administration more than a century to grow into a massive, expensive, wasteful, inflexible, ineffective, distant and indifferent bureaucracy. It now violates a founding principle of the practice of medicine: "First, do no harm." The FDA does...
The Health Care Bailout of 2018
In the 1990s, politicians wanted to make home ownership as universal as possible. They used laws such as the Community Reinvestment Act to force banks to make unsustainable loans to millions of people. They also expanded quasi-government agencies such as Fannie Mae...
Free Trade versus Protectionism
There's a growing anti-trade sentiment in our country. Much of the dialogue is grossly misinformed. Let's try to untangle it a bit with a few questions and observations. First, does the U.S. trade with Japan and England? Put another way, is it members of the U.S....
Ivan and Boris Again: Why Politicians and the Media Attack CEO Salaries
There is an old Russian fable, with different versions in other countries, about two poor peasants, Ivan and Boris. The only difference between them was that Boris had a goat and Ivan didn't. One day, Ivan came upon a strange-looking lamp and, when he rubbed it, a...
“Jolting” the Economy
Barack Obama says that we have to "jolt" the economy. That certainly makes sense, if you take the media's account of the economy seriously-- but should the media be taken seriously? Amid all the political and media hysteria, national output has declined by less than...
This Thanksgiving, Don’t Say Grace, Say Justice
The religious tradition of saying grace before meals becomes especially popular around the holidays, when we all are reminded of how fortunate we are to have an abundance of life-sustaining goods and services at our disposal. But there is a grave injustice involved in...
Reason, Not Force, As The Basis of Human Interaction
In a recent lengthy discussion with a friend who is an Obama supporter, she wanted to focus upon economics. Her view was that top economists had endorsed Obama. Why was that not enough for me to support him? One, I refused to discuss economics. I explained to her that...
A Nation of Thieves: Evil Concealed by Money
Evil acts can be given an aura of moral legitimacy by noble-sounding socialistic expressions such as spreading the wealth, income redistribution or caring for the less fortunate. Let's think about socialism. Imagine there's an elderly widow down the street from you....
The Future of Social Security?
One of the slowly-simmering issues I try to follow is the future of Social Security. Eventually, the current Ponzi scheme is going to go bankrupt, and right now there's no morally principled reform on the horizon. So one big question is what sort of response to this...
The Right To Win: Tolerance for Gay Activists But Not for Mormons and Evangelicals
Among the many new "rights" being conjured out of thin air, a new one seems to be a "right" to win. Americans have long had the right to put their candidates and their ideas to a vote. Now there seems to be a sense that your rights have been trampled on if you don't...
It’s Priceless: How Politicians Hand Out “Free Lunches”
Wouldn't it be wonderful to live in a world where there were no prices? If you happened to want a Rolex or a Rolls-Royce, you could just go get one-- or two if you wanted-- and not have to worry about ugly little things like price tags. There is such a world. It is...
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