On April 11, the ongoing saga of journalist and transparency activist Julian Assange took a dangerous turn. Ecuador’s president, Lenin Moreno, revoked his asylum in that country’s London embassy. British police immediately arrested him — supposedly pursuant to his “crime” of jumping bail on an invalid arrest warrant in an investigation since dropped without charges but, as they admitted shortly thereafter, actually with the intent of turning him over to US prosecutors on bogus “hacking” allegations.
Tag: america
My Provisional Support For “Borders”
The only legitimate justification for something like a “national border” would be to separate a free territory from any unfree territories around it. In order to protect the people in the free territory from the statists surrounding them.
The History of History
It would be interesting, though very difficult, to study how history changes. I don’t mean how the sequence of human events changes from the present into the future, I mean how the past changes. Since it exists only in memory from our present perspective, the stories we believe about the past are the past. But those stories aren’t fixed. They change all the time.
The Gig Economy is What Yesterday’s Socialists Said They Wanted; Why do Today’s Socialists Hate it?
They don’t want the wage system to go away. They just want to run it. They don’t want the workers to own the means of production. They just want to tax and regulate it. They don’t want a classless society. They just want to be the new ruling class.
You Don’t Make the Tax Laws, but You Do Pay the Taxes
One thing is certain: virtually nothing in the tax code is there by accident. Every incomprehensible provision is there to serve the interest of someone who made it worthwhile for a politician to direct his staffers to put it there at an opportune point in the legislative process.
Why I’m an Economic Optimist but Happiness Pessimist
When I insist that standard measures sharply underestimate economic growth, it’s easy to accuse me of motivated reasoning. Before you make this accusation, however, consider the whole picture. What possible agenda could I advance by simultaneously claiming that GDP has greatly increased, but brought us little joy?
Compulsory Schooling Laws Aren’t Progressive, They’re Inhumane
Someone asked me recently if I could wave a magic wand and do one thing to improve American education what would it be. Without hesitation, I replied: Eliminate state compulsory schooling statutes. Stripping the state of its power to define and control education under a legal threat of force is a necessary step in pursuit of education freedom and parental empowerment.
Reflections on The Sopranos
I just finished re-watching the entirety of The Sopranos, HBO’s classic Mafia drama. I saw it season-by-season when it originally aired (1999-2007), and I still hew to the allegedly philistine view that the ending was not only bad, but insulting. Overall, though the show’s reputation is well-deserved. Here are the top social science insights I take away.
Social Media Regulation: Speak of the Devil and in Walks Zuck
In a recent column on the mating dance between Big Government and Big Tech, I noted that “Big Tech wants to be regulated by Big Governments because regulation makes it more difficult and expensive for new competitors to enter the market.” Two days after I hit “publish” on that column, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg called for government regulation of social media in a Washington Post op-ed.
Unforeseen Consequences, Boeing Edition
I don’t want to rehash the details, to second guess, to play “I told you so.” It looks as though, however, that complication has led again to unforeseen consequences. It seems that a collision among customers, research and development, marketing, and multitudinous governmental regulatory agencies has produced another snarl of buck passing and finger pointing, diluted responsibility and destroyed accountability.