When the lockdowns were imposed last spring in the USA (slightly later in Mexico), the rationale was to flatten the curve so that hospitals would not be overwhelmed. It was acknowledged then, if only implicitly, that lockdowns would not eliminate COVID-19 or keep it from spreading.
Tag: knowledge
The Freedom to Do What Sounds Wrong
Friends of freedom routinely defend the right to do wrong. “If you’re only free to do good things, what freedom do you really have?” Yet on reflection, this sorely underrates the value of freedom. Yes, the freedom to do bad things is important. Much more important, though, is the freedom to do good things that sound bad.
Self-Help Is Like a Vaccine
The fact that many people refuse to do what works is a flimsy reason to humor them. And it is a terrible reason to endorse clear-cut errors like, “They just can’t do it.”
The Net Effect
We should learn from everything, from the diaper to the shroud, schooling is only a narrow part of that. Then pass it on to the next generation and the next, and the next if you have the chance. But the state is not really an educator, it is rather an indoctrinator.
Loyalty Oaths Compared: An Orwellian Exercise
What’s afoot? Orwellian doublethink of the highest order. Sure, the hated 1950 Loyalty Oath seems far less onerous than the new Diversity and Inclusion Vow. But the people who refused to sign the 1950 Oath were heroes standing up for freedom of conscience. The people who question today’s orthodoxy, in contrast, are hate-mongers who need to be excluded from high-skilled employment.
Randy Barnett: The Structure of Liberty (54m)
This episode features an interview of legal scholar and lawyer Randy Barnett from 2015 by Trevor Burrus and Aaron Powell, hosts of the Free Thoughts podcast. Barnett describes five rights—informed by natural law—that are crucial for properly structuring a society. He also shows how libertarian theories successfully counter the structural societal problems of knowledge, interests, and power.
Gallup Poll: Homeschooling Rate Doubles as School Satisfaction Plummets
Results of a new Gallup poll released last week may give us the sharpest look yet at how the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted American education and what may lie ahead. According to the poll, parents’ overall satisfaction with their child’s education dropped 10 percent over last year, while at the same time the number of parents saying they will choose homeschooling doubled in 2020 to 10 percent.
Big-Spending Trump
When Donald Trump ran for president, he promised “big league” spending cuts. Once in office, he again said he’d cut the budget, adding, “There’s a lot of fat in there.” There sure is.
Change Their Culture for The Worse
The fear that some nativists express that an influx of foreigners will change their culture for the worse expresses a lack of confidence in the virtues of their existing culture and a failure to imagine how their culture might be enriched, rather than despoiled, by encounters with other cultures.
With Remote Learning, Schools Are Watching and Reporting Parents at Alarming Rates
As remote learning creates more distance between school districts and students, school and state officials are clinging to control however they can. From sending Child Protective Services (CPS) agents to investigate charges of neglect in homes where children missed Zoom classes last spring, to proposing “child wellbeing checks” in homes this fall, government schools and related agencies are panicking over parents having increased influence over their children’s care and education during the pandemic.