The Business of Policing

We live in curious times when it is the left getting broad traction on what up until a few weeks ago had been the domain of only the most radical of the anarchist-libertarians. They are demanding that the state (what some people call “government”) vis-à-vis its enforcement arm (the police) should play a diminished role in our lives. Unchecked abuses of authority (or rather “privilege”, literally Latin for “private law”) accumulated over space and time have finally reached a boiling point. To be clear, we libertarians have expounded for decades upon the obviously predictable and empirically proven flaws inherent to any state socialized monopoly system such as the police. But I suppose it isn’t until our predictions bear enough fruit that anyone wants to listen. So be it. The police are single payer security: monopoly service coupled with an extortionist payment scheme and zero liability has finally overflowed onto the bathroom floor of modern American society. It is heartening to see that people are finally awakening to the results of flawed incentives while equally depressing that so many have had to suffer death and injustice in order for people to finally take notice en masse. For those that are only capable of binary thinking, I’m not saying, “all cops are bad”. I’m saying that bad incentives produce poor outcomes because of a systemic lack of error correction.

For those communities looking to make a change to their policing system the obvious question is “What will you replace it with?” The simple answer is, “I don’t know.” And that is actually the point. This is why we have (free) markets, to give individuals a space in which to experiment to see which ideas work and which ones do not. Markets produce better outcomes not because of magical capitalist pixie dust but because given a problem to be solved, more minds are better than fewer. State monopoly systems fixate on only one way of doing something and then enforce that method upon all. Any variance from The One way is either outlawed or so heavily regulated as to make any attempt pointless. The state, lacking a profit motive, is incapable of rapid negative feedback (the loss part of profit/loss) if it implements a poor solution; it takes decades of public suffering for anyone to notice the accumulating damage of the failure. 

This movement to “defund the police” is the best thing for that industry –  in the same way that Obama’s ‘defunding’ of NASA with respect to the Shuttle program has spawned a whole new market for orbital lift companies (Space X, etc.). So how could this private policing/security model work in the real world? The beauty of any market is that it is inherently self-regulating due to the profit motive. For example, one vertical market possibility is this: client—>insurance company—>security company—>training academy. The entity to the right has to work to satisfy the demands of their customer to the left; if they don’t then the customer seeks out a different supplier and that former supplier suffers a loss. Without the state imposing the privilege of qualified immunity the individual police/security officers would carry their own indemnity insurance for their actions or their firm could cover them on their policy, but in either case, officers with a poor claim record would quickly become unemployable in the same way people that have multiple car accidents quickly find their premiums skyrocket. This is the market telling them perhaps they should seek a different career. The desire to prevent this would induce the self-regulation of more stringent training and screenings imposed upon the security firms by the insurance carriers seeking to minimize their claims resulting from rogue officers. Security firms that produce the best outcomes (solve or prevent crimes) would excel and gain more paying customers, those that do a poor job would go out of business – profit guides firms to delivering what the consumer demands: safe, effective, and efficient security. 

One common rejoinder to this model is “but what of the poor that can’t afford such security?”: well, please tell me about how “the poor” are receiving such great policing service in our current system? I’ll wait. But in all seriousness, there are many options in a market system, no doors are closed: community policing, á la carte subscription models, insurance pass through protection, charitable organizations, and many more I can’t envision. The next objection is typically “but what about law enforcement?” An indirect benefit of privatizing security/police is that it instantly nullifies all victimless crimes; no victim, no crime to solve and certainly no one to pay for it. Perhaps the laws stay on the books, but without an enforcement arm they are effectively null and void. Good. Nearly half the current prison population is for drug “crimes.” Ending the drug war in this way would create a huge public dividend of the billions not spent on pursuing such cases as well as dramatically reversing the current racial disparity in the prison system. 

While it does seem no one is currently calling for anything as radical as what I’ve outlined, the mere fact that the general populace is actively looking for some alternative is encouraging. Even if one community experiments and succeeds it would be the perfect empirical template to show that separation of police and state is no more radical than the separation of church and state.

Rescue our Seniors

Where there is death, we grieve. Death comes in many forms. It manifests not merely as the cessation of biological life also as the irreversible termination of relationships and experiences. We grieve that which is meaningful that we can’t get back. The truth of this is borne out by considering the grief many experience during the aftermath of a romantic break up. A rarely acknowledged collateral damage of this pandemic “shut down” is that of 3.2 million high school seniors. They are indeed experiencing that grief – and – just like the economic fall out for “non-essential” workers and businesses – no one seems to care.  Each passing day is a milestone that they should have experienced – Prom, honors night, senior night and apparently now graduation itself – but which has now been snatched away, never to return. You can delay a vacation, a wedding, a birthday party – you cannot delay that which cannot be rescheduled. And it is not merely events that some might dismiss as superficial trivialities. For student athletes counting on their athletic performance to qualify them for scholarships or team placement these set backs will have real world financial consequences.  If you find these statements overly dramatic, then I can only conclude you are not currently the parent of a high school senior. If you believe your own deferring of your life events is a sacrifice then you are deluding yourself. A real sacrifice is giving up something one can NEVER get back. In this regard high school (and college) seniors qualify. Sitting on the couch watching Netflix does not. Some are being asked to sacrifice much more than others. I take that back, they are not being “asked”, they are being “told.” Sacrifice leaves a much more bitter taste in your mouth when forced upon you rather than voluntarily given.

For 18 years they have anticipated that which every generation before them has enjoyed. But instead they get Lucy snatching the football away at the last second. Specious platitudes about how “we are all thinking of you” ring hollow; stop thinking and start doing. The Governor and the school boards CAN do something. If they actually cared about our seniors’ interests they would be steadfastly crafting a concrete plan to restore as much of what has been lost of the senior year rather than hiding behind non-committal weasel words of “hoping”  to try this or that. If anyone truly cared they could still squeeze several senior year milestones into a resurrected last two weeks of school. Not ideal, but better than nothing at all. And to all you parents trying to help, please stop. Well intentioned but poorly considered ideas of parents posting their own graduation photos online to honor their senior is pouring salt on an open wound. Honestly, this is like sending selfies from your ski trip to your buddy who broke his legs.

The constant false hope has been a destructive psychological rollercoaster. First it was just two weeks of closure, then two more, then finally, sorry, school year is over and oh by the way we’ve made this decision over 6 weeks in advance of the end of the school year. Why make decisions so far out? What purpose does it serve other than to virtue signal one’s adherence to the groupthink of the mob? If you can close schools on 3 days notice you can open them on 3 days notice. This is school, not the moon landing.

So what to do? At least in Georgia the outbreak and deaths have never gotten anywhere near what they claimed and we are clearly “over the hump” at this point (see here and here) . The Governor should permit the public school systems to resume normal operations if they so desire. Each school district can tailor their response to their own environment and to the desires of their parents and seniors. If schools are opened but some are still concerned for their health they are free to stay at home and continue as they have. But, we should not let the fears of some override the desires of everyone else. Hold high school sports, hold the Prom, hold Senior night – if people want to attend these events they can, but nobody is forcing anyone to attend them, it is quite easy to opt out: just don’t go. 

We have nothing to fear…

Amidst the current global pandemic of COVID-19 there is another more sinister and stealthy infection moving through society: BBD-20, Binary Brain Disease. It renders the victim incapable of analyzing any topic, in particular the COVID response, in anything other than a good/bad false choice mode. For years this disease festered amongst the political class but for the most part was confined to that realm. It has now broken through those ranks and spread to the general populace. It sickens the soul of this country, as its victims willingly disown the Constitution while all but begging for martial law. And people wonder how the fascist regimes in Germany, Italy, and Japan so easily subdued their populace into compliance.  They did so through fear; fear of the “other”. Today that other is not some corporeal enemy but instead the invisible specter of a potential harm. 

Currently the most common symptom of BBD-20 is the belief that any discussion regarding the immense social, economic, and mental devastation resulting from bankrupting tens of millions of people equates to an obvious desire to kill grandma and millions like her. Furthermore the infected commonly engage in very public virtue signaling via sanctimonious pronouncements about how obviously basic morality compels us to lock ourselves in our basement for an indeterminate period in order to protect the “vulnerable”. Newsflash: those that are immune compromised face that risk from all diseases, not just COVID. Anyone else at risk with COVID should protect himself or herself and not expect the rest of the planet to bankrupt themselves trying to protect them. There are reasonable precautions and there are unreasonable. Right now we are in the unreasonable zone, but even the mere thought of a conversation about dialing it back to the reasonable zone sends BBD-20 victims into apoplexy.

I suppose this is to be expected. Our society is largely the product of a public school system that propagandizes its citizenry into the false narrative that the state is our savior. A savior is of course omniscient (after all a less wise being cannot save us). It is imprudent to question our betters, so unsurprisingly those of us that do so are chastised to no end: “How dare you question such and such, don’t you know he’s an EXPERT!?” This mistaken belief in state level omniscience compels many to suspend their critical faculties and blindly follow the state anointed “experts.” Never mind that these very same “experts” told us in January that,

“this is not something that the citizens…should be worried about right now.” (Fauci, Jan 2020)

First we are told we don’t need masks, now we are told we do. Ok, well which is it? Were they wrong then and right now, or right then and wrong now? Were there weapons of mass destruction or were there not? When exactly is the state lying to us or when are they merely incompetent? I suspect it is a bit of both, after all, the political class (elected and appointed) are largely made up of the C-students that couldn’t cut it in the real world and so have carved out a cushy sinecure in the hierarchy of state mediocrity.

Again this ignorance is to be expected. The state school systems do not teach economics. They barely teach history. Nobody learns about tradeoffs, marginal benefits, or the division of labor. If they did they would understand one does not simply “stop” the marketplace and restart it later with little to no harm. If these concepts were taught, then the political class would understand one can’t repair the damage that they are causing throughout society by merely printing money. Most people genuinely have no idea how the goods they order on Amazon end up on their front porch. Even the most mundane of products is the result of the truly invisible hand of the market that coordinates millions of individuals across hundreds of sectors. To truly grasp the depth of that statement I encourage the reader to take a look at “I, Pencil” by Leonard Read.

In any event, in a non-political society where “the people” lack the power to meddle with things they don’t understand their lack of understanding would be irrelevant, insofar as they could not derail that which they cannot grasp. The current state of affairs is comparable to people banning electricity but expecting their smart phones to continue working.

It is telling that the more vocal proponents of these “shut it down” measures are those that work either directly or indirectly for the state or a state (tax) supported sector of the economy. Those other people, who have been deemed “non-essential,” they should lose everything. It’s for the “greater good” after all. Those in the non-essential camp see it differently. How grotesque a society have we become when someone can turn to their neighbor and tell them that they are “not essential” to society while they collect their “essential services” paycheck from their state connected employer? Were the hospitality and other “non-essential” sectors of the economy allowed to operate again would they not see a steep decline in revenues? Yes, of course – but it wouldn’t be zero revenue as it is now. At this point anything is better than zero.

            Maybe, just maybe, the solution to this problem is not to go running to the very entity (the state) that is the proximate cause for the dilemma we see ourselves in. The state has only one solution for every problem it encounters: pass a law and then back that law up with the threat of violence – the state is literally a hammer that sees every problem as a nail. There are a million instances of state created distortions in society that have hampered our ability to cope with this pandemic, but let’s just look at the top three:

(a) Certificate of Need laws severely restrict the number of hospitals and hospital beds in Georgia (and in 34 other states in the US) – there would be far more beds right now had these laws never existed, this one is not even debatable,

(b) Regulatory bodies like the FDA have for years thrown up a wide assortment of regulatory barriers that have kept safe, cheap, and effective treatments and tests for a myriad of diseases and ailments from being available to the public or needlessly delayed them for years; to wit, the CDC delayed testing in this country for weeks as it bungled about trying to make its own kit while existing kits were already available

(c) the sclerotic monetary and financial system propped up by the inflationary monetary policies of the Federal Reserve ensured and promoted wide ranging financial moral hazards that rendered most companies unable to cope with unpredictable downturns such as this pandemic – a pandemic that would never have become a pandemic in the US had (a) and (b) not been an issue.

            To turn to the state now as our savior is like asking your dentist to remove all your teeth, both cavity infected and not, when it was that same dentist that advised you your whole life to eat sugary foods and brush your teeth with cake frosting. Yes, perhaps now you have few options, but at least get a second opinion and make a note to ignore or critically evaluate all future advice. 

A Blind Hen…

As the saying goes, even a blind hen finds corn. Georgia House Bill 523 is just that bit of legislative corn. Typically it is large, distant governing bodies (federal and/or state) that impose upon their subsidiaries egregious violations of individual liberty. These large bodies commonly compel all to march in lock step with their directives irrespective of the preferences of the smaller communities and individuals. But as Yoda says, “size matters not.” Small governing bodies may be just as injurious to individual rights as large bodies. House Bill 523 is trying to right the wrongs that numerous local, city, and county governments have inflicted on their citizens. In short, House Bill 523 would remove the legal authority for such communities to restrict the property rights of those who wish to engage in “short term” rentals (under 30 days) of their homes. HB 523 has been dubbed the “AirBnB” bill because it is attempting to restore the rights of homeowners to use their property as they see fit with respect to these rentals. Many local communities currently impose either outright bans on such short-term rentals or onerous restrictions (such as being forced to plead one’s case in front of a board of commissioners – basically begging to be permitted to use their own property). This bill would do away with these regulations and render the local governing bodies impotent in this domain.

The indignant outcries from the local communities’ governing leaders (e.g. Morgan County which encompasses a wide swath of lake homes and charming antebellum abodes – see this article (behind paywall)) concerning this bill is deafening in its hypocrisy. Why this is a blatant violation of THEIR right to violate the rights of those that live in their community! This ranks right up there with the indignation of slave owners who were forced to free their slaves after the Civil War – “I can’t believe what is being done to me!” These are the same people that will put their hand over their heart and recite the pledge of allegiance while fondly reflecting on the phrase “liberty and justice for all” and then with a straight face tell a homeowner, “no, sorry, we have the right to tell you how you may or may not use YOUR property.” Yep, nothing illustrates pursuit of happiness better than other people imposing their will on you.

The objections to HB 523 run the usual gamut of crony-capitalism, protectionism, and nods toward the protection of existing homeowners. Unsurprisingly existing bed and breakfasts and local hoteliers oppose this bill since AirBnB and similar real estate sharing activities threaten their business. But it is not the domain of government to protect the economic interests of businesses by restricting competition  – regardless of how rampant this behavior may otherwise be across this country (from taxi medallions, to Certificate of Need laws, to food truck regulations and similar “turf” zoning). The other concern raised is typical fear-mongering; paint a worst case scenario to the constituents and then step in and offer a solution to prevent said scenario, “well, this might happen, so let’s ban it.” But of course existing laws prohibiting public nuisance or excessive noise already cover the scenarios they outline; there is no need for additional restrictive controls.  

In fact, this bill is so astutely crafted that it carves out an exception for existing private protective covenants that govern short-term rentals. Why? Because protective covenants are voluntary contracts: one may opt in or out by buying or not buying property governed by them. But this is not so with ordinances and regulations, they come and go and change with the prevailing political winds so it is impossible to ever be sure what your property rights will be in one, five or ten years. Perhaps HB 523 will change just a bit of that.

Hypocrisy on Trial

Trump is going to win re-election. Bigly. And the Democrats have ironically all but guaranteed that result with this head-scratching insane witch-hunt of impeachment. The political class may think they have uncovered a cleaver loophole to abort their least favorite President but the rest of us, the American public, can see right through their subterfuge. The core of the argument for impeachment demonstrates the willful hypocrisy so often demonstrated by both parties against the other. They are literally saying that Trump’s political extortion to expose Biden’s political extortion is impeachable whereas Biden’s identical behavior is perfectly fine. Furthermore, these aren’t mere allegations against Biden – we literally have video of him bragging about doing just that. Biden boasted about how he got Ukraine to drop an investigation into Burisma Holdings Ltd in front of a small entourage by insisting if they didn’t do what he asked the foreign aid they had been promised would not be forthcoming. Sound familiar? That seems like an odd request for  a Vice-President. Why would he be so interested in the internal machinations inside Ukraine? Well it just so happens that his son, Hunter Biden, sat on the board of Burisma at the time. Of course no one in the corporate press seems curious to ask how Hunter Biden managed to secure a million dollar a year sinecure on the board of one of the largest Ukrainian natural gas companies. I’m sure it was complete coincidence that this dropped right into his lap while his father was Vice-President. Nothing to see here, move along, move along. 

Basically the new standard they are trying to set in Congress is that as soon as a politician is running for political office they are immune from all investigations of potential wrong doing. The only entity that could open such investigations is the government. And those in the government in the same party as the candidate certainly aren’t going to open such investigations. So that leaves only people from the other party. So the second someone from the other party suggests to open an investigation they themselves will be hauled before Congress on violation of “ethics” rules for having even proposed such a thing.

So what Trump intimated be done is no different than if say Exxon had a new CEO and that CEO asked that some outside party investigate the former CEO because there was strong evidence of wrongdoing. Let’s even say that former CEO was still on the board and seeking to claim his spot again. Even then, would anyone object to this scenario? Seems perfectly reasonable shareholders would want to know if there were wrong doing at the top of their company. Seems perfectly reasonable we would want to know if Biden engaged in unethical horse-trading during his tenure as VP.

Trump simply asked for the matter to be looked into. He didn’t ask them to “get him” by fabricating evidence. It is entirely possible the results could have been to fully exonerate Biden. There is no way to say a priori this request would necessarily benefit Trump politically. Firstly, it was unknown (and still is) who the final Democratic nominee for president will be, and secondly, it was equally likely that Biden could have been cleared or have implicated in something inappropriate. 

The final irony here is that what Trump (or Biden) actually did is something that nearly all politicians do all the time. They are constantly making deals to advance their own interests – that is literally how they get most votes for their bills, e.g. the old “you vote for my bill, I’ll vote for yours.” How is that ethical? A politician willing to undermine the interests of their constituents to advance their own political capital is certainly engaging in far more egregious behavior that what Trump is accused of. He literally was suggesting that a foreign country would not get a GIFT of OUR money unless they help him investigate possible FRAUD committed by a former elected official. Oh, the horrors! Lock up that monster now!

Warren’s Healthcare Plan Dead on Arrival

The likely Democratic front-runner, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, has at long last lifted the proverbial kimono to reveal the wizardry by which she proposes to fund the so-called “Medicare for All.” She has long insisted her plan would require no new taxes for the middle class while deftly sidestepping questions seeking details on the funding scheme. Those details have now been revealed and it is apparent that the veracity of her prior assertions depends on her definition of “tax”, “middle class”, and “total costs.” In Warren’s world a payment that the government requires you to make is not a tax but rather a “contribution.” Ok. Although Democrats are not shy about wanting to drain your wallet via taxation, they assiduously avoid associating themselves with that particular term, instead opting to use feel-good Orwellian phrases such as the “Affordable” Care Act’s “shared responsibility payment.” Other common taxation weasel words include “revenue,” or board/department of “equalization” when referring to the entity responsible for taking the money. The Department of Theft would be more honest, but I digress. 

The crux of the financial underpinnings for her plan rely on a new employer mandate, that is, a “contribution” paid by every “large” (whatever that means) employer to the federal government in place of the amount they used to pay in health insurance premiums. But I’m sure that amount will never go up, just like the original income tax rate of 6% was promised to never increase. New government programs always cost exactly what they are estimated to and efficiently achieve their stated goals. 

But wait, there’s more. The remaining funding for her plan relies on what George Bush senior would have charitably called “voodoo economics.” It makes broad assumptions about economic growth and how much can be saved by consolidating services under the federal umbrella as well as laughable estimates of how much more tax revenue can be brought in by increasing IRS enforcements efforts. How tone-deaf does a candidate have to be to propose increasing IRS audits? Truly, Americans love nothing more than the prospect of an IRS audit. It’s right up there with Root Canals for All. 

But don’t take my word for it. Just listen to what her fellow Democrats have to say about this plan. Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign went on the record stating that,

For months, Elizabeth Warren has refused to say if her health care plan would raise taxes on the middle class, and now we know why: because it does. Senator Warren would place a new tax of nearly $9 trillion that will fall on American workers.”

Additionally, the Urban Institute (a highly regarded liberal think tank) projects a Warren/Sanders style single payer plan would raise health care spending by $7 trillion over a decade, while healthcare economics Kenneth Thorpe finds such a plan would increase costs to more than 70% of people who currently have private insurance. And these are people on the left!

To briefly touch on the economics of her new “contribution” it should be obvious this would have the side effect of suppressing future earnings of the very middle class she is pandering to. Economics is (partly) the study of the seen and the unseen (Bastiat). The seen benefit here is the “free” healthcare. The unseen result is that future wages and hires will necessarily be lower in comparison to a world where this new “contribution” does not exist. Companies do not have an infinite supply of money; if resources are mandated toward an MFA payment scheme, then that much less will be available for raises, new hires, and expansion of operations. In short this new tax would be a million ton anchor on the American economy. To suggest one can add $20 trillion in new spending without harmful economic consequences is either deranged or willfully dishonest. Neither is a good option from a presidential candidate.

Quora: I’m sick of paying for everyone else’s kids to go to school. Why can’t people without children pay smaller amounts of school tax than people with children?

Why? Because we live in a world populated by morons that can’t seem to comprehend the idea that just because an investment (yes, education is an investment) benefits other people indirectly doesn’t therefore require all of “society” pay for said investment through a progressive theft (taxation) scheme

My God people. So a factory is built and it employs people and produces goods we all enjoy, does that mean “society” should pay to have all factories built? To subsidize all business creation? I invest in a car so I can get to work and I’m a heart surgeon. Guess without that car I couldn’t operate on people. I guess “society” has to buy me a car otherwise you have no right to think I should ever operate on you if you need my services.

“Society” benefits from everything everyone does (other than crimes of course). Does that mean every dang thing anyone does should be bought and paid for by some kid of tax?

The idea that without government schools throngs of children would be neglected and uneducated is absurd. So I guess all these same non-school inclined parents are now also neglecting to feed, clothe and provide shelter for their children too? Oh no you say of course they would do those things. All except for education. Right. Nope just sit at home and watch TV son. It’s alright

Government schools helping the least advantaged? Right! Where are the most common complaints about schooling levied? At the poorly run schools from poor districts. And that’s the outcome right now with government in charge. That’s your system folks. If the same occurred right now under a non government school environment you’d never hear the end of the screaming for the government to step in. But it happens on their watch and those of us insisting on a free market in education as the solution (and only moral system as it involves no theft) are called the crazy ones.

But I’m not surprised. What would you expect to come out of government indoctrination centers err I mean public schools but mindless brainwashed apologists for the very system that produced them. The lesson there is theft is perfectly fine as long as I can come up with an ex post facto reason why I think you might have indirectly benefited from the tax money I stole from you.

Trump’s Troop Withdrawal, Spark of Peace?

How do you know when Donald Trump is doing the right thing? When the D’s & R’s are equally outraged. This past week Trump managed to trigger the neocons on the left and right into autistic apoplexy with his directive that US forces be withdrawn from northern Syria. What have the troops been doing there? Glad you asked. The US forces were allied with the Kurds who were busy fighting ISIS. ISIS tried to establish a new Islamic state in part of Kurdish territory a few years ago out of the chaos that arose from the Syrian “civil” war (or more aptly described by Tulsi Gabbard as the “Syrian regime change war”). This US instigated proxy regime change war utilized most fully the principle that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. The US decided, on Obama’s watch, to fund and arm Al-Qaida (the guys that brought down the Twin Towers, yes those guys) because they were willing to fight President Assad’s forces in Syria on our behalf.

The Deep State (aka The Swamp) wants war. They want death. They want chaos. Why? Money and power; but mostly money. As long as people are killing each other they’ll need weapons to do so. It is a viciously endless Yin and Yang of death. Each party will gladly participate in murders half a world away to keep the music playing. Step 1: foment war. Step 2: sell weapons. Step 3: use weapon sales profits to keep war-friendly politicians in power. Wash, rinse, repeat. And if anyone tries to interrupt this broken record, then smear them as “obviously” being some sort of traitor or “in the pocket” of the enemy du jour (today that being Russia and/or Iran). The contradiction of the smears is laughable at best. For example, the claim now is that Trump is simultaneously in the pocket of Ukraine and Russia; two countries whose long-standing animosity make this assertion incoherent. Likewise, just this week, Tulsi Gabbard (Representative from Hawaii, military combat veteran, and Democrat candidate for President) has been accused of being a Russian asset by Hillary Clinton. Gabbard brooks no smears and shot back,

“The reason why she’s doing this is because she knows that she can’t control me. She knows that she’s not going to be able to manipulate me if I’m elected president to be able to continue these warmongering policies that she has championed.”

Trump is no angel but his instincts, at least when it comes to killing people, are in the right place. Please recall that when Iran shot down an unmanned US drone a few weeks ago Trump rightly called off a counter attack that would have killed dozens if not hundreds of people because Iran broke our toy. Response in the corporate press: apoplexy. But when he ordered an air strike early in his first year in office the response in the corporate media was nothing but effusive praise for how “presidential” he was. It would seem the presidency is like joining the mafia; you aren’t a “made man” until you’ve killed someone. 

Fortunately, Trump’s impatience with these endless wars was correct. Not even a week after the announced withdrawal of US troops from northern Syria, the Kurds have negotiated with Syria and Russia to provide them protection from a potential invasion by Turkey. The US bemoaning the idea that Russia now might exert more influence in Syria is as absurd as were Russia to decry US influence in the Panama Canal. Peace is on the horizon. Whether that horizon is a dawn or dusk depends on Trump’s ability to keep the war hawks in check. 

Every Breath (of CO2) You Take – “We’ll be watching you”

The noted 18th century British essayist Samuel Johnson is perhaps best know for his statement, “Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.” This is often misunderstood to be a disparagement of patriotism, but, in fact, is quite the opposite. Johnson was casting aspersions against those who shield their true motives beneath a banner of a noble ideal. Apropos the shielding of true motivations: the modern era “climate” crusaders. If I may be so bold as to pen as variant of this principle, “Children are the last refuge of the undefendable.” 

            The most current example of this principle (argumentum ad liberi) is manifested in a one Greta Thunberg. She is the physical incarnation of the modern climate campaign. And her address to the UN is the likely apotheosis of that movement. A child is the perfect avatar for a cause whose sole call to action is predicated on future calamities. And who will be here in that future? Children, of course! Being a child she is granted immunity from all criticism because this then facilitates casting such a critic as a misanthropic ogre (and we’ve already seen this dance play out in the media in the past week any time she has been criticized). Cue my critics in 3, 2, 1 and…

            But of course this is not her doing. We cannot blame her, she is after all only a child. She is but a tool, a puppet, for a movement whose roots extend far back into the last century. No, not environmentalism, but rather Marxism (aka communism). These 21st century Climate Marxists are political watermelons (green on the outside and red on the inside). Marxists are adept at pitting one “class” of people against another in order to foment unrest and animosity that they can capitalize (ironically) on in order to effect their political ideals in society. This pattern emerged during the Russian revolution and repeated throughout the 20th century (China, Cuba, Cambodia, Vietnam). Everywhere it was tried it was an abysmal failure that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of millions who did not want to be a part of their utopic commune. And now they are trying again. 

            Seeing as how capitalism raised the standard of living for billions in the last century and reduced absolute poverty from 90% to around 10% today, clearly the anti-capitalism message is rapidly losing its strength. But then along came “climate change” to breath new life into a dying movement. The appeal of this cause célèbre is that it doesn’t matter if the details are correct or not, what is important is that we “do something.” And of course that something, in their view, is to radically alter the global economy in order to “save” the planet. But leaders have been slow or recalcitrant to implement their favored policies. Potential damage is decades away. Time to shorten the timetable and pull out the big guns: children. 

            The current climate alarmism lobby is now taking a page from the Chinese communists propaganda playbook.  They used children in their propaganda as a means to shame adults into conforming.  And that is exactly what Greta set out to do. From her opening remark ,

“My message is that we’ll be watching you”

to her closing statement,

“You are failing us. But the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, I say: We will never forgive you”

were remarkable in their capacity to cram so much shaming, hate, anger, and implied revenge into such a short speech. Her statements sound more like dialogue from “The Godfather” than the expected plaintive pleas of a young schoolgirl afraid for her future.

            But the mask is off now. If these “climate” extremists get voted into power you can fully expect unyielding persecution, subjugation, or worse to any that would stand in their way (“How dare you oppose us! Why do you hate the planet so much comrade?”). The 20th century’s mountain of corpses stands as a testament to what the extreme left is willing to do to its opponents to achieve their ends. And they would have zero qualms about a repeat of the Ukrainian Holodomor on a global scale. This is not hyperbole. The stated “solutions” to keeping temperature rise below 1.5 °C would quite literally sentence several billions to death by starvation. Without carbon or nuclear-based fuels there is no serious short-term alternative to maintain the current global standard of living and food supplies. If we go back to the future of 1850’s technology within 10 years then population must necessarily fall from today’s 7 billion to the 1 billion back then. And this is entirely ignoring the concomitant drop in standard of living, as manual labor must increase without an equivalent supply of power. Ironically their boogeyman “income inequality” would skyrocket to what it was in the 19th century with mostly those in government occupying the upper echelons of income and power (a pattern by the way seen in every communist/Marxist regime). Of course this would be perfectly fine since many of those on the left (from Paul Ehrlich of “Population Bomb” fame, to the Club of Rome) have called from drastic reductions in global population.  

“Our aim is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to change the global economic system…”

UN Climate Chief Christiana Figueres (Feb 2015)

“The common enemy of humanity is Man. In searching for a common enemy against whom we can unite, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like, would fit the bill..”

– The Club of Rome Premier environmental think-tank and consultants to the United Nations. 

Anything Goes!

This past week Trump’s Energy Department announced a relaxation of a set of light-bulb energy efficiency standards (EISA) first implemented under George W. Bush and finalized under Obama. The standards were set to go into full effect in January 2020 (eliminating incandescent versions of three-way bulbs, candle-shaped, globe-shaped and reflector bulbs). 

The autistic screeching from the corporate press and leftist “public policy” lackeys only underscores the lengths to which “the Cathedral” will go to in order to maintain the hell-fire of climate alarmism. For Cathedral adherents the sky is quite literally falling. It is because of their prescient guidance that the rest of us are corralled into doing “the right thing” – namely spending $10 on a bulb to save $15 in electricity – over the next 30 years. Even though the market has always deprecated older technology in favor of newer, we just can’t wait when it comes to energy efficiency. In the words of New York Times columnist John Schwartz, we need the federal government to “force(d) Americans to use more energy-efficient light bulbs.” Please note that “force” here is a politically correct euphemism for “threaten with initiatory violence”. Now it is true, force can solve problems quickly. All the mugger needs to do is to wave his gun in my face and moments later his monetary problems are solved. One would like to believe that in the “land of the free” such state sponsored aggression would not be so readily lauded as the primary method deployed against perceived societal problems. Of course I do not expect the state to abjure this special power it has any time soon, it is the qua sine non of every state/government. When a such a body dictates to the citizenry what they may or may not manufacturer and buy, then that country is no longer entitled to call itself “the land of the free” or claim “liberty and justice for all.”

One of the more vocal critics of this rollback, an Andrew deLaski of the Appliance Standards Awareness Project went on record with some rather eyebrow-raising comments. For example

“The Trump administration is trying to protect technology that was first invented in the 1800s. It’s like trying to protect the horse and buggy from the automobile technology.”

Correct me if I’m wrong, but as I recall the government did not OUTLAW the sale or manufacture of the horse and buggy in favor of promoting the automobile. Consumers transitioned to the newer technology over time at a rate mediated by both the cost and advantages of the new technology.

To imply that removing regulations that are annihilating an industry is equivalent to “protecting” said industry makes about as much sense as saying someone who was in the process of knifing you to death but then pauses and begins to only punch you in the face is actually now “protecting” you. The truth is the polar opposite. The manufacturers of fluorescent and LED bulbs are the ones receiving state protection insofar as competing technology have being outlawed. But we’re “protecting” the planet so greater good trumps all. Makes one wonder what the left is capable of when they eventually hold power and the climate apostates are in their cross hairs. In the words of Cole Porter I suspect it will be “anything goes!”