See What You Want To See
The usually excellent Glenn Greenwald has written a very poorly argued tirade against the influence of Wall Street money in national politics.
It’s trivial to use this incident to support the exact opposite of Greenwald’s conclusion. If bankers are complaining that they haven’t gotten anything in exchange for their political contribution to Democrats, then presumably [...]
The Welfare State
Bryan Caplan eloquently summarizes the libertarian view of the welfare state:
I’m against forced redistribution, even to help the deserving poor. Still, unless you buy the whole libertarian package, I understand taxing the rich to help the poor. What I can’t understand is taxing everyone to help everyone. Means-tested programs like TANF and Medicaid aren’t crazy; [...]
Pot. Kettle.
Glenn Greenwald discusses governments spying on their own citizens:
It should go without saying that all of the sponsors of the pending bill to ban American companies from collaborating with domestic Internet spying in foreign countries — the inspirationally-named Global Online Freedom Act of 2009 — voted in favor of the 2008 bill to legalize what had [...]
Things Worth Reading
Bryan Caplan on Democratic Fundamentalism and The Baby Business.
A very cute way to make students pay attention: “it is my intention to work into each of my lectures … one lie”.
John Timmer wants to know Why is the news media comfortable with lying about science?
Violinist Joshua Bell plays the DC Metro. Or, rather, he did [...]
Women, Culture, and Ayn Rand
Via Ophelia Benson, I found a news article titled South Sudan: Women Perpetuate Culture of Submission, which is mostly self-explanatory but still very much worth reading. I am reminded of what Alex Tabarrok said about Ayn Rand:
it’s no accident that Hillary Clinton was once an avid Randian (recall her political career started with Barry Goldwater) [...]
