Don't Newsletter on Me (1/25/21)
Articles from Reason, FEE, FFF, AIER, The American Conservative, Ars Technica, Caitlin Johnstone, AntiWar.Com, and The Mises Institute.
These are in no particular order.
If you need some Zen, check out this fish tank. #LifeGoals
Goodbye, Trump. Hello, War on Domestic Terror.
Reason
With Americans still reeling from the January 6 Capitol riot, the Biden administration will begin its term amid a rapidly escalating "tough on domestic terror" mood.
That's never a good influence no matter which ruling party is in office, and perhaps especially bad in times of intense partisan conflict. There are a few things both Democrats and Republicans can almost always come together on, and limiting civil liberties in the name of national security is chief among them. But worse, Biden has never backed away from hysterical policy reactions to perceived crime and terror threats.
The FDA Is Holding Up a Cheap Vaccine as COVID Deaths Surge
The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)
Many might assume that the purpose of the FDA is to protect Americans and save lives. Unfortunately, this is not the nature of bureaucracies. Their purpose is not to save lives, but to follow processes.
…
Sadly, because of this flawed incentive structure, we are only left to wonder how many lives of COVID victims might have been spared in a system based on voluntary choice, not bureaucracy and coercion.
Milking the Capitol Melee for All It’s Worth
The Future of Freedom Foundation (FFF)
Hitler’s reaction was predictable. He went to the Reichstag and requested emergency powers to deal with the communist-terrorist crisis. When he met with resistance among members of the Reichstag, he went ballistic, screaming and berating them for not understanding the serious nature of the crisis facing Germany. Giving him temporary emergency powers would enable him to wage war on terrorism and win it.
The Reichstag gave Hitler what he wanted. Germany was never the same again, until after it was defeated in World War II. Giving Hitler those emergency powers plunged the nation into years of darkness.
All Hail the Reopening!
The American Institute of Economic Research (AIER)
Given how incredibly political this pandemic has been from the beginning, many people smell a rat. Is it really the case that the reopening of the American economy, particularly in blue states, is so perfectly timed? Do the science and politics really line up so well?
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What matters right now is that the astonishing destructiveness of lockdowns might be coming to an end.
For those of us inveighing against lockdowns for a full year, it’s truly been a remarkable week. Restrictions are being loosened or are going away. We are finally getting some truth about the carnage. And we are even starting to see some elected officials being honest with us.
You Can’t ‘Just Build Your Own Twitter’
The American Conservative
With cultural domination in one hand and financial muscle in the other, power is assuming its final, undivided form. American progressivism has gone mask-off and revealed itself to be little more than pink libertarianism. The interests of working people take a backseat to two symbiotic concerns: increasingly radical social crusades, and the apparently sacred property rights of megacorporations that insulate social crusades from opposition.
Unemployment During the Pandemic Expected to Cause 900,000 US Deaths, New Economic Study Finds
The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)
“Our results suggest that the toll of lives claimed by the SARS-CoV-2 virus far exceeds those immediately related to the acute COVID-19 critical illness and that the recession caused by the pandemic can jeopardize population health for the next two decades,” the researchers said.
Treasury nominee Yellen is looking to curtail use of cryptocurrency
Ars Technica
So instead of trying to force the networks themselves to comply, regulators in the US—and many other jurisdictions—have focused on regulating bitcoin exchanges that help users trade between dollars and cryptocurrencies. Once a bitcoin exchange identifies who initially received a particular bitcoin payment, law enforcement can often trace subsequent payments through a blockchain network's open payment ledger.
Is ‘Stakeholder Capitalism’ Newspeak for Economic Fascism?
The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)
In the same vein, “for fascism the state is absolute, individuals and corporations [are] relative” said Mussolini. Either way, the holders of centralized power, by controlling production, control your life. They become the solitary “stakeholder” in all decisions involving material resources.
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A system that replaces the goals of true stakeholders with the iron will of ruling elites, which retains nominal private ownership, but uses government force to pressure firms to serve centrally determined goals, looks and smells an awful lot like economic fascism.
Will Democrats Embrace the Imperial Presidency Now That Their Guy Is in Charge?
Reason
"Joe Biden Must Not Shy Away From the Full Power of the Presidency," says the headline above a New York Times op-ed piece by University of Chicago law professor Eric Posner. "During the presidential campaign," Posner notes, Biden "was not shy about criticizing then-President Donald Trump for abusing his executive authority." But Posner, who seems to be drawing the wrong pointers from his 2020 book The Demagogue's Playbook, warns that such constitutional concerns are dangerous to the Democratic agenda now that Biden has replaced Trump. As Posner sees it, untrammeled presidential power is a problem only when Americans make the mistake of electing the wrong president.
The Boot Is Coming Down Hard And Fast
Caitlin Johnstone
The first draft of the civil rights-eroding USA PATRIOT Act was magically introduced one week after the 9/11 attacks. Legislators later admitted that they hadn’t even had time to read through the hundreds of pages of the history-shaping bill before passing it the next month, yet somehow its authors were able to gather all the necessary information and write the whole entire thing in a week.
This was because most of the work had already been done.
The No Fly List: More Dangerous Than the Capitol Rioters
AntiWar.Com
You have no way of knowing if you’re on the list until and unless you’re prevented from boarding a plane. You have no way of finding out WHY you’re on the list even then. You can politely ask the US Department of Homeland Security to remove you from the list, and they can politely tell you no. If you have the means, you can go to court, maybe win, maybe lose. The US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled the list unconstitutional in 2019, but the list is still there.
Why Cuomo’s Latest Tax Hike Proposal Would Accelerate New York’s Decline
The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)
New York state officials should be doing everything they can to reverse this troubling trend; cutting taxes; removing regulations; expanding education options. If Cuomo successfully implements his tax hikes, though, it will only result in more people leaving the Empire State.
Why? It’s simple.
A tax proposal cannot be evaluated simply on its raw numbers. One must also take into account how it would change people's behavior.
Psychologist Explains the Unhealthy Incentives Behind 'Cancel Culture'
The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)
There is no opportunity to change one’s mind, nor is there room to defend opinions you genuinely believe. And this is a huge problem for any civil society.
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Put simply, shaming others doesn’t work. It’s purely punitive, and self-aggrandizing. It also rarely changes a person’s mind and often further radicalizes their beliefs, widening the divide already growing in our country.
No, the Chinese Won't Invade America If Secessionists Succeed
The Mises Institute
In spite of this, it's not uncommon to hear claims that neighboring states are all poised to go to war with each other at any given moment. This, we are told, would be the natural outcome if the United States allows any portion of the nation to become independent. These antisecessionists often point to examples like the Yugoslav wars and claim ethnic cleansing is on the horizon. But North America isn't southeastern Europe. In the case of North America, we'd be dealing with countries that share a common language, a high standard of living—and thus much to lose from an internecine war—and have deep and extensive trade relations.
Mike
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