‘Yee-haw is not a foreign policy.’ (Hand-written sign in the bar of the British compound of the Green Zone, Baghdad) Why America invaded Iraq In March 2003 the US Army, accompanied by forces from the so-called ‘coalition of the willing’, invaded Iraq with the aim of overthrowing Saddam Hussein. The architects of the invasion, US […]
Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Baghdad’s Green Zone by Rajiv Chandrasekaran (2006)
Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Baghdad’s Green Zone by Rajiv Chandrasekaran (2006)
05 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
The House Crack Suicide Squad: The Ouster of McCarthy Captures the Politics of Our Times
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment

In Monty Python’s film, “The Life of Brian,” the lead character hangs hopelessly on the cross when a small army arrives to rescue him. His relief is short-lived as Otto, the leader, promptly announces that they are the crack suicide squad trained to kill themselves “within 20 seconds.” The scene came to mind yesterday as […]
The House Crack Suicide Squad: The Ouster of McCarthy Captures the Politics of Our Times
Paris under the Swastika – Collaboration and Resistance – On the Homefro…
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
in defence economics, laws of war, war and peace Tags: France, World War II
Checking out Carmel Sepuloni’s campaign claims
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
Radio NZ reports that Minister for Social Development Carmel Sepuloni was on the campaign trail in Christchurch yesterday defending her government’s performance. She said that: “Her government had seen higher numbers of beneficiaries moving into jobs …” Yet the numbers on a Jobseeker benefit continue to climb. Technically her assertion may be true but it’s…
Checking out Carmel Sepuloni’s campaign claims
Fighting ideological repression by the Authoritarian Left
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment

I don’t know how Anna Krylov manages to sustain a successful career as an accomplished and honored theoretical and quantum chemist at the University of Southern California—while at the same time turning out long and thoughtful pieces that attack the ruination of science by the Authoritarian Left. She was, for example, the main author of […]
Fighting ideological repression by the Authoritarian Left
Why Sweden Isn’t an Example of Socialism
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
in economic growth, economic history, economics of regulation, history of economic thought, industrial organisation, labour economics, macroeconomics, welfare reform Tags: Sweden
When I meet Americans who self-identify as “socialists,” it is quite uncommon for them to advocate the abolition of private property and the “collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods”–which is the dictionary definition of socialism. Instead most of the American “socialists” I meet favor a more…
Why Sweden Isn’t an Example of Socialism
Certified
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
If a drug or medical device has already gone through the regulatory gauntlet at the FDA and Australia, or in the UK and Canada, or the EU and Taiwan, or Switzerland and Singapore, does it seem all that likely that Medsafe’s going to find anything that everyone else missed?Sure, Medsafe has ‘expedited’ processes for drugs…
Certified
Some charts on our underperforming economy
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
in economic growth, macroeconomics

It is election season, and since the performance of the economy enables (or disables) so much of what political parties want to do, or to spend, it is worth having a look at a few charts. There have been plenty on inflation this year, and plenty of fiscal policy in just the last few weeks. […]
Some charts on our underperforming economy
NSF invests millions in indigenous knowledge
04 Oct 2023 Leave a comment

It is of course precarious to criticize the present-day worship of “indigenous knowledge”, as it’s all too easy to dismiss that criticism as racism or bigotry. The problem is not that the empirical knowledge of indigenous people is worthless, because it isn’t. Although it’s often derived from trial and error, that is still a way […]
NSF invests millions in indigenous knowledge
Some Links
03 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
TweetErec Smith talks with C-SPAN about his new book, A Critique of Anti-Racism in Rhetoric and Composition. Ken Langone’s letter in today’s Wall Street Journal is worth reading: A hearty second to Ira Stoll (“ProPublica Buries Its Clarence Thomas News,” op-ed, Sept. 23). The closer you look at the left’s latest attacks on Justice Clarence Thomas…
Some Links
Quotation of the Day…
03 Oct 2023 Leave a comment
Tweet… is from page 454 of my late Nobel-laureate colleague Jim Buchanan‘s 1989 paper “The Relatively Absolute Absolutes,” as this article is reprinted in volume 1 (1999) of The Collected Works of James M. Buchanan: The Logical Foundations of Constitutional Liberty: I consider it to be the task of economists, as economic scientists, to make…
Quotation of the Day…
How to Wreck Reliable & Affordable Power Supplies: Keep Adding Wind & Solar
03 Oct 2023 Leave a comment

Without exception, every country that’s plugged into the grand wind and solar ‘transition’ is suffering from crippling power prices and unreliable delivery. The relationship is so stark as to be blindingly obvious; and one that was as perfectly predictable, as it was perfectly avoidable. Paying wind and solar operators seemingly endless and practically countless $billions […]
How to Wreck Reliable & Affordable Power Supplies: Keep Adding Wind & Solar
How to Wreck Reliable & Affordable Power Supplies: Keep Adding Wind & Solar
03 Oct 2023 Leave a comment

Without exception, every country that’s plugged into the grand wind and solar ‘transition’ is suffering from crippling power prices and unreliable delivery. The relationship is so stark as to be blindingly obvious; and one that was as perfectly predictable, as it was perfectly avoidable. Paying wind and solar operators seemingly endless and practically countless $billions […]
How to Wreck Reliable & Affordable Power Supplies: Keep Adding Wind & Solar
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