Sorry, Ansari: a praxeologist looks at the latest scandalette

This is an expanded version of a comment I left on Megan McArdle’s post Listen to the ‘Bad Feminists’ in which she muses on the “Grace”-vs.-Aziz-Ansari scandalette and wonders why younger women report feeling so powerless and used. It’s not complicated, Megan. You actually got most of it already, but I don’t think you quite… Continue reading Sorry, Ansari: a praxeologist looks at the latest scandalette

Decentralized threats as the mother of liberty

Dave Kopel gives us a fascinating account of the divergence between American and British gun culture in The American Indian foundation of American gun culture. I learned some things from this article, which is not a trivial observation because I’ve studied the same process from some different angles. While Kopel’s article is excellent of its… Continue reading Decentralized threats as the mother of liberty

As the pervnado turns

I’m a libertarian who tried to stop Donald Trump with my vote in the PA primaries – even changed party registration to do it. But Trump’s opponents may make me unto a Trump supporter yet. From Harvey Weinstein’s casting couch through John Conyers being the guy every female reporter in DC knew not to get… Continue reading As the pervnado turns

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NRA loses the plot

Dear NRA leadership: are you out of your fucking minds? Supporting a ban on bump stocks in the wake of the Las Vegas massacre is a terrible idea, for all the usual reasons that there has never been any case in the history of the known universe in which supporting a ban on firearms or… Continue reading NRA loses the plot

Unlearning history

In some circles there’s lately a vogue for vandalizing or pulling down Confederate statues. The people doing it think (or say they think) that they’re striking a blow against racism. I think they’re, at best, engaged in a dangerous reopening of old wounds. At worst they’re threatening to inflict serious new ones. I’m a Yankee… Continue reading Unlearning history

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Please give generously to James Damore’s fundraiser

I just gave $100 to James Damore’s official fundraiser. Damore, for any of you who have been hiding under a rock, is the guy who wrote a completely sane and reasonable memorandum, objecting on principled and scientific grounds to the assumptions behind “diversity”. He’s been fired and is, of course, the target of a full-blown… Continue reading Please give generously to James Damore’s fundraiser

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Hey, Democrats! We still need you to get your act together!

Six months ago, I wrote Hey, Democrats! We need you to get your act together!, a plea to the opposition to get its act together. A month ago, a Democratic activist attempting a mass political assassination shot Steve Scalise through the hip. Today, Gallup’s job creation index at +37 in July—a record high. In my… Continue reading Hey, Democrats! We still need you to get your act together!

Spelunking the alt-right

Recently, on a mailing list I frequent, one of the regulars uttered the following sentence: “I’m told Breitbart is the preferred news source for the ‘alt-right’ (KKK and neo-nazis)”. That was a pretty glaring error, there. I was interviewed on Breitbart Tech once. I visit the site occasionally. I am not affiliated with the alt-right,… Continue reading Spelunking the alt-right

Dilemmatizing the NRA

So, the Washington Post publishes yet another bullshit article on gun policy. In this one, the NRA is charged with racism because it doesn’t leap to defend the right of black men to bear arms without incurring a lethal level of police suspicion. In a previous blog post, I considered some relevant numbers. At 12%… Continue reading Dilemmatizing the NRA

TPP and the Law of Unintended Consequences

Once upon a time, free-trade agreements were about just that: free trade. You abolish your tariffs and import restrictions, I’ll abolish mine. Trade increases, countries specialize in what they’re best equipped to do, efficiency increases, price levels drop, everybody wins. Then environmentalists began honking about exporting pollution and demanded what amounted to imposing First World… Continue reading TPP and the Law of Unintended Consequences

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This may be the week the SJWs lost it all

This may be the week the SJWs lost it all…or, at least, their power to bully people in the hacker culture and the wider tech community. Many of you probably already know about the LambdaConf flap. In brief: LambdaConf, a technical conference on functional programming, accepted a presentation proposal about a language called Urbit, from… Continue reading This may be the week the SJWs lost it all

What Amending the Constitution Cannot Do

An underappreciated fact about U.S. Constitutional law is that it recognizes sources of authority prior to the U.S. Constitution itself. It is settled law that the Bill of Rights, in particular, does not confer rights, it only recognizes “natural rights” which pre-exist the Bill of Rights and the Constitution and which – this is the… Continue reading What Amending the Constitution Cannot Do

Why I joined the NRA

After 20 years of evading joining the NRA, I finally did it last week. I’ve never been a huge fan of the NRA because, despite the fearsome extremist image the mainstream media tries to hang on it, the NRA is actually rather squishy about gun rights. A major symptom of this is its lack of… Continue reading Why I joined the NRA