April 18 marks the 1772 birthday of David Ricardo, English political economist and one of the most influential thinkers in economic theory. An advocate for free trade and the abolition of slavery, Ricardo’s most famous work is his Principles of Political Economy and Taxation (1817).
Destutt de Tracy, as quoted by Mme. Victor de Tracy, Death Notice on Destutt de Tracy
It is manifest that, to banish bad sentiments born of oppression and insolence, it is necessary that laws be equal for everyone, and even for everyplace.
(translated by Iris Hartman, 1852).
Michigan is a state divided.
While Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) has become a veritable dictator, in her stated desire to curb the contagion, the infection and death rate in the U.P. (which stands for “Upper Peninsula”) would look like a success story . . . were anyone to believe that her policies deserved credit.
But to some extent, “social distancing” is just society-as-usual for rural Yoopers.
Whitmer’s stay-at-home orders are the most restrictive of any of our states. All public gatherings are shut down, as are most stores and shops, though lottery sales are still allowed. And enforcement has not been slack, as Reason informs us: “Police stopped landscaper Brandon Hawley for carrying on with his business, although he lives in the northern city of Alpena, which confirmed its first COVID-19 case on Saturday.”
Not on board with every one of the governor’s executive orders are four sheriffs in westside counties of the main part of the state. They have proclaimed they will not be enforcing every single one of her edicts. “While we understand her desire to protect the public,” they wrote in a joint statement, “we question some restrictions that she has imposed as overstepping her executive authority.”
And Michiganders have started to rebel, with the state experiencing our nation’s largest protests.
So far.
Recognizing that the state has the third highest coronavirus death count, though most are in the southeastern part of the state, does this menace justify the governor’s restrictive measures?
Well, that will be an ongoing debate in Michigan — as elsewhere.*
The perception of costs will grow rapidly as negative results from the shut-down become more numerous and more obvious.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* The most startling report shows the virus forming the same pattern of contagion and lethality everywhere, regardless of “mitigation” measures (as Dr Anthony Fauci dubbed them), i.e. shut-down or no shut-down. Meanwhile, a few contrasts: the 2017-2018 flu season was quite bad, with 80,000 deaths, including “high severity across age groups”; the U.S. coronavirus death count hasn’t hit half that yet, which is worth keeping in mind as projections of the contagion’s extent and death rate plummet in most models.
See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts
April 17 marks the 1937 birth of Ronald Hamowy, Canadian historian, who first came to international prominence for his writings in the short-lived New Individualist Review. Hamowy died in 2012.
Patronage is the sword and cannon by which war may be made on the liberty of the human race.
From the beginning of the panic-induced shutdown of much of what we call “the economy,” many of us were wondering if the cure might not become worse than the coronavirus disease.
The ramifications of the near-total curtailment of the production, processing and movement of goods and services? Potentially disastrous.
The notion that politicians and bureaucrats inhabit that sweet spot which allows them to distinguish “essential” from “non-essential” work activities? Dubious at best.
It smacks of what F.A. Hayek called “the fatal conceit” and “the pretense of knowledge.” The consequences of the shutdown have from the first suggested a tragedy in the making.
On Tuesday, The Washington Examiner’s Emma Colton reported on a tweet: “Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie warned that the United States could face food shortages due to the ‘brittle’ supply chain, bankrupting farmers and forcing them to euthanize livestock.”
Massie does not mince words: “We are weeks, not months, away from farmers euthanizing animals that would have been sold for meat/food. Also, fruits and vegetables are going to rot in the fields.”
The late psychiatrist Thomas Szasz liked to use a word applicable here: iatrogenic. Doctor-caused.
The insistence that President Trump follow every jot and tittle of advice from Dr. Anthony Fauci and the federal medical establishment may provide an object lesson on why we must not trust “doctors” and “scientists” to make policy alone.
They specialize.
And our commercial society (as Adam Smith called “the economy”) is the very opposite: a veritable cosmos of human interaction.
Which makes the politicization of medical doctoring potentially quite fatal, as Rep. Massie warns.
Just ask anyone who’s lived through Communism’s command economy.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., penned his Letter from Birmingham Jail while incarcerated in Birmingham, Alabama, for protesting segregation, on April 16, 1963.
Dictatorships foster oppression, dictatorships foster servitude, dictatorships foster cruelty; more abominable is the fact that they foster idiocy.
China and its lapdog, the World Health Organization (WHO), face increasing global anger over having initially hid the person-to-person spread of coronavirus, which has killed a staggering 126,000 people worldwide. So far.
Still unrepentant, Beijing and the WHO have continued to butcher the truth — even in petty ways.
Late last month, a Hong Kong reporter asked a WHO official to comment on how successfully Taiwan had responded to the pandemic. The official pretended he couldn’t hear the question. Then, when the reporter offered to repeat it, he insisted they move on.
WHO could provide such a cocktail of cowardice and disingenuousness?
Yes!
Of course, the last refuge of such scoundrels is to hurl utterly bogus allegations — to play the victim and change the subject. Enter WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who last week made the ridiculous and completely unsubstantiated charge that the Taiwanese government was instigating racist attacks against him on social media.
Discriminated against by the United Nations and WHO for years, upon China’s insistence, the Taiwanese reacted on social media with their usual grace, sense of humor and a smart promotion of their island’s great food and beautiful scenery, using the hashtag: #ThisAttackComesFromTaiwan.
As explained yesterday, Taiwan is a friend. China and the WHO? Not on your life.
That’s why Americans of all political persuasions (and so many others across the globe) cheered President Trump’s announcement yesterday that the U.S., the largest donor to the World Health Organization, would suspend its financial support.
“So much death has been caused by their mistakes,” Mr. Trump said.
Sadly, I fear Trump is wrong about one small part: “mistakes” seems far too generous a word for what WHO and its dastardly daddy, China, have done.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts
On April 15, 1945, the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp was liberated.