27
Aug
2014
Potpourri
==> The Mises Institute is now offering a flat-fee option for access to all of the archived Mises Academy lectures.
==> Ron Paul talks to Mark Spitznagel about sundry topics, including foreign policy.
==> Alex Tabarrok has an interesting post about Ferguson and the modern-day “debtor’s prison.”
That Tabarrok piece is the most illuminating one on Ferguson I have seen.
I should hope so. It is getting pretty dark over there.
Murphy trying to avoid Spitznagel’s wrath.
Huh?
You gave a very vague description of the interview. I assumed that was you throwing a jab at Spitsnagel for his lashing out at you the last time.
If not, I’m disappointed in you for missing a chance to make a funny.
When did Spitznagel lash out at me? Sorry, I really don’t know what you’re talking about.
Oh! Do you mean when his brother did, on Twitter? Did I talk about that here? I can’t remember…
Yesm….
http://consultingbyrpm.com/blog/2014/05/spitznagel-snaps.html
Ah OK. Yeah that earlier episode was Eric, brother of Mark the investor. Mark is the one talking to Ron Paul.
He’s a nice guy, but quite frankly I think he is hopelessly misguided in this aspect. With any sort of profit making business, there’s an advantage to be had by investing some of that profit to knobble the competition. That is pure Capitalism, because when all options are open, all options will be utilised. This includes bribery, collusion, and paying some thugs to go around and trash the other business.
Whether those be private thugs, or government official thugs doesn’t make a whole lot of difference to the principle, other than with government thugs they run a monopoly, and with private thugs the other guy can hire some too.
Ask yourself why cronyism exists at all…
That Tabarrok piece demonstrates why AnCap can never work and why it’s necessary to have a monopoly state police force and roads, especially in a multi-ethnic society.
More reasons why a monopoly state is necessary: Because they can plow down neighborhoods and plan to build runways in Ferguson:
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/8/20/kinloch-town-blackmissouri.html
Monopoly states can plow through old minority neighborhoods to build freeways so that white people can live way out in the suburbs:
http://www.autolife.umd.umich.edu/Environment/E_Casestudy/ChryslerFreeway.htm
We hear the term Political Capital, and we see that it applies in Ferguson. For the most part, the police there shake down the locals and create resentment. The last straw was not just the shooting, but also allowing the young man’s body to lie uncovered in a pool of blood for four hours. The lack of respect for the community could not have been more loudly stated.
Yep.
I hear and read on the news textbook government psyops. One is to print quotes from Kim Jong Un. I saw “North Korea says the events in Ferguson show the United Statea is a cesspool of human rights” or something to that effect.
The intention is to foment toleration for what the police did in Ferguson. We are told what Kim Jong Un or one of his cronies are saying about how terrible human rights are in this country, and a quite reasonable reaction would be for us to say or think “Yeah right, North Korea is lecturing US on human rights? With their concentration camps and police state violence? What hypocrites!”
There is no other reason for quotes from Kim Jong Un to be plastered over the news if it wasn’t an attempt to influence people’s psychology about what the police did.
Unfortunately the Mises Academy is not what it once was. Barely any courses (currently nothing at all), my favourite teachers have completely disappeared. I wish it continued.
Kinsella’s lectures are all on his website for free.