Author: jvi7350

“Common sense is genius dressed in its working clothes.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

On balance, considering all the political pundits, candidates, advocates, journalists, and party apparatchiks, why is there so little common sense? The current vocabulary describing the spectrum of political doctrines in the US today tends to be about some linear direction to the left or right, with who are called “moderates” somewhere in the center of an imaginary neutral point between the two extremes; it appears to be a movable point as the extremes become more or less radical. This paradigm tells us little other than whose narrative has the most influence at any particular time; it does not provide a factual context to determine that it represents any common sense, which instead tends to deepen the partisan divide rather than promote civil discourse.

If the narratives are subjected to verifiable observation or experience rather than emotion, prejudice or theory, we should be able to see if there is any common sense to them; unfortunately there’s not much of that available with most mass and social media, but that does not mean common sense people can’t determine this for themselves, and in fact would be better off doing so. Recent polls showed the average American IQ at about 95, whereas the minimum for someone to be considered “intelligent” is 100, and a genius at 140 or better; the definition of intelligence is the ability to derive information from experience, adapt to the environment, and understand and correctly utilize thought and reason. That’s informative but why do Americans fall short…or do they?

While there’s controversy about IQ tests given accusations they are tainted by political prejudice, we can ignore that since common sense by definition (see last post) is “foundational”, meaning “common” with being human; this was considered radical back in the day that Aquinas, and later Locke wrote about natural rights. To test if the “Enlightenment” writers were right, let’s consider some common problems Americans need to solve today.

Consider immigration for example. As a factual matter, by “Americans” means US citizens, because citizens of other countries are not by definition Americans. Immigrating to another country for whatever reason means you chose to live in that other country; in doing so you should understand that you have become subject to its laws, customs, and societal norms, but if not then why immigrate? One of the narratives in support of open immigration is “multiculturalism”, a concept devoid of any common sense. Culture is a societal characteristic reflecting its history from which it developed. While there have been various eras of immigration in America’s history from all parts of the world, for the most part assimilation was key providing acceptance by those who came before and a civil evolution to citizenship for those immigrating. There have been over 170 immigration laws passed by Congress, which tells us that immigration is one of the most important phenomena in American history.

When Biden claimed that he needed Congressional action to provide him the executive power to enforce immigration laws, given the scope and breadth of legislative history common sense told us that was simply not true; the laws are there, but the agenda by his administration and party was so obviously focused on changing the composition of the American electorate with massive infusions of “illegal aliens”. The term “illegal aliens” originated about a century ago during a high immigration period; it is now attacked as politically incorrect as we are lectured to use the term “Undocumented Americans” in the promotion of a concept called “Multiculturalism”. Again, common sense tells us that this is just so much more word salad; if you are an American, that means you are a US citizen, so the term “undocumented” does not apply, and yes, there are likely as many cultures as there are countries, including American culture.

While the process of immigration and assimilation has influenced the development of American culture, particularly in music and cuisine, multiculturalism does not mean what we are told it means. As the well known and respected journalist George Will insightfully observed, “Multiculturalism is a campaign to lower America’s moral status by defining the American experience in terms of myriad repressions and their victims. By rewriting history, and by using name calling (Racist! Sexist! Homophobe!) to inhibit debate, multiculturalists cultivate grievances, self-pity and claims to entitlements arising from victimization.”

These are facts, and there is nothing more insidious to common sense than pretending otherwise in support of narratives. The same goes for the deployment of ICE agents as we are told that they are directed to first attend to the deportation of immigrants with criminal records; while it’s true that entering the US illegally is in itself a criminal act, common sense also tells us that the sheer numbers of illegal aliens entering the US during the last administration requires a focus on those representing a threat to the safety and security of Americans first and foremost. However, what we have also seen is some pretty blanket sweeps in immigrant neighborhoods, sometimes of people who have been here for a long time; what we have also seen is the ludicrous practice of state and local politicians obstructing enforcement of federal laws as the constitution reserves immigration as the sole domain of the Federal government. I hate to say it, but common sense tells us that we need to have yet a new immigration law that attends to these issues, but don’t bet on that happening.

The idea that diversity is intellectually important is inconsistent with common sense if the narratives about it demand compliance to whatever perspective is promoted, even to the extent of suppressing speech that is a contrary perspective; if there are no other perspectives allowed, then all perspectives are intellectual dead weight. The intellectual value of a true diversity of perspectives makes it more likely that the truth will not be overlooked, or in common sense terms, we can judge what the facts are. It is also common sense that judgement will not always be right, leading at times to making bad decisions, and that experience will be the feedback that tells us when that happens; that in itself is just plain common sense, and there will be more of that in future posts.

“Good decisions come from experience. Experience comes from making bad decisions.”  Mark Twain

“Common sense is a foundational level of sound judgment, practical reasoning, and everyday knowledge that allows individuals to navigate daily life, solve problems, and make decisions without specialized training. It relies on shared social norms, experiences, and cause-and-effect understanding. It is often defined as generally accessible intelligence and has historical roots in Aristotelian concepts of shared human perception.”

This excerpt from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary so clearly and concisely defines this phenomenon we call common sense; it has no reference to education, but relies on experience, perception and logic. As the great late 19C writer and orator Robert Ingersoll observed “It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.” Ingersoll also was an advocate for Americans to read and understand Thomas Paine’s role in unifying the American colonies with his famous essay in a pamphlet appropriately titled “Common Sense”. It was common sense that Thomas Paine relied on when he offered his reasons for advocating for the American colonies to rebel against Great Britain.

Historically, Americans were by necessity a practical people who sought to resolve their differences rather than fight about them. However, that didn’t always happen; ever since America’s inception, its social structure was fractured politically, leading to the bloodiest war in its history; so polarized were the political opponents represented by the Democratic and Republican parties that violence was inevitable. It is hard today for us to understand how, on a common sense level, anyone could defend slavery; what we know of those in the Democratic led South that did, is that they saw the Republican led North as an aggressor against their “way-of-life” and violators of the constitutional guarantee of “states’ rights”.

Here we are about to celebrate our 250^th year as a Republic, and still with a similar dilemma. Politically, the American electorate is now about 40% independents, and about even between the two main parties, which means the largest sector of voters are skeptical about any political party’s claims to the principles of a republic as they have proven contrary to how they govern; their failed policies have brought us forever wars, egregious debt greater now than our GDP, chronic inflation, high crime, dysfunctional educational institutions, and ludicrous crisis mongering. Throwing out mindless labels like fascist, extremist, radical, racist or whatever the current narrative dictates demonstrates a lack of thoughtful consideration of the issues, a fig leaf to cover the essence of a problem and a sure-fire way to perpetuate the polarizing partisanship we claim we want to cure.

So how about some common sense, OK? If we rely on common sense regarding what’s going on, we first have to find out what that is; it sounds like common sense, nothing new except that over time our reliance on mass and social media has increased dramatically, creating the opportunity for prejudicial journalism, if not disinformation. We must listen to a lot of noise in the news, and attempt to distill from it whose position has more or less common sense, and without even thinking about Trump, Newsome, Schumer, Cruz, and the rest of the political pantheon all struggling for oxygen in the rarefied air of the power elite, none of whom seem to be aware that we have a constitution so you don’t have to rely on your egos to know the rules.

How about the rule that only Congress can legislate a tax like tariffs? How about the common sense that only American citizens can vote? How about the rule that protects free speech? How about the common sense that as a species humans know the difference between male and female? How about the rule that you are elected to serve your constituents first, not your party. How about the common sense that living beyond your means brings trouble? How about the rule that only Congress can declare war? Oh, I forgot that Congress passed a law about limiting presidential war powers that actually provides for the president to go to war! I would dare anyone to advise us where the common sense is in that, except for the fact that the Supreme Court found that law constitutional! In every one of the above examples there is no common sense, yet politicians will claim that there’s a wrong they must right, or an emergency to address, some crisis to provide cover for what we all know is nonsense; this is what Aristotle calls “a shared human perception” for what is universally considered BS.

I am not proposing that there are no Republicans or Democrats that have common sense, and therein lies the existential problem with political parties – those in power appear to owe more to the party than to the principles under which they were elected and sworn to defend; there are exceptions like John Fetterman and Rand Paul, but too few to mention. Regardless of the narratives we are given, the political process is not about good governance as it has degenerated into the chaos of power struggles; you don’t need common sense in a power struggle – what you need is anything that hurts your opponent, regardless of collateral damage.

So how does an independent navigate through all the narratives, lies and rants that serve as news today? The only common sensible way is to ignore all that and focus only on actions and consequences, or cause and effect. In addition to all that’s going on today, we have the ludicrous American phenomenon of what we call the midterm elections where the outcome has traditionally been the opposite of what created the administration we just voted in. There’s no common sense having the distraction of political campaigns so often, especially since the content itself are promises so seldom kept, and especially now given the dysfunctional situation created by a mindless government shutdown about funding that has already taken place with a bill that was already agreed to. What we have here is the perfect storm of power plays whose collateral damage falls on the very people these dumbocrats and moronocans are sworn to serve and protect. More to come next post on the status of our common sense, or lack of it.

“The heresy of heresies was common sense.” George Orwell, 1984

“History doesn’t repeat itself, it just rhymes.”  Mark Twain

This old quote is so often repeated that we would think society should have come to terms by now with how to avoid repeating the same mistakes; while Twain understood that events are never identical, he wrote often about society’s repeated behavior in similar situations. Given our historical resources, why does society so often get on the wrong side of history; it’s like failing an open book test, a sure sign of willful ignorance. Cynically, Sigmund Freud dismissed it all as “History is just new people making old mistakes.” When we hear Mamdani, Sanders and AOC speak in support of socialism, they ignore the historical reality of the inevitable failure of centrally planned economies; these are the voices of ignorance using words cloaked in deceptive labels like “progressive” or “democratic” in order to make us think that somehow this time things will be different.

You don’t have to be an economist to understand on a commonsense level that debt is not a good thing, that deficits are unsustainable, and that nothing is free as someone always pays; but here we are with so many politicians telling us the opposite of what common sense, and history tells us is just not so. The legacy media reports about polls that show there are many Americans who think that socialism is a good thing, while at the same time so many are concerned about saving democracy; is this a contradiction or an insight into the relationship between the two? The very word “history” comes from the ancient Greek word for “inquiry”, or “witness”, meaning to know something by investigation or actually being part of it; the former relies on those who have written about being a part of it because we weren’t, and the latter relies on our understanding of what’s going on around us. Thomas Sowell observed that “One of the most important reasons for studying history is that virtually every stupid idea that is in vogue today has been tried before and proved disastrous before, time and again. Do we need to keep repeating the same mistakes forever?”

Is such repetition the definition of insanity as Einstein noted or is there something else at play that brings society time again to the same dismal result when socialism is embraced? Heinlein made a very insightful observation when he said that “A generation which ignores history has no past and no future.” I think he’s really on to something there, although it’s not so much that recent generations “ignore” history, it’s more that prior generations failed to educate them about it, or even worse, to rewrite it in support of some narrative. These narratives are constructed on a very facetious and fallacious concept called “Presentism”, i.e., judging the past based on current standards and values; this creates a very distorted context as it’s not the one that existed at the time of past events, leading to prejudices based on ignorance.

There are politicians who use language to disguise socialism’s inherent authoritarianism with labels like “Democratic Socialism”; this is just to create an illusion that somehow you can have freedom while you destroy it. According to Karl Marx, “Democracy is the road to socialism.”; maybe that’s less an illusion for socialism than a delusion about democracy, a system of government that operates on the premise that your individual rights don’t exist because you are outnumbered. For some politicians, the fear of losing power underlies the anger they direct at those who expose their failure to perform the foremost existential responsibility for government to begin with, which is the safety and security of the citizens they are sworn to protect.

Change is not synonymous with progress. During the 60’s and 70’s, things changed; while we didn’t have ANTIFA or HAMAS, we did have SDS, and the PLO. While free speech was all the rage, there was also rage against those who had a position contrary to whatever group objected to it. Rock was here to stay, while pot was illegal everywhere, like alcohol during the prohibition (now there’s a definite historical lesson to learn with that). Race, sex and the Viet Nam War dominated the social debates, while today we have the race card, gender identity, dominant drug cartels and even more wars; this does sound like a rhyme, and it keeps getting dumber. Consider the choices of running mates that presidential candidates have made starting with Obama, and why; they didn’t want anyone more intelligent than themselves, so Obama took Biden, Trump takes Pence, Biden takes Harris, and Trump takes Vance. This is not going in a good direction considering how many VPs ran or will run for President.

Historically, socialism has always failed because it is not about creating wealth but redistributing it, lasting only as long as there are capitalists around to pay for it; in every sense it’s a parasitical system. There is no virtue in any engineered economic system as they all rely on coercion and so are contrary to the natural laws of humanism, so contrived as to rely on ignorance and envy that all it can do is create misery in the name of equality; historically liberty only exists with equality of rights, but equality of wealth only exists with a government with totalitarian powers.

“The history of the 20th century is full of examples of countries that set out to redistribute wealth and ended up redistributing poverty.” Thomas Sowell

“Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms.” Aristotle

I came across “hamartia”, which means “fatal flaws”, in reading an article about how Hayek and Mises addressed those delusional developments of modern society that become fatal laws; the concept comes from Aristotle in his analysis of Greek tragedies. The fatal flaws begin with the narcissistic behavior of those who claim to know what is best for everyone; it is pure hubris, a character trait that Aristotle observed leads to ruin.

The reason such delusional aspirations and grand plans for humanity invariably end in disaster is that they ignore the realities of human nature itself. Adam Smith was a philosopher and sociologist at the time he wrote “The Wealth of Nations”; economics as a field of study did not yet exist. What Smith did is use his perceptions of society for empirical knowledge of human behavior, particularly in activities involved in what we today call an economy. So many of today’s economists are obsessed with “modeling” how markets should function, when in fact the role of economists is to be objective observers of how they actually function.

Nothing reflects more the nature of a society than its economy, and the measure of its success is its health, freedom, and wealth. When there are free markets, you have an organic and spontaneous economy because people are free to associate and interchange services, goods, and ideas; when government enters the market, you get the parasitic and compulsory behavior of power for sale. Such corruption metastasizes throughout society, affecting its culture, politics, customs, and institutional structures; without free markets, you get less healthy, free, and wealthy people.

I don’t think that Aristotle’s opening quote above necessarily means that he thought that the political evolution he described was inevitable, but as a warning. Mencken knew this and followed through with his observance that “The ideal government of all reflective men, from Aristotle onward, is one which lets the individual alone, one which barely escapes being no government at all.” Aristotle and Menken were empiricists, deriving knowledge through perception in order to understand reality.

There are many examples of current social and political realities that qualify as fatal flaws, most are a long time in the making; we don’t have to go back very far to understand the sources to identify fatal flaws. They all evolve from flaws created when basic principles which safeguard against them are ignored or sometimes even abandoned; for example, constitutionally only Congress can declare war, yet it passed the War Powers Resolution of 1973, intended to limit the President’s authority to use military force while it contrarily defined a process for his ability to do so. It was fatal as it made the President a warlord, just like King George III.

Wars are expensive, so you need lots of money. Income tax was a hard sell for Wilson as he needed to amend the constitution and the marketing for that was the ludicrous idea that a progressive tax system would reduce revenue disparities; the 16^th Amendment was passed, but it did nothing of what was promised other than enable politicians to wage war, and create a lot of fatalities. Oh yes, tariffs are taxes and SCOTUS recently ruled against Trump as the President has no constitutional power to levy them; we hardly need a warlord with also the power of legalized theft, which is reserved for Congress.

The constitution clearly reserves all powers regarding immigration with the Federal government, and current law is clear as to what is required regarding illegal immigrants. The flaws are the near criminal negligence of the Biden administration regarding border security, and the moronic action by some state and local governments creating sanctuaries and inciting their constituents to riot, creating chaos so volatile it borders on insurrection. The last time we had one of those more than 650K Americans died; that’s extremely fatal.

There is no provision in the constitution regarding filibusters; the Founders simply did not anticipate that Congress would actually find a way to do nothing. Both major parties have used it, condemned it, and promised to end it; the closest they came to doing so is the “Cloture Rule of 1917”; now would be a good time to use it as we have another shut down, and while such actions are always fatal flaws, this one is especially dumb given that the demands to cut funds for ICE comes after they have already been appropriated. This shutdown affects agencies like FEMA and TSA that have nothing to do with immigration; the fatal flaw here is putting citizens in harm’s way, a consequence created by those whose job is just the opposite.

If anything reflects badly on the moral fiber of a society it is child abuse, and gender transitioning minors is as clear an example of this as the revolting medical experiments involving children in WWII by the Nazis; so horrified was the “civilized” world it created the “The Nuremberg Code of 1947”, an international declaration of ethical practice. There are legal cases regarding gender transitioning of minors, initiated by the victims of such horribly misguided medical procedures; I remember reading an article about this in which the author James Bradley commented that “Calling sex changes for children gender affirming surgery is like calling serial killing population control.” Well that just about sums up that fatal flaw.

Racism is perhaps the most repulsive form of collectivism, a fatal flaw that deals with humanity in terms of groups, not individuals. The obsession of progressivism with racism is inherently racist as it primitively focuses on biological traits to categorize people’s intellectual, social, and ever more so, political characteristics. Promoting such social and at times political policies like DEI makes apparent that evaluations of people are being made not based on merit, but race, which is by definition racism. This flaw is not limited to any race, it’s a vice that’s very “inclusive”; Thomas Sowell eloquently observed that “Racism has never done this country any good, and it needs to be fought against, not put under new management for different groups.” Racism inevitably leads to violence, like the American Civil War which is still the leading conflict for American casualties.

The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 created a central bank that in effect became America’s economic directorate. How this came about despite a long history of American hostility toward such a flawed idea is covered in my blog “Remember Hyde” (09/25/20). Add to this the subsequent policies of FDR and Nixon ending the gold standard, making the US dollar a fiat currency, which is devoid of any intrinsic value with which to protect wealth from the confiscations caused by the inherent inflationary nature of fiat currency. P. J. O’Rourke once observed that, “A U.S. dollar is an IOU from the Federal Reserve Bank. It’s a promissory note that doesn’t actually promise anything.” When inflation becomes a monetary policy, higher prices are a consequence of the bad ones, and fatal if you want “affordability”.

A common example of fatal flaws is perfectionism, an obsessive search by despots for great plans to save the world, even as you make it worse; the reality as George Orwell observed is that “The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfection.”

“Ours may become the first civilization destroyed, not by the power of our enemies, but by the ignorance of our teachers and the dangerous nonsense they are teaching our children. In an age of artificial intelligence, they are creating artificial stupidity.” Thomas Sowell

Unfortunately, Sowell’s observation, while empirically obvious, is not limited to recent generations; that could not be the case simply because there were teachers who preceded those generations who taught children such “dangerous nonsense” to begin with. I’m a “Boomer” so I was not subject to as much of that nonsense as later generations were; it seems that such nonsense is like an annuity in finance where you’re paying dearly but have limited access to its value, which due to inflation is declining. Education is not supposed to be like that; it supposed to be something whose value exceeds what is invested in it with enhanced productivity providing long term growth. This is the metaphorical way I look at one of the most important and sometimes the costliest investments parents make for their children.

Listening to the financial news, I hear that many experts attribute the recent stock and commodity “corrections” to the hyper spending by many corporations investing in A.I., which is expanding corporate debt to dangerously unsustainable levels. While this is causing many investors to pull back on their positions with such companies, few of them can tell you what A.I. is, which I bet is the same for most Americans, me included. Then why is everyone constantly talking about something they know nothing about? I have learned that A.I has been around for decades, but our educational system appears more concerned about gender and race than the sciences that would enable children to know about what may very well be something bigger than the Industrial Revolution or the Nuclear Age.

Another heavy news item is the trend for Americans, especially the younger generations (I can say that now because most generations are younger than me), to think that socialism is something worth trying, you know, like the latest vitamin supplement, protein drink or skin cream. I read in the NYT that recent polls found various levels of support for socialism and capitalism, ranging from 39-43% for socialism and 54-70% in favor of capitalism. In all cases the pollsters also found that few of either group could explain what socialism and capitalism are; how can this be a serious debate at a societal level with such profound ignorance about something as basic as the economy in which in some way, shape or form we are all a part of? How is it that most elementary and secondary schools do not even have a class on economics while the US is supposed to be the largest economy in the world?

However, the prize for the most newsworthy topic of current times is immigration, especially the issue of deportations by ICE; again, the ignorance about the topic is only exceeded by the hysterical level of debate…..check that, there is no debate since name calling does not qualify as civil discourse. Further, violence against civil authority is often the cause for violent reactions. When taken together with the violence from the criminal elements within the immigrant community, we have a triple down effect caused by dangerous nonsense. The US Constitution is very clear that only the Federal government has jurisdiction of immigration in the US, but again it’s apparent that few know and understand that, including same governors and mayors. Is there anyone out there who has ever had a civics class in elementary school (Boomers put your hands down)?

I use these examples of hot button topics because what’s common to all of them, and many others, is the ignorance created by not only the lack of education, but the behavior by those entrusted with teaching our children who substitute basic knowledge with irrational narratives about gender, race, transitioning, climate catastrophizing, etc., leading them to think “…the end is near…”; little wonder we have the highest rates of mental illness among the young in our history, and coupled with ever falling academic metrics. Where A.I. takes us is unknown, yet everyone seems to know, everyone except me and most Boomers; what we do know is that we are we are more and more failing to use our organic intelligence, the kind we are born with but like food, we are being fed the artificial kind, losing our ability to think.

“We are all born ignorant but one must work hard to remain stupid.” Ben Franklin

“The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, and intolerable.” H.L. Mencken

From the ancient Greeks we have “kleptocracy”, the name for governments ruled by corrupt leaders (kleptocrats) who abuse their power to exploit the citizen’s wealth for their own advantage and enrichment; this need not be done outside the law as laws can be created to facilitate the deception that it’s all in the cause of the greater good. Once such a cause is established under law, what remains is for the bureaucratic process to move the money along the path to where it can be used by those politicians who created those laws for their benefit.

It is not so much that Mencken is being cynical about the inevitability of such corruption, but observant both historically and regarding the current circumstances of his time; he lived through a very chaotic and transformative era in America from the end of the Great Frontier to the Cold War. While it was a period of huge economic development, it was also a period of wars, depressions, revolutions, and the growth of extreme political partisanship; in it all he saw the rise of statism, both home and abroad.  What he also observed were the failures of “democracy” to preserve the liberties so essential for the health of the Republic.

The recent news hysteria about all the fraud being found in so many government welfare programs would not really have surprised Mencken because as a journalist, essayist, satirist, and cultural critic he had written and spoken often of the same problems of his time; what I believe may have shocked him is the magnitude and conspicuous nature of such corruption of our time. It’s not only the huge amounts of money involved in the cases found in Minnesota, California, etc., but the declared ignorance of the problem claimed by those responsible when in fact it was known to have been going on for some time.

There’s another word that comes down to us from the ancient Greeks, this about willful ignorance, i.e.,     agnotology; they saw this as a cultural or societal phenomenon where the ignorance of a people provides their leaders with the political tools to manipulate and deceive them. The most vulnerable are those that suffer from economic and financial illiteracy; it’s not an affliction limited to “developing countries” but prevalent in much of the so called developed western countries, in whose societies so many lack the knowledge necessary to make sound decisions about their personal finances or understand the economic consequences of their governments policies.

The common vehicle used by those that wish to deceive people about the corruption inherent in the nature of government welfare programs is the ignorance of the people themselves; when there’s opposition to such proposed laws, there is a default response mechanism we have come to know as “Virtue Signaling”, cloaking the self-righteous as advocating against racism, capitalism…or whatever label works to shame the opposition and avoid transparency. The unfortunate combination of ignorance about economics, finance, and virtue signaling is that all too often it actually works in favor of corruption…until it doesn’t!

Will Rogers once observed that “The United States Senate opens with a prayer and closes with an investigation.” When schemes such as those discovered in Minnesota, California, etc., are exposed, we get the scandals, the investigations, along with the obligatory and mind numbing endless news coverage, full of partisan posturing and “expert” analysis; what we never get is all that money back, accountability and an end to the policies and programs that caused these problems to begin with.

“Beware of altruism. It is based on self-deception, the root of all evil.” Robert A. Heinlein

“If you look at the drug war from a purely economic point of view, the role of the government is to protect the drug cartel. That is literally true.” Milton Friedman

Good old Milton was way ahead of his time as his above quote is truer now than it was in his day as we have entire countries whose governments are the cartels, like Venezuela, Mexico and Columbia. The Mexican cartels remain the largest organized drug lords in the world. Consider the fact that the “War on Drugs” is more than 50 years old, and the cartels are still winning; talk about waste, fraud and abuse and you have to include this failed policy that keeps on taking tax payer money, and keeps on failing.

Politically Mexico is divided into 32 federal entities, actual sovereign states, each with their own constitution and governing bodies; such a structure not only makes it difficult to exist as a federal republic, which in one sense should mean governance closer to and by the people, but in reality has enabled the societal gang cultural to flourish. This primitive political environment has produced the powerful cartels that rule most of these states.

While the US/Mexico border is now secure, at least in comparison to the prior administration, there is still a huge trading economy between the two countries, including considerable tourism. While President Sheinbaum has proven to be a very popular politician, Mexico’s cartels have proven to be highly resilient criminal enterprises. I recently read the New York Times article “The Hidden Cost of Your Avocado”; Mexico is a major agricultural producer, and not just drugs. It exports most of the avocados, limes and other foods that are in high demand in the US; the cartels have targeted such products with their own “taxes”, i.e., extortions from the growers with the inevitable result of higher prices at our grocery stores.

But the same is true for every business in Mexico, including a thriving business in human trafficking, starting with kidnapping and ransom. Despite the “efforts” of the Mexican government (the capital Mexico City being one of those federal entities…?!?!?) the problem persists; while the US focuses on drugs, the cartels focus on everything. While Trump threatens tariffs (which of course will increase the cost of already cartel taxed goods), the cartels are becoming a more diverse criminal enterprise.

But there is one thing that the American people can do, both for their own well being and a way to hit the Cartels where it hurts; I’m not talking marijuana as that’s now mostly grown domestically. Tourism accounts for nearly 10% of Mexico’s GDP and increasing annually, and the cartels know it and have acted predictably; resorts operate only at the pleasure of the cartels. Before we take that cheap trip, we should understand where much of that money goes.

While it’s true that Columbia and Venezuela are significant players with sizable cartels, Mexico remains the center of the cartel universe, and they are right on our border, and our main trading partner in Latin America. While Trump plays war games with Maduro, Americans can still eat their avocados and drop their limes in Tequila, but should just go south to the Caribbean if they want a vacation in the sun; what we should not do is support the parasitical thugs that rule our neighbor…and maybe eat fewer avocados and limes.

“A sword never kills anybody; it is a tool in the killer’s hand.” Seneca

The violence over the last few months has been a dominant content of the news, the other being affordability; later regarding the latter. The victims vary; a corporate exec, evangelist, students, scientist, Hollywood icons, soldiers…what also varies are the weapons used, which really is the least important issue as Seneca points out in the opening quote, or as the police often say, “It’s never the gun, it’s always the gunman.”

The common sense about focusing on the human element and not inanimate objects gets lost in the political narratives.  In Australia, after the Bondi Beach Massacre, the Prime Minister goes on about more gun and speech controls to address violence, ignoring of course that criminals and terrorists are what they are because they live outside the law; such policies put citizens who obey the laws such policies create even more at risk.

Excluding self-defense, which is a moral imperative, violence is the greatest evil humans commit against each other. The choice of tools is ultimately irrelevant, and the progress of technology will always provide better tools. The fact that gun control laws do nothing about controlling guns except to limit the ability of the law abiding to protect themselves against the lawless, who always have access to guns because they do not live within the law.

The reality of life is that there are good people and there are bad people, and as Aristotle so wisely observed, “It is our choice of good or evil that determines our character, not our opinion about good or evil.” The role of the police is to preserve and protect. Once violence is committed, the weapon of choice can provide forensic information to help the police get the bad guys, but no longer prevents the violence already committed; for that to happen, defense falls on each individual, and for that very reason we have the second amendment.  

Those that think that gun control laws will prevent violence, or censorship can control hate are getting things all wrong; as if cars are the issue and not drunk driving, or pens misspell words and not illiterate people. Everything man can make is inanimate without the use of it by humans; divorcing humans from the equation is like transferring the responsibility of human action to things, instead of people taking on responsibility for their own actions. Government overreach on constitutional rights does not exactly endear us to their good faith in our wellbeing, contrary to the narrative spin.

“Never trust a government that doesn’t trust its own citizens with guns.” Benjamin Franklin

“Tariff policy beneficiaries are always visible, but its victims are mostly invisible. Politicians love this. The reason is simple: The beneficiaries know for whom to cast their ballots, and the victims don’t know whom to blame for their calamity.” Walter E. Williams

While I have in the past called Trump a narcissistic grifter, perhaps worse than calling him a king, which may be construed as a compliment of nobility, I can’t deny his successes such as the release of the hostages from Hamas, immigration, borders and taxes. However, I deplore his tariff tantrums that are nothing more than punitive taxes on Americans; they are also unconstitutional since only Congress can legislate a tax, a decision the Supreme Court should come to soon.

The Trump tariffs are not the first instance where a president has claimed emergency powers to do so; we have McKinley, known as the “Tariff King”, and Hoover, Nixon, Reagan, Bush, and Obama. Curiously, FDR lowered tariffs that he correctly thought made the Great Depression worse; unfortunately, he also continued policies and programs that prolonged what is still the worst economic depression in US history.

When we hear the Trump administration’s arguments against a likely Supreme Court decision against executive power imposing tariffs, we are told that the revenues from tariffs will have to be returned, depriving the American people of all that money. This is absurd as it was the American businesses and people who paid the tariffs that were “…depriving the American people of all that money.”

Then there’s the argument that there will be a return of production by American businesses and the relocation of production by foreign businesses to the US to avoid tariffs; that will happen provided the tariffs are big enough to offset the higher cost of labor and materials, plus the cost of building the infrastructure to accommodate domestic production. In the cases where that will happen, those goods will become more expensive, and in the cases where it doesn’t, Americans still pay higher prices because of the tariffs.

We also have the age old argument about creating more jobs in America, which could happen with that production that comes to the US, but that still means higher costs of the goods produced, which will affect all Americans, including those with the related jobs; when that happens, it will put upward pressure on all labor costs to offset the increase in prices. The jobs argument fails to address the consequences, a bad habit of most administrations.

What tariffs historically tend to do, immediately and eventually, is alienate the foreign countries who lose that production, including those we consider allies; some will immediately retaliate with tariffs on US goods, and some will eventually do that and legislate restrictive trade practices with the US. The increase in production from tariffs may have some immediate benefits, but as this works through the economy, it will decrease trade that will slow growth, eventually lowering employment.  

There are some good things in Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill that was passed regarding taxes and regulations that will contribute to growth, but it also creates a deficit, something that Republicans rightly criticized prior administrations for, and said they wouldn’t do. Starting a trade war which the administration claims will offset deficits is punishing people, both foreign and domestic, who had little to do with those deficits, other than being burdened with the debt it creates.

“The primary reason for a tariff is that it enables the exploitation of the domestic consumer by a process indistinguishable from sheer robbery.” Albert J. Nock

“The first step to knowledge is a confession of ignorance.” Ancient Chinese Proverb

Thanks to all those that read the prior post where across all four platforms where it was posted there were about seventy views, but not so many answers to the questions provided; I think it was perhaps a little presumptuous in asking too much of viewers’ time to do so. The intent was to illustrate what Thomas Sowell said about definitions of words, i.e., “While the fact that the word is undefined is an intellectual handicap, it is a huge political advantage.”

The ancient proverb above illustrates that giving the quiz right from the start of the course forced students to understand our degree of ignorance; the reaction was energizing and made the course that much more informative and enjoyable. Here are the “correct” answers per the professor together with his explanations, which were technical, not political, i.e., he was not advocating, merely providing definition; they are followed by my comments:

1. Is money an asset or a commodity?

Commodity – it is something of intrinsic value used to facilitate a trade for another commodity, commonly known as a medium of exchange.

Most students and viewers got this one right, but some said it was an asset; back then we were still on the gold standard, which doesn’t exist anymore as all money has become fiat currencies, so the context has changed. Today it’s no longer a commodity, but remains a medium of exchange, but only to the degree its source is trusted, i.e., good faith. On a moral and ethical level, good faith could be an asset, but not a commodity.

2. Is capital money or any asset?

Any asset – while money is an asset, capital is something with a broader economic utilization like land, natural resources, stocks, bonds, buildings, tools…anything of value to society at large.

Nearly all the students and viewers got this one wrong; understandable as in most financial news the word capital is used for funds required for the expansion and purchases of a business.

3. Is trade the essence of an economy?

Yes – as a society progresses it develops divisions of labor, essential for the level of production required to create trade, without which there is no economy.

Most students and viewers got this one right as you can’t have an economy unless there is the exchange of goods and services.

4. Is inflation monetary or fiscal, or both?

Monetary – the cause of inflation is an increase in the money supply, which affects its value, and depending on other factors, may affect prices.

Most students and viewers got this one wrong; again, the context was a prior time when money was a commodity and not fiat. The confusion arises given the manipulation of fiat money which now always affects prices.

5. Is capitalism a cause or an effect?

Effect – it was not invented but observed that the less a society is controlled, the greater the level of production which creates higher levels of capital, hence its name.

Most students and viewers got this one wrong, perhaps because the word evokes political emotions; again, this is a definition, not an advocacy.

6. Is deficit the same as debt, yes or no?

No – when consumption exceeds income it’s called a deficit; if a loan is taken as an alternative to cutting consumption it creates a debt.

Most students and viewers got this one wrong, likely because the media and politicians conflate the issue due to ignorance, which can be contagious.

7. Is the maximization of efficiency and the minimization of cost profit or production?

Production – providing goods and services by nature is a competition for the consumer; there’s no guarantee of profit.

Most students and viewers got this one wrong, again because the media and politicians conflate efficiency and cost as negatives inherent in a free market environment.

8. Is labor part of work or the same?

Part of work – in economics, work includes everything involved in production, including capital, labor, management, investment, resources, etc.

Most students and viewers got this one wrong, perhaps assuming that anything involved in production is “labor”, something physical, an assumption based on poorly defined terms.

9. Is interest the time preference of money, yes or no?

Yes – time is an asset with a variable shelf life, i.e., you either spend your money for immediate consumption, or defer it for future use as in savings and investment, in return for which you are compensated, which is interest.

Most students and viewers got this one right; we all have the choice of either spending or saving, and how we save varies, some in bonds, stocks, CDs, etc.

10. Is an asset’s price depressed by high interest rates, yes or no?

Yes – all asset prices are dependent on both current and future time preferences; the buy or sell price is subject to the cost (interest) of money at any one moment.

Most students and viewers got this one right; high interest rates reflect the high cost of buying any asset, increasing the preference to save rather than spend, consequently depressing demand.

In summary, only a third of students and now viewers got the “correct” answer according to my economics professor, whose explanations were technical, not political, although there was some change over time in context. As a subtext of sociology, economics is a science of observation of human actions. In all sciences it is necessary to establish clear definitions to avoid confusion when communicating ideas; this will lead to an understanding of what is fact and what is fiction, enabling knowledge and a way out of ignorance. In politics there is a tendency to avoid such clarity as definitions get in the way of narratives, an emotional substitute for knowledge, a deception enabled by ignorance.

“It is usually futile to try to talk facts and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.” Thomas Sowell