Random stuff I find interesting and you may not.
In this miserable Covid-19 spring, it’s tempting for remote workers to vent our frustrations with being hemmed in, forced to stare at screens while unable to do much else other than walk around the block or go to Costco. Yet the pain felt by the teleworking middle class is dwarfed by that of working-class Americans. … Read more
We used to joke on Wall Street that you should marry a trader at another firm, trade with only each other, and by end of the year one would have made a lot of money and the other lost the exact same amount. The winner would be paid a big bonus, and the loser only … Read more
Despite what many people hoped, COVID-19 is clearly worse than the seasonal flu. But despite what other people feared, it does not seem to be nearly as lethal as the “Spanish flu” of 1918, which killed about 0.7 percent of the total U.S. population—equivalent to more than 2 million people today. As we move from … Read more
Food delivery services always felt a bit wonky to me. I’m usually not terribly old fashioned about most things, but I generally understood that some restaurants delivered and some did not and that that was mostly fine. Along came food delivery services to bring us food from places that didn’t deliver and that was mostly … Read more
There are many things that can disrupt the production and distribution of goods. A hurricane might do that for a while, as it did in parts of Texas and the rest of the country when Harvey drenched Houston and put an important gasoline pipeline out of commission. Not having easy access to retail gasoline for … Read more
In many ways, Goop is like any other celebrity cult. Yet it also reflects something more widespread, embodying many of the characteristics laid out in Christopher Lasch’s 1979 bestseller The Culture of Narcissism. Lasch argued that escape into grandiose self-delusion, previously deemed pathological, had been mainstreamed as normal or even desirable. He outlined a distinction … Read more
Author Aldous Huxley once said, “A thoroughly scientific dictatorship will never be overthrown.” Even as we try to battle the COVID-19 pestilence, we may be contracting a more dangerous virus — hygienic fascism. This involves a process when our political leaders defer to a handful of “experts,” amid what Dr. Joseph Ladopo, an associate professor … Read more
Sometimes the truth is like mythical kryptonite. It radiates power and yet promises great destruction. And so reality is to be left alone, encased in lead, and kept at bay. Take the Chinese genesis of the COVID-19 epidemic. We started in February with the usual Chinese deceptions about their role in the birth, transmission, and … Read more
Writing in this magazine a month ago, I applauded the government’s stated aim of trying to follow the science in dealing with Covid. Such promises are easier made than kept. Following science means understanding science. It means engaging with rival interpretations of the limited data in order to tease out what is most important in … Read more
As I recently wrote here, and spoke about here, bans on elective surgery invoked by governors across the country in response to the COVID-19 pandemic have caused many people to suffer and even possibly face fatal consequences due to delays in necessary medical care. But there are other reasons why the public health emergency has … Read more
A three-column article in the local daily recently revealed the alarming news that Arizona State Sen. Lupe Contreras and members of his family had tested positive for the coronavirus. I wish Sen. Contreras and his family well. He seems like a good guy. But in a sane world without the hyperbolic, breathless press treatment of … Read more
Pete Wehner, a gifted writer, thinker, and senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, recently wrote a great op-ed in the New York Times on C.S. Lewis’s approach to politics. You can read the whole piece here, but one quote, in particular, caught my attention. Wehner writes, Lewis saw public matters, and indeed … Read more
Today we have the “rule of experts.” Monopoly experts have the power to choose for you in one field after another, including child protective services, economic policy, and pandemic response. But if you give some humans the monopoly power to choose for other humans, you have created some dangerous incentives. The rule of experts gives … Read more
In my lifetime, there was another deadly flu epidemic in the United States. The flu spread from Hong Kong to the United States, arriving December 1968 and peaking a year later. It ultimately killed 100,000 people in the U.S., mostly over the age of 65, and one million worldwide. Lifespan in the US in those … Read more
If you want people to keep being okay with lockdowns, don’t make them feel lied to. Those of us outside of the New York area have done exactly what we were told we had to do. We “flattened the curve,” and now we’re being told that this flattened curve is a sign of our failure … Read more
Unfolding this month, in the background of the pandemic, is a “depopulation” of livestock farms — another surreal new term of the crisis to add to our list. It’s as detached and colorless a word as the industry could find for gassing, suffocating, or otherwise doing in the millions of animals whose appointments at the … Read more
Some doctors, economists and educators argue stay-at-home orders defy data and medical science, and are hurting young people the most. Former chief of neuroradiology at Stanford University Medical Center, Dr. Scott Atlas, says an overestimation of the fatality rate of those infected has created an unwarranted panic. In a column published by The Hill, he … Read more
Are you sure we’ve handled this event properly? Let’s go back to 1969 for a moment. You were nine or 10 years old, and I was 18. I was in college, you were in elementary school, it was the year of Woodstock, and the Hong Kong Flu was in full swing, eventually killing over 100,000 … Read more
The increasing possibility of a breakdown in the meat supply chain in the United States due to COVID-19 is prompting Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.) to renew his push for a bill that would make it easier for small, independent slaughterhouses and meat processors to sell directly to consumers. Large meatpacking plants across the country have … Read more
Few people in history have seen more jobs up close than Mike Rowe, the longtime host of the Discovery Channel’s hit TV show Dirty Jobs. Now the blue-collar icon has a message for those who say “non-essential” employees have no business working during the COVID-19 pandemic. In a recent TV appearance with Dana Perino on … Read more
“Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket,” advises the proverb. Why not? Anyone who ever has spoken with an investment adviser has heard the sermon about diversification of risk. And most people understand that in the context of an investment portfolio. But in other contexts, we respond to risk with the opposite of … Read more
The schools in Arlington County are refusing to teach children anything new out of a concern for “equity.” Although the schools are physically closed due to coronavirus, students have been doing their assignments from home using school-issued electronic devices. Now school officials fear students will learn differently if they come from different home environments or … Read more
“Where’s the Beef?” was once just a funny (yet successful) advertising slogan. But now, it could soon be an actual question on the minds of many shoppers. Amid the coronavirus crisis, some are calling attention to the coming meat shortages the United States faces as the virus continues to ravage our economy. Rep. Thomas Massie … Read more
Professor Elizabeth Bartholet of Harvard Law recently caused a stir with her ignorant and nakedly authoritarian Arizona Law Review essay calling for a ban on homeschooling. On its own, the article is bad. In context, it is worse. Professor Bartholet is hardly the first progressive academic to call for a ban on homeschooling. She is … Read more
Parents the world over are dealing with massive adjustments in their children’s education that they could not have anticipated just three months ago. To one degree or another, pandemic-induced school closures are creating the “mass homeschooling” that FEE’s senior education fellow Kerry McDonald predicted two months ago. Who knows, with millions of youngsters absent from … Read more