Capitalism!

In Analysis by Michael Rae

When Thomas Robert Malthus published his Essay on Population in 1798, explaining that population always tends to grow faster than the resources available to support that population, condemning most people to a level of income barely sufficient to survive, he was describing the history of humankind up to that point.
The history of humankind goes back hundreds of thousands of years. Only in the past few hundred has economic progress raised most people out of poverty. What has been responsible for this remarkable increase in the global standard of living? Capitalism!
Since its beginning, capitalism has had its critics. In a new book, Rainer

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Washington Senate Bill 5263 proposes important psilocybin reforms but could go further 

In Politics by Michael Rae

These public comments were submitted to the Washington House Health Care and Wellness Committee on March 23, 2023.

Dear Chairman Riccelli and Members of the Committee: 

On behalf of the Reason Foundation, thank you for accepting these comments and making them part of the public record. Reason Foundation is committed to ending the drug war and allowing discerning adults to safely and responsibly partake in substances they believe may enhance their lives. Decades of academic research combined with the emerging results of large-scale clinical trials have shown that psychedelic substances, used within many cultures since antiquity, may hold substantial value for

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Lower cannabis taxes could bolster Alaska’s legal market

In Politics by Michael Rae

These public comments were submitted to the Alaska House Labor and Commerce Committee on March 24, 2023.

Dear Chairman Sumner and Members of the Committee:

On behalf of the Reason Foundation, thank you for accepting these comments and making them part of the public record. Reason Foundation is committed to ensuring that state-regulated marijuana markets are competitive, offer widespread opportunities for entrepreneurship, and can successfully transition commerce away from dangerous illicit markets and into the legal market.

One of the primary challenges in setting up a state marijuana market is to establish the correct tax structure. Taxes lay at the intersection of

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CCLA Reacts to R v McColman Decision

In Rights by poladmin

OTTAWA — Shakir Rahim, Director of Criminal Justice for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), reacted to the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision in R v McColman;
The Supreme Court of Canada has confirmed police do not have the authority to conduct random sobriety stops on private property.
This is a victory for all concerned with police awarding themselves new and novel powers outside their existing statutory authority and for reassuring for those who care about civil liberties in Canada.
Suspicionless roadside stops have been a serious and longstanding concern for the CCLA because they act as a notorious pretext

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Hubris of the powerful

In Miscellaneous by Michael Rae

The 18th-century British cartoonist James Gillray was the first to satirize Napoleon as a “thundering boastful character.” Later in the 20th century, despite Napoleon’s being of average height for his time, the term Napoleon Complex was applied to short men whose feelings of inferiority led to “a strong desire for power and dominance.”


You don’t have to be short to feel inferior or crave power. We don’t have to speculate on Napoleon’s mindset; the despot himself shared that with General Philippe-Paul de Ségur. During Napoleon’s 1812 invasion of Russia, Ségur served as his aide-de-camp. Ségur’s historical account Defeat: Napoleon’s Russian Campaign became a primary source for Tolstoy’s’ War and Peace.


Ségur recorded Napoleon’s declaration, “in affairs of state one must never retreat, never retrace one’s steps, never admit an error.” We can call the mindset of refusing to acknowledge errors the Napoleon Syndrome. In the grip of the Napoleon Syndrome, individuals make trouble for themselves. Leaders so obsessed can cause misery for millions.



In his classic Anything That’s Peaceful, Leonard Read observed, “When in possession of political power over the creative actions of others, a fallible human being is almost certain to mistake this power for infallibility.”


When we believe we are infallible, we mistake our thoughts for instructions rather than constructions of our mind. Inflated self-confidence leads to recklessness. Disregarding criticism and evidence, we lose touch with reality.


Napoleon’s invasion of Russia yields a timeless and sobering lesson about the consequences of exercising unbridled power while ignoring mounting evidence that you have chosen the wrong course of action. Hubris is destructive.


Never admitting an error led Napoleon to disaster. He set out to invade Russia with his Grande Armée of around 600,000 men; only about 10,000 came home. Napoleon kept chasing a decisive battle. As Napoleon moved deeper and deeper into Russia, the Russian forces mostly refused to engage.


Ségur’s account explains, “the Emperor of course believed what he most desired”—that the Russians were just around the corner. For each strategic decision, Napoleon “was better able to deceive others concerning his intentions since he was deceiving himself.” Ségur observed, Napoleon could “pass carts loaded with amputated limbs” and cover “all these horrors with glory.” He often mistook “the promptings of his impatience for the inspiration of genius!”


The Russian strategy of elusiveness and attrition was too much for Napoleon’s forces. Supply lines were stretched too long to provide food for men or horses. Starvation, disease, and bitter cold took their toll.


The sick and injured, Ségur reported, “commonly went without food, bed, blankets, straw and medicine and died in “unmentionable stench and filth.” The thirsty men fought over “puddles” of water. Ségur writes of the hunger: “A harsh, violent, merciless nature seemed to have communicated her fury to [the soldiers]…When a horse fell, … the men swarmed upon the animals and tore it into scraps, over which they fought like famished hounds!


This is no tell-all exposé from a disgruntled soldier; Ségur admired Napoleon and served him faithfully. Napoleon had instilled in his army “the love of war, of glory and of [Napoleon].” Ségur and his men thought the subjugated people would receive them as conquering heroes: “The people would flock to supply all our needs: love and gratitude should surround us.” Instead, the invasion provoked “blind rage” among Russians.




On the way to Moscow, the Battle of Smolensk resulted in a rare victory. Ségur wrote of the burned city: “we passed through the smoking ruins in military formation… triumphant over this desolation, but with no other witness to our glory than ourselves.” This was a “bloody triumph” with no benefits. Yet, Napoleon marched on in pursuit of what Ségur described as “the mirage of victory.”


Entering Moscow, Napoleon found “only a few scattered houses standing in the midst of ruins.” The city had been burnt by released convicts. Occupying an empty Moscow for five weeks, Napoleon waited in vain for Emperor Alexander to surrender. Yet, the Russians would not acknowledge defeat. Still maintaining “his policy of being above making mistakes,” Napoleon refused to acknowledge his errors. Doubling down, Napoleon considered going on to St. Petersburg. In his delusional way, he told Ségur, “We shall be overwhelmed with praise! What will the world say when it learns that in three months’ time we have conquered the two greatest capitals of the north?” The mindset driving Napoleon’s blunders is further revealed, as he explained to Ségur,



What a frightful succession of perilous conflicts will begin with my first backward step! You must no longer find fault with my inaction. I know that from a purely military point of view Moscow is worthless! But Moscow is not a military position, it is a political position. You think I am a general while I am really an Emperor.



Ségur sums up the lesson: “Fully aware of the power he reaped from the prestige of his infallibility, he shuddered at the thought of dealing it its first wound.” Before even his invasion of Russia, Napoleon had dealt himself the “first wound.” Another advisor and emissary, Armand Caulaincourt, had tried to explain to the delusional Napoleon how much he, not Alexander, was hated all over Europe.


Ségur’s account is a gripping read. Napoleon sought to protect the illusion of his infallibility by his unwillingness to admit errors.


It’s “a tale as old as time;” examples of Napoleon’s mindset are not hard to find throughout history and today.


Dr. Fauci’s refusal to acknowledge natural immunity led to cascading policy errors. The CDC, too, refused to acknowledge errors. Policymakers pushed, and still push, vaccines even while it became clear that, for at least some age groups, the costs of potential side effects exceed any benefits. Perversely given known risks, the CDC recommends everyone, even children and adults with heart disease, receive the COVID vaccine.


A noted pro-vaccine researcher Dr. Paul Offit warned, “because boosters are not risk-free, we need to clarify which groups most benefit.” Offit explained the policy of “let’s just dose everybody all the time” is not good reasoning. A noted authority on evidence-based medicine, Dr. Vinay Prasad wrote that boosters without random-clinical trials are “unethical and scientifically bankrupt.”


Will FDA and CDC bureaucrats admit their errors or, holding fast to their notions of infallibility, continue marching toward “Moscow?”


Napoleon declared to Ségur, “When one makes a mistake, one must stick to it—that makes it right.” The way of politics and bureaucracy is to refuse to change despite the costs. Only the delusional with coercive power can maintain a belief that the repetition of an error establishes its validity.


The way of peaceful commerce rejects leaders like Fauci. In business affairs, the market drives continuous improvement, and looking to detect errors results in better service to consumers. When products are introduced and things don’t go as planned, stubbornly blundering forward is not an effective strategy. The market cares not a whit about a leader’s delusions of infallibility.


Try this thought experiment: Imagine yourself at your worst, wreaking havoc on your family, friends, or associates with your insufferable arrogance. Answer honestly, are you fit to exercise power over anyone?


Considering human nature at its worst, the very foundation of the American government was set up to minimize concentrated power. Leaders holding concentrated power are especially susceptible to losing contact with reality, perpetuating errors, and destroying lives.




Barry Brownstein




Barry Brownstein



Barry Brownstein is professor emeritus of economics and leadership at the University of Baltimore. 


To receive Barry’s essays subscribe at his Substack, Mindset Shifts.


His essays also appear at the American Institute for Economic Research, Intellectual Takeout, Learn Liberty, The Epoch Times and many other publications. Barry’s essays have been translated into many languages, most frequently Spanish and Portuguese. He is the author of The Inner-Work of Leadership.


Barry holds a Ph.D. in economics from Rutgers University and a B.S. in mathematical statistics from CCNY. 




This article was originally published on FEE.org. Read the original article.



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More Iraq war lessons, Canada and Israel and another AUKUS update

In Opinion by Michael Rae

MORE LESSONS FROM THE IRAQ WAR 20 YEARS ON
Canada, the Iraq war and Canadian intelligence assessments
In our 17 July 2020 blog post, we referenced a superb National Film Board documentary, High Wire — the story of how Canada came to its decision not to join the US in its illegal

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Ronald Coase’s Fitting Tribute to Adam Smith

In Analysis by Michael Rae

The year 1776 is certainly a landmark year in history, and one of the reasons why is Adam Smith’s “The Wealth of Nations,” which first appeared in print that year. In 1976, to commemorate the book’s bicentennial, University of Chicago economist and Nobel Prize winner Ronald Coase wrote a pair of essays that discuss two of Smith’s great works—“The Theory of Moral Sentiments” and “The Wealth of Nations”—and their continued importance. This year marks the 300th anniversary of Adam Smith’s birth, and Coase’s essays once again make a fitting tribute. Here, I comment especially on Coase’s “Adam Smith’s View of

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From Power Struggles to Unity: The Opposition’s Plan to Challenge Maduro in 2024

In Analysis by Michael Rae

Venezuela’s opposition has been seriously weakened in the last few months. Part of the reason is that Nicolás Maduro’s brutal dictatorship has survived every attempt to topple it with support from Cuba, Russia, Iran, and to some extent China. But some responsibility lies with the leaders of the opposition themselves, who have devoted an inordinate amount of time to internecine power struggles and, in some cases, engaged in acts of corruption that have tarnished its image.
As the head of a National Assembly in which the opposition held the majority after the parliamentary elections of 2015, Juan Guaidó was recognized

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