Book Summaries

Humans have an innate moral sense. How we use it depends on the environment we grow up in and how we define morality. The desire for unity and distrust of strangers are universal human tendencies. Of all systems ever created that actually increases trust and cooperation among strangers none has been as successful as the market. The market lowers the level of distrust by letting very different peoples and cultures find common interest. Him… Ideology flows from human nature… and refining the definition of evil is the very essence of what civilizations do Read More

Notes on BALANCE by Glenn Hubbard & Tim Kane The book is a review of the experience of great powers in world history and the political and economic lessons to be learned from studying them.  Two thousand years ago, Rome was a stable and prosperous civilization. After 3 centuries of decline from the relentless stagnation… Read More

Introduction The political purpose of identity politics is to divide the country into groups as a strategy to change America completely. Identity politics sees people’s beliefs and interests as determined by their membership in specific groups, particularly sex, race, sexual orientation, and disability status. It is an enemy of reason and Enlightenment values. Identity politics… Read More

American Marxists call themselves progressives, democratic socialists, social activists, community activists, etc….They claim to promote economic justice, environmental justice, racial equity, gender equity…They claim the dominant culture and capitalist system are unjust, inequitable, racist and sexist…The aim is to undermine the citizenry’s confidence in the nation’s institutions and traditions, weakening the nation from within, and destroying American republicanism and capitalism.

They occupy our colleges and universities, newsrooms and social media, entertainment and boardrooms, and their ideas are increasingly influential within the Democratic Party. Their influence pervades teacher training and classroom curriculum throughout America’s public school system. They use propaganda and indoctrination, and demand conformity through cancel culture, etc. to destroy reputations and careers. They censor and ban patriotic and contrary viewpoints on social media. They attack academic freedom and intellectual diversity in higher education. Read More

The world of economics is deeply divided and inherently political. Advocates for stronger incentives for risk taking and those for income redistribution each work backward from their conclusions to find a set of indisputable beliefs on which to build their arguments. The economy is so complex that it is impossible to definitively isolate the effect of any one factor. This book attempts to explain how the economy works, why the U.S. has outperformed its high wage rivals, what caused the financial crisis, and what improvements might better protect our economy without damaging its growth Read More

America’s success is heavily dependent on its bedrock of political, social, and economic institutions – a free market democracy with secure personal freedoms and property rights. The real secret to its extraordinary success is human capital. …Given the indispensable role of government in generating human capital it matters a great deal how, specifically, government executes that role. Education, productivity, and immigration are a country’s human capital tripod and government has a key role to play in each. Government support of education and basic research generates enormous benefits Read More

Among liberal democracies, Americans are by far the most patriotic people and America has the most robust and creative civil society. …A majority now believes that big government is the biggest future threat to the country. In the 1950’s, the vast majority of Americans trusted the federal government to do the right thing in most instances, today only a tiny minority do. Today the public views the federal government as a chronically clumsy, ineffectual and bloated giant that can’t be counted on to the do the right thing much less do it well Read More

Laws are fundamental to the concept of society, and the principal differences among all societies are in the laws by which they function. By the 18th century, concepts of individual rights and laws to protect them were being developed. David Hume wrote A Treatise Of Human Nature in 1739, and John Locke in his Second Treatise On Government said that all men are endowed by a supreme being with natural rights which include life, liberty, and property and that governments are instituted for the purpose of protecting and advancing those rights Read More

Two phenomena corroding self-governance and liberty are the unchecked and metastasizing agencies of the executive branch, and the shameful abdication of responsibility by our elected representatives.

The only alternative to Imperial rule from DC is self-governance within the Federalist system. Read More