Taking the Red Pill....

Your worldview is shaped by the sum total of the events and people that have impacted your life thus far. By the time you reach adulthood your life rolls along down a rut of your own creation, and its very difficult to dislodge most people from their worldview rut. Because of this, arguing worldview with people is difficult or pointless. It's the reason I don't argue with theists anymore. At some level in their thinking they do not accept reason and evidence in the fundamental things, the way I do. But even these people can be moved if they harbour any doubts at all.
Its true in politics as well. Generally arguments are pointless and only deepen the ruts if beliefs are firmly held.
People that drastically change their views may have been hiding something that allows them to make the change abruptly. Some good advice given in Shakespeare's Hamlet works here, "To thine own self be true." 


In the movie The Matrix the hero, Neo, takes the red pill to affirm his hidden suspicions and finally accept reality as it is. He was true to himself, but he was likely halfway there already.

So it is with the announcement this weekend by a veteran Toronto newspaper writer and editor who came out of the closet, as he put it, and declared himself a libertarian. Like Neo he was finally true to himself as well, it was just a matter of announcing it.
Of course this still takes courage, maybe less so when you are established in your career, but never underestimate how such a declaration seems to make horns sprout from your head in the view of some people.
Over the years, the generally held view of members of my party has been to seek out those people who are already leaning toward libertarianism, and help them screw their courage to the sticking post, to use a Shakespearean metaphor (this time from Macbeth). Literally, to help them take the Red Pill by offering it to them. I think this is a good time to come out, the lines are being drawn and closets tend to be stuffy.       

Put your books away, its time for a quiz!

It has been a while since I said that. Of course the line students wish for that follows my heading is: "but it doesn't count!"
So relax, this one doesn't count either, but you will learn something.
The questions in this quiz were used some years ago as part of a Zogby International survey to gauge "economic enlightenment" among Americans based on questions of basic economics that were intermixed among other questions.

Other important data was collected data as well, including: each respondent's 2008 presidential vote, party affiliation, voting participation, race or ethnic group, urban vs. rural, religious affiliation, religious participation, union membership, marital status, membership in armed forces, NASCAR fandom!, membership in the “investor class,” patronage at Wal-Mart, household income, and gender. Thorough eh?

For your amusement, I present to you just the eight salient questions involved. Give them a shot and I'll discuss scoring later.

Please indicate whether you agree or disagree with each of the following statements.

1. Minimum wage laws raise unemployment.
  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

2. Rent-control laws lead to housing shortages.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

3. Restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

4. A company that has the largest market share is a monopoly.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

5 .Third-world workers working overseas for American companies are being exploited.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

6. Mandatory licensing of professional services increases the price of those services.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

7. Overall, the standard of living is better today than it was 30 years ago.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure

8. Free trade leads to unemployment.

  1. Strongly Agree  2. Somewhat Agree     3. Somewhat Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree       5. Not sure 

Remember the Occupy movement, way back last year? One of the criticisms of that group that I supported, was their obvious lack of economic knowledge which was apparent because of their demands. This type of quiz makes that assertion more credible as you will see.

The Zogby researchers Zeljka Buturovic and Daniel B. Klein discovered that of the 4,835 respondents' (all American adults) in their survey, there was a clear association of enlightened answers and self proclaimed political persuasion. The researchers asked the respondents to state their political leanings as either: progressive/very liberal; liberal; moderate; conservative; very conservative; or libertarian. Rather than looking at correct answers, the researchers looked at answers that were clearly "unenlightened."
So, look at the first question above. Minimum wage laws set a floor below which employers are not permitted to pay their employees any less. That means employers either pay that amount to employees, and reduce their own profit, or as often happens, not hire more people and push the extra work onto current employees. So the enlightened answer is to AGREE with question one. When scoring, both "somewhat disagree" and "strongly disagree" were considered unenlightened or incorrect. "Somewhat agree" was accepted as correct in case the respondent thought the question was ambiguous, and "not sure" was not counted.

The researchers discovered that the incorrect responses from 0 to 8 are as follows: Very conservative, 1.30; Libertarian, 1.38; Conservative, 1.67; Moderate, 3.67; Liberal, 4.69; Progressive/very liberal, 5.26. The last two groups were the MOST UNENLIGHTENED.

This is a dramatic difference, and it supports my contention that the economic knowledge of so called "leftists" or better "statists," needs to be upgraded. Libertarians, as I would have guessed, are fairly well grounded in fundamental economics. The Occupy movement, that I believe consists largely of people who think government intervention is the solution to economic disparity, likely belongs to the poorly scoring statists.

One of the researchers, Daniel Klein, wrote about his work in the Wall Street Journal, and did an analysis of the questions which is interesting:

"To be sure, none of the eight questions specifically challenge the political sensibilities of conservatives and libertarians. Still, not all of the eight questions are tied directly to left-wing concerns about inequality and redistribution. In particular, the questions about mandatory licensing, the standard of living, the definition of monopoly, and free trade do not specifically challenge leftist sensibilities.
Yet on every question the left did much worse. On the monopoly question, the portion of progressive/very liberals answering incorrectly (31%) was more than twice that of conservatives (13%) and more than four times that of libertarians (7%). On the question about living standards, the portion of progressive/very liberals answering incorrectly (61%) was more than four times that of conservatives (13%) and almost three times that of libertarians (21%)."

Check your own score - Enlightened answers:

1. AGREE, 2. AGREE, 3. AGREE, 4. DISAGREE, 5. DISAGREE, 6. AGREE, 7. AGREE, 8. DISAGREE

H/T Claude Lesperance

Canadian Healthcare - Waiting Your Turn

There are nights when there is nothing worth watching on television and a few like last night. There were the results from the Iowa Caucuses, disappointing, the Canadian Juniors playing Russia, disappointing, and an interesting spin on Canadian healthcare, all going on at the same time.

Radio talk show host Jerry Agar was doing a substitution stint for Ezra Levant on the SUN NEWS channel, and the entire show was devoted to Canadian healthcare. Mr. Agar elaborated on two myths about healthcare:

• Government is the only entity caring and efficient enough to offer health care to Canadians.
• Canada provides the same healthcare service to the poor as to the rich.

He used a report produced by the Fraser Institute recently, titled Waiting Your Turn, and pointed out that monopoly services are controlled by making customers wait. Who can forget the long lines for bread and toilet paper in the former Soviet Union which monopolized the production and distribution of goods? In Canada, healthcare is a monopoly, and too many Canadians suffer from a nationalistic, chauvinistic attitude that somehow our healthcare system makes us better than our American neighbours. Its past time to stop that silliness. 

Watch the video here and then you may want to watch HEALTHCARE HULLABALOO, afterward with Dr. Roy Eappen, familiar to many of us, as he comments on this issue.   

Ron Paul on to New Hampshire

Funding faith-based schools, good?

Conflicted, that was my initial reaction when I read that the Government of Saskatchewan has decided to fund faith-based schools this year. I have several conflicts about that.
I'm not a fan of religious anything (except maybe foods), let alone education, and governments shouldn't be funding education or even involved in it. Of course when governments do fund education, as they do in most jurisdictions, there is also the conflict that religious teaching should not be something that taxpayers are forced to support - that's the church and state conflict. So you might be surprised with my considered opinion on this issue. I think this new funding is a step in the right direction. Why?

Where I live in Ontario, the provincial government funds the public system and since the mid-1980's it also funds all Roman Catholic Schools. Of course this is controversial, but it's a constitutional issue that goes back to the founding of Canada. That doesn't make it right, thats just the way it is. Why not fund all religions?

In an editorial today the Globe and Mail disagrees with Saskatchewan's decision. Its chief concern is that this new funding emphasizes the "separateness" in the schools, in what is becoming a very diverse population. This is very typical of the statist view in Canada. On the one hand Canadian governments encourage bilingualism, and multiculturalism because diversity brings new ideas, and new viewpoints to the Canadian population - its good. On the other hand the statists, including the major political parties, advocate 'sameness' in education to unify the country. As the Globe suggests: "A diverse population needs strong core institutions. It needs rallying points and meeting places, especially for its young people." So, separate schools are bad....unless of course they're Catholic...in Ontario. Confused yet? I am.

Why wouldn't it be a good thing to have diversity of choice in the schools, with competitive curriculums? Wouldn't that encourage schools to develop best practices that maybe produce better students and maybe give parents more options for their coerced tax dollars? I think it might. Would atheist/secular schools be funded?

It seems to me that if diversity of the population is good, so is diversity of the educational institutions, unless there is an ulterior motive, and of course there is. The state may not want competition of thought in the younger population, it wants unity, sameness of thinking. That is the best way to keep the ship of state from being rocked in the future. Or am I wrong? Why should their be more freedom of choice when the state can arbitrarily create less? That's really the issue isn't it, more freedom or less. The Globe suggests in the final line of its editorial:    "Diverse public schools are a multicultural society’s best way to promote unity, while still preserving difference." That almost sounds like Newspeak. 

A libertarian's New Years Resolution for 2012

As a high school teacher a few years ago, I took very seriously my obligation to teach. If a student didn't understand a concept, I tried to explain it in a different way, that was my job. I never assumed that my students were unable to understand the subject. I always assumed that their mental block, was my challenge to remove.

I mention this because my venture into politics of late is a bit like teaching, but without the captive audience. However, my efforts at persuading people to my political views have not quite reached the level of my ability to successfully teach biology. On the contrary, I may have done the opposite, turned people off my politics. Like my previous teaching example the fault or obligation is mine. How do I know how well I've done? Judging from the reactions of my own friends and family, I doubt I've persuaded any of them, though I'm still trying. Of course I don't know for certain about any other people I've encountered, I can't ask them, but I can look at three sets of previous election results, and they are not encouraging.

As a teacher I adapted (different ways of teaching) to my accommodate students, but my political persuasion techniques leave much to be desired. I have used just one technique so far, the debate. Debates rarely persuade, rather, the opponents "butt heads" intellectually, and the goal is to win, not to discover the truth. When I don't win, I just debate harder, I become more aggressive and argumentative. Who does that persuade? Not many.

Voters, the people I'm trying to persuade these days are very conservative, and I mean that in the original sense of the word, not the current meaningless political usage. Dramatic change, the kind libertarians advocate, is just not on. Successful persuasion requires getting people to come along with you voluntarily, steering their thinking, sort of like teaching. That means getting in tune with people, not shocking them with libertarian bravado. I'm as guilty as any one of doing that. So, where to get help?

Over the years, libertarians have created a variety of different organizations each with its own niche (many you will find on this page). Some organizations specialize in economics, others in politics, still others in education. With the advent of the internet, access, popularity, and usage of these organizations has multiplied. One them, The Advocates for Self Government is concerned with the best practices for communicating the ideas of liberty. Many of you may be aware of the Nolan Chart which is at the centre of the World's Smallest Political Quiz, that is one of their tools. The Advocates have taken on the niche of persuasion by selling books, tapes and CDs, plus providing training. Over recent weeks I've been listening (mostly while driving) to a CD set titled The Essence of Political Persuasion and I've learned a great deal about using language to sell liberty, I recommend it. In it, there are several techniques, easily learned with practice, that can help anyone vary their own particular attempts at persuasion.

Its very difficult to sell the idea of liberty to people who are constantly told and who already believe that they have freedom. Governments routinely use their powers to usurp more and more of our personal responsibility, that's how they continue to grow. They have grown so large, and we are so inured to their presence now, that some freedoms are even considered to be destructive to our best interests. For example, as John Stossel suggested in a recent article that applies just as much to Canadians as Americans:
"Lots of Americans oppose free trade and free markets. It takes some knowledge to realize that the seeming chaos masks underlying order. The benefits of freedom are not intuitive, and when you go against people's intuition, they get upset.
The benefits of freedom are largely "unseen," as the 19th century French liberal Frederic Bastiat put it. He meant that rising living standards and labor-saving inventions don't appear to flow from freedom. But they do.
It's one of the ironies of life that people need not understand freedom for it to work, and because of this, there is the perennial danger that they will give it up without realizing the disastrous consequences that follow."

So this year I am determined to learn some new tricks of persuasion, and use them so that I can become as good a politician as I think I once was a teacher.

To all reading this, I wish you a Happy, Healthy, Prosperous 2012.

Holiday detoxing and purging.....don't do it.

Anticipating New Year's Eve? Ready for some heavy partying? One thing you don't need to worry about is cleansing your body of the "toxic substances" you may be consuming.

Those late night "infomercials" that claim your body accumulates toxic material that needs to be removed every so often....well, that's just bunkum. The bodies of most reasonably healthy people do a fine job of protecting them from toxicity, no need to waste your money on stuff like this. Companies like that prey on the ignorance of the general population who have never learned or totally forgotten their high school biology. Spend a few minutes and read this timely article that debunks the detox myth and lend support to reason and evidence. 

The Jetsons vs the leviathan state

By the time the Jetsons cartoon series came to television in September 1962, I already had great anticipation for the future. Manned space flight was a reality after Yuri Gagarin's one orbit in April of 1961, then came Alan Shepard's flight weeks later.
The Jetsons' cartoon world showed freedoms and possibilities that were only heard of in the pages of Popular Science at the time. Mundane household tasks were carried out by robots, and as Jeffery Tucker writes:
"— people work only a few hours a day, travel at 500 miles per hour in flying cars that go as fast as 2,500 miles per hour, and the main job is "pushing buttons."
The galaxy is their home. Healthcare is a complete free market with extreme customer care. Technology was the best (but of course it still malfunctions, same as today). Business is rivalrous, prosperity is everywhere, and the state largely irrelevant except for the friendly policeman who shows up only every once in a while to check things out."

I yearned for that world, and had every confidence that the way things were going, I would live to see it. I saw every episode of The Jetsons, and so, apparently, did Jeffrey Tucker.

Mr. Tucker is a prolific writer for mises.org, and has written It's a Jetsons World, as you can see in the short video clip below. Over the past few days, in the quite times of this holiday period, I had the pleasure of listening to the free audio book version online. This represents a portion of the full text. The reader is Stefan Molyneux, who needs no introductions, and he does a wonderfully theatrical job of reading. Mr. Tucker's audio book is funny, entertaining, and enlightening. Listening here is a treat. Enjoy.   

It's a Jetsons World from Mises Media on Vimeo.

Psssst......wanna buy some potato chips?

What does the leviathan state do best? That list would be very short. Certainly one of the most proficient if dubious examples of efficacy, is the ability of the state to create criminals, inadvertently, of course.
In Ontario, Premier 'Dad' Dalton McGuinty, uses his government's legislative powers to socially engineer the lives of it's citizens. McGuinty means well, he is a gentle paternalistic bully, but a bully nonetheless. What's he done? Since taking power almost nine years ago, Ontario now has laws that dictate what breed of dog is allowed as a pet, how homeowners must care for their lawns, what must NOT be done while driving, what methods of electricity production are acceptable and encouraged, how to dress while riding a bike, and lately in the government run public schools, what foods may and may not be served or sold at lunch.

Since the 2011-12 school year began, the Ontario Ministry of Education is "committed to making schools healthier places for students" after instituting Policy Memorandum 150. Parents are no longer fully responsible for what their children may or may not eat, the McGuinty Liberals have prescribed some fairly stringent rules about nutrition. How stringent? Well, in-school fundraisers like a weekly "pizza day" or the ubiquitous chocolate bar sales are now verboten.

The Ministry has divided up foods sold or served in schools into three categories:

1. Foods that can be sold or served at least 80% of the time or more.

2. Foods that can be sold or served 20% of the time or less.

3. Foods that must never be sold or served in school. 

The 80% or more category contains things like salad, vegetables, fruits, bread, pasta, cereal, meat, and fish as long as they all have low salt, low sugar, and  low fat content. So, pizza does not qualify because it has too much salt, and likely too much fat. Here is the multiple page appendix that stipulates the new nutrition standards in Ontario schools.

Of course proper nutrition makes sense. French fries and gravy, common lunchtime fare when I was a student, are not healthy foods to be eaten regularly. But is it the job of the school to teach this or should parents have final say? Why don't schools just concentrate on what they are supposed to be doing (and often not that well) and let parents make personal and societal decisions?

The problem whenever government uses legislation to engineer habits, is that the legislation always limits choices and often creates conflict that would not have occurred without the bad legislation. Government run public schools, where most students in Ontario are educated, already come with numerous limitations on parental freedom. Many wealthy parents vote with their feet to keep their children out of the government school system, but even that is undermined, because the Ministry prescribes the curriculum taught in ALL schools.

My cartoon, suggestive of a black market in illicit junk food, may seem a bit over-the-top, but is it really? In many school districts in the American states and elsewhere, the intrusive regulations we have adopted in Ontario, have already been field tested. A recent posting at LewRockwell.com (below) shows how black markets have sprung up in Public School cafeterias:

Though the Los Angeles Unified School District has received accolades for its new, healthful lunches, the appearance of quinoa and whole wheat bread has created “an underground market for chips, candy, fast-food burgers and other taboo fare.”
At Van Nuys High, a Junior ROTC officer and an art teacher have been caught selling candy, chips, and instant noodles to students. And, as Hank Cardello, the author of Stuffed: An Insider's Look at Who's (Really) Making America Fat, and a former food executive with Coca-Cola, General Mills, and Cadbury-Schweppes, pointed out in the Atlantic, candy dealers have sprouted up wherever fresh food is sold:

• Last week, Van Nuys High School juniors, Iraides Renteria and Mayra Gutierrez told the LA Times, they considered the new school fare "nasty, rotty stuff," as they pulled three bags of Flamin' Hot Cheetos and soda from their backpacks – which they very well may have purchased from one of the junk food “dealers” on campus.
• Following the passage of the Texas Public School Nutrition Policy, which banned candy, enterprising students at Austin High began selling bags full of candy at premium prices, with some reportedly making up to $200 per week.
• Similarly, young entrepreneurs at one Boca Raton (Florida) middle school make runs to the local Costco and buy candy bars, doughnuts, and other high-calorie snacks in bulk. They then offer these goodies for sale in an environment that has supposedly eradicated such goodies.
• An eighth-grade student body vice president in Connecticut was forced to resign after buying Skittles from an underground "dealer."
• The U.K. has also seen its share of black market trade in banned foods, snacks, and beverages, with schools in Oxford, Dorset, and Essex reporting healthy underground markets trading in food contraband. The plots ranged from kids selling McDonald's hamburgers in playgrounds to bicycle-riding entrepreneurs hauling bags of soft drinks and milk chocolate for sale.

New on the curriculum at the schools mentioned above and coming to Ontario schools is: "flouting the rules" and getting away with it. The children will learn early that dumb rules create a criminal class of entrepreneurs that operate in the shadows, a black market in junk food. Again the leviathan state does what it does best.

  

"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws." Tacitus

Disenchanted, Disengaged, Disenfranchised

In the most recent Ontario general election voter turnout was at an historic low, only 49.2% of eligible voters actually bothered to cast their ballots. This was despite a concerted effort by Elections Ontario to make voting easier and more convenient than ever.

The following was included in a late summer media release:

“It’s now easier than ever to vote in a provincial general election” said Chief Electoral Officer Greg Essensa today at a media conference held in Toronto. Stating that making voting easy was the core driver for Elections Ontario, Essensa took attendees through a review of the voting options available, highlighting the More Days More Ways approach which gives voters more flexibility than ever before to choose how, when and where to vote. 

On election day, most voting locations:
Will be wheelchair accessible, as indicated on your Notice of Registration Card.
On election day, all voting locations:
Will have magnifiers, Braille ballot templates and other tools to assist voters who are blind or with vision loss.
Will provide pens and pads to help electors who are deaf, deafened, or hard of hearing to communicate.
Will provide the elector the opportunity to book a sign language interpreter paid by Elections Ontario through the Canadian Hearing Society's Ontario Interpreting Services to be with you at your voting location.

During the 15 days preceding election day:
In returning offices and satellite offices, assistive voting tools will be available that feature:
Audio headphones
Tactile buttons
Large keypads marked with Braille
Paddles
A "sip and puff" device
If you have restricted mobility:
You may transfer to a more convenient voting location within your electoral district. Contact your Returning Officer to make arrangements.

Almost $92 million later, it didn't seem to work. In fact, its almost axiomatic (for me) that whenever a big government (like Ontario's) institutes a program to fix a problem, not only is the problem not fixed, but it is often made worse. Such was the case here. Obviously "ease" of voting was not preventing people from voting in this election. It was something more fundamental. Why did 67.8% of the population turn out to vote in 1975, dropping to 49.2% in 2011? Was it more convenient then? Hardly. So the answer must be something else and I suspect the answer is incentive. No, I'm not suggesting that we pay or reward people who vote. Nor would I suggest that people be coerced to vote, as they are in Australia. I'm suggesting that people need a reason to vote, a reason to believe that their ballot may change what is, after all, an entrenched system.
There is some evidence for this. In 2008, Obama's election was a spike in the usual US voter turnout, maybe because people were under the misimpression that an Obama victory would change things. US turnouts seem to be far worse in percentage terms than Canadian federal elections. Ontario turnouts resemble the US.
The upcoming US election will be interesting, or not, depending on who is chosen by the GOP. If a razor blade will be needed to separate and distinguish the policies of Obama and the GOP candidate, then look for a low turnout. That's what I'm predicting.