the wealth gap isn't widening because of capitalism
it's widening because asset owners benefit from monetary expansion while wage earners suffer from currency debasement
the cantillon effect isn't a market failure, it's a policy feature
Milton Friedman: “I am not a conservative. I’ve never been a conservative. Hayek was not a conservative.”
“We are liberals in the true meaning of that term: concerned with freedom. We are not liberals in the current distorted sense—those liberal with other people’s money.”
Nice.
As I wrote in Skin in the Game, the only people annoyed by inequality are the no-skin-in-the-game bureaucrats and professors who envy the class above them. The rest of us worry about mobility.
Humans are hardware.
Cultures are software.
We have fundamentally the same hardware, but adopt very different software.
Not all software is compatible.
America's software is built on universal principles and respect for law.
Developing countries often run software that prioritizes tribe, custom, and heritage.
That's okay. But it's incompatible.
When an immigrant comes to America, they need to choose America's software over the software of the place they're leaving.
Otherwise, America gets buggy and dysfunctional.
Some countries have software more similar to America - and immigrants from those places will likely have an easier time integrating.
That's pattern recognition, not prejudice.
But the promise of America is that anyone who adopts our software and adds value to the lives of people already here gets to be here.
You don't get to be here just because you want to be here.
You need to bring something to the table.
Millions of people want to come.
We can have empathy for all of them, but we can't accommodate all of them.
That's why merit-based immigration is the only rational path forward.
Don't let people scare you into silence by calling you racist for recognizing this.
This is how citizens of other countries approach their country.
Why should America be any different?
5 years old - Dad knows everything!
7 years old - Dad knows.
10 years old - Maybe Dad doesn’t know?!
12 years old - Dad doesn’t know.
14 years old - Dad's gone crazy!
16 years old - Can’t take Dad seriously.
18 years old - What does dad know?!
22 years old - Dad's talking rubbish!
24 years old - I know more than Dad!
26 years old - Dad seems to know some things after all.
30 years old - Think I should ask Dad about this?!
40 years old - It’s amazing how Dad went through all this!
45 years old - Dad's been right all along.
50 years old - If Dad was here, I could have learned a lot from him.
We’re told the political spectrum runs from far left (communism) to far right (fascism)
But that’s stupid
That “spectrum” is propaganda - designed to make you pick a team instead of spotting the real danger 🧵
It almost doesn’t matter whether someone calls themself a Nazi, a communist, or a nationalist. The structure of power has already been conceded. Once you accept the idea of a leader or a state with absolute authority over the individual, the labels become interchangeable.
If Hitler had woken up one day and decided that nationalization should be done in the name of the proletariat rather than the Volk, nothing in his system could have stopped him.
If Stalin had decided that class identity should be replaced with racial identity, nothing in his system could have stopped him either.
Because once you erase individual rights, the borders between ideologies dissolve. The dictator’s whim becomes the law. The ideology just becomes the aesthetic justification for power.
The real issue isn’t:
• Nazi or Communist
• Right or Left
• Nationalist or Internationalist
The real issue is:
Is the individual protected from the state, or is the state allowed to rule the individual?
If the state outranks the person, you have already accepted the principle that made both Hitler and Stalin possible. You have already surrendered the only safeguard that prevents atrocities.
This is why debating labels is a distraction.
The danger is not the branding.
The danger is the concentration of power.
Once a system allows a government or ruler to override individual rights, everything else is decoration.
The only real defense against tyranny is the recognition that:
No person, no party, and no nation has the right to own the life of an individual.
At that point, it doesn’t matter what color the flag is.
If you believe free speech is for you but not your political opponents, you're illiberal.
If no contrary evidence could change your beliefs, you're a fundamentalist.
If you believe the state should punish those with contrary views, you're a totalitarian.
If you believe political opponents should be punished with violence or death, you're a terrorist.
Young women taking recourse to arms should be galvanizing to men. When those who should be the gentlest and most peaceable are forced to defend themselves, it is a scandalous sign that the moral fabric is tearing. A man is roused to bloodlust by the plight of the shield maiden.