A Cry from the Far Middle: Dispatches from a Divided Land

Classical Liberalism has had a good run. Now it’s about to get run over by a bus full of stupid “post-capitalist” political trends—the new socialism, the new nationalism, the new trade war mercantilism, and the new social media platforms that drive this bus.

The growth of politics is the opposite of the growth of liberty. When liberty grows we get increased individual enterprise and expansion of free markets. We create more goods, services, and benefits to society. The pie gets bigger. But politics is not about creating more goods, services, and benefits to society. Politics is about dividing them up.

Government and politics are different. Government is . . . words fail me . . . government. Politics is the fight over who runs the government. And the fix is in because, as you may have noticed, every time politicians stage that fight a politician wins.

Also, lacking civil liberties and property rights, representative democracy is left with nothing to represent except the will of the mob or—as it’s called these days—“activism.”

There is an oft-cited apothegm credited to the Spanish mystic and Carmelite nun St. Teresa of Avila (1515–82): “There are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered prayers.”

there’s about $80 trillion in the world. The world’s population is 7.5 billion. Dividing it equally, we each get $10,666.67.

the lungs of long-distance joggers, gym rats, hot yoga practitioners, and others who engage in vigorous physical activity can emit as much as eight times the average amount of CO2

The first broadly functional social media network, SixDegrees, wasn’t introduced until 1997. At the height of its popularity it had 3.5 million subscribers.

According to the Census Bureau, 62.7 percent of Americans live in urban areas, on only 3.5 percent of the country’s land.