[Bread and Circuses - Politics and other Silliness]

I first met Elizabeth Warren when she was a professor at Harvard Law School in 2004. She was fresh off the publication of her bestselling book, "The Two-Income Trap." There was no doubt she was politically liberal — our only face-to-face meeting involved a recruitment visit at the W Hotel in Los Angeles, where she immediately made some sort of disparaging remark about Rush Limbaugh — but at the time, Warren was making waves for her iconoclastic views. She wasn't a doctrinaire leftist, spewing Big Government nostrums. She was a creative thinker.   That creative thinking is obvious in "The Two-Income Trap," which discusses the rising number of bankruptcies among middle-class parents, particularly women with children. The book posits that women entered the workforce figuring that by doing so, they could have double household income. But so many women entered the workforce that they actually inflated prices for basic goods like housi...

Light bulbs and iPhones were invented for profit, not public service, but they’ve undoubtedly done more to help “humanity,” “society,” “community” or however you choose to describe the intended recipient of “help” that dominates so much of the discussion in politics, than any humanitarian or government program ever has. “Humanity,” “society” and “community” are in quotation marks because these are abstract concepts that are defined by people who want to use government force to compel other people to work for them. In contrast, “individual” and “family” are not defined by other people. Those concepts exist independently of anybody else’s opinion, and without government force. A free country protects individual rights. That’s what the Declaration of Independence means when it says we have the “unalienable rights” of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and that governments are instituted “to secure these rights.” You have the right to provide for yourself and your...

Myths are like an air mattress. They are terribly comfortable, and when deflated, cause a serious jolt. Josh Billings: "It ain't what people know that causes trouble. It's what they know that ain't so." Myth #1: Robber Baron myth - that in the 19 century there was an era of unrestrained rugged individualism in which heartless monopoly capitalists exploited the poor unmercifully. Myth #2: Great Depression myth - 1929-late 30s was a failure of private enterprise. Myth #3: Demand for government service - govt. had to step in because of failure of private market and great demand for government services. Myth #4: Free Lunch myth - that there is such a thing as free lunch. Myth #5: Robin Hood Myth - That government operates by taking from the rich and giving to the poor. Myth #1 - has roots in the Greenback Party movement - "all problems could be solved by printing more money"; Free silver movement - William Jennings Bryant "Will mankind b...