Coronavirus and Public Ineptitude

 Unlike their US counterparts, European political leaders are ready to admit their mistakes and stop doubling down on dumb policies.  Today's WSJ reports that new cases in Europe are spiking, primarily among young people, but new broad lockdowns will not happen. For example, the German health minister said Germany would have opted for less-sweeping measures had they known then what they know today. And the coordinator of the EU scientific advisory panel noted "there is only so much a government can do." European governments will stress personal responsibility, similar to how other public health problems are managed. 

Fat chance that governors like Cuomo and Whitmer will listen, let alone act.   

"Experts"

Don Boudreaux is an economics professor and a disciple of Hayek. Here's his letter to the editor of the WSJ commenting on a Jason Riley op ed.  

Editor

Jason Riley rightly warns of the dangers lurking in the Progressive assumption that humans are stupid, self-destructive, hate-filled hedonists who can cohere into a productive society only if so regimented by alleged experts – ‘experts’ whose commands each puny individual must obey (“Spare Us More of the Arrogance of ‘Expertise’,” September 2). Mr. Riley also rightly quotes the great Thomas Sowell in opposition to this arrogant and deeply mistaken notion.

But my favorite line from Prof. Sowell is a different one. It’s the closing sentence of his 1980 book, Knowledge and Decisions, in which he pleads for “above all, the right of ordinary people to find elbow room for themselves and a refuge from the rampaging presumptions of their ‘betters.’”*

Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Professor of Economics

I'm starting to think that Thomas Sowell is one of the great analysts of our time. 

News Media

 It's not easy getting news on TV.  I often rotate through CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. None of them is close to being unvarnished.  So today I watched CBS Evening News, and was pleaseantly surprised.  A little left leaning, but  not too bad.  And it was news, not garbage and no Enquirer type fodder.   Who'd athunk it.   

Soft on Crime DAs

The left wing voters of Berkshire County elected a criminal defense attorney to the position of county district attorney. Her name is Andrea Harrington.  She is like the DAs in Chicago and St. Louis who fail to understand that their job is to protect the public.  She just issued a press release announcing an expanded Brady policy that will require police to confess, among other things, "racial bias." Why not just hand out "get out of jail" cards? I posted the following response to the announcement: 

This is not a news story, it's a promotional brochure for Andrea Harrington's "wokeness." If the story is accurate, the policy goes well beyond Brady requirements. I am sympathetic to the plight of the relatively small number of defendants who are wrongly convicted. I am more sympathetic to the plight of victims of criminals who are wrongly NOT convicted because of overly generous policies imposed by district attornies who want to make political statements more than they want to prosecute wrongdoers.

Cancel Culture

A man named Robert Moulton lives in North Adams, MA.  He serves on several local committees and the volunteer ambulance service.  He ran unsuccessfully for mayor.  Recently, on a local radio show, he made two controversial comments: he said that black lives matter is a terrorist organization, and he said that the coronavirus shutdowns were a horrible mistake and that worldwide coronavirus dealths were "miniscule."  The local online newspaper published my letter to the editor:

"The Eagle front page story on July 24 about Robert Moulton is deeply disturbing.  If, as seems to be the case,  the North Adams Ambulance board forced Mr. Moulton to resign, the other members of that board should resign en masse.  Disciplining someone for views that have nothing to do with his or her performance or ability constitutes cancel culture at its worst and should not be tolerated.

Regarding Mr. Moulton's views, people should remember that Black Lives Matter was often labeled a terrorist organization during the Obama administration.  If it is, the fact that the public now has more sympathy for Black Lives Matter doesn't change its nature.  Mr. Moulton's attempt to spur public discourse about an important public matter should be applauded, not condemned. 

Regarding his views on the coronavirus, not only should Mr. Moulton be applauded for encouraging public discourse, but he is correct. The number of worldwide deaths from the coronavirus, most of them in the over 65 age group, is less than one-tenth of one percent of the world's population. Even if the death toll more than doubles, two-tenths of one percent falls within the definition of the word "miniscule." The media and politicians have scare-mongered the public into thinking that death from the virus constantly lurks just around the corner.

Our democratic system requires that all viewpoints be constantly aired and debated.  Stifling viewpoints that are contrary to politically correct dogma is known as "groupthink."  It inevitably leads to tyranny."

As you might expect, comments condemning me appeared immediately.  Because cancel culture and similar nonsense are a serious threat to our democracy, I followed my new practice of responding to all of them.  How long will it be before I will need my gun?

Harper's recently published a letter that was described in the NY Times as follows. It caused a firestorm on the left, because it didn't follow the "woke" narrative. 

"Artists and Writers Warn of an ‘Intolerant Climate.’ Reaction Is Swift.

An open letter published by Harper’s, signed by luminaries including Margaret Atwood and Wynton Marsalis, argued for openness to “opposing views.” The debate began immediately."

Brian Allen posted the link to the letter  - with no other comment - on the Village of Hastings Facebook page.  It was pulled down within an hour.

Using Federal Troops

Someone posted a long screed on our local e-newspaper here claiming that Trump's threat of sending in federal troops to quell the recent riots was not just awful but also patently unconstitutional. I posted the folloiung rebuttal:

"In September 1957, nine black students enrolled at a high school in Arkansas. On the first day of school, the governor barred them from attending by calling in the national guard. The President sent in federal troops to ensure order and enforce Constitutional rights.

In 2020, many state governors refused to enforce the law and chaos resulted. Some governors brought in national guard troops and quietly ordered them not to enforce the law. Sound a little familiar?

If Eisenhower were President he would have once again sent in federal troops. Hatred of Donald Trump does not change the situation."

George Orwell No Longer a Hero of the Left

Orwell was often lionized during the last three years by the left as a harbinger of the evils that Trump would surely bring about.  Not any more. Now Orwell is being quoted as a harbinger of the evils the left is bringing about.  In 1984, Orwell describes vividly how the government methodically destroyed all history in order to create a new order that controlled all thought.  Looks to me to be a lot more realistic than fear about Trump.

Defunding the Police

The ironies just keep coming. A TV station in Minneapolis reported that the city was paying for private security protection for three city council members who had received death threats related to  their support of measures defunding the police.  Why wasn't the police department providing the protection?  The department's resources were stretched thin by everything else going on.

What Should the Grounds Be For Tearing Down a Public Statue?

If a statue is anti-American, can it be torn down?  What if it honors someone who is arguably a traitor?  What if it depicts slavery or subjugation of humans?  What if it implies that some people are better than others?

How do we draw the line between what public statues can be torn down and which ones not?

Easy.  The answer is none. Vandalism is vandalism regardless of the property being vandalized. A government can decide to tear down or move or replace a public statue.  Mobs cannot. 

What Is A Racist?

I've noticed several instances of the liberal media capitalizing the word "black"  recently.  If you capitalize "black" but don't capitalize "white," guess what that makes you?  Hint:  It's a six-letter word that starts with "r."

Dissent

Many years ago, Edmund Burke said "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

Several weeks ago, I decided that I would post responses to every inaccurate, schmaltzy, dumb posting up here in western Massachusetts about black lives matter or sympathy for rioters or defunding police.  Sad to say, it takes a lot of time.

At our annual town meeting earlier this week, two young people tried to change the town budget by reducing what we spend on police.  They were unaware that the town has a contract with our police union that wouldn't allow that. 

The more sensible people in town - we still have some - successfully fought off the move. But there was a considerable amount of support, expressed through pious ruminating, for defunding the police.  Seriously?  Here in rural Massachusetts, where the only charges ever made about the police are  about ticket fixing and alleged cooping?  It's insanity.

I  spoke against the move, pointing out that in most urban places reducing police budgets would result in more black deaths, not fewer.  I described the effort as "asinine."  One of my "woke" neighbors went to the microphone and called me out - by name - claiming that I said she was an "ass."   English is not her strong point.

I can withstand a lot of opprobrium.  And I don't think I'm paranoid. But I'm starting to worry that my outspokenness might lead to physical attacks on me, even out here, because there are so many people who can't accept any dissent from their "wokeness."  So I'm cleaning my rifle, and thinking about getting a shotgun and a permit to carry. Sad time. 

White Wokeness

From a piece today by Charles Love (who is black):

"It appears that a sleeping giant has been awakened in white America. Most woke whites probably have good intentions, but their symbolic gestures will at best have little effect and at worst do real harm. The campaign against police is a good example. Broad anti-police sentiment has already caused cops to become less proactive in high-crime neighborhoods, with the predictable result that shootings have spiked around the country. Whites are engaging in activism motivated by a misperception about black life that does not comport with reality for most blacks. With their views of blacks as wounded and perpetually oppressed, woke whites would do more good by doing nothing."

Mind Control

Cuomo's noontime pronouncements are sometimes entertaining, sometimes hilarious and almost always misleading. Today he was downright scary.

He was talking about the "demonstrations" in the city. He said you didn't have to be either on the side of the demonstrators or on the side of the police; you could be on both sides.  He said we should support the demonstrators because they were expressing their right to be heard, and also the police because they were trying to do their job and deserved support.  So far, so good.

Then, without a hint of humility but plenty of hubris, he said we had to change people's attitudes.  We had to get people to have "societal awareness." He asked can you "change behaviour to respect one another?" "Yes," he sayid emphatically, because we just did it.  We successfully got them to stay home and wear masks!  He believes that he can - and will - change society to fit his vision of what's right, not by persuading people but rather by compelling them to think and act as he orders them to.

This is scary stuff.

My despondence took a bit of a turn for the better this afternoon.  First I got a haircut from a barber who believes all these coronavirus rules are hogwash. I told her about the latest CDC data and she said a sixth grader could have figured out how all this was going to turn out from the beginning: many old people would die and the rest of us would be okay.  It's not as if coronavirus is some sort of never before seen scourge that is going to eat you alive. 

Then I went to the grocery store. The people in front of me at the checkout counter (obviously New Yorkers) were protected to the nines:  masks, shields, wipes, the whole nine yards.  The checkout woman and I grinned at each other, and when the New Yorkers were gone I said their chances of dyimg from coronoavirus were less than their chances of being run over and killed in the parking lot.  She chuckled and commented about how all day long she had to pretend that lowering her mask was tantamount to mass murder.

So maybe there's hope.  I hope the sheep don't carry the day any more than they have already.

 

Can a Libertarian Tolerate Shutdowns?

If you purport to be a libertarian, can you tolerate the coronavirus shutdowns?  The answer depends on the breadth of the shutdowns.

The basic libertarian philosophy is that individuals should be free to act as they wish, so long as their actions don't adversely affect the health or safety of others. That means governmental action should be limited to protecting health and safety.   The shutdowns are intended to protect public health. Therefore they're okay, right?

Yes, but there are limits.  First, there must be a real health problem; government can't use the "health problem" excuse to justify regulatory action.  Second, the scope of the governmental action can't exceed what is necessary to deal with the problem. Third, the severity of the governmental action must be commensurate with the severity of the health problem; no using a hammer to kill a fly. Finally, the duration of the governmental action must be limited to the duration of the problem; the action should have sunset limits.

As the data concerning the coronavirus pandemic pours in, it has become clear that government overestimated the severity of the problem.  Like all of us, government can make mistakes. The political problem is that polticians hate to admit them. Can you imagine Mr. Trump or Mr. Cuomo publicly saying "In hindsight, I didn't accurately weigh the potential adverse effects of the pandemic against the potential harm that would result from the shutdowns.  I don't think I was irresponsible, but as it turned out, I was wrong.  I take responsibility for that."

Of course not. They'll say things like "I relied on the science," or "it was the other guy's fault." So rather than promptly adjusting governmental action to accord with the newly found data, they'll continue doing the wrong thing for as long as it takes to justify their mistakes. And we'll all suffer as a result.

As you approach one end of the spectrum, libertarianism transitions into anarchism. It's important not to let your disgust with government action on the pandemic turn into rejecting virtually everything government does.   Rather, speak up about the mistakes, hold the politicians responsible for their actions and stay true to your principles.

NY Assholes

As with many places, we have a love/hate relationship in the Berkshires with the second home owners and tourists.  The difference between here and, say, Lake Geneva and Chicago, is that so many of our invaders are what I call New York assholes. I know it may be worse in the Hamptons, but it can get pretty bad here as well.

I went to the little country store here in Egremont yesterday to pick up my mail.  A man entered the post office area while I was doing so and said "did you forget your mask?" I replied "actually, yes, I did forget."  He bellowed "you're a prick!"  My responses to him were not cordial.  I came very close to decking him.

He was driving a BMW with NY plates. Enough said.

National Whiny Radio

Like the NY Times, NPR can't seem to report anything without being negative about it.  (At least if the report is about the right or republicans).

This morning an NPR "reporter" named Hannah Allam did an interview about Moderna announcing its progress in creating a coronavirus vaccine.  Ms. Allam could have found countless credentialed experts to interview about this, but - perhaps because those experts would have been too positive - she found an obscure academic at the University of Vermont who could be bearish about it.  His name was Timothy Leahy or something like that. I didn't catch all of his announced CV, but he apparently is a professor of some sort of ethics.  Not impressive.

The professor bemoaned the lack of detail in the Moderna announcement. He then launched into the prospect of Moderna making money from this development.  She encouraged him. 

Apparently, neither Ms. Allam nor Mr. Leahy is aware of securities laws. Moderna was obligated to make its announcement, and  probably announced whatever details existed, sketchy or not. By admonishing Moderna about its announcement as being too early, they were actually suggesting that Moderna should break the law. 

NPR has long moved leftward in all its programming.  But one would hope that at a minimum it would get at least some of the facts right.  And recognize that there is much out there in the world that is outside its narrow focus.

Wisdom From Long Ago

From a 1972 book by C.S. Lewis:

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.
It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies.
The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated;
but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with
the approval of their own conscience."

Why Are Many Have-Nots Acting Irrationally

Polling on the coronavirus shows a clear divide between the "haves," defined for this purpose as the ones who can work from home and/or are still making money, and the "have-nots," who are suffering, often severely.  Yet a significant portion of the have-nots say the economy shouldn't be opened up until it's "safe" to do so.  How can this contradiction be explained?

The answer is fear. The media and politicians have convinced people that death from the "scourge" is always lurking around the corner.  The data and statistics clearly show that most people have nothing to fear, but people are always inclined to believe the worst.

If politicians wanted to be honest and informative, they'd be calmly explaining the realities, but most of them are totally invested in defending their actions (and never admitting mistakes) so they continue to mislead.

A friend who is a retired clinical psychologist tells me he and others in his profession are very concerned about the deleterious impact that fear of this "plague" is having on people.  It's very unhealthy.

The media should be ashamed. They focus on every outlier death of people under 50, no matter that they're comparatively rare.  The NYT seems unable to stop itself from casting a negative tone on every development.  This morning, for example, the front page has a story entitled "New Cases in U.S. Slow."  Good news, right?  No, the Times feels compelled to add to that headline "Posing Risk of Complacency."  They're really beyond redemption.   

Tyranny

Holman Jenkins wrote a thoughtful piece in the WSJ this week.  Here's how it ends:

"For some families, sheltering in place now appears to have increased their risk rather than reduced it. For most individuals, the danger was flu-like, which never before led to them being stripped of basic rights. Banning outdoor activities appears to have been absurd overkill. The notion that a vast testing and contact-tracing scheme is plausible and could halt the epidemic, much less is a requisite condition to resume most of our economic freedoms, would likely fall to sixth-grade math. Start with the challenge of identifying millions of asymptomatic carriers among millions of others whose symptoms are due to the common cold or flu. 

"That politicians took steps out of panic is understandable. That these steps were unjustified by the science that existed then much less now doesn’t mean their motives were bad. We can accept, especially in a panic, that the media will eschew complexity in favor of a story of an enemy who must be vanquished.

"Our country and our Constitution are finished, however, if the most sweeping, authoritarian and undemocratic restrictions on individual liberty ever contemplated are not subjected to legal challenge and accountability."

Mind Control

We have a Google group named "Egremont Neighbors" where people can post things like "can you recommend a plumber" or "the garden club will meet next Tuesday" or "is anyone going to Boston that could give me a ride."   It's very useful and can promote neighborliness.

Today someone posted a tsk-tsk that she was walking somewhere, and saw people not wearing masks, and how can we enforce mask wearing?

I could go on and on about why in the world people are sheepishly and unquestioningly doing what the governor and our town officials tell them to do.  If they said "jump up and down and chant the Lord's prayer," I suspect most of my  fellow Egremonters would comply.  That subject deserves serious and extensive analysis and commentary.

But for now I want to raise a corollary issue: The trend toward shaming and reporting neighbors.  There are many historical examples of how dangerous that is. Almost every tyrannical regime engages in the practice of encoraging the reporting of violations by others.  Reporting crimes like murder or burglary is beneficial in a society.  Reporting crimes against the state in the nature of disagreeing with the authorities is not.  Cambodia under the khmer rouge and Germany under the nazis are two examples.  There are many others.

Restrictions on the populace, even where they are resisted by a minority, are always justified as being in the best interest of everyone and the nation. That is the stated justification for the current mandatory shutdowns, social distancing and stay at home orders.   But it is all too easy to slide from that into restrictions on particular categories of the citizenry.  If the "data" show that slavs spread the virus more than others, why not restrictions applicable just to slavs?  You get the idea.

RESIST!

     

Unemployment

Wow!

I'm tired of the media saying the unemployment numbers were causred by coronavirus.  A virus can't cause unemployment.  Stupid politicians can - and have chosen to do so, not by accident but by design.   That includes republicans and democrats, starting with Trump.  I'm sure he's now kicking himself for slavishly following the advice of some scientists while not considering the contraty advice of others.  Medicine is not the only science.

Oh, sorry, Trump never kicks himself.  Among all the politicians, he is THE master at blaming others and taking no responsibilty.

It's interesting watching both the left-leaning and right-leaning media avoid criticism of the shutdowns themselves. Right-leaning media can't bear to say Trump made a mistake.  Same thing for left-leaning media regarding the governors. 

New York Times

A great newspaper no more.  I buy it on Saturdays and weekends, primarily for the puzzles, but also to get my blood pressure up. There are rarely articles any more that just report the news.  Most articles are opinion pieces thinly disguised as reporting.  And even in an otherwise plain vanilla piece, the Times reporters (who are overwhemingly young) often can't resist throwing in some tangential commentary on Trump or victimhood, or both.

Two examples from today:

In the middle of an article about apparent anomalies in the distribution of remdesivir, the reporter notes that a hospital in Massachusetts serving a primary black population isn't getting any. Trump is a racist.  So are most republicans.

Two long articles about the dropping of the Michael Flynn case barely contain the reporters' outrage, implying the action was part of a conspiracy or worse.  The articles contain virtually no mention of any facts about the case itself.  In the Times' world, prosecutions against republicans are always justified but those against democrats are always political vendettas.   

More Coronavirus Updates

Three interesting developments:

Without any recognition of irony, NPR reported this morning that many nurses are  having their hours cut or are being laid off, as the need for virus care declines.  That's a predictable result of ramping up too much by politicians overly influenced by the Katrina effect.  The very same NPR report noted that the nurses have fewer places to turn for employment because of the shutdowns.  NPR is unable to see any link between these things because it views everything that happens in the world through the lens of victimhood. I'm starting to call it National Whining Radio.

The CDC collects data and reports the results of what they call "excess deaths," the number of reported deaths from all causes that exceeds historical expectations.* So far the incomplete data show significant recent excess deaths, only part of which are identified as resulting from the virus.  I couldn't find a breakdown of the causes of those other deaths; perhaps I couldn't navigate the website adequately.  It will be interesting to see the eventual breakdown of excess deaths and compare their causes.

Cuomo has no apologies for having pleaded for health care workers from outside New York to come to the state to help out and then taxing them on the resulting compensation they received.

*The website carefully notes the many limitations affecting the accuracy of the data.   

More Coronavirus Updates

Andrew Cuomo is either dense or a charlatan.  I'm guessing a bit of both.

At his "briefing" today,  he expresses surprise that the rate of infection of hospital workers is low.  He credits his arranging for PPE for that.  He either doesn't realize or ignores that hospital workers are always exposed to germs and viruses and are experienced in protecting themselves. The only difference about the Wuhan virus is that's it's more contagious, not more deadly.

Certainly we should be grateful to hospital workers.   But the media, spurred by the politicians, are going overboard on this, likely from a sense of guilt.  Hospital workers are just doing their job, like most of the rest of us try to do.  The media treat this as if the workers going to work are like the charge of the light brigade, risking almost certain death.  But the data are beginning to show that it's pretty much life as usual for them.  If they've been underappreciated in the past by the elite, it's great that the elitists may henceforth be a bit more humble.

And health workers aren't stupid.  They're already beginning to make noise about higher pay.  Cuomo and his ilk have labeled them "heroes" and you know what comes next. 

 

Coronavirus Updates

Governor Cuomo claimed he was surprised to discover that hospitalizations in NY were concentrated in the elderly and stay-at-homers, not workers.  I'm guessing he wasn't surprised at all.

This virus has little serious impact on the young and healthy.  Your chances of being hospitalized, let alone dying, are minuscule unless you are old and have a fairly serious  underlying respiratory condition.  Disregard the outliers that the doomsday media loves to ferret out. 

There never was any reason to lock down everyone.  The evidence is slowly emerging showing that. 

But  politicians are blinded by the Katrina effect: No politician is going to be caught underestimating the severity of a calamity.  And now the politicians will spin the data and narrative to justify what they did.  Very few will admit error.

The coronavirus pandemic has resulted, among other things, in bans on public gatherings. I appreciate the need for these actions, but I question their constitutionality under the First Amendment. People too often forget that the amendment says the government can't abridge "the right of the people peaceably to assemble." The Supreme Court had blessed some exceptions in serious emergencies, but very very carefully. It is all too easy to use a "medical emergency" as a reason to ban gatherings that are repugnant, for unstated reasons, to the ruling authorities. Just look at how college administrations use the possibility of violence to ban gatherings.