Substack has finally gone mainstream and respectable (I have joined). My account is called Great Capitalism, and my launch post is here: greatcapitalism.substack.com…

Ponder this

But remember, tariffs and nationalizations and farm bailouts and huge deficits are populist, and if you're against them, you're out of touch with The People.

Name one? How about a few? Rockefeller lowered the cost of kerosene through efficient refining and distribution. Ford made automobiles affordable through mass production. Carnegie reduced steel production costs through industrial innovation. Walton lowered retail prices through bulk purchasing and efficient logistics. Dell made computers cheaper by eliminating retail intermediaries. Kamprad made furniture affordable through flat-pack manufacturing and distribution. Bezos intensified retail competition through Amazon. Koum made international messaging practically free through WhatsApp. Page and Brin made search, navigation, email, and translation available without direct charges. And that's barely scratching the surface. In fact, it would be considerably more challenging to find a billionaire who earned their fortune through voluntary trade without lowering costs, improving quality, increasing productivity, or making something more accessible. That's how fortunes are generally made in competitive markets. You create value for others, and the more people you serve, the greater your potential reward. You don't even have to buy from these businesses to benefit. Their competitors must improve their offerings or risk losing customers. These clout chasers destroy their credibility daily without so much as flinching. They enjoy the accumulated benefits of capitalist innovation while confidently demanding evidence that any of it ever happened. The economic illiteracy would be impressive if it weren't so commonplace.

Yeah man, if only we were to give Chang Kai-Shek and his followers a little island just off the coast of China, then we’d see how utterly poor and…uh…hold the phone…I’m being told Taiwan has 3x the GDP per capita of China…

Excited to see a positive review of the book in The Telegraph!

I will go where Romina goes:-)

Why have free-market ideas fallen out of favor with both political parties? CEI's Kevin Williamson and guest Dominic Pino (Washington Post) dig into it on the new How the World Works episode: bit.ly/4jKbpUa

A new review of 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘪𝘮 𝘖𝘭𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘺𝘴 from New Zealand: "In her recent historical broadside, 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘪𝘮 𝘖𝘭𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘺𝘴, Chelsea Follett takes a sledgehammer to this twee pastoral myth beloved of inner-city Green voting classes and romantic reactionaries alike."

Is there such a thing as "irrational pre-flight freakout" travel insurance?

Come tour a thankfully lost world.

Bro verse

Retrocession solves all the actual constitutional problems, but no one in the DC statehood movement will actually accept that.

Review here! greatcapitalism.substack.com…

Preparing to take a portion of my kids' halloween candy after promising them it was a "one-time" wealth tax last year.

I live less than a mile from the Embassy of Finland, I knew I liked those guys.

Volume discounts are good.

Wow the DC government has a narc hotline to tattle on restaurants that give you a plastic straw instead of a mandated lame paper straw:

An obscure 1966 law -- the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) -- burdens critical infrastructure across the country (energy projects, transportation, housing, etc). During my decade at DOJ, I litigated several NHPA cases and saw its unintended consequences up close. Now, I’ve written a 50-page report about how the law works, how it doesn’t, and promising avenues for reform. Two quick case studies that show different aspects of NHPA’s disfunction, Lucy the Margate Elephant and the SunZia transmission line: Lucy the Margate Elephant is a roadside attraction and AirBnB near Atlantic City, NJ. Federal reviewers found offshore wind turbines ~20 miles away would "adversely affect" Lucy under the NHPA -- not by touching her, but by appearing on the horizon within her "viewshed," which you can see below. You can't un-see a turbine, so there's nothing to physically preserve with mitigation. Instead, the developer agreed to fund "Visitor Experience" for Lucy. Not financially ruinous to the wind project, of course (it failed for other reasons) -- but this kind of "everything bagel" costs are part of what makes infrastructure in America more expensive than peer countries. And wind farms are not the only tall, large infrastructure affected by NHPA. In our report, we estimate that the SunZia transmission line required a survey area around 2x as big as D.C. -- with a visual study area larger still. Even this study did not satisfy the project's opponents, who sued, arguing the entire San Pedro Valley should have been considered a historic property under NHPA. Though the line is now operational, the lawsuit continues with Plaintiffs’ request to set aside BLM’s authorizations currently before a judge. Luckily, there are ways to curb the excesses of modern NHPA practice while respecting the historic preservation values it was passed to protect. In the report I propose concrete ways to reform the law while staying true to its purpose and goals: - Cap view effects at 3 miles (similar to how view effects from telecom infrastructure is treated today) - Require adverse effects from visual impacts to be material & to be evaluated against the view that exists today - Where legal error is found, let agencies fix the problem and proceed, instead of voiding the permit, absent extraordinary circumstances - Put the review NHPA review on a clock, like NEPA got in 2023 - and many more proposed reforms, big and small!

Coming in under 2 weeks: HAYEK FOR OUR TIME. This short book is in the Cambridge Element series, @Cambridge_Uni @CUP_Elements, and it will be followed by a big book on Hayek in 2028 from @mitpress. Special thanks to @PeterBoettke cambridge.org/core/books/hay…

Feeling refreshed in North Carolina.