Thoughts and musings on the Declaration of Independence, made on July 4th, 2021. Available on Odysee at https://odysee.com/@MarginalNonHermit:3/independence-day-2021:2
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Rehabilitating “Competition”
The word “competition” gets a really bad reputation from a lot of directions these days. However, much of that reputation comes from the fact that the term “competition” in economics doesn’t have all of the implications it does in plain English. This allows anti-market forces to associate a wide variety of contemptible behavior under the umbrella of “competition,” while papering over the fact that many of the negative elements associated with competition are actually not included in the economic definition of competition.
It seems like economics has this problem in a variety of places, where they come up with terms that use preexisting English words with specific connotations. “Perfect” competition is another example of this, where “perfect” in the context of economics means “adhering to the model” as opposed to “morally righteous” or “correct.”
Check out my video for more! Also available on Odysee at https://odysee.com/@MarginalNonHermit:3/rehabilitating-competition:d
Update: The video is now also available on YouTube.
I heard about an article in the New Criterion a while back and did a little bit of examination and discussion of the article in a short video. The article is called “Leninthink,” and is written by Gary Saul Morson. It talks about the system of thought Lenin pushed as he reigned terror on the people of the newly formed Soviet Union.
Leninism, and, frankly, socialism of any type, are extremely dangerous and destructive ideologies, and it is important for any freedom-loving person to learn about these pernicious systems of thought, to better grapple with them and identify elements of them in modern political discourse.
My video is also available on Odysee at https://odysee.com/@MarginalNonHermit:3/leninthink-article-discussion:5
Update: The video is now also available on YouTube.
There was a nice little article by the great Robert P. Murphy on mises.org the other day, so I decided to do a reading of it. The reading is licensed under a Creative Commons License, per the requirements of the license.
The marginal revolution in economics was a major step forward in the late 1800s that helped solve some serious problems in the field, especially around the concept of value. Dr. Murphy’s article is a concise explanation of what it means to look at an economic problem “on the margins,” so go have a listen!
Also available on Odysee at https://odysee.com/@MarginalNonHermit:3/reading-what-does-marginality-mean:3
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Now Appearing on Odysee!
I decided to do a little more work on New Tech, so I started a channel on Odysee and am uploading some of my more evergreen content from the past, and once that channel catches up, I’ll start uploading new stuff there, too.
The new channel can be found at
https://odysee.com/@MarginalNonHermit:3
If you like Odysee better than BitChute (and I can see reasons why you might), come find me there!
It always bugs me when people misdiagnose the cause of a lot of bad behavior by corporations, big ones especially. A lot of heat gets thrown at the corporations, and much is wasted burning the branches of this problem and ignoring the root, that is, the state.
Certainly, corporations can and will try to get away with a lot. But they have very little power to actually push people around before the state gets involved. And the state loves to get involved, because working with corporations gives them an excuse to use their power and find reasons to demand more!
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Support the LP Mises Caucus!
The Libertarian Party has a lot of people in it who value signaling their social virtue better than actual liberty. The LP Mises Caucus is dedicated to bringing a strong love of liberty to the forefront.
They’re great, and they just published a really good promotional video that got me really inspired.
You can find the video at https://www.facebook.com/GoulashFilms/videos/538229143853502/
-or-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFPGjXBFA1Y
(you don’t need to be logged in to watch them).
I also made short video talking about them.
The concept of civil libertarianism is sometimes useful, but it has some serious logical flaws–well, perhaps flaws is too strong a word–let’s say issues. In reality, the notion of civil libertarianism is often used to push out liberties from the argument because the speaker doesn’t like those particular liberties.
In my opinion, a person who respects only a subset of liberties is usually not acting based on principle, but on aesthetics or personal preference.
Below is a short video where I discuss.
Update: Now also available on YouTube.
The recent breaking of the peace deal with the Afghan government and the Taliban is worse than most people are thinking, or at least worse than they’re saying. Here’s a short video where I think out loud about why.
I’ve been hearing a lot of what I would charitably term as concern trolls using late-stage capitalism as a rationale why so many firms today are becoming bad actors. No, it’s not because the Material Productive Forces are inevitably pushing us toward socialism. It’s not because voluntary trade has some kind of internal contradiction that will break upon itself and herald the next stage in social evolution.
It’s the state. The state’s velvet-covered iron fingerprints can be found practically everywhere these bad actors appear. And the idea of late-stage capitalism is just bad economics.
Enjoy.
Update: Video now also available on YouTube.