A few days ago, I posted a brief statement of what I, as a conservative, seek to conserve. The first item on the list was what I regard as the foundational principle of all sound morality: the profound, inherent, and equal dignity of each and every member of the human family.

A valuable article - as policymaking instruments, shutdowns are quite poor choices. They are almost universally ineffective & carry heavy costs. I would add the opportunity costs, as everything else grinds to a halt during them. Why Shutdowns Never Work thefp.com/p/another-poin…

Slightly hilariously, The Economist put their story on the penny in the obituary section. At last, some real change ... on our change.

C.S. Lewis anticipated "horseshoe theory" way back in 1942:

Why I'm leaving Harvard and moving to UF's Hamilton School of Classical and Civic Education. Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Ed The New Criterion Encounter Books Claremont Institute Hoover Institution James Madison Program Robert P. George University of Austin (UATX) compactmag.com/article/why-im…

Historical look at tariff economic effects. dkaenzig.github.io/diegokaenzig.c…

A meta-analysis of 168 studies covering more than 11 million people found no reliable link between economic inequality and well-being or mental health. go.nature.com/49h47R4

The United States proper began in 1789 (arguably 1776), so we needn't debate about the Founders. Of the more than half a billion people ever born in the US, Lincoln was the greatest. Happy Birthday, Railsplitter!

I get this same question - this is a pretty good answer from Jay Nordlinger. If in doubt, read the 1st two sentences of the Declaration's 2nd paragraph. If still in doubt, read them again, and add the Declaration's very last sentence. ‘What Should I Do?’ open.substack.com/pub/jaynordlin…

Who Is Paying for the 2025 U.S. Tariffs? libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2026/02/who-is…

“If we ever allow morality or law to become just a question of whose ox is gored, then we will have taken a fatal step toward national suicide. We can survive lapses into hypocrisy, but we cannot survive making hypocrisy a ruling principle.” — Thomas Sowell

This masterwork is turning 250. It’s needed now more than ever. wapo.st/3OTKg3J

An under-told story: the returns to the insane high school extracurricular arms race would diminish significantly if the SAT and ACT would make the test harder so that there wasn’t a giant blob of people with ~2400 or ~36 scores.

New in Theory and Society (Springer Nature), the first systematic, cross-disciplinary, assessment of ideology in social science, drawing from ~600,000 social science abstracts across ~60 years. Check it out here (open access!): link.springer.com/article/10.100…

there's a new comprehensive report out from YouGov America using CES data to plot trends in partisanship over the past two decades. i've got a piece up today in Good Authority summarizing some key findings. links to both in the reply!

“The first lesson of economics is scarcity: There is never enough of anything to fully satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics.” — Thomas Sowell

Fascinating article by Columbia University sociologist Musa al-Gharbi: "The well-being gap between liberals and conservatives is one of the most robust patterns in social science research." Read here: americanaffairsjournal.org/2023/03/how-to…