A Arte da Fuga

Paleofantasy?

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 22:59:00 +0000

The Paleo Diet Delusion: Paleofantasy's Marlene Zuk on Dietary Myths

ao cuidado dos engenheiros da natalidade

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 22:00:00 +0000

A Singaporean strategy for increasing the fertility rate:

I explained to my students the creative (and often racist) ways in which the Singaporean government has encouraged people to have more babies. As noted in this 2006 article, Prime Minister Lee set up an institution in 1984 called the Social Development Unit (a perfect year to create such an Orwellian sounding agency), which would find innovative ways to get young people to procreate. He was worried that the well-educated women (who typically were of Chinese heritage) were not having babies, while the lesser educated women of Malay descent were procreating much more rapidly.

So what did the SDU try?

1. “Increased financial incentives to encourage bigger families, amounting to cash gifts of S$3000 (US$1889) for the first child and savings of up to S$18,000 each for the third and fourth child.”

2. Tax rebates

3. Tax cuts on maids plus more childcare and maternity benefits.

4. “Offer graduate women with three children priority in securing places at the top nursery schools, an advantage in helping children get ahead at school, university and in the workplace.”

5. Set up “love cruises” for singles!

6. “Speed-dating and online dating services, along with an agony aunt called Dr Love.”

Somehow all of those awesome ideas didn’t make Singaporean couples want to procreate. So now the government has paired up with Mentos (huh?) to urge citizens to do their patriotic duty and make babies on “National Night.” You truly cannot make this stuff up.

Libertarian Anarchy

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 21:00:00 +0000

Libertarian Anarchy: Tom Woods Talks to Gerard CaseyBÓNUS
- Gerard Casey: 'No property is safe in the EU'
- The great Gold vs Bitcoin debate: Casey vs Matonis

Defendendo o Gaspar

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 20:00:00 +0000

Defender o Gaspar! por Miguel Pimentel:

Ouço cobras e lagartos do nosso ministro das finanças. O homem faz tudo errado e falha em todas as previsões. Pois eu não sou economista, estarei muito longe de um dia saber como ele de ciência económica mas de gestão sempre estudei um bocadinho e se me visse a aceitar um lugar como responsável financeiro de uma empresa perto da falência ver-me-ia, por certo, a fazer o mesmo que ele ou parecido, nas devidas proporções.

The European Union Will Fail

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 19:00:00 +0000

Why The European Union Will Fail: Q&A with Austrian Economist Barbara Kolm

The Ron Paul Institute

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 18:00:00 +0000

‘The neo-conservative era is dead’: Ron Paul announces DC think-tank:

“The neo-conservative era is dead. The ill-advised policies pushed by the neo-cons have everywhere led to chaos and destruction, and to a hatred of the United States and its people. Multi-trillion dollar wars have not made the world a safer place; they have only bankrupted our economic future. The Ron Paul Institute will provide the tools and the education to chart a new course with the understanding that only through a peaceful foreign policy can we hope for a prosperous tomorrow.”

Ron Paul, 77, says he will formally unveil his latest endeavor next Wednesday at a conference in Washington, DC, only a stone’s throw from the congressional office he occupied for nearly three decades. Slated to attend the conference are the members of the Institute’s board of advisors, which contains a number of high-profile names including noted economist Lew Rockwell, the CEO of the Ludwig von Mises Institute and a longtime collaborator of Paul’s — he served as the congressman’s chief of staff from 1978 to 1982, and later advised the politician as he vied for the presidency.

Also on the Institutes board is Rep. Walter Jones, Jr. (NC), Rep. John Duncan, Jr. (TN), former Rep. Dennis Kucinich (OH) and Judge Andrew Napolitano.

The Coming Non-Intervention Revolution:

We need something new.

We need a hard look at the key issues of our time: the future of freedom, the future of the human race, and of the United States. Neither the Republican nor the Democrat party are pro-peace. They are merely partisan. How many of our pro-peace allies during the Bush administration have disappeared now that a Democrat is in office pursuing the same policies? Also, see how many of the Bush-era hawks have questioned "Obama's wars" only for petty partisan reasons. It is about political advantage rather than principle. But this is all coming to an end. It cannot be sustained. Every day more and more come over to our camp, the non-interventionists.

- Ron Paul speaks at opening of Institute for Peace and Prosperity
- Ron Paul launches Institute for Peace and Prosperity

Smoking Age

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 17:00:00 +0000

Raising the Smoking Age to 21? Young New Yorkers React

UKIP

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 16:00:00 +0000

Ukip vote is payback time for a political class that has lost the plot por Christopher Booker:

.. I had been invited to give the keynote address to the first Ukip national conference in Central Hall Westminster. I told the 900-strong audience that there would be only two parties fighting that election. One consisted of the Tories, Labour and Lib Dems who, not just on Europe but on a whole range of issues, had become almost identical. The other was Ukip, the only party trying to fight for the people of Britain against a “political class” that, in alliance with Brussels, had hijacked our democracy. For some years I had been reporting on an astonishing revolution taking place in how Britain was governed. Thanks not just to the increasing powers of the EU, but also to those of our own officials, we were now being ruled in a new way. After talking to ministers and politicians of all parties, I had been struck repeatedly by how they seemed to have become mere ciphers in a vast, unaccountable bureaucratic system that appeared to have lost any contact with reality and the concerns of ordinary people ..

.. The sense that we are now ruled over by a political class cut off from the rest of us in a bubble of unreality has become the most conspicuous feature of our politics. We see it everywhere, from the powerlessness people feel over uncontrolled immigration to the insanity of our energy policy. Above all, we see it in the all-pervasive power of that weird system of government centred in Brussels, which has so blatantly now lost people’s trust not just in Britain, but also across Europe. It is not only here that this profound sense of alienation is finding political expression in the rise of new parties not dissimilar to Ukip ..

Reduce Spending

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 15:00:00 +0000

The Grover Norquist of Spending Cuts: Jonathan Bydlak and the Coalition to Reduce Spending

Factual Free-Market Fairness

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 14:00:00 +0000

Factual Free-Market Fairness por Deidre McCloskey:

How do I know that my narrative is better than yours? The experiments of the 20th century told me so. It would have been hard to know the wisdom of Friedrich Hayek or Milton Friedman or Matt Ridley or Deirdre McCloskey in August of 1914, before the experiments in large government were well begun. But anyone who after the 20th century still thinks that thoroughgoing socialism, nationalism, imperialism, mobilization, central planning, regulation, zoning, price controls, tax policy, labor unions, business cartels, government spending, intrusive policing, adventurism in foreign policy, faith in entangling religion and politics, or most of the other thoroughgoing 19th-century proposals for governmental action are still neat, harmless ideas for improving our lives is not paying attention.

Yes, I know, you want to reject all these factual findings because they are “right-wing” or “libertarian.” All I ask you to do is, once in a while, consider. Don’t believe everything you read in the papers.

Govt Spending vs. Reality

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 13:00:00 +0000

5 Facts About Govt Spending: Nick Gillespie at Reason Weekend 2012

Gillespie argues that:
We're spending too much ..

We've got too much debt ..

Debt overhang kills growth ..

Spending growth is driven by entitlements ..

Trust in government is at historic lows.

Citação Liberal do Dia

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 12:00:00 +0000

Words That Replace Thought por Thomas Sowell:

.. But if you don't stop and think, it doesn't matter whether you are a genius or a moron. Words that stop people from thinking reduce even smart people to the same level as morons.

Escape From Collectivism

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 10:59:00 +0000

Milton Friedman - The Escape From Collectivism

...sobretudo na educação, explicando o seu modelo de school voucher.

Sundown in America (5)

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 10:00:00 +0000

No seguimento de Sundown in America (4), The Corruption of Capitalism in America por Detlev Schlichter:

David Stockman’s new book is a brilliant, penetrating analysis of the present state of the US economy and the US political system, and a detailed account of how the nation got into this mess. The book will upset Democrats and Republicans alike, and quite a few other constituencies as well, which can, in this case, be safely accepted as proof that Stockman’s narrative is spot on.

Here are the main myths that Stockman exposes:
Myth one: The 2008 financial crisis was the result of unregulated markets. TARP and the Fed saved the country from Great Depression 2.0

Myth two: There was such a thing as the ‘Reagan Revolution’ and it revitalized American capitalism.

Myth three: The Great Depression was caused by the gold standard and was ended by Roosevelt’s Keynesian policies.

Myth four: Free floating paper monies are a sign of free market capitalism

Myth five: Modern financial markets represent free market capitalism.

.. He closes the book with a few pages of policy recommendations, all of them sensible, I guess, and naturally following from the preceding extensive analysis. But Stockman is under no illusion – he knows that his policy ideas do not stand a snowball’s chance in hell of being implemented. In any case, the book is not really, first and foremost, about a new policy program but about shifting the parameters of the debate by providing a thorough and accurate description of America’s economic and political problems. And here the book succeeds with flying colors.

Price Gouging is Good (6)

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 09:00:00 +0000

No seguimento de Price Gouging is Good (5) e Preços e Temperaturas (8)

Is Price Gouging Immoral? Should It Be Illegal?

A hipocrisia da esquerda quanto às guerras de Obama (25)

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 08:00:00 +0000

No seguimento de A hipocrisia da esquerda quanto às guerras de Obama (24), Pessoas de Guantánamo párem de torturar o senhor Presidente Obama:

Petition Statement
Dear Hunger Strikers,

We understand that indefinite detention is not a picnic and that many of you are probably homesick. But the hunger strike is doing nothing to hurt the Congressional Republicans, who are actually the ones responsible for your imprisonment. Meanwhile, the man who has pledged repeatedly to free you is said to be suffering from deep anguish. Obama has your back, but do you have his? Please call off this ill-advised hunger strike.

P.S. We’re serious and if you continue to push Obama, we will call you terrorists and urge the president to throw the book at you.

Petition Background
For several years, President Obama has stated his intention to close the prison at Guantanamo, but the Republicans have thwarted him at every turn. Unfortunately, the hunger strikers at Guantanamo – many of whom may be well-intentioned – do not understand how America’s political system works. The hunger strike will do nothing to sway the stubborn Republicans who don’t care whether the prisoners live or die. But it is causing President Obama – who frankly probably cares too much — great anguish and tarnishing his awesome presidency. And if the hunger strikers damage Obama and the Democratic Party, they’ll be worse off, as will women and gays.

Razão armada vs. destrambelhice desarmada (13)

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 07:00:00 +0000

No seguimento de Razão armada vs. destrambelhice desarmada (12)

Nora Craig instructs the NJ Senate Committee on the second amendment

baixem os impostos

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 06:00:00 +0000

O apelo que não se ouve: baixem os impostos!:

Entre os muitos apelos, uns patéticos outros não, que por aí se ouvem, raro é dar com alguém que quer uma coisa tão simples como esta: que o Estado deixe de sufocar os cidadãos através de impostos. Eu percebo porquê. Num país onde tanta gente vive encostada ao que o Estado dá, não convém a muita gente que o Estado deixe de sacar... aos outros.

.. a única política de desenvolvimento e de fomento que o Estado pode e deve ter é baixar os impostos, além de rebentar com essa maldita burocracia onde gasta e nos faz gastar dinheiro. E beneficiar fiscalmente quem crie emprego, para combater a pornográfica taxa de desemprego com que vivemos.

Ao contrário da cacofonia que por aí se ouve, a melhor política do Estado é não atrapalhar. Gostava que alguém, na política, o dissesse claramente, mas, infelizmente, preferem discutir teoria geral.

Charter Cities (12)

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 22:59:00 +0000

No seguimento de Charter Cities (11),

Immigration Policy: Charter Cities - Prof. Bryan Caplan

charlatan science

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 22:00:00 +0000

The Way Back por Dr. Vincent Gray, Wellington, NZ:

For over 30 years the world has been saturated with the environmental fallacy.

It has taken over the media; newspapers, radio, TV; the education system;, the schools, the universities.

It has led to a retreat from experimental and theoretical science.

Scientists now live on short term contracts, interspersed with press announcements which either scare the public or claims to have made world shattering discoveries, all in the aid of receiving the next grant.

The climate models that have been foisted on the public would have been rejected by all the journals I knew in 1940. They can only gain credence in an atmosphere where science education has been replaced by dogmatic endorsements of the pioneers, and, increasingly, of the charlatans who have taken science over.

.. There is still much to do before science and common sense can once again prevail.

Patriotism

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 21:00:00 +0000

The Consequences of Patriotism - Stefan Molyneux on Breaking The Set with Abby Martin

A Esquerda Não Sabe Fazer Contas

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 20:00:00 +0000

A Esquerda Não Sabe Fazer Contas:

A economia não existe porque temos um Estado para alimentar. As pessoas exercem actividades porque têm que se vestir, alimentar, viver e adquirir tudo aquilo que cada cidadão considera essencial para si próprio, famílias e todos aqueles com quem pretende ser altruísta e ainda para suportar todas as ambições de investimento, poupança ou esbanjamento que passem pela sua cabeça e que estejam ao seu alcance.

Se 20% da economia não é tributada, os cidadãos no seu conjunto não perderam. Uns receberam mais, outros menos, mas no agregado ganharam, porque conseguiram obter mais bens e serviços consumindo os mesmos recursos. No limite, usando o pressuposto absurdo de considerar que não há nenhum desperdício no estado, Portugal ficaria na mesma.

Confundir a economia de um país com as suas finanças públicas é um erro crasso que está imbuído em muitos raciocínios, tanto à direita como à esquerda – mas principalmente à esquerda para quem o estado é tudo.

Citação Liberal do Dia

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Via Cafe Hayek:

An economist looking at the business world is like a critic looking at the art world. Economists and other human scientists can reflect intelligently on present conditions and can tell useful stories about the past. These produce wisdom, which produce broad, conditional “predictions.” Some are obvious; some require an economist; but in equilibrium, after the $20 bills have been picked up, none is a machine for achieving fame or riches. The study of the human sciences can produce wisdom, routine predictions. It cannot produce profitable prediction and godlike control.

Deirdre McCloskey’s, Knowledge and Persuasion in Economics

The I.R.S. Abusing Americans

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 17:00:00 +0000

The I.R.S. Abusing Americans Is Nothing New
BÓNUS - The I.R.S. Takes Aim at the Tea Party (David Keating)

the socialist Laugh Track

noreply@blogger.com (António Costa Amaral) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 16:00:00 +0000

Did Capitalism Give Us the Laugh Track? por MK Markus:

The laugh track did emerge as the result of decisions made by private parties—entrepreneurs, entertainers, and engineers—in the pursuit of popularity and profit; no government agency imposed it on the television industry. But when advocates of free enterprise celebrate the blessings of free-market capitalism, competition, and the profit motive, we have in mind voluntary exchanges in a commercial context of secure private property, sound money, and little or no coercive regulation from the state. Recent history offers us no examples of unhampered markets, but some enterprises are certainly more hampered than others, and radio and television constitute one of the most regulated industries in the American economy.

Would the laugh track have existed in a free market? Almost certainly. But it took the uniformity imposed by the television cartel to let it dominate so thoroughly, giving artists few options within the industry—and leaving audiences little choice other than the off button.

So it was outside competition that drove back the laugh track. Artists had resisted and critics had complained, but until the networks perceived a threat to the bottom line, they stuck with the process they trusted; and until large audiences had a real alternative, they stuck with the programming of the major networks.

Contrary to the popular wisdom, the capitalist pursuit of the bottom line does not promote the lowest common denominator. Competition drives diversity (and vice versa). Cartels, like the one Hoover created in the broadcast media, create homogeneity.