Dan Mitchell shoots, scores.
About three weeks ago, I unveiled the “Seventh Theorem of Government” to support the libertarian proposition that a smaller government will do a better job of fulfilling its legitimate responsibilities.

This should not be a controversial concept. There’s plenty of empirical data as well as academic evidence showing that smaller governments are more competent.Many people in the D.C. bubble obviously disagree.
In his Washington Post column, Dana Milbank tries to make the argument that the fight against coronavirus has been hampered by inadequate government.
…then came the tea party, the anti-government conservatism that infected the Republican Party in 2010 and triumphed with President Trump’s election. …What you see today is your government…a government that couldn’t produce a rudimentary test for coronavirus, that couldn’t contain the pandemic as other countries have done… Now it is time to drown this disastrous philosophy in the bathtub — and with it the poisonous attitude that the government is a harmful “beast” that must be “starved.” It is not an exaggeration to say that this ideology caused the current debacle with a deliberate strategy to sabotage government. …Americans are paying for this with their lives — and their livelihoods.
There are some glaring inaccuracies in Milbank’s column, starting with the absurd notion that big-spender Trump (he increased domestic spending at a faster pace than Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, or Barack Obama) is somehow connected to the principles that animated the Tea Party.
More relevant, he wants readers to believe that anti-government activism somehow blocked the production of a “rudimentary test” for the virus, yet I’ve repeatedly documented that the actual problem has been mindless red tape from bureaucracies such as the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control.
Mitchell’s pwnage of Milbank gets even more humiliating from there. But hey, y’know, it’s Dana Milbank. Most any half-bright person could clean that witless pud’s intellectual clock in his sleep.
(Via Insty)
Update! Speaking of stupid.
One particularly terrifying consequence of the Chinese Bat Soup Virus that is not yet getting the attention it deserves is how this situation is making already stupid liberals even dumber, especially when they sound off about economics. In the wake of this pandemic, we’ve been subjected to a series of mind-numbing insights from the pinko blue check brain trust that reaffirms the clichéd but true observation that our elite is anything but elite. Leave it to our liberal betters to take a bad situation and seek to make it exponentially worse.
For example, Sally Kohn – oh, you know where this is going – offered an astonishing observation just as the Democrats were obstructing the vital relief our small businesses desperately need:
“I’m really tired of reading how business owners are “forced” to layoff workers. No one made them do that. They *chose* to do that. Not saying it isn’t a hard choice, during a hard time, but to say they were *forced* obscures their agency AND casts owners/CEOs as the victims.”
If that hasn’t plunged your IQ to new depths, consider ever-dumb Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota), who tweeted out this brainstorm:
“We need to cancel rent until this crisis is over.”
Wow. Her economics advice is even worse than her relationship advice.
Okay, it seems like you would not have to explain this to allegedly educated people, but apparently there are still some people who need a lesson in Economics 101. Since I actually own a business, perhaps I have a perspective that C Tier social media personalities and commie grifters could find illuminating.
Here goes.
Are you people stupid? What the unholy hell are you thinking? When there is no income, what do you expect a business owner to pay his employees with? IOUs? Monopoly money? Feelings?
Schlichter goes on to consider the question of whether they’re stupid, or evil. Need to embrace the healing power of “and” there, buddy, no reason they can’t be both. Actually, with politicians and “journalists” you almost never see the one without the other, in what you might call a most wretched symbiosis.
- Entries
Stupid and evil, of course. Rather obvious.
Dana actually says the Tea party “infected” the Republican Party.
I’m so old that I remember a time the Tea Party ideals were the CORE BELIEFS of the Republican party. Laffer and the Reaganite Supply Siders knew budget deficits would increase early but eventually close the gap as long as spending was held at bay. Lo and behold Gingrich’s Contract With America actually made that technically come true (not really, but it’s the closest we’ve come to a real balanced budget since the Calvin Coolidge’s day.)
I just did the math using cases/1MM Pop and Deaths/1MM Pop.
You are 22x more likely to catch ChinaFlu in NY State than in North Carolina and you are 49x more likely to die from ChinaFlu in NY State than North Carolina.
Also if I could find numbers to compare my County in NC to say NYC it would be an astronomical difference in the odds.
The worst County in NC, Mecklenberg, would probably have numbers 100x safer than any borough in NYC.
If you took out NY and NJ from the stats the New Cases and New Deaths numbers would fall by 50%. The Top 7 states DC account for the Median of Total Cases and Total Deaths.
For about 80% of the Country this ChinaFlu is a minor event. Yet for about 75% of that 80% we are Locked Down like we had NY or NJ numbers instead of how our numbers really stand.
Makes you wonder doesn’t it.
By the way, Sweden has comparable numbers to the USA without forced shutdown.
Our governor is planning to extend the NC lockdown into May. Why am I not surprised?
For some reason I cannot reply to a comment and have to add a new comment. I am replying to Barry’s last comment.
Sweden shows what I was arguing over at DP.
In some places heavy restrictions are needed. In other places, we never really had a discussion about marginal mitigations in a cost/benefit analysis.
Sweden shows that in certain places additional mitigations does not result in any less cases, and more importantly any less serious cases or any less deaths. It just hurts the economy.
Oh and btw, I do not believe that older people, especially ones who have health histories that are less than stellar, shouldn’t take more care about this than the average person.
They lump 25-49 ages in one category. If they broke that out I would tend to think that things would be clearer. But here’s how they play out in Carolina.
52% of cases are over 50. Another 39% are over 25. However 80% of deaths are over 65 and 92% of Deaths are over 50. There are 35 Nursing Home/Senior Living Facilities with Outbreaks. The totals as a % of totals is not tallied, but does anyone think most of the serious cases and deaths come from there.
Once WA and CA got control of their senior facilities they’ve flattened the curve.
NYC Metro Area is run by someone who makes Dinkins look competent.
So let’s try to analyze this rationally instead of hysterically.
OK, perhaps – I have to click on the “text” tag just in your upper right before I can type a reply. Beats me, but that’s what it takes.
But kennycan, if it saves just one
childgrandpa/ma …