The Economics of America’s Civil Unrest

The Economics of America’s Civil Unrest

Economics doesn’t explain everything. Heartbreakingly high rates of incarceration, illegitimacy, disease and poverty among black Americans are tinder waiting for a spark like the death of Minneapolis resident George Floyd in police custody. “What the great French sociologist Emil Durkheim called “anomic suicide” is the Great Plague of our times. Self-destructive behavior in the form…

Death, Protest and George Floyd

Death, Protest and George Floyd

Mobs are unruly, headless things. The message is the action. The platform is often violence. But what is happening across the United States cannot simply be labelled as a looting-leads-to-shooting episode. It ranks as another chapter of enraged despair and untidy opportunism. It all began with a savage act in South Minneapolis, a killing grotesque…

‘Looting is the Price of Freedom!’ Washington Conveniently Forgets Its Cynical Advice to Post-Invasion Iraq

‘Looting is the Price of Freedom!’ Washington Conveniently Forgets Its Cynical Advice to Post-Invasion Iraq

As the United States finds itself overwhelmed with protests and riots raging across the nation, its unsolicited past advice in places like Hong Kong and Iraq under similar circumstances is coming home to roost, with a vengeance. Just yesterday Washington DC was the cock of the walk, sufficiently drunk on power to scold foreign governments…