Random Observations

• Cancel culture, the disinformation industry, and assaults on free speech all have a common root: When your cause is based on lies, your greatest enemy—and greatest fear—is the truth. Hiding the truth is the work of cowards around the world. Brazil, for example, offers a lesser-known but no less representative example.

• Truth and opinion differ in two important ways. First, truth is valid whether anyone believes it or not; an opinion is valid if the marketplace—or the mob—says it is. Second, a truth, once lost, can never be regained. For example, if every photo, video, news story, memoir, and official narrative of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald is destroyed and every personal recollection of the event is lying in the grave, the full truth of Oswald’s death can never be reconstructed. An opinion, however, having once been manufactured by one human mind can always be made up again by another. Full disclosure: This is a rough paraphrase of Hannah Arendt’s thoughts (The Banality of Evil, Eichmann in Jerusalem) about the necessity of ensuring that we remember evil deeds.

• Jesus taught his disciples to love their enemies. I don’t think he intended his admonition to become a fundamental tenet of foreign policy.

• Why do you suppose Big Pharma is so willing to spend billions on TV ads to sell you prescription drugs you can’t go out and buy? Could it be because they’ve already failed to sell your doctor on their effectiveness? Is their aim to replace medical science with consumer demand? Just one among many, Paxlovid is a good example.

• Squatters’ “rights” seem to take precedence over the long-established (e.g. in the Constitution) rights of property owners. This legal chicanery sounds like one of Karl Marx’s favorite phrases: “From each [property owner] according to his ability [to acquire property], to each [squatter] according to his needs.”

• The First Amendment guarantees that NPR can make their programming as selectively left-leaning as they want. This week we were treated to an example of NPR’s double-minded (dare I say “hypocritical”?) application of this guarantee: Compare the exposé written by long-time NPR senior business editor Uri Berliner and the social media posts of brand-new NPR CEO Katherine Maher. (After Maher suspended Berliner, he resigned, ending a 25-year career with NPR.) The big question for me is not so much about the freedom of a radio network to express its partisan views, but why taxpayers should be compelled to foot the bill for NPR, PBS, and CPB. Sure, Ken Burns is great and all, but, just to be fair, shouldn’t taxpayers fund Fox News too? Or Netflix? Or is fair just not a thing anymore?

• Fans and talking heads alike are upset about Caitlyn Clark’s “shocking” salary of $76,535 for her first year with the WNBA’s Indiana Fever. Here are two quick lessons in how capitalism works: (1) Her salary is determined by a collective bargaining agreement that sets her value as a player artificially low, while it sets other players’ value artificially high (perhaps discouraging teams from taking a chance on an unproven talent). This is considered “fair” because every rookie gets the same salary no matter what value they may add to their team, either on the court or in the market for tickets, concessions, or TV revenue. (2) The market is not constrained by any such agreements; she will make millions in endorsements based solely on what Nike, Gatorade, State Farm, Buick, and others think she is worth. In other words, if she sells more tickets and beer (virtually certain) , the Fever keeps the money. If she sells more shoes or sports drinks (also a virtual certainty), she gets a share of the money.