Ryan McMaken on the Boston Tea Party, mercantilism and the American Revolution

On the night of the Boston Tea Party in 1773, American insurrectionists donned disguises and destroyed a shipment of tea imported by the East India Company.  The protestors boarded privately owned ships in the harbor and threw the tea overboard.  Later that night, the activists discovered another tea shipment that had been unloaded at a warehouse.  Not content with having destroyed most of the company's import, they broke into the warehouse and destroyed that tea, too.  The total damages amounted to more than $1.5 million in today's dollars.

This was the work of the Sons of Liberty, a group which would become known for acts of resistance, arson, and violence against tax collectors and other agents of the crown.

But why destroy the tea of a private company if the group's target was the British state?  The answer, of course, is that the East India Company was essentially an adjunct of the regime and private in name only.  This was the era of mercantilism, when colonial governments used protectionism and monopoly powers to enrich the state and its supporters through supposedly private companies.  The Sons of Liberty understood the system well and targeted the "private" East India Company.

The success of the American Revolution struck a heavy blow against the mercantilist system.  But unfortunately, the wound was not mortal.  Many old mercantilist policies persisted under new labels and were promoted with new claims of helping "the people."  The regime of the new republic, too, used the tools of cartelization, monopoly, regulation, and taxation to support certain corporate friends at the expense of the ordinary people.

~ Ryan McMaken, "From the Editor," The Misesian, p. 5, January-February 2025

1973

Stanley Druckenmiller: "The economy looks very, very strong" (2025)

The economy's very interesting.  We're at a very low unemployment rate, 4% essentially, we've got 3% GDP growth and I've been doing this for 49 years and we're probably going from the most anti business administration to the opposite.  We do a lot talking to CEOs and companies on the ground and I'd say CEOs are somewhere between relieved and giddy.

We're a big believer in animal spirits.  Paul Ryan was on your show last week talking about a 32% increase in business confidence over the last 12 months.  I think that's probably a record in terms of chain.  So the economy looks very, very strong at least for the next six months, which is about as far out as one can see with any degree of confidence.

~ Stanley Druckenmiller, CNBC interview, March 23, 2025

Stephen Mack on how defense spending is off limits for DOGE

Is the DOGE initiative a delusion? 

The DOGE initiative promulgated by Elon Musk is being widely celebrated for all of the savings that it has realized.  Much of that savings is attributed to cancelled government contracts across the various federal agencies and departments.  A table of the savings can be found at the DOGE web site [see here].

An analysis of the savings shows that the Department of Defense (DOD) has been essentially untouched by DOGE.  As of 3/20/2025, of the 5,630 cancelled contracts on the list, only 25 (0.44%) are associated with DOD.  Of the notional $19 Billion in total savings, DOD contract cancellations only contribute $10 Million (0.053%) to the total. 

[...]

It must be noted the waste, fraud and abuse at DOD has been documented over many years with many acquisition boondoggles and profligate dysfunctional financial management.  The Pentagon has "failed" all recent audits.  But little has been done to correct the systemic dysfunction in the Pentagon.  DOGE appears to be strangely reluctant to address the pathological elephant in the fiscal living room.

It should also be noted that Elon Musk sees DOD as a target rich environment for his companies.  Is the DOGE interest in addressing the fiscal pathologies in the Pentagon inversely proportional to Elon Musk's interest in making a lot of money from the Pentagon?

~ Stephen Mack, LinkedIn post, March 21, 2025

Tom Bernhardt on AOC's comment that Elon Musk is "a billionaire con man"

I’ve seen this meme posted on X and Facebook by many active Dems.  It’s remarkable on several levels.

Long before Musk’s recent sojourn into politics, I considered him to be the most consequential person this century.  He changed payments with Paypal, propelled the electric car business from niche to mainstream in Tesla, radically reduced the cost of space lift with SpaceX, gave us low-latency global internet with Earthlink, advanced AI at OpenAI, Boring Company provides new tunneling tech, evolved Twitter to being a better free-speech platform with X, and Neuralink advanced brain-computer interface giving hope to victims of neurological damage.  He is a business polymath and tech visionary by any definition.

Contrary to AOC’s post, Musk is a brilliant engineer.  Several years ago, I recall listening to Musk on Lex Fridman’s podcast where he talked in depth about topics such as rocket engine design and autopilot AI for over four hours.  I was very impressed.  But it is his extreme ability to spot opportunity, hire top talent and fearlessly execute that sets him apart. 

Entrepreneurs significantly differ (on average) from the general population in several of the Big Five personality factors, notably being far lower in Agreeableness (going along with others) and Neuroticism (negative emotions such as anxiety) and higher in Openness (curiosity and attraction to the novel).  You see this in spades with Musk, Jobs and others (Gates, Ellison, etc.).  They are very difficult to work for, but the results speak for themselves. Geniuses such as Musk are also often quite eccentric. 

Musk was a hero of the left when he was a lifelong Dem.  Now he is the victim of metastasized TDS.  It’s not surprising that an ex-barista would say something this dumb.  What is surprising is that Dems are picking this up as some piece of important insight.  Until they emerge from this psychopathology, the electorate will shake their collective heads in disbelief and vote otherwise.

~ Tom Bernhardt, Facebook post, March 22, 2025

Alon Mizrahi on the Israel bubble

I have lived most of my life in Israel.  And what I see is how destructive this is, how cruel and inhumane and how destructive it is and it has no future.  Part of me is trying to tell my former country, because I can't call it my country anymore, "You have to stop because what you are doing, you are bringing a catastrophe upon yourself.  You have to stop it before this catastrophe."  But no one seems to want to listen.  The conformity is so strong that no one dares break rank with the politically-approved message: "You have to kill children, you have to..."  We are looking at, I don't know, a huge historical disaster as it's happening and as it's about to get worse.

Israel is different because it is a bubble.  It is isolated basically from the rest of humanity.  And it is being shielded from its neighbors, from... humanity basically by the support of the U.S.  The U.S. is there to make sure Israel never faces consequences for what it's doing.  So Israel can be as belligerent and brazen and lawless as it wants because the U.S. will make sure nothing ever happens to it.  Which is an illusion, because something is going to happen to it eventually.  That's life.  

There's no isolation.  No one is isolated for long.  It can work for a short period of time, but no one is truly isolated.  We are all connected.

~ Alon Mizrahi, "Roger Waters Just Endorsed THIS Anti-Zionist Jew—Israel FREAKS OUT!," Kim Iverson, 12:15 mark, March 21, 2025

Tesla Universe on how U.S. sanctions on Huawei unleashed a wave of innovation

The resilience of companies previously seen as vulnerable to sanctions has surprised many.  Huawei, once thought to be in decline after restrictions cut off its access to key technology made a dramatic comeback in 2023 by unveiling the Mate 60 Pro.  This smartphone, powered by an advanced, domestically produced 7 nanometer processor, caught industry experts off guard.  Many believe that China's ability to innovate had been stifled by sanctions, yet Huawei's success told a different story.  The company has also built next-generation networking equipment using entirely local components, reinforcing its ability to navigate external pressures.  Rather than acting as barriers, trade restrictions have fueled advancements by forcing Chinese firms to develop alternative technologies.

[...]

Texas Instruments, a major supplier of analog semiconductors reported a revenue shortfall of $2.3 billion due to reduced demand from Chinese buyers.

[...]

For years, these [U.S. semiconductor] firms generated up to 30% of their revenue from China.  With demand shrinking, new concerns have emerged over whether these policies [tariffs and sanctions] are backfiring.  China's share of global semiconductor production has surged.  In 2020, it accounted for around 15% of the world's total output.  By 2023, that figure climbed to nearly 30%.

[...]

China's influence extends beyond chip manufacturing.  Domestically-produced processors are now powering critical infrastructure, including data centers, telecommunications networks and artificial intelligence platforms.  Major companies are replacing imported components with locally-developed alternatives, reshaping the supply chain.  By 2023, over 60% of China's cloud computing industry was running on homegrown technology, demonstrating the shift away from foreign providers.

~ "China SHOCKING Tech Breakthrough: Did U.S. Sanctions Backfire?," Tesla Universe, March 17, 2025

Huawei Mate 60 Pro

Howard Lutnick on Tesla: "It's unbelievable that the stock is this cheap (2025)

I think if you want to learn something on this show tonight, buy Tesla.  It's unbelievable that this guy's stock is this cheap.  It'll never be this cheap again.  When people understand the things he's building, the robots he's building, the technology he's building, people are going to be dreaming of today and Jessie Waters and thinking, "Gosh, I should've bought Elon Musk's stock."  I mean, who wouldn't invest in Elon Musk?

~ Howard Lutnick, Commerce Secretary, Fox News appearance, March 19, 2025