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Brownstone Journal features in-depth articles, news, research, and commentary on public health, science, economics, social theory, and related policy issues — offering critical perspectives on institutional failures, government interventions, and threats to liberty.

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Brownstone Institute - The Great Reset Didn’t Work: The Case of EVs 

The Great Reset Didn’t Work: The Case of EVs 

It turns out that the entire bit, including the fake prosperity of the lockdown economy, made possible by money printing and grotesque levels of government spending, was unsustainable. Even sophisticated car companies bought into the nonsense. Now they are paying a very heavy price. The new market depended on a panic of buying that turned out to be temporary. 

The Great Reset Didn’t Work: The Case of EVs  Continue Reading

Brownstone Institute - Authority Isn't What it Used to Be

Authority Isn’t What It Used to Be

My final rejection of ‘mainstream’ claims to authority happened during the Covid debacle. Whether a new, revitalised sense of legitimate authority could eventually be generated in the place of the spurious claims to authority on the part of those representatives of the supposed ‘New World Order’ who still wield power, only time will tell.

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Rational Policy Over Panic

In view of their influence, international health agencies have a particular responsibility to ensure their policies are well-grounded in data and objective analysis. Moreover, governments have a responsibility to take the time, and effort, to ensure that their populations are well-served. It is hoped that the evaluation in the REPPARE report Rational Policy Over Panic presented with this article will contribute to this effort. 

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Brownstone Institute - New Media Sues the State Department over Censorship

New Media Sues the State Department Over Censorship

According to a new lawsuit filed in December on behalf of two media organizations, those being The Daily Wire and The Federalist, as well as the State of Texas and AG Ken Paxton versus the U.S. Department of State (the State Department) through its Global Engagement Center (GEC) and various US government officials, it is alleged that the defendants are actively intervening in the news media market to both censor and limit the circulation of disfavored press outlets.

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Brownstone Institute - Conspiracy Theory Debunker Finds Real Conspiracies

Conspiracy Theory Debunker Finds Real Conspiracies

The 2023 book Misbelief by Dan Ariely belongs to a genre I would label “debunking Covid conspiracy theories.” The book is meant to explore the thought process of people who subscribe to conspiracy theories, especially about Covid and the Covid vaccines. Thus I was surprised to encounter in the book two stories in which the author uncovered real conspiracies to hide information about Covid from the public. 

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Brownstone Institute - Trump’s Covid Problem

Trump’s Covid Response Casts a Long Shadow

Neither candidate has any reason to bring up the issue of the pandemic response. The situation is somewhat akin to the Mutually Assured Destruction doctrine of the Cold War – we won’t push the button if you don’t push the button and neither of us should push the button because we’re both going to die if we do.

Trump’s Covid Response Casts a Long Shadow Continue Reading

Brownstone Institute - Our Last Innocent Moment

Foxes and Hedgehogs

The philosopher Isaiah Berlin starts his 1953 essay, “The Hedgehog and the Fox,” with this perplexing proverb attributed to the Greek poet Archilochus. Berlin goes on to explain that there are two types of thinkers: hedgehogs, who see the world through the lens of a “single central vision,” and foxes, who pursue many different ideas, seizing upon a variety of experiences and explanations simultaneously. 

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Brownstone Institute - Intellectuals for Sale

Intellectuals for Sale

We’ve lived through this and seen too much to have the same level of trust we once had. What can we do? We can rebuild the ideal as it existed in the old world. The kind of genius we know was on display in a place like Salamanca, or in interwar Vienna, or even in the coffee houses of London in the 18th century, can return, even if on a small level. They have to, simply because the shape of the world around us depends fundamentally on the ideas we hold about ourselves and the world around us. Those should not be for sale to the highest bidder.

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Brownstone Institute - Another Variant, Another Desperate Cry for Masks

Another Variant, Another Desperate Cry for Masks

Those who were responsible for incalculable damage will continue to skate scot free, while the cycle of unnecessary panic, inaccurate predictions, and the call for more masking rears its ugly head every few months as new variants emerge. Although it’s frustratingly predictable and infuriatingly obvious, best to prepare for a whole lot more of it.

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Brownstone Institute - Propaganda Looney Tunes

Propaganda Looney Tunes

Virality with this ease of spread is a fairly novel psychic phenomenon for the human race. So, when a novel physical pathogen came along, both the disease and the memes, cartoons, and propaganda began to spread. Confronted on both physical and psychic fronts, some incredibly bizarre and often vindictive behavior resulted. It isn’t the first time this has happened.

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