Why are people still drawn to Marxism? Did you know it's still hot among the professoriate? I know, I know. Thoroughly discredited. But they eat that stuff up in the ivory tower. Brad Thompson's thesis is essentially that Marx was a great sloganeer. And he was. (I'd also argue that people have inherent dispositions to socialism.) My friend Michael Strong argues quite powerfully that -- due to academia's continuing fixation with Marx -- higher ed may be the "world's leading social problem."
I once heard Sec. George Shultz say "people liked to argue with Milton Friedman when he's not around." In this video you can see why. Unfortunately, you have a guy who wants to ask a "three-part" question. Fortunately, you have a man who can answer each part -- masterfully. Allow me to riff on a couple of Friedman's points that are particularly brilliant.
To watch this trailer, one may get the feeling that this, while sad, is remote. These are people in a distant land, practicing a different religion, wearing different cloths, living under different rule. And yet we are so close to living in this kind of state. It's happening right under our noses.
Americans love spectacle. The biggest issues of the day are secret service agents and Columbian prostitutes. People are outraged by either side of the gay marriage debate -- and justifiably so. But we need to get some perspective. Our most fundamental freedoms are being stripped away right now.
State Policy Network has just come out with their second in a video series on the Constitution and its erosion. The production values in this piece are pretty darn good. Indeed, this piece is much better than most of what think tanks turn out. If I had any critique, it would be that the talking heads disrupt the flow of a pretty good narrative. In any case, the view count of this piece suggests it's not getting the eyeballs it deserves.
You want to work your ultra-liberal friends into a tizzy? What about your stoggy protectionist buddies? Nowhere will you find reasoned economic, and dare-I-say ethical, thinking carried out with such confidence and concision.
The above video has officially gone viral. For those in the business of producing free market media, we need to speculate as to why. We should also ask whether this is an echo-chamber piece or might actually be affecting the way some people think. Below is my assessment, for what it's worth. But before giving it, understand that 'video killed the think-tank star' -- in a manner of speaking. Let's discuss the communications strategy.
This video may strike our international readers as being rather U.S.-centric. But it's for everyone, let me assure you. In Andrew Napolitano's goodbye address, he is speaking unashamedly in favor of the principles that helped found the United States. But he is also speaking in universals. You see, what Napolitano is saying above used to be our American secular religion.
The enemies of limited government have succeeded in suggesting people like Napolitano are on the fringe, that his ideas are quaint, and those who still espouse those ideas are crude troublemakers.
Turns out that when it comes to education, the slumdogs are the millionaires. This TEDx Glasgow talk will reward you for the time spent. And Pauline Dixon has done a great job communicating a research program undertaken with James Tooley whose work you may have heard of watching Free To Choose Network's The Ultimate Resource.
