Matt Zwolinski
@Mattzwolinski
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Philosopher, Bleeding Heart Libertarian. Co-author: The Individualists (Princeton, 2023) and Universal Basic Income: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford, 2023)
San Diego, CA
Joined September 2011
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The Libertarian Party is a dumpster fire.
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If you think Nancy Pelosi’s tax hikes are a greater threat to human liberty than literally driving tanks into a neighboring country, you might want to “check your premises.”
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New study shows: academic philosophers are predominantly left-leaning; right-leaning philosophers experience hostility from left-leaning peers; and the more left-leaning the philosopher, the more willing they are to discriminate on the basis of ideology.
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Dear libertarians,
Protesting to defend the power of an incumbent president is not “anti-state.”
That is all.
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As a member of the Advisory Board of
@NiskanenCenter
, I object in the strongest terms to the termination of
@willwilkinson
. He made a horrible and poorly timed joke, but it was clearly *just* a joke, and his apology was sincere. Don’t cave in to the right-wing cancel mob.
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1. "Capitalism has produced incredible wealth" - Yup!
2. "Social justice is evil." - Umm...
3. "There is no such thing as market failure." - ???
When Milei talks like a classical liberal, he makes perfect sense. Once he starts talking like a Rothbardian, he goes off the rails.
Javier Milei's full speech at the World Economic Forum
¡Viva La Libertad Carajo!
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Syllabus completed, Political Philosophy, Spring 2023:
- Rawls: A Theory of Justice
- Nozick: Anarchy, State, and Utopia
- Hayek: The Constitution of Liberty
- Kukathas: Immigration and Freedom
- Anderson: Private Government
- Brennan: Against Democracy
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Bad: Hoppe writing that communists will have to be “physically removed” from libertarian society
Worse: Alt-right memes of physical removal via being thrown or hanged from helicopters
Jaw-dropping: Hoppe embracing those memes by gleefully carrying around little toy helicopters
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This image of Hayek with a katana is just begging to be memed.
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It’s odd, isn’t it, that of all the things the Libertarian Party could criticize about our government, they choose to focus so much attention on its efforts to protect individuals in their lives, liberties, and possessions.
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The world lost a great teacher, economist, and human being today. Steve Horwitz was a good friend and an inspiration, and someone who really captured the spirit of Bleeding Heart Libertarianism. I will miss him dearly.
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Talk amongst yourselves. I’ll give you a topic.
“The Mises Caucus of the Libertarian Party is neither Misesean, nor libertarian.”
Discuss.
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If you can’t see the difference between a UBI and “literal human slavery,” or if you can’t see the difference between Obama and Hitler, maybe it’s time to take off the ideological blinders and try to see the world as it actually is.
@Mattzwolinski
You support literal human slavery (sometimes called Universal Basic Income).
The fact that you ever felt welcome anywhere near the Libertarian Party is a condemnation of what it was previously, and your current alienation is a cause to celebrate.
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So, judging from the last few weeks of tweet from the Libertarian Party, the main heroes of liberty today are Kyle Rittenhouse, Alex Jones, Gary North, and Vladimir Putin. Cool. Coolcoolcoolcoolcool….
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At its best, libertarianism is a form of classical liberalism, inspired by ideals of progress, tolerance, and self-realization. At its worst (see Hoppe), it’s a form of feudalism, with property rights as a flimsy cover for the maintenance of hierarchy and discrimination.
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Someone please organize a conference on ordo-liberalism, neoliberalism, and state capacity libertarianism so I can figure out what, if any, the actual differences are.
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* George Floyd was murdered by the cops.
* Cops in the US have a long history of racist violence toward blacks.
* Most cops in the US are decent ppl, who condemn the George killing.
* Burning and looting your local businesses is wrong.
* These claims are mutually consistent.
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Am I the only academic who searches for PPE on twitter and finds only endless stream of posts like this? Time to step up your game, PPE Society!
Very Good 🌟Merry Christmas 🎄Today is very happy with PPE 🌟🌟 Good Job , No.1 👏👏🔥🔥
#WinterFestivalxPERTH
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If you want to make a libertarian say stupid things, ask them to talk about risk. Even Nozick got kinda silly when he talked about the subject. But still, when you get to the point where you’re calling for the repeal of laws against drunk driving, you should probably just stop.
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Tibetan Teen Getting Into Western Philosophy. "It's blowing my mind"
http://t.co/jXqspLuX2h
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Lately, the
@LPNational
has been saying that the American regime is a greater threat to liberty than China, or Russia, or whatever.
But libertarianism has always been a universalist creed, holding that all people everywhere are entitled to equal liberty. [1/3]
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@LPNH
“People who still wear a mask should be shamed.”
Here’s a different approach: assume people know their own circumstances better than you do, and have the right to make their own decisions about how to run their own lives.
I call it, “libertarianism.”
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The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy now has an excellent new entry on “neoliberalism,” written by
@kvallier
. I highly recommend it as a model source of clarity on a sometimes muddy and misunderstood concept.
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Peter Singer asks how much each of us is obligated to give to famine relief - whereas Adam Smith would have asked: how do some societies become famine-proof?
- David Schmidtz on how philosophy lost its way, from his excellent new book _Living Together_.
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This is pretty amazing. Gary Johnson is beating both Trump and Clinton among active duty troops.
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FiveThirtyEight has a terrifically comprehensive piece on the idea of a
#BasicIncome
today. Highly recommended.
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"Most Welfare Dollars Don't Go Directly to Poor People Anymore." Another reason a
#BasicIncome
would be better.
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Can’t wait to watch this - Mario Rizzo and Cass Sunstein debating the idea of “Hayekian Behavioral Economics.” May 11th.
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We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming for an appearance by my new puppy.
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“People who still wear a mask should be shamed.”
Here’s a different approach: assume people know their own circumstances better than you do, and have the right to make their own decisions about how to run their own lives.
I call it, “libertarianism.”
People who still wear a mask should be shamed.
Businesses that try to bring back mask mandates should be protested and boycotted.
Government officials who try to bring back mask mandates should be arrested and prosecuted.
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Hayekian liberalism, with its emphasis on dispersed knowledge and epistemic humility, lends itself to a kind of openness and tolerance that is sorely lacking in the Libertarian Party today.
#MoreHayekLessRothbard
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“No one knows the kind of government he is living under who has never been in jail.” Lev Tolstoy (1828– 1910)
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@timgill924
Sounds like a recipe for burnout. There’s a lot to be said for balance. Even as a grad student.
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After nine years, we're bringing the Bleeding Heart Libertarians blog (
@BHLblog
) to a close. It's been a great experience, but we've said what we needed to say in that forum, and it's time to move on.
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Libertarian Javier Milei has just been elected to be the next president of Argentina. But what Milei means by "libertarian" might not be what you think or hope it means.
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I know I’m late to the party, but the last few weeks of reading have really driven home for me the way that housing / land-use policy is a perfect example of how supporters of free markets and social justice can really work together for a common cause.
#YIMBY
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The comments on this thread, in which Jason Soren’s calls out an ugly racist post from New Hampshire libertarians, are awful, revealing, and for anyone who had followed the recent history of the Libertarian Party, utterly unsurprising.
I don’t know who this guy is, but bigots are not welcome in the FSP.
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Lots of libertarians believe that lockdowns are a) immoral restrictions of liberty, and b) unnecessary because COVID has a relatively low fatality rate.
Q: how high would the fatality rate have to be before some form of lockdown was permissible? 5%? 10%? Is there any number?
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Why do libertarians disagree so much about how to respond to COVID?
Short answer: libertarian theory isn’t well-suited to addressing problems involving risk and aggregate harms. Like COVID, or like climate change.
Longer answer at link.
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“Seattle's minimum wage ordinance appears to have delivered higher pay to experienced workers at the cost of reduced opportunity for the inexperienced.”
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I’m still skeptical about Milei. But I would definitely buy a T-shirt with a picture of his face and his contribution for the coolest political slogan ever: “Internalize your externalities!”
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The classical liberal economist Hernando de Soto is running for president of Peru.
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California: “Please turn off the water while you’re brushing your teeth. The quart of water you save will help us with the 5 million acre feet we need to grow alfalfa in the FREAKING DESERT.”
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I’m putting together a conference on modern conservative thought. Six sessions devoted to discussing readings distributed in advance. But I need your help! What are some key authors/readings/themes I should include? What different varieties of conservatism do I need to include?
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But who knows. Every time libertarians have gotten excited about a politician in the past it’s worked out great, right?
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Introduce yourself with 7 books:
1. Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments
2. Hume, Treatise of Human Nature
3. Mill, On Liberty
4. Mises, Liberalism
5. Oakeshott, Rationalism in Politics and Other Essays
6. Hayek, The Constitution of Liberty
7. Schmidtz, Elements of Justice
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Libertarianism is perfectly compatible with the view that not everything that should be legal is moral.
At the same time, there can be a real tension with between such moralism and the commitment to tolerance and autonomy that underlies libertarianism in the first place.
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Looking to get a new personal academic website. Any recommendations for experienced designers in this area?
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Belief in natural property rights isn't distinctively libertarian. A lot of socialists also believed that workers have a natural right to their labor and to the fruits of their labor. John Tomasi and I discuss this at length in chapter 3 of The Individualists.
Debates like this are why I often call libertarian property theories "magical reasoning". The insistence that one's property rights are based on some eternal metaphysical force beyond the state, based on some arbitrary method invented in the 17th century is really something.
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Wow, you guys are some serious fans! I'm impressed. In my world, PPE stands for "Philosophy, Politics, and Economics." It's an exciting field of inquiry, but I don't think we have much chance of overtaking your Perth in terms of popularity. :-)
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True conservatives recognize that a stable, peaceful, and prosperous society is a rare and fragile accomplishment, and that flagrant violation by those in power of the norms and values that undergird such a society is among the gravest of crimes.
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What’s your coolest academic lineage?
Mine is:
Ludwig von Mises —> FA Hayek
FA Hayek —> Ronald Hamowy
Ronald Hamowy —> Williamson Evers
Williamson Evers —> Me!
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Thought of the day, from
@tylercowen
's Stubborn Attachments: "Redo U.S. history, but assume the country's economy had grown at one percentage point less each year between 1870 and 1990. In that scenario, the United States of 1990 would be no richer than the Mexico of 1990."
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@kate_manne
I’m not sure how the existence of eating disorders is supposed to show that it is not possible to avoid fatness in a healthy way. The fact that some people avoid fatness in an unhealthy way hardly entails that all people must.
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“There are way too many self-described libertarians who I wish were as afraid of nationalism and fascism as they claim to be of socialism.
Libertarianism is opposed to all of those. None is inherently worse than the other.”
-
@sghorwitz
, on Facebook
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Just sent the completed Routledge Companion to Libertarianism off to the publisher. 40 essays providing a comprehensive reference guide to libertarian thought on self-ownership, public health, race, gender and more. Look for it in 2022.
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Great idea, but it doesn’t go far enough. Why should proud Californians buy anything produced out of state, shipping our jobs across the country? In fact, why should proud San Diegans buy anything not made in our own city? Why should I buy anything I didn’t make my own damn self?
Millions of Americans have seen their livelihoods evaporate due to 30 years of bad trade deals that shipped manufacturing jobs overseas.
#EconomicPatriotism
is how we can begin to reverse this process and deliver for the people again.
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Still got a few weeks to go on this one, but I gotta say it’s not looking good. Maybe COVID wasn’t just a political stunt by the enemies of liberty after all...
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Alright humanities folks. Time to stop complaining about all those students majoring in business. You owe your toilet paper and fresh produce to all those people who studied supply chain management. Show a little gratitude.
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In the new issue of
@TheCriticMag
, I lay out the moral case for a
#BasicIncome
, based on
#neoliberal
principles of freedom and property rights.
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My book with John Tomasi - The Individualists: Radicals, Reactionaries, and the Struggle for the Soul of Libertarianism - won’t be out until April. But you can see table of contents, introduction, and index on Princeton’s website now!
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Apparently, the
@lpnh
is as bad at research as it is at winning elections. I’ve never defended socialism; the article about vaccine mandates is about why *some* libertarians support them; and as for carbon taxes, there’s nothing unlibertarian about the state preventing pollution.
If you want to see how vile and dishonest socialists will be, check out "libertarian"
@Mattzwolinski
For years he has pretended to be a libertarian, using it as cover to advance some of the most evil, anti-liberty ideas in existence: socialism, vaccine mandates, and carbon taxes
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@jerryzmuller
I’m reading this book now. These kinds of error run throughout the whole book. Even The NY Times called him out for shoddy scholarship.
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If we’re going to spend a bunch of federal money, why not adopt a universal basic income that distributes that money to everyone, instead of student loan forgiveness that distributes it only to college graduates?
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I’ve said it before, but the strongest case against Trump is a deeply conservative one. He is a disgrace to the national honor, and a threat to the values, norms, and institutions that undergird a free and self-governing society.
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Today’s the day!
Out today in North America (30 May in UK/Europe), The Individualists by
@Mattzwolinski
& John Tomasi is a sweeping history of
#libertarian
thought, from radical anarchists to conservative defenders of the status quo. Get it in hardcover, ebook, and audio.
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Happy to announce that
@mirandaperrygrl
and I just signed a contract with Oxford to write a book on Universal Basic Income for their What Everyone Needs to Know series! Hoping to have it written by Spring 2021.
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@BuenoForMiami
I believe there is an approximately 30% earnings premium for high school graduation. And a GED seems like an ineffective compromise. The labor market treats GEDs about the same as high school dropouts.
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@worst_account
Well, at least racist ideas are going to be "clearly defined." That's reassuring.
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What’s the alternative?
Only my liberty matters? (Egoism)
Only the liberty of people who live in the same country as me matters? (Nationalism)
Neither of these are an attractive basis for libertarianism. [2/3]
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“My own suspicion is that if we cannot teach people to be virtuous with twelve years of public schooling, a few more years of imprisonment are unlikely to do the job.”
- David Friedman’s amusing but accurate take on imprisonment as “rehabilitation.” (from Law’s Order)
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Freedom of association is a genuine right, but it doesn’t follow that particular exercises of that right are immune from moral criticism.
Having the right to segregate yourself from others on the basis of race or sexual preference doesn’t mean it’s *right* to do so.
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It’s really gratifying to see such open-minded engagement with _The Individualists_ over at
@jacobin
. Many thanks to
@MattPolProf
for this (characteristically!) thoughtful and engaging review.
Libertarians weren’t always apologists for the rich and powerful — but they mostly are now.
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Marshall seems awfully eager to write off the vast majority of the economics profession as “economically illiterate ideologue[s].”
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One day, some random person on the street is going to catch the reference of this shirt. And that will be a wonderful day.
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Happy birthday to Lysander Spooner! One of my all-time favorite libertarians.
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I suspect the LP is leaning toward nationalism. But this is especially bizarre. Libertarians have always ridiculed the idea of a “social contract.” So why think that how much a person’s freedom matters should depend on which side of an imaginary border they live on? [3/3]
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…against the naked initiation of force by an authoritarian thug, I might add
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I know some of my libertarian friends are opposed to all redistribution as such. But I think everyone can agree on this principle: if you’re going to transfer wealth, tranfer down, not up.
It’s a shame that such a morally obvious point is so rarely instantiated in the real world.
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Really looking forward to digging into this important new book from David Schmidtz.
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I have some idiosyncratic views, including that people should be able to sell human kidneys, and that everyone should receive basic income.
And I find it just wonderfully odd that the only country in the world to have adopted both of these ideas is the Islamic Republic of Iran.
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Walter “slavery was not so bad” Block is upset that libertarians ruined the election for Donald Trump.
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@fakertarians
You cannot end the drug war as long as we have a welfare state. You cannot allow people to smoke as long as we have Medicare. You cannot allow people to procreate freely as long as we have tax-funded schools. You cannot have any freedom as long as we have any coercion.
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Neither Hobbes, nor Locke, nor Spinoza, nor Kant ever had children.
How might liberal political philosophy been different if they had?
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My greatest fear for a post-Trump realignment is that Democrats are going to adapt the worst elements from both ends of the political spectrum: social conservatism and opposition to immigration from the right, and a more interventionist, populist economic policy from the left.
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"Rawls asserts that justice is the first virtue of institutions. John Kekes’s new book offers a sustained argument that justice is more like the sixth or seventh. The first virtue...is that they enable limited, flawed people like us to live together..."
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@ThoBishop
Paleolibertarianism means being told to wear a mask during a pandemic is a greater threat to liberty than having bombs dropped on your apartment building. At least if the person dropping the bombs is a Friend of Trump.
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Chat GPT is great at writing essays. Not so good at citing sources. I mean, the sources it cites sure sound good, especially that third one. The problem is that none of them actually exist.
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I like idea of taking a traditional, bourgeois idea and dressing it up in the language of “privilege” to make it more palatable. Next book: “the work hard and finish school privilege.”
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Just finished
@yhazony
’s book on conservatism. For anyone looking for a systematic statement of contemporary, and especially American conservatism, there’s probably no better book than this. If I’d read it earlier I would probably have included it in my upcoming course. But…
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