Paradocracy

This past weekend, I witnessed a woman drop a carton of almonds on the floor at the grocery store. 

She was talking on the phone and decided against picking them up, allowing them to remain scattered around the check-out lanes. 

This is the attitude of the San Francisco Bay Area resident, the paragon of the modern Leftist, who’s obviously far too important to assume responsibility for herself, as that responsibility is reportedly reserved for those with “privilege,” whatever that means. 

It appears that we are witnessing a developing competition to the bottom, whereby every resident aspires to outdo the other in terms of struggle, excuses and handicap instead of responsibility, triumph and success. 

The glorification of struggle — even self-imposed struggle — has become some sort of twisted yellow badge of courage celebrated by the community empowered to assume that some other abstract body (of people or institutions) is responsible for their failings. 

Of course, their stations in life ar…

In a recent article from CBS News, readers learn of a two-year-old boy suffering from a rare genetic condition that affects his mobility. 

According to the boy's family, who live in Farmington, Minnesota, they couldn't afford to spend upwards of $20,000 for the specialized wheelchair they desired for their son. 



In hopes of receiving some assistance from the community, the toddler's parents contacted the local high school robotics team, named Rogue Robotics, who in turn collaborated with the University of Delaware's GoBabyGo program to build the custom wheelchair for the little boy.

According to the team's coach, it took the group a couple of weeks to build the vehicle, and they completed the project in time to deliver it to the family just before Christmas.

Oddly, however, where the average reader may see a story of compassion and charity, the Left witnesses an opportunity for controversy and exasperation.  

On a relatively popular and conspicuously-socialist Facebook …

The oft-repeated objective of monetary policy — or monetary inflation — is to “stimulate the production of goods and services,” or more broadly to increase preoccupation, which says nothing at all in the way of improving the general standard of living. 

Of course, the object of any number of parties involved in any series of transactions is to improve their lives, respectively. 

This aim tends to coexist with greater measures of productivity and the overall proliferation of goods and services, but the end goal is the optimization of one’s personal standard of living. 

While there may appear at first glance to be no discrepancy between this objective and the goal of “stimulating the production of goods and services,” there is one major caveat, and it just so happens to illuminate one of the many capacities in which government fails miserably. 

That one caveat is this: those goods and services have got to be the appropriate ones, those valued and sustained by the market. 

On the other hand, …

A wide range of research demonstrates a dearth of employment options for individuals operating at an IQ below 87. A great many psychologists have staked the claim that society must work to address this problem. 

Given that 15 percent of the population operates below this level, this is a pressing issue meriting serious consideration. Fortunately, we could resolve a great measure of this problem overnight, but unfortunately political considerations will prevent us from doing so. 

How could we do it overnight?

Simply, by abolishing the minimum wage. 



Persons with IQ below 87 would stand a far greater chance of securing employment if the minimum wage were simply eliminated. 

While many intellectually-disabled individuals are exempt from the minimum wage, many are not — for a lack of eligibility or for unawareness of their respective disabilities — while those who are exempt are often placed in group employment settings by vocational rehabilitation service providers that furnish their own besp…

Most people in the United States long for a $150,000-per-year salary. This makes sense, as the nation's median personal income is roughly 80 percent below that mark. 

It's a lot of money. 

In fact, this income level qualifies for the top 4 percent of Americans and the top 0.1 percent of the world's population; it is 109 times the global average.

If this is true, how could an unemployed homeless person possibly make more money? Well, the federal, state and local governments: that's how!

Let's take a look at the numbers.

A single Bay-Area Californian earning $150,000 per year pays an effective income tax rate of 32.23 percent: this figure is inclusive of a 7.20-percent effective state income tax (and 9.30-percent marginal rate), an 18.27-percent effective federal income tax (and 24.00-percent marginal rate), and a 6.76-percent effective rate for Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) taxes. 



In addition to income taxes, the homeowner incurs an annual mortgage cost amou…

The fallout after Michael Richards' on-stage breakdown ironically showcases an extent of intolerance which miraculously stands beyond reproach: intolerance for honesty and expressed emotion in a solitary moment of vulnerability. 

Despite a decades-long career spectacularly devoid of any gaffes or blemishes, one isolated moment would ultimately define Richards' career and his legacy in the minds of many: that moment on stage when he shouted pejoratives at hecklers during his performance at Hollywood's Laugh Factory in 2006. 

Of course, those of the school of reason see it very differently. 



Every person is uniquely imperfect, and those imperfections are merely accentuated by one's placement under the spotlight. 

The average person lives out his entire existence outside the limelight, in the sanctuary of his home, the comforts of his selected social group, and the confines of his preferred echo-chamber. 

The average person, therefore, avoids the sharp scrutiny of being nakedl…