I am worried about climate change. In one respect, I may be more worried than other people. I am worried because I have very little confidence that we know what is causing it....One of my fears is that we could reduce carbon emissions by some drastic amount, only to discover that-oops-it turns out that climate change is being caused by something else.

The gap between what one knows and what one thinks one knows may be higher in the ranks of the elite. The result is supposedly-clever government interventions, introduced with excessive confidence, leading to disastrous results.

After over half a century of employer-provided health care coverage, the American people have developed a phobia of paying for health insurance themselves.

I have come to believe that politicians are in the business of 'marketing' their product to the public, by exaggerating threats and over-selling government solutions.

I call this the Fundamental Problem of Political Economy. How do we limit the power that idiots have over us? ... [Milton] Friedmans insight is that a market limits the power that others have over us; conversely, limiting the power that others have over us allows us to have markets. Friedman argued that no matter how wise the officials of government may be, market competition does a better job of protecting us from idiots.

I believe that the Welfare State redistributes poverty and reduces income. As Karl Kraus once said of psychoanalysis, the Welfare State is the disease which it purports to cure.

Constitutional provisions are not barriers to government misconduct. At best, they can be speed bumps.