print
I spoke at the Mises Institute’s annual gathering in Bellevue, Washington, Saturday, September 14.
I was asked to address the dumbing down inherent in democracy. The title of my presentation was “How Democracy Made Us Dumb,” or “Democracy As Idiocracy.”
Indeed, the greatest thinkers (before Hans-Hermann Hoppe)—the Athenian philosophers—distrusted democracy. The Athenian thinkers held that democracy “distrusts ability and has a reverence for numbers over knowledge.” The Founders agreed.
Thinking in opposition to democracy is part of our heritage, yet you won’t hear a critique of democracy in mainstream circles, conservative or liberal.
Many thanks to Jeff Diest for his introduction—and for including me in this well-attended event. Liberty still flickers in Washington State.
The podcast is up. A YouTube is to follow.
UPDATE (9/30/019): YouTube of “How Democracy Made Us Dumb.”