Will future historians recount how World War III was started by an unknown and rather eccentric American economist obsessed with China and by a president desperate to stay in power by stirring nationalism after a disastrous and unpopular first term? Let’s hope not but consider some troubling trends.
In response to a tweet of mine pointing out that President Trump is (characteristically) “both for and against lockdowns,” a Twitter follower suggested that the coronavirus was an act of war:
If you feel the need to point fingers, why not point out the real culprits, the CCP [Communist Party of China]? It is really hard to believe that the international spread was not intentional. It is beyond criminal gross negligence. An act of war, literally.
He is not the only one to have caught the most virulent strand of the current war virus.
The idea that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a government lab in Wuhan has been circulating for a while. A second idea appeared that it could have been a bioweapon. Although there is no evidence for either hypothesis, neither is impossible but the second one is much less likely. Leviathans, of course, are not known for their trustfulness, their intelligence of things, or their organizational efficiency.
We know, from history and from any realistic, non-romantic theory of political power, that it is often in the perceived self-interest of rulers to start wars. As Randolf Bourne famously said, “war is the health of the state.” Of course, some defensive wars against an actual aggressor may be desirable under certain constraints, but this is not what is under consideration here.
Few American voters suspect that there is at least one American official who has been agitating for more than a trade war with China and that the Covid-19 pandemic has provided him with an ideal, scapegoat-like excuse. Peter Navarro, director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, created by Trump, has been, for a long time, arguing for real war with China—or at least for actions that could only lead to war.
In “Peter Navarro’s Conversion” (Regulation, Fall 2018), I explained how Navarro’s protectionist crusade was driven by, or drove, his opinion that the Chinese government had to be confronted militarily. A few short excerpts:
Fast-forward 23 years to Navarro’s 2007 book, The Coming China Wars: Where They Will Be Fought and How They Can Be Won. Largely devoid of economic analysis, it looks like a pre-write of the June OTMP report. In the book, he argues that China is a totalitarian and corrupt country on the verge of popular revolt, and that the Chinese government is trying to build an empire. …
He still wants to work within the system when he recommends using international organizations and negotiations to pressure the Chinese government to reduce its protectionism. However, he does not exclude “military might to back up the prescriptions.” …
Navarro’s 2011 book Death by China … argues that the United States and China are in an “undeclared state of war” and that a real, non-trade war between them is possible. …
In 2015, Navarro published Crouching Tiger: What China’s Militarism Means for the World. It deals mainly with a future military confrontation between the United States and China, and ways to prevent it if possible. It too has a companion documentary, subtitled “Will There Be a War with China?” In both, Navarro argues that the U.S. government must build a strong military advantage over China with the help of its allies. American consumers must stop financing China’s own military expansion with their purchases of Chinese goods. A “trade rebalancing” would “slow China’s economy and thereby its rapid military buildup,” according to the book.
On the contrary, in his 1984 book The Policy Game: How Special Interests and Ideologues are Stealing America, Navarro had argued against protectionism, noting that “it is highly possible that our defense capability might actually be enhanced—not damaged—by import competition.”
While I am on the topic of war, I should add that my friend Mark Brady had a point when he criticized a recent post of mine (“Collectivist or Confused Clause in the WaPo,” Econlog, May 10, 2020). He argued that, contrary to my argument against collectivist-speak, it makes sense to say, for example, that “Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia fought the battle of Stalingrad” and that everybody understands what it means. I implicitly grant his point above by saying something to the effect that bureaucrats and politicos like Navarro want a war between the United States and China. But note in which sense this apparently collectivist way of speaking is correct: by attacking the Chinese government’s armed forces, the US government would aim at bringing the whole American population into the war willy-nilly, exactly like the Chinese government would aim to do with its own subjects.
READER COMMENTS
Craig
May 14 2020 at 11:36am
I remember a world without China. We bitched about Japan and quite a few things were made in ‘good’ China – Taiwan of course. Everybody had jobs, pools, cars, plenty to eat. Now we are in a world 20 years since China’s ascension to the WHO and here we are in a Great Depression, food lines, everybody losing their jobs. Now the world sucks. Get rid of China, its time to decouple. The US was a prosperous country without them. At the end of the day this relationship just isn’t working out. The consequences speak for themselves.
Pierre Lemieux
May 14 2020 at 1:39pm
@Craig: What do you think is the proportion of personal consumption expenditures in the US that is made of things imported from China? 75%? 51%? 49% One-third? 25%? 10%? The answer is 2.7% (at most): see the study by economists at the Federal Reserve Board of San Francisco at https://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-letter/2011/august/us-made-in-china/. You are not claiming, are you, that this 2.7% of imports by Americans (not evil Chinese) is a “relationship” that transformed America from a land of plenty to a “shithole country”?
Craig
May 14 2020 at 1:58pm
Without google I would do what I think are current Chinese imports $500bn and I’d divide by my mental conception of US GDP $20tn = 2.5%
So I wouldn’t have been too far off from your 2.7%.
Unfair trading practices impact investment decisions.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 1:59pm
And ultimately the relationship ends in geopolitical conflict (South China Sea, Taiwan), or pandemic. Whole point was to liberalize them, that failed.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:06pm
This is a classic post hoc ergo proper hoc fallacy. China is not responsible either for the economic downturn nor food lines and people losing their jobs. All three of those were done by US government (federal and state) actions.
Furthermore, prior to COVID, US jobs and wages were steadily increasing.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 2:09pm
They’re responsible for the pandemic.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:14pm
Ok. Irrelevant. They are not responsible for the US governments’ actions
Warren Platts
May 14 2020 at 3:40pm
Jon, obviously it is relevant or you would not have blurted the bald, absurd, mere assertion that “China” was not responsible for the pandemic! lol…
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 4:23pm
Citation needed.
Mark Z
May 14 2020 at 4:27pm
Which has nothing to do with international trade. You are by the way free to give up you’re Chinese made amenities and live like it’s 1980.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 6:00pm
Its potentially an act of war.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 6:17pm
Personally I was a bit young for 1980 to really remember it. I remember the late 80s though, very well. They were AWESOME.
Know what sucks? 2020
Craig
May 14 2020 at 12:51pm
If you told me that Canada orchestrated such an attack, I’d summarily dismiss the claim as beyond the realm of possibility. China? Maybe its true, maybe its not, I wasn’t there, but I find it as being something a country like China would, at least in theory do. That alone is telling because at the end of the day, no matter how you slice it, you have to recognize dysfunctional relationships for what they are and cut them out of your life like a tumor. Its time to decouple.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 1:06pm
It’s not telling of much more than your own bias.
Here’s the thing: anything is possible. It is possible your wife cheats on you. It is possible your car has a bomb in it. It is possible you are knocked out by your best friend and left to die by being eaten by rats. Does this mean you should cut out your wife, car, and best friend for being “tumors” simply because it is conceivable they betrayed you?
It is possible Trump honestly believes people should inject themselves with bleach to fight COVID. Does this imply he should be booted from office?
If contemplation of the possible is telling of a dysfunctional relationship, then you would have to completely isolate yourself from all people.
Rather than focus on what is possible, one should focus on what is probable, what makes sense.
Pierre Lemieux
May 14 2020 at 1:30pm
@Craig: I think you forget individuals and their relationships. You mean that if an American wants to import a fishing rod or a doll from China (because he thinks the terms are good), he should be cut out like a tumor?
Craig
May 14 2020 at 1:51pm
Don’t worry you’ll live, in fact you’ll live longer. The relationship must end because it will end in war if it continues. Its a fundamentally unstable situation.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:08pm
So, China is getting wealthy because of 2.5% of US expenditures and so this must inevitably lead to China wanting to kill the very people making them wealthy?
Possible, yes. Probable, no.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 2:11pm
There are people in China getting wealthy trading with the US. There are also people in China who want to kill you.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:16pm
The same is true of my county
Pierre Lemieux
May 14 2020 at 4:44pm
Jon: Perhaps there are even more people who would like to kill you in the US than in China. (After all, lots of Americans hate economic freedom and individual liberty.) So, as a collectivist would say, “the US” is out to kill you.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 5:29pm
That is true. I have been threatened with death by several Americans. I have never been threatened with death by anyone in China.
Warren Platts
May 14 2020 at 1:04pm
Circumstantial evidence is still evidence. A few of the items include:
(a) detaining 8 scientists who first figured out the Wuhan pneumonia was caused by a SARS-like retrovirus;
(b) orders to destroy samples of the virus;
(c) “rectification” of a Shanghai lab that first published the SARS-CoV-2 genome without permission;
(d) the requirement that any scientific research on SARS-CoV-2 must be reviewed by government censors;
(e) sterilization of Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, thus destroying any possible evidence of the origin of SARS-CoV-2;
(f) blatantly lying about person-to-person transmission of the virus;
(g) CCP state-run media publishing several slick-videos encouraging Europeans and Americans to hug Chinese nationals in February 2020;
(h) diplomatic cables pointing out lax safety standards at Wuhan labs;
(i) first draft of Nature paper on origin of SARS-CoV-2 claimed that it could have originated through a gain-of-function experiment involving an intensive program of artificial selection using ferrets as the virus host (since ferret ACE2 receptors are virtually identical to human ACE2 receptors) similar to 2014 gain of function experiments involving ferrets and avian flu virus H5N1;
(j) past history of SARS-CoV-1 escaping from Chinese labs in the past at least twice that we know about;
(k) past history of Chinese lab techs and scientists selling used laboratory animals to “fresh markets” for food and as pets;
(l) recent increased Chinese military activity in the South China Sea and vicinity of Taiwan;
(m) internationally famous Chinese generals have published that biological warfare is a legitimate form of warfare, and that one of the best things about biological warfare attacks is the accompanying plausible deniability;
(n) fentanyl imports from China began ramping up strongly after Xi Jinping acceded to power;
(o) the same Chinese generals also say that state-sponsored exporting of dangerous drugs is also a legitimate form of “unrestricted warfare.”
I could go on. Suffice it to say that what is certain is that the CCP government has engaged in deliberate spoliation (ruining, destroying, hiding) of the evidence regarding SARS-CoV-2’s origin. And while I am no lawyer, there is a concept that spoliation of evidence allows the “spoliation inference”: namely, that the spoliation is conducted out of a “consciousness of guilt,” and that, therefore, a judge or jury is allowed to assume that an attempt to coverup X implies that X actually occurred.
Therefore, it in fact appears to be quite likely (beyond a reasonable doubt imho) that SARS-CoV-2 did in fact originate in a Chinese laboratory.
Thus at the very least, the CCP is guilty of criminal gross negligence, and thus liable for actual and punative damages for the destruction wrought so far. Of course if China was ordered to pay one dime by an international court of law, they would refuse. Nonetheless, the facts as they exist certainly justify seizure of Chinese assets that reside in the United States.
However, the real question of course, is whether the subsequent spread of the virus was done on purpose. Certainly, what has happened is consistent with a deliberate intention to spread the virus worldwide.
But of course we can never be sure of the intentions of foreign leaders. Any speculation is speculation. Sure, one could argue that spreading the virus would not be in China’s economic interest; one could argue that it is better to be poor and surrounded by rich neighbors than to be poor and surrounded by poor neighbors.
Alternatively, one could equally argue that from a realist international relations perspective, power is relative and zero-sum: in that case, it would be in Beijing’s interest to see that the ROW got sick as well. Then Beijing’s relative power would be preserved and possibly enhanced by a global pandemic.
A darker theory is that the “escape” from the lab was an intentional preparation for a kinetic, military invasion of Taiwan.
Nonetheless, barring an invasion of Taiwan, it is impossible to judge Xi’s intentions. Given the uncertainty, what should be our response. Should we give Chairman Xi the benefit of the doubt?
To be honest, the spoliation inference applies here as well. If the pandemic was a simple accident, then why the coverup? Even if the pandemic could not have been prevented altogether, certainly much of the damage could have been avoided had China actually cooperated. On the other hand, the massive loss of face that would accompany an admission of an enormous accident would justify the coverup in Xi’s mind.
So the uncertainty remains. There is a version of Pascal’s wager that when one is confronted by uncertainty as to whether p or ~p is true (where ‘p’ means the same as ‘the spreading of the virus to the ROW was a deliberate act of war’), then one should pragmatically simply accept as the case the option that would have the better social consequences.
I believe that is what is happening in the American debate, as evidenced by Pierre’s article above. The enormity of the very idea of kinetic war with China is too horrible to contemplate. Therefore, we must accept that it is not the case that Chairman Xi ordered that steps be taken to ensure the virus spread to the ROW.
On the other hand, the consequences of being wrong about the Chinese Leviathan’s benign intentions are not good, to say the least. If Xi can get away with killing 1o0,o00 American civilians and destroy the U.S. economy, then he will be incentivized to repeat the behavior in the future. Moreover, retaliation need not entail nuclear war, nor kinetic war of any sort. Rather, the options on the table could be limited to freezing of Chinese assets, a trade embargo, denial of access to the U.S. banking system, effectively barring Chinese transactions in U.S. dollars, as well as the prevention of the sale of oil and other raw materials to the Chinese totalitarian regime.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 1:11pm
No, it’s not. That’s why it’s rejected in all scientific, legal, and logical frameworks. It’s a form of question-begging.
But, all that aside, I’m glad you popped up. There’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you.
You claim that scarcity only exists at full employment . We are definitely not at full employment now, and many things are exceedingly scarce (paper goods and meat, for example). According to you, these shortages are quite impossible. I wonder: how do you justify your claim with the reality of these shortages?
Craig
May 14 2020 at 1:37pm
No, he’s correct, circumstantial evidence is evidence and is used in courts all the time. The WEIGHT of the evidence completely different issue. Yes, triers of fact, judges/juries, can draw reasonable inferences from circumstantial evidence.
Great example is Scott Peterson trial. “It was circumstantial evidence that led jurors to decide that Scott Peterson murdered his wife. They agreed it was premeditated, first-degree murder even though prosecutors did not prove where, how or exactly when Laci was killed.” — East Bay Times
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:03pm
See my response below. And see Warren undermining his own point by bringing up OJ Simpson.
Warren Platts
May 14 2020 at 1:55pm
@Craig: The O.J. Simpson was another classic case where practically all the evidence was circumstantial. One jury found that the weight of the evidence was not beyond a reasonable doubt; another found that the weight exceeded a preponderance of the evidence.
@Jon: Obviously industrial capacity and labor are not in short supply.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:00pm
Ok. Doesn’t answer the question. According to you, these shortages are impossible. Yet they are here.
Vivian Darkbloom
May 14 2020 at 1:46pm
“No, it’s not. That’s why it’s rejected in all scientific, legal, and logical frameworks. It’s a form of question-begging.”
That’s news to this lawyer. For example, consider the following NY State Jury Instruction:
https://www.nycourts.gov/judges/cji/1-General/CJI2d.Circumstantial_Evidence.pdf
It is possible, although difficult, to convict (beyond a reasonable doubt) solely based on circumstantial evidence. Any lawyer who fails to present available and relevant circumstantial evidence (either pointing toward or against guilt) would be guilty of malpractice. For example, “I didn’t see the accused murder the victim; however, I did see him running away from the scene of the crime with a bloody knife in his hand”. Another example would be evidence showing the accused’s blood identified by his DNA on the victim’s body.
The primary consideration on the admission of evidence, direct or circumstantial, is “relevance” (see Rule 401 of the Federal Rules of Evidence). Does the evidence have probative value in that it helps to make the existence of a fact more probable or less probable? If you see a man walking into your building with a wet umbrella in his hand, is that relevant evidence that helps to infer that it is probably raining outside?
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:01pm
Right. Thus, it is rejected. A case-based solely upon circumstantial evidence is quite weak. hard to reject the null with it.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 2:19pm
Based on your comment, I was unclear.
I am thinking of this like someone trained in econ and stats (not in that order) and some research in law. The burden of proof is on the accuser, the null hypothesis requires a strong amount of evidence to be overcome. Merely “possible” or even “probable” is insufficient to reject the null hypothesis, so the alternative is thusly rejected.
Vivian Darkbloom
May 14 2020 at 2:37pm
Jon, you were wrong. At this point, it might be best to just admit that. It’s not the end of the world.
Because it is difficult (not impossible) to convict someone of a crime based solely on circumstantial evidence, that does not mean the evidence is “rejected”.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 3:36pm
Vivian-
I will admit, as I did above, that I am being unclear. I am using a very precise meaning of “rejected” and applied it in a broad manner.
It is incorrect, as I implied, that circumstantial evidence would be disallowed in a court of law. It is not incorrect that such evidence would be rejected, as evidenced by both Mr. Platts’ comment about OJ and your point that conviction would be quite difficult.
Warren Platts
May 14 2020 at 5:55pm
Well, congratulations Jon! You, an aspiring economist, just exploded all economic science! To the extent that economics is an empirical science rather than a free-floating cobweb of theory, it is entirely based on circumstantial evidence. After all, when was the last time a person witnessed a tariff causing an economy-wide deadweight loss. Thus, as you said, “It is not incorrect that such [circumstantial] evidence would be rejected.”
Even meteorologists who have a hard time predicting the future can at least look out a window and see direct evidence of whether it is raining or not. Poor economists do not even have that option. The dismal science indeed!
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 7:41pm
You don’t actually know what empirical and circumstantial evidence is, do you?
Craig
May 14 2020 at 2:40pm
Questions of burdens of proof are very relevant of course, but the burden of proof can shift and often times you might hear of presumptions, but more famously the concept of res ipsa loquitur, ie you walk past a building get hit in the head with a brick from a construction site….the thing speaks for itself and the burden there would shift.
Now they are discussing lawsuits being filed against China, see where that goes of course.
As for the potential for an act of war, that is a completely different animal. The power to declare war belongs to Congress and they are not beholden to any particular burden of proof. That’s a non-judiciable political question. Congress needn’t ‘convict’ the foreign nation of the casus belli.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 3:10pm
*justiciable
Warren Platts
May 14 2020 at 3:23pm
If 100,000 and counting dead, innocent, American civilians, and an economy destroyed more effectively than years of constant, strategic bombing does not count as a casus belli, then what exactly does?
Answer: Nothing, apparently, judging by much of the “expert” commentariat.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 3:40pm
Two points:
1) Let’s not exaggerate. Anything short of 100% is better than years of constant, strategic bombing. The US in the depths of the Great Depression was nothing compared to what we did to the Germans over the course of the War.
2) If the economic consequences are reason for war, then given they were self-inflicted by the federal and state governments, that would imply war against the US governments, not Chinese.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 4:29pm
One final point:
Note this directly contradicts your earlier statement:
Either industrial capacity and labor has been “destroyed more effectively than years of constant, strategic bombing” or they are “not in short supply.” It is impossible to have both.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 4:31pm
Even a dog knows the difference between being stepped on and being kicked.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 5:30pm
Ok? Odd response. I don’t know what it has to do with Warren’s contradictions.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 6:08pm
When Warren notes this as a casus belli he’s seeing corona as an assault. By saying even a dog knows the difference between being stepped on and being kicked. From my point of view it looks to me like we got kicked in the teeth.
Warren Platts
May 14 2020 at 6:14pm
Jon, your comments thus far consist of nothing but disingenuous obfuscation, deflection, and ad hominems. The only difference between you and the wumaos I deal with every day is that they get paid seven cents per comment, whereas you willingly carry water for the CCP for free.
To get back to the topic of Pierre’s article, Pierre claimed that there was no evidence that (a) SARS-CoV-2 originated in a lab, nor that (b) the subsequent spread of SARS-CoV-2 was deliberately aided and abetted by CCP officials that would constitute a covert act of war.
I, on the other hand, asserted that there is indeed much circumstantial evidence that would support those claims.
Then you, in turn, said that circumstantial evidence is irrelevant and does not warrant “rejection” of what you think is the null hypothesis: that, presumably, (a) SARS-CoV-2 is entirely a natural product that never touched a lab before the epidemic struck; and that (b) the spread of the virus to the ROW was an innocent, if unfortunate, accident.
Since you reject the use of circumstantial evidence: What then, would be the sort of direct evidence be like that would convince you to reject your “null hypotheses?”
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 7:40pm
Citation needed.
There is the ad hominem.
Empirical evidence. Not mere assertion and conjecture. Something that would survive the peer-review process.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 7:42pm
Personally, I’ll just settle for an explanation of your contradiction. Your name-calling and obfuscation is getting tiring (though it does suggest I have hit a nerve).
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 3:37pm
True but irrelevant. The justness of such a decision does require a burden of proof, especially in a free and liberal society.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 4:15pm
“If the economic consequences are reason for war, then given they were self-inflicted by the federal and state governments, that would imply war against the US governments, not Chinese.”
Government could have done absolutely nothing and the virus creates a situation where nobody in their right mind wants to be 6′ away from anybody. You know the government isn’t actually enforcing the vast majority of this stuff, sure, you’ll see a story here and there about a barber or some nonsense, but the police aren’t even interested in enforcing the law generally.
Ever see somebody pass a cop doing 100mph in the US? Happening today, police basically won’t pull you over right now (tickets are down 92% in FL)
Think anybody stopping people from going to their offices? Well, I shouldn’t be too hasty, I was going to go up to NYC in May but I suppose the government piling bodies up like cordwood outside my office in downtown NYC.
The virus itself is the cause of the economic calamity. Corona is the ultimately economic weapon.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 4:22pm
The burden of proof is entirely up to Congress.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 4:27pm
And here I thought that in a republic the government is established for the people, of the people, and by the people. I guess you are right; China has won if we are already living in a world where the people of the United States have no right to judge the actions of their government.
The virus started things, but the governments have been making things worse. Don’t believe me? Ask the lockdown protesters or look at the CARE Act.
It’s pretty odd to claim the US governments have been doing nothing.
Now, it is true that people largely social distanced on their own, but that alone would/could not have caused the problems we now witness, as evidenced by Sweden, South Korea, etc.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 4:54pm
“Now, it is true that people largely social distanced on their own, but that alone would/could not have caused the problems”
Yes, it does.
The 6′ radius kills the economy.
Workplaces don’t function
Places I liked to go – don’t function
Feel a little sick? Well, last place you want to go is a doctor.
Schools don’t function and before we would be say that at least it doesn’t seem to impact the children. Still there was fear they could be a conduit for it and of course their concept of sanitation is just way off. But wait, guess what, now we read out of NY that apparently it can mess them up too.
“Ask the lockdown protesters”
Sure, you go on TV and there’s protestors and now when you protest like that and you want to make a show of things, well, then you’re right the government will do something.
But that doesn’t change the fact that in 99.9% of the rest of America the police themselves aren’t interested in being 6′ away from anybody either.
Pierre Lemieux
May 14 2020 at 5:02pm
@Craig seems to forget not only “shelter in place” orders and business-closure orders but also price controls by state laws and by the federal Defense Production Act. It is not the Chinese government that is arresting entrepreneurs who want to sell things that are impossible to find because of price controls: see, as an introduction, https://stageeconlib.wpengine.com/dont-confuse-shortage-and-smurfage/ and https://stageeconlib.wpengine.com/our-most-fundamental-american-values/.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 5:06pm
“And here I thought that in a republic the government is established for the people, of the people, and by the people. I guess you are right; China has won if we are already living in a world where the people of the United States have no right to judge the actions of their government.”
“To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water”
Its an expressly delegated power.
“Under these conditions, where the President’s own assessment of the offensive posture of the Nation’s enemies overseas leads him to conclude that the Nation is at risk of imminent attack, we cannot find in the Constitution any support for judicial supervision over the process by which the President assures himself that he has in fact targeted that part of the enemy’s wealth of property that he thinks, if it were destroyed, would most effectively neutralize the possibility of attack. ”
Taken from the El Shifa case where Clinton was actually wrong. Apparently that plant was not a terrorist facility. Clinton simply needs to sincerely believe it presented an imminent threat of course, otherwise it would just be a pretext for an affirmative war crime.
Come next election, vote the way you want, if you think the power is utilized wantonly, fine, you’re entitled to your opinion.
But yes, if the government THINKS there is a legitimate threat to our national security, the government can shoot at it. There’s no ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ here.
Political question doctrine.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 5:24pm
“@Craig seems to forget not only “shelter in place” orders and business-closure orders”
FL was 4/1 and everything had already been closed for weeks. There were occasional stories in the news about spring breakers on beaches.
And then 4/3 there was a statewide stay at home order. And nobody obeyed that. Everybody still went outside and for car rides, walks, bike rides, even the beaches which were ‘closed’
“price controls by state laws”
Still most retailers obviously didn’t raise prices to any price ceiling imposed by state law. So sure, Publix and Walmart couldn’t raise the price of toilet paper of Scott, 20 rolls, 20000 sheets to $16, but they were selling it for $14 anyway.
“DPA”
And I really wanted to buy a Corvette but GM was busy making ventlators. I don’t support Pandemic Trump, but you’re not going to convince me the utilization of the DPA was really ‘relevant’ from my p.o.v. here in South FL.
All well and good of course, but the foundation of this calamity is corona. You don’t have to order me to stay 6′ away from people, I don’t WANT anybody NEAR me. 12′ is even better.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 5:32pm
No one disputes Congress’ power to declare war. That is irrelevant; do not bring it up again. What I am saying is that it is exclusively the right of the citizenry to judge their government; that is where the burden of proof lies.
Craig
May 14 2020 at 6:39pm
Its my right to judge China’s government too.
Guilty.
Jon Murphy
May 14 2020 at 7:37pm
It is your right. But that is irrelevant
Amy Willis
May 15 2020 at 9:16am
All,
A gentle reminder that civility is prized highly here at EconLog, and the Comments here are drifting far into the uncivil. EconLog is a moderated forum. We’d like very much to keep the Comments open here.
Pierre Lemieux
May 15 2020 at 11:30am
These are, no doubt, difficult and contentious issues. Explicit positive theories of human behavior and institutions are necessary to hope to understand what is happening. And, as old welfare theorists have taught us, one has to try to see how and where is own moral/political values enter his analysis. (Plus, as Amy reminded us, we must maintain a civil conversation.)
I want to come back to three points discussed above.
(1) Warren wrote, near the beginning of the thread:
This is a good point, but I don’t think I am guilty. Let’s not forget that the Chinese state, like any advanced Leviathan, is very inefficient. If US government has been unable to assure the production of cotton swabs, who would be surprised that the Chinese government was unable to stop the coronavirus? Moreover, contemplating that one’s own government is bringing one’s own country to war, and partly because of its own inefficiency, is also too horrible to contemplate. But we must. The US state is also a Leviathan, no doubt much more livable than the Chinese one, but it is still Leviathan; and if it has any function, it is to prevent us from being dominated by a China-like Leviathan, foreign or domestic. Perhaps one cannot really understand this last point without reading the first chapter (“The Capitalist State”) of de Jasay’s The State.
(2) On one of Craig’s remarks–that I am not going to convince him that “the utilization of the DPA was really ‘relevant’ from [his] p.o.v. here in South FL”–we should guard against an interpretation of economic history whereby prices don’t matter, government (and the army) can allocate goods as well as free markets, and when they fail, it’s not really their fault, but because there has been a bad crop or a foreign embargo or a coronavirus. By controlling prices, state governments have been a major contributor to the current economic crash; by controlling prices and the allocation of goods in the queue, the federal government has been an even worse contributor. US governments have, in this, just followed the socialist instincts of other governments in the world. To see this, one can compare Canada and the US during the early 1970s oil shock; or the US and Sweden now. I have given illustrations of government allocation and the role of prices in a few previous posts.
(3) I would defend Jon against the accusation of “carrying water for free” for the Chinese Leviathan. What’s most dangerous in historical context is carrying water for one’s own Leviathan. On this, I would suggest it is essential to reread Hayek on the opposition between “the Great Society,” which most of us here are defending, and the tribe.
Craig
May 16 2020 at 11:15am
On one of Craig’s remarks–that I am not going to convince him that “the utilization of the DPA was really ‘relevant’ from [his] p.o.v. here in South FL”–
I’m making that assertion in the grand scheme of things, ie the elephant in the room is the fact that the virus itself undermines economic interactions.
Also, this isn’t WW2, the government isn’t telling GM not to make cars and they must make Sherman tanks, the government is telling them to make ventilators at a time when they shut down their assembly lines. He also ordered the meat plants to stay open but nothing was drafting the workers to show up. I don’t support these actions, but the problem remains the coronavirus.
“By controlling prices, state governments have been a major contributor to the current economic crash;”
I agree that price ceilings will act like price ceilings. Yes, there are anti-gouging laws, even in FL, and yes, you can point to some notable examples in the media, ie those teenagers in TN, right? They went around store to store and bought up ALL of the sanitizer.
But in the grand scheme of things big box retailers like Publix, Walmart, Target, Winn Dixie are not charging more, voluntarily. They’re just NOT doing it. They’re in this for the long run and they’re more interested in their long term goodwill than making an extra $.50 off a toilet paper roll right now. They CAN charge more, by law, but just don’t since price gouging laws don’t prevent all price increases. Now at the pre-pandemic retail price the quantity demanded exceeded the quantity supplied and there are bare shelves, right? Absolutely, but the state ceiling is not the cause.
Enter the ‘black’ market. Yesterday I decided to do some takeout at my favorite South FL chicken place, the Chicken Kitchen in Broward County because they had sent me a text telling me how much they missed me and offered me a BOGO chicken and rice platter. They were also selling sanitizer, toilet paper, bleach, masks, full face masks/shields, latex gloves….you name it and the prices would exceed any state cap. So surely the police must be there? Well, they were, the Broward County sheriffs were there. Eating chicken.
Again, the virus, the virus has even caused law enforcement to substantially reduce its desire to enforce ANY law, much less price gouging laws. They don’t want to get near you.
Vivian Darkbloom
May 15 2020 at 11:55am
“What’s more dangerous in historical context is carrying water for one’s own Leviathan”.
That’s debatable. But, I don’t think, in the intellectual sense, that one should carry water for free for anyone else, Leviathan or not, but solely for oneself, one’s conscience and one’s quest for “the truth” (the latter, like “reality” should always be put in quotation marks). Agreeing with other people (government, etc) consciously or unconsciously to please them or aggrandize oneself to them, for whatever reason, isn’t the correct burden to bear. There are many types of “tribes”, not only based on nationality.
I say that as a lawyer who has often carried water for a fee, but within an organized system of two opposing water carriers whose personal opinions are clearly distinct from one’s advocacy of another.
SaveyourSelf
May 16 2020 at 12:32pm
“What a cruel thing war is… to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbors.” Robert E. Lee.
“I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell.” William Tecumseh Sherman
“I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
I had a hard time deciding how to enter this conversation. Honestly, I was astonished Pierre brought it up at all. Economics is a study of civilization. War is the opposite of civilization. War, as a matter of course, tears down quickly and indiscriminately what was typically built up slowly and carefully. War is the antithesis of economics. Why a brilliant economist would bring up such foolishness boggled my mind. But I see now why he did. There are, apparently, some people in the world who unashamedly would welcome and encourage war between the US and China. I would never have imagined… but at least now and I know and can prepare.
With regards for the argument in question: China is the most populated country in the world. That being the case, if a new virus that infects humans were to show up anywhere in the world on a purely random basis, it would probably show up in China first. No need for conspiracy theories. It’s beginner statistics.
For those disinclined toward statistics, there is another even simpler rule of thumb helpful for this discussion called Occam’s razor. All other things being equal, the simpler solution is more likely correct. It is far more likely, for example, that the cause of your woes, whatever they may be, originate with the people close to you (like your own government) rather than, say, the people living on the opposite side of the world and their government. Americans’ blaming China and Mexico for all its problems for the last several years is an example of displacement, pure and simple. For that reason, I consider nationalism and its advanced form, warmongering, at best, little more than intellectual laziness.
Statistics and Occam’s razor gave Jon Murphy the stronger position in the above argument right out of the gates. He maintains it admirably thereafter, though it seems he overstepped when talking about what is admissible in court. That is not to say that the opposition was without merit or skill. In truth I was impressed with their performance given how little they had to work with. But I don’t think they got even close to winning the argument. (Thank god. “Winning” an argument for war is losing in every sense that matters.) Still, I take it as a dire warning that this conversation happened at all.
Amy Willis, your request for civility at the end of the argument reminded me of Dr. Strangelove:
“Gentlemen, You Can’t Fight In Here! This is The War Room.” (This quote and the movie it originates from are remarkably fitting to this whole conversation. Eerily so.)
Tyler Wells
May 16 2020 at 3:30pm
How ironic would it be if we sent 100s of thousands of young men to die in order to avenge ourselves of a virus that killed 10s of thousands of elderly people. A virus that has also crippled China and cost lives there.
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