I’ve been on the road a bit and will be off for a couple of weeks on my “Globalization is Great” tour. (For the theme, see the University of Colorado poster here.) The talks at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and at Northwestern University went well, and I had some very good meetings with Cato Institute Sponsors during the afternoons. I’ll end up the tour in Las Vegas, where I will speak at the Foundation for Economic Education convention. (To check that out, click here.)
D.C. is currently full of the ragtag remnants of the American left. They’re protesting against, um, let me check the list: Israeli occupation of the West Bank; the existence of Israel; the U.S. war against the Al Qaeda and the Taliban; IMF and World Bank policies (not that they know what they are); globalization; trade; and badness generally. I could not resist a little argument with a number of the unpleasant little critters in the local Chipotle burrito bar on Saturday. They were covered with stickers demanding a Palestinian state NOW and holding signs denouncing Israel. I asked whether I’d seen them at the protests against Hamas’s suicide bombers and against funding of the Palestinian Authority, which receives oodles of money from the U.S. and the E.U. I guess not, I added, since that would mean they were against the killing of Jews. I shouldn’t assume that the enemies of my enemies are my friends, but it’s clear that the enemies of Israel are despicable. I’m not a Zionist, but the people who are attacking Israel the loudest are precisely the sort of people who make me more sympathetic to the Israelis.