There's an idea

For the few of us left who like empirical evidence, Mark Steyn points out an interesting observation about how to improve standards of living in Africa.

And then there’s Somalia, where, as Professor Peter Leeson of George Mason University points out, functioning government collapsed in 1991. And yet in the 16 years since, by almost every measurable indicator, life has improved: extreme poverty down 20%, infant mortality down 24%, access to health facilities up 25%, measles fatalities down 30%, maternal mortality down over 30%. I hate to sound like a fainthearted moderate squish, but even we small-government conservatives don’t usually have anything quite so drastic as the Somali model in mind. Still, strictly on the empirical evidence, the no-government solution is working out a lot better than the previous three decades of Afro-socialism.

Now THAT is an inconvenient truth for latte set.