A new book is asking a not-so-new question: is democracy nothing more than a not-too-smart formalization of mob rule? Here's more analysis from WORLD and The New Yorker.

Caplan is the sort of economist (are there other sorts? there must be) who engages with the views of non-economists in the way a bulldozer would engage with a picket fence if a bulldozer could express glee.

The argument of his book is that economists and political scientists have misunderstood the problem. They think that most voters are ignorant about political issues; Caplan thinks that most voters are wrong about the issues, which is a different matter...