Okay, who is the real traitor? Is Edward Snowden a heroic whistleblower or a traitor? Well, maybe Snowden is a bit of both. He is both a hero and a traitor, arising from different aspects of his dramatic actions. Snowden was a computer whiz and former Booz Allen contract employee handling secret work for the National Security Agency ... MORE
Mark Nestmann: When You Need To Disappear
Leave no footprints. Whistleblower Edward Snowden needs to disappear if he is to avoid kidnapping, assassination, extradition, or deportation to the United States. If you’re ever faced by a situation in which you need to disappear, right away, what would you do? Perhaps someone is bent on revenge and has threatened to kill you. ... MORE
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cell phones,
death,
e-mail,
Edward Snowden,
identification,
Internet,
life,
privacy,
secrecy
The Forgotten Man Of The Minimum Wage Debate
by Doug Altner. President Obama has renewed his call for Congress to raise the minimum wage to at least $9 per hour. Advocates claim that raising the minimum wage helps low-wage workers. Opponents point out that if Congress makes it illegal to hire an employee for less than $9 per hour, there will be fewer job opportunities for those who lack ... MORE
Prohibition Lite Is Making RYO Cigarettes All The Rage
by Jeffrey A. Tucker. A month ago, I was sitting with some college students for lunch. After we ate, two of them took out loose-leaf tobacco and rolling papers, with filters and all. They started rolling cigarettes at the table. In some way, it looked more like poverty than a charming anachronism. Puzzled, I asked why they were doing this. The ... MORE
Where's Fidelity To The Constitution When You Need It?
by Andrew Napolitano. When former spy Edward Snowden revealed to the world that the federal government is spying on most Americans, most Americans were surprised and unhappy. But half of official Washington yawned before it roared. Somehow the people in the government had a pretty good idea of what government spies ... MORE
Jerry Brito: How Leaks Advance Liberty And Resist Tyranny
Using technology to keep the government in check. We now know what we have long suspected: that the National
Security Agency is collecting the phone call records of all
Americans. And we are now justified in suspecting what we have long
feared: that it is also keeping a permanent backup copy of
everything that happens on the ... MORE
John Stossel: The War On Drugs Is Worse Than NSA Spying
Politicians cause more problems than they solve. In their arrogance, they assume that only they solve social problems. They will solve them by banning this and that, subsidizing groups they deem worthy and setting up massive bureaucracies with a mandate to cure, treat and rescue wayward souls. Their programs fail, and so they pass new ... MORE
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bureaucracy,
civil rights,
drug war,
government,
individual liberty,
NSA,
prohibition,
spying
Dan Mangan: Poll Finds ObamaCare Is Already Hurting Jobs
No surprise here. Small business owners' fear of the effect of the new health-care reform law on their bottom line is prompting many to hold off on hiring and even to shed jobs in some cases, a recent poll found. "We were startled because we know that employers were concerned about the Affordable Care Act and the effects it ... MORE
Jack Lakey: Speed Traps Are About Revenue, Not Safety
Policing for profit: dragnets and fishing expeditions. If radar enforcement is all about safety, as police say, why are they fishing for speeders on Allen Rd. in the middle of the night? Paula Morese describes the cop who pulled her over at 2 a.m. as an “entrapment officer,” one of three who were ambushing drivers where the speed limit drops ... MORE
State Legislatures Strengthen Constitution Via Nullification
Keeping limits on an otherwise unlimited government. On May 4, politicususa.com published “Republicans Shred the Constitution By Passing Unconstitutional Nullification Laws” by Rmuse. This article is nothing more than worship at the altar of the
All-Powerful National Regime. The author’s supposition is that
Republicans despise ... MORE
Dexter Wright: Impeach Eric Holder
Why isn't this a no-brainer? As the Washington media continues to trip over the stumbling blocks of administration scandals and echoes of Watergate bounce off the buildings across the Potomac River, the question comes to mind: Will there be impeachment hearings this summer as there were in the Summer of '73? There may indeed ... MORE
Scott Locklin: They Say They Want A Revolution
People are obviously upset about something. According to Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind survey,
29% of US citizens polled say they believe that “In the next few years,
an armed revolution might be necessary in order to protect our
liberties.” Of the five potential responses to this question—“agree,
disagree, neither, unsure, ... MORE
Citizens & The State: A Bigger Problem Than You Think
by A. Barton Hinkle. “This abuse of state power,” writes Chinese artist and dissident Ai Weiwei about the U.S. government’s surveillance of U.S. citizens, “goes totally against my understanding of what it means to be a civilized society.” Weiwei has a better understanding of important things than Americans who find nothing wrong with the NSA’s ... MORE
Homeland Security Seeks NSA-Level Spying Powers
by Josh Peterson. Domestic spying capabilities used by the National Security Agency to collect massive amounts of data on American citizens could soon be available to the Department of Homeland Security — a bureaucracy with the power to arrest citizens that is not subject to limitations imposed on the NSA. Unlike the DHS, the NSA is ... MORE
Thomas Sowell: The Loss Of Trust
Obama's dishonesty obscures real issues. Amid all the heated cross-currents of debate about the National Security Agency's massive surveillance program, there is a growing distrust of the Obama administration that makes weighing the costs and benefits of the NSA program itself hard to assess. The belated recognition of this ... MORE
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data mining,
deception,
government,
NSA,
Obama,
politicians,
spying,
surveillance,
terrorism
Derron Matthews: More Philosophical Filth At The NYT
No good guys in Syria. There is an almost unanimous consensus that, when it comes to Syria, the United States has a “duty” to do something. The arguments for intervention range from spreading democracy to stopping the slaughter of civilians. Unfortunately, few have provided cogent arguments for why American soldiers should be ... MORE
John Fund: Who Is Watching The NSA Watchers?
Why the oversight can never be adequate. It’s clear that congressional oversight of the government’s intelligence activities is either inadequate or flawed. Asked if he believes there has been enough oversight of the NSA, Senate majority leader Harry Reid was dismissive last week: “Enough is something that’s in the eye of the beholder.” ... MORE
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data mining,
freedom,
government,
intelligence,
NSA,
oversight,
privacy,
spying,
surveillance
James Hamblin: There Will Always Be More Drugs
Another reason the war on drugs is a failure. A trillion dollars deep and arguably no further forward, the war on
drugs continues to meet new fronts. Only recently have designer drugs
taken hold in forms that effectively mimic the physiologic effects of
the substances we've spent decades and lives and fortunes to eliminate.
The target moves ... MORE
Labels:
addiction,
black market,
chemicals,
drug war,
drugs,
government,
prohibition,
substance abuse
NSA Copies All Internet Data, Creates Dossiers On Users
The extent of government lawlessness is massive. The Associated Press dropped a bombshell report yesterday that claims the NSA's secret Internet spy program Prism is just a small part of a much more "expansive and intrusive" digital spying effort. According to the AP, the NSA copies ALL INTERNET traffic in and out of the United ... MORE
Labels:
database,
government,
monitor,
PRISM,
privacy,
snooping,
spying,
surveillance,
tracking,
tyranny
Michael Barone: Americans Becoming More Libertarian
The evidence is abundant. Are Americans becoming more libertarian on cultural issues? I see evidence that they are, in poll findings and election results on three unrelated issues -- marijuana legalization, same-sex marriage and gun rights. Start with pot. Last November voters in the states of Colorado and Washington voted to legalize marijuana, ... MORE
Labels:
drug war,
free market,
freedom,
gay rights,
gun rights,
individual liberty,
libertarian,
marijuana
Walter E Williams: Unasked & Unanswered Questions
Contempt for liberty by progressives. Grutter v. Bollinger was the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld the University of Michigan Law School's racial admissions policy. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, writing for the majority, said the U.S. Constitution "does not prohibit the Law School's narrowly tailored use of race in ... MORE
Obama Speaks With Forked Tongue On Surveillance
by Sheldon Richman. It’s bad enough the federal government spies on us. Must it insult our intelligence too? The government’s response to Edward Snowden’s leaks about the National Security Agency’s secret monitoring of the Internet and collection of our telephone logs is a mass of contradictions. Officials have said the disclosures are (1) old ... MORE
VIDEO: The NSA's Future Crime Unit
A lawless government based on a general warrant by a secret court. The United States was created in part to explicitly reject the abuses of King George. One of those abuses, so-called "general warrants," allowed police to search homes and businesses without evidence of a crime. The broad collection of Americans' phone records, e-mail correspondence and purchase records has largely occurred without suspicion of criminal activity. Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the Cato Institute, comments on the redefinition of privacy by the National Security Agency.
Court Rules Proof Of Citizenship Not Necessary To Vote
Claiming citizenship will be enough. The U.S. Supreme Court threw out an Arizona law that required evidence of citizenship when people register to vote, in a victory for minority-rights advocates and the Obama administration. The justices, voting 7-2, said Arizona’s proof-of-citizenship law runs afoul of a federal statute that sets out ... MORE
Labels:
citizenship,
Democrats,
election,
illegal aliens,
immigration,
politics,
Supreme Court,
voting
Steve Chapman: Birth Control Without The Middle Man
Hoping for the triumph of logic. We all know that every day, people in Mexico come across the border in pursuit of something they can't find in their country. What you may not know is that every day, people in the United States go across the border to Mexico for the same reason. They aren't looking for jobs. They're looking for birth. ... MORE
Wary Of Tracking, Users Flock To DuckDuckGo
by Nidhi Subbaraman. First news of the government's Web tracking program PRISM broke late
last Thursday, and by Friday, traffic at the indie search engine
DuckDuckGo was on the upswing. The tagline on its homepage: "Search anonymously." "You could notice the difference almost immediately," Gabriel Weinberg, DuckDuckGo's founder ... MORE
Jonah Goldberg: The Unfolding Revolution
Freedom, not statism, is progress. ‘Why are there no libertarian countries?” In a much-discussed essay for Salon, Michael Lind asks: “If libertarians are correct in claiming that they understand how best to organize a modern society, how is it that not a single country in the world in the early twenty-first century is organized along ... MORE
Why Mistrust Of Government Is Good
An insightful interview with Penn Jillette. Question: Why is it important to mistrust the government? Penn Jillette: I believe that our country, uniquely for the time, was founded on mistrust for the government, which is such a heady and beautiful idea. The idea that we have all the rights in the world. We have complete and utter ... MORE
Labels:
freedom,
government,
individual liberty,
libertarian,
politics,
reason,
suspicion,
virtue,
war
NSA Scandal Separates Liberty Lovers From Poseurs
by Steve Chapman. Most Americans who pay any attention to politics believe the
nation’s great chasm is between “Red State” Republicans and “Blue
State” Democrats. While the nation’s two major parties have their
differences, the real divide is and always has been between those
who reflexively trust the authorities and those ... MORE
Shane Clark: Are You Willing To Die For Your Freedom?
Massive loss in freedom vs. minimal gain in security. Before we even got the whole picture detailing exactly how widespread the government's phone tracking efforts were, we were hit with news of the NSA PRISM program. The details are still being uncovered and debates and questions concerning both programs abound, but the most ... MORE
How To Keep Your Government From Spying On You
by Ronald Bailey. “Does the [National Security Agency] collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) asked James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing in March. Clapper replied, “No sir...not wittingly.” We now know that was ... MORE
Labels:
government,
individual liberty,
privacy,
protection,
smart phones,
snooping,
spying,
surveillance
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