Steve Tobak: How To Gain Personal Freedom And Control

My dad was a strict disciplinarian.        I hated that. I hated it so much that I grew up desperately wanting to control my own life. To have the freedom to do what I want, how I want, when I want. But here’s the thing. The pursuit of personal freedom has brought me face-to-face with an interesting dilemma. Turns out, it takes a tremendous     ... MORE

Austin Hill: Federal Agencies Choking-Off Farming Industry

Interests of the bureaucrats over those of the people.     Good news: the U.S. Department of Agriculture has published research indicating that there are lots of un-filled jobs and career opportunities in the farming industry. Bad news: the Obama Administration has been cannibalizing the nation’s farmers for the bigger part of the last   ... MORE

VIDEO: Milton Friedman - The Plight Of Federal Employees

Andrew Napolitano: A Legal Way To Kill?

The president's extra-judicial killings.     When President Obama decided sometime during his first term that he wanted to be able to use unmanned aerial drones in foreign lands to kill people — including Americans — he instructed Attorney General Eric Holder to find a way to make it legal — despite the absolute prohibition on          ... MORE

LA Cops Charged With Planting Guns At Pot Dispensary

Dedicated drug warriors on a mission.     Two former Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies were charged with planting guns at a medical marijuana dispensary, resulting in the arrest of a man who was sentenced to six months in jail, authorities announced Wednesday. Julio Cesar Martinez, 39, and Anthony Manuel Paez, 32, were charged last   ... MORE

VIDEO: Julie Borowski - Libertarian Infighting

Help Wanted: Girls Gone Wild to Replace Lois Lerner

by Katie Kieffer.      Female, feisty and unemployed? Fear not! Obama will need to hire IRS Girls Gone Wild to replace Lois Lerner. To secure his legacy and help Democrats win future elections, Obama needs to replace former IRS Director of Exempt Organizations Lois Lerner, his number one Agency Girl Gone Wild. Lois has already been replaced in name    ... MORE

Initiative Seeks To Legalize Pot In Nevada

by Sandra Chereb.      A pro-marijuana group hoping to ride a wave of mounting acceptance for cannabis filed an initiative petition Wednesday seeking to legalize recreational pot use in Nevada. The measure backed by a group called Campaign to Regulate Marijuana would allow adults 21 and older to possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana. It also sets up   ... MORE

Will You Be A Rebel, Revolutionary Or A Slave?

by John W. Whitehead.     The Bundy Paradigm. “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”—John F. Kennedy  Those tempted to write off the standoff at the Bundy Ranch as little more than a show of force by militia-minded citizens would do well to reconsider their easy dismissal of this brewing        ... MORE

Jacob Sullum: Go To Heaven, Bloomberg

Meddling ex-mayor thinks he's on a mission from God.     If Michael Bloomberg is going to heaven, as he recently assured The New York Times, does that mean I am going to hell? The former New York mayor and I do not agree about much, especially when it comes to his two biggest passions: gun control and "public health," both of which   ... MORE

VIDEO: John Stossel - Government Lotteries

Alexander Bolton: Is Rand Paul Plausible In 2016?

Can principles also be practical?  Can Sen. Rand Paul really become the 45th president? His curly hair and slight frame aren’t a Hollywood casting agent’s idea of a commander in chief. But the freshman Republican senator from Kentucky rejects established norms; he’s on a declared mission to redefine the presidency and his own party.  ... MORE

Civil Asset Forfeiture: 7 Things You Should Know

A Heritage Foundation fact sheet.        Civil asset forfeiture is a legal tool that allows law enforcement officials to seize property that they assert has been involved in certain criminal activity. In fact, the owner of the property doesn’t even need to be guilty of a crime: Civil asset forfeiture proceedings charge the property itself with     ... MORE

VIDEO: Is Standing Up To Government Really Terrorism?

John Stossel: Privacy, Please

We can never tell government to butt out.      Scarlett Johansson left nude photos of herself on her computer. A hacker grabbed them and sent them to gossip websites. A Pennsylvania high school issued laptop computers to students and then remotely activated the laptops' cameras to watch the students when they were away from school.       ... MORE

How Much Does ObamaCare Rip Off Young Adults?

by Scott Gottlieb.     We ran the numbers. Obamacare is still struggling to sign up young people. In order to offset the high cost of the older, and probably less healthy people who are joining Obamacare plans, the White House must coerce a sufficient number of thirty-somethings to also join. Problem is, the health plans are too pricey to make economic  ... MORE

Matt Kibbe: 'You Can't Have Freedom for Free'

On Rush, Ayn Rand, and Not Compromising.      In 1977, I bought my first Rush album. I was 13. The title of the disc was 2112, and the foldout jacket had a very cool and ominous red star on the cover. As soon as I got it home from the store, I carefully placed that vinyl record onto the felt-padded turntable of my parents’ old Motorola console   ... MORE

Thaddeus Russell: Sex Slaves And The Surveillance State

Why 'human trafficking' is a dangerous term.     Her name, like that of nearly all the victims, is unknown. Not older than a teenager, she has large, downturned eyes, long and wavy hair, and pale skin. She wears a demure white dress, suggesting that the life she lived before she found herself in this dungeon was one of innocence. She stares     ... MORE

VIDEO: Fox News - Overkill At Bundy Ranch

Thomas Sowell: The High Cost Of Liberalism - Part Three

The wrong incentives.      Income inequality has long been one of the liberals' favorite issues. So there is nothing surprising about its being pushed hard this election year. If nothing else, it is a much-needed distraction from the disasters of ObamaCare and the various IRS, Benghazi and other Obama administration scandals. Like so many other   ... MORE

Thomas Sowell: The High Cost Of Liberalism - Part Two

Liberals can be disarming.     In fact, they are for disarming anybody who can be disarmed, whether domestically or internationally. Unfortunately, the people who are the easiest to disarm are the ones who are the most peaceful — and disarming them makes them vulnerable to those who are the least peaceful. We are currently getting a     ... MORE

VIDEO: The Tiny Dot

Thomas Sowell: The High Cost Of Liberalism - Part One

Liberals advocate many wonderful things.      In fact, I suspect that most conservatives would prefer to live in the kind of world envisioned by liberals, rather than in the kind of world envisioned by conservatives. Unfortunately, the only kind of world that any of us can live in is the world that actually exists. Trying to live in the kind   ... MORE

Walter E Williams: Wage Discrimination

Never mind the reasons.     "President Obama Vows Zero Tolerance on Gender Wage Gap," read one headline. Another read, "Women Still Earned 77 Cents On Men's Dollar In 2012." It's presumed that big, greedy corporations are responsible for what is seen as wage injustice. Before discussing the "unjust" wage differences between men and      ... MORE

Ronald Bailey: The Menace Of Secret Government

Proposed reforms fail to safeguard civil liberties.        In January, President Barack Obama made a much-anticipated speech at the Department of Justice outlining proposed reforms of the domestic surveillance programs run by the National Security Agency (NSA). The secretive spy agency has taken a public battering ever since      ... MORE

The Economist: What Civil Asset Forfeiture Means

Politicians have given police a license to steal.      Kerri Kaley was a sales representative for a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson. She and some of her colleagues sometimes received excess or outdated medical devices from their clients, which they then sold, splitting the proceeds among themselves. The government believed this amounted to   ... MORE

VIDEO: John Stossel - Bitcoin Betting

James Conca: It's Final -- Corn Ethanol Is Of No Use

It's always been about subsidies, not the environment.   OK, can we please stop pretending biofuel made from corn is helping the planet and the environment? The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released two of its Working Group reports at the end of last month (WGI and WGIII), and their short discussion of    ... MORE

Editorial: A Banner Season For Government Red Tape

Regulation, the anti-stimulus.        Democrats and Republicans in Congress can’t seem to agree on the time of day. But that’s not stopping the executive branch when it comes to cranking out red tape. When it comes to federal regulations, the Obama administration is setting productivity records. According to an April 16 report in the     ... MORE

VIDEO: Matt Rosendale Is A True Patriot

California Moves To Ban Judges Affiliated With Boy Scouts

by Patrick Howley.     Politicians say Scouts lack morality. California is proposing to ban members of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) from serving as judges because the Boy Scouts do not allow gay troop leaders, The Daily Caller has learned. In a move with major legal implications, The California Supreme Court Advisory Committee on The Code of    ... MORE

Insensitive Bans on Sharing Food With Homeless Persist

by Baylen Linnekin.     Regulation trumps hunger for politicians. With all the restrictions on selling and marketing food, it’s easy to forget that even sharing food is sometimes still a crime. Despite my own stated optimism last year, it appears that bans on sharing food with the homeless and less fortunate won’t be going away any time     ... MORE

Richard Rahn: Abusive Civil Asset Forfeiture

Theft without due process because it's government.    Do you think the Internal Revenue Service and other government agencies should have the right to seize your assets, including your bank accounts, when you have not been convicted of wrongdoing? The fact is, the IRS and other government agencies do this all of the time, and often without   ... MORE

Flash! Drivers Have Free Speech Rights

by Augusta Chronicle Editorial Staff.     The right to tip off other motorists to police. Here’s something we’d like to see law enforcement officers add to their “I-have-bigger-things-to-worry-about” list: drivers who alert fellow motorists to police radar by flashing their lights. Ticketing someone for a headlight heads-up is not only petty   ... MORE

VIDEO: Milton Friedman - Who Benefits From Licensing?

Obama's Green-Energy Scams Leave Taxpayers In The Red

by Justin Sykes.       How we gave China a stimulus. It’s been more than five years since President Obama signed his misguided economic-stimulus package into law, creating green-energy subsidies and expanding others, but American taxpayers are still feeling its disastrous effects. This month a deal was reached between competing creditors of      ... MORE

VIDEO: A Deeper Look At The Employment Numbers

The Free Market Vs The Interventionist State

by Richard Ebeling.          In whatever direction we turn, we find the heavy hand of government intruding into virtually every aspect of American society. Indeed, it has reached the point that it would a lot easier to list those areas of people’s lives into which government does not impose itself – and, alas, it would be a very short list. But it   ... MORE

Bret Swanson: The Patent Drain On Economic Growth

Patent trolls stifle innovation.     Slow economic growth since the Great Recession has been devastating for employment, middle class incomes, and federal and state budgets. Worse, many economists are predicting slow growth for the next generation. A number of policies — from tax and immigration reform to more innovation friendly     ... MORE