September 27, 2019

A license for outrageous police conduct

fromReason: Qualified immunity protects cops from liability for actions that would land ordinary people in jail. Another double standard favoring government agents.

Police State America

IRS testing behavioral analytics to verify online users

fromNextGov: The agency is piloting a proof-of-concept that will track how individual taxpayers interact with its online systems by tracking behavior and movements through phones.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Food is freedom: How Washington’s food subsidies have helped make Americans fat and sick

fromTheDailyBell: All told, the U.S. government spends $20 billion annually on farm subsidies, with approximately 39 percent of all farms receiving some sort of subsidy.

Economic Policy: Statism Vs The Free Market

VIDEO: Thomas Sowell - Dismantling America

fromLibertyPen/YouTube: Upon completion of his book Dismantling America, in 2010, Dr. Sowell is interviewed by Peter Robinson of Uncommon Knowledge.

The Government is Not Us

The world’s most-surveilled cities

fromComparitech: Six are in America (San Francisco is one of them).

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Why Is the CDC still fostering potentially deadly confusion about vaping and lung disease?

fromReason: Contrary to the evidence, public health officials and journalists continue to link the recent outbreak of respiratory illnesses with legal e-cigarettes.

Regulation Nation

July 19, 2019

Could I have some news with my emotions, please?

fromTheHill: From the earliest days of television, journalists understood the power of an image to overwhelm objectivity. That’s why Cronkite and others worked hard to present the news without emotional cues.

Media Bias on Parade

New numbers show San Francisco's homeless population has grown by 30 percent

fromReason: Democrats love the poor. That's why they make so many.

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Libertarian group demands NASA remove false '97 percent consensus' global warming claim

fromPJMedia: The study — and the 97 percent figure that depends on it — is fatally flawed, and NASA has 120 days to respond to the CEI complaint..

Indoctrination and Censorship

Barr: Justice Dept. is 'all in' on criminal justice overhaul

fromNewser: Under the resentencing provisions of the law, more than 1,600 inmates have qualified for a reduced sentence and more than 1,100 have already been released, a Justice Department official said. 

Justice is a Result, Not Just a Process

VIDEO: Tucker Carlson - Climate Change Wasn't About the Environment At All

fromYouTube/LibertyPen: So you thought climate change was about the environment? From Tucker Carlson Tonight, a peak inside the great Green New Deal deception. Marc Morano, Tucker Carlson. 

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Beware, the IRS is eyeing your inherited money

fromMarketWatch: From the earliest days of television, journalists understood the power of an image to overwhelm objectivity. That’s why Cronkite and others worked hard to present the news without emotional cues.

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

May 29, 2019

"The most destructive breach In history": Hackers use NSA code to grind Baltimore to a halt

fromReason: It has now been revealed that a key component of the malware used by cyber-criminals was actually developed just a short drive from Baltimore - at the NSA, according to the New York Times.

The Government is Not Us

Walter E Williams: Slavery is neither strange nor peculiar

fromReason: The favorite leftist tool for the attack on our nation's founding is that slavery was sanctioned.

Political Correctness and Other Nitwittery

IRS defends giving refunds to illegal immigrants

fromFoxNewsInsider: In a letter to Congress, IRS Commissioner John Koskinen defended the decision to allow illegal immigrants to get refunds from the agency.

The Government is Not Us

Weapons of war on our streets: A guide to the militarization of America's police

fromAmmo: The only people with “weapons of war” on America’s streets are, increasingly, the police.

Police State America

“Truth ultimately Is all we have:” Julian Assange appeals for public support

fromGlobalResearch: “The US government or rather those regrettable elements in it that hate truth liberty and justice want to cheat their way into my extradition and death rather than letting the public hear the truth."

Indoctrination and Censorship

The inside story of how Denver decriminalized magic mushrooms

fromReason: Decriminalize Denver campaign director Kevin Matthews speaks about his winning strategy and the new frontier of drug policy.

The War on Unapproved Voluntary Exchange

September 27, 2018

Empowering personal liberty, not systems of control, solves societal problems

fromAbovetheLaw: China is developing a digital dictatorship to exert control over its 1.4 billion citizens. For some, "social credit" will bring great opportunities — for others, punishment. Coming to a tyranny near you?
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

VIDEO: The Trouble with Google

fromLibertyPen/YouTube: We know one entity proven to interfere with American elections and support the most oppressive communist dictatorship in the world.
Media Bias on Parade              Government is Watching Every Move You Make

A federal court rules that IRS agents who demanded to watch a woman use the bathroom were clearly violating standards of decency. The government appeals.

fromTheDailyBell: The IRS literally tried to justify this ritualistic degradation of an innocent human being’s most basic dignity by calling it ‘standard procedure’. Public service or pervert service?
The Government is Not Us

Digital dictatorship: China exerts control over population through "social credit" system

fromZeroHedge: China is developing a digital dictatorship to exert control over its 1.4 billion citizens. For some, "social credit" will bring great opportunities — for others, punishment. Coming to a tyranny near you?
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Michelle Obama encourages people who "know nothing about nothing" to vote

fromInfowars: Democrats unveil their voter registration strategy for the midterms.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

The Brett Kavanaugh confirmation has exposed the Democrats as threat to Constitution

fromAmericanSpectator: This is disgusting on a scale we may never have experienced in modern American history — for which one side in our politics is responsible.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Michelle Malkin: Obamacare’s Tax-Time Torment

The bumbling Obamacare bureaucracy.   Thousands of taxpayers must do without a form needed to claim a tax credit for their overpriced health-insurance premiums. Where is my 1095-A? This is what it must be like dealing with a government agency in a third world country.” That was the lament on Twitter of just one poor citizen this week trying   ... MORE

Obama Advocates Government Access To All Devices

by Jeff Mason.    No surprise that privacy invasion is the tyrant's choice. U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday made a passionate case for mobile devices to be built in such a way as to allow government to gain access to personal data if needed to prevent a terrorist attack or enforce tax laws. Speaking at the South by Southwest festival in Texas, Obama   ... MORE

Forecast Of Distrust With A Chance Of Revolution

by Glenn Reynolds.     When Americans have more faith in the military than the political class, democracy is in trouble. According to a recent Associated Press poll, the public lacks confidence in government. And by “lacks confidence,” I mean “really lacks confidence.” Specifically, “More than 6 in 10 respondents expressed only slight confidence — or   ... MORE

Oops Again? A Key Server Accidentally Gets Wiped By IRS

by Steve Sherman. It would be comical if it wasn't so corrupt. Another server has been “inadvertently” wiped of all of its key data at the IRS. What is it over there? Does Lois Lerner come in and give “tutorials” on server wiping? The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) saidFriday it erased a hard drive belonging to a former agency Senior official after a  ... MORE

Americans Hate The U.S. Government More Than Ever

By Aimee Picchi.  The reasons continue to grow. A handful of industries are those "love to hate" types of businesses, such as cable-television companies and Internet service providers. The federal government has joined the ranks of the bottom-of-the-barrel industries, according to a new survey from the American Customer Satisfaction Index.     ... MORE

What Some Think As Law-Abiding Is Really Jackass Abiding

by Paul Hein.     If you were to ask people on the street, “Are you law-abiding?” the vast majority would say, some with evident pride and self-righteousness, “You bet I am!” A smaller percentage would say, after some hesitation, “Sure, I guess I am,” and a very few might grimace and say, “Only when I have to be!” Thank God for this last group!  ...  MORE

VIDEO: The Tiny Dot

Goodbye To 2015, A Year Of Absurdity And Overreach

by George Will.  E.B. White reportedly said "the most beautiful sound in America" is "the tinkle of ice at twilight." In 2015's twilight, fortify yourself with something 90 proof as you remember this year in which: We learned that a dismal threshold has been passed. The value of property that police departments seized through civil asset forfeiture — usually      ... MORE

Tami Luhby: No One Stays In The Top 1% For Long

Up and down the income ladder.      Made it into the Top 1%? Congrats! Just don't expect to stay there for very long. The Top 1% is often considered an exclusive, monolithic group, but folks actually rise up into it and fall out of it quite often. That's because their incomes can vary widely year to year. Some 11% of Americans will join the Top 1% for    ... MORE

John Stossel: Politicians Without Borders

Today's politicians seem to have few limits.     When driving on treacherous roads, guardrails are useful. If you fall asleep or maybe you're just a bad driver, guardrails may prevent you from going off a cliff. Recently, The Wall Street Journal's Kimberley Strassel used the phrase "no political guardrails" to point out how many of today's    ... MORE

Alexander Hendrie: Impeach IRS chief John Koskinen

Halt the tax agency’s partisan scheming.    After revelations that the Internal Revenue Service was restricting political speech and targeting conservative and tea party groups, John Koskinen was appointed to head the agency, promising reform and transparency. These promises never came to fruition. Instead of admitting fault, Mr. Koskinen’s IRS   ... MORE

IRS Possessed Stingray Cellphone Surveillance Gear - Why?

by Nicky Woolf and William Green.     13th federal agency to use secretive dragnet!  The Internal Revenue Service is the latest in a growing list of US federal agencies known to have possessed the sophisticated cellphone dragnet equipment known as Stingray, according to documents obtained by the Guardian. Invoices obtained following a request  ... MORE

Walter E Williams: Wealth, Poverty and Politics

Sowell's new book is a fun read.  Dr. Thomas Sowell, my colleague and friend, told me several years ago that he wasn't going to write any more books, but that was two books ago, and now he has just published his 45th. The man writes with both hands, as can be seen from his website, which lists his 45 books, 19 journal articles, 71 essays in       ... MORE

25% Do Not See Widespread Corruption In Goverment

Political blindness strikes one in four.    Three in four Americans (75%) last year perceived corruption as widespread in the country's government. This figure is up from two in three in 2007 (67%) and 2009 (66%). While the numbers have fluctuated slightly since 2007, the trend has been largely stable since 2010. However, the percentage of   ... MORE

Judge Tells IRS It Can’t Hide White House Emails

by Mark Tapscott.   White House emails to the IRS about individual tax returns cannot be exempted by the embattled agency under the Freedom of Information Act, a federal judge ruled Friday. United States District Court for the District of Columbia Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled that Section 6103 of the tax code does not justify the IRS from         ... MORE

Ron Paul: The Seamless Web Of Liberty

Toward a free society.        Many people think the Internal Revenue Service was violating civil liberties when it harassed tea party groups. After all, the groups were targeted because they wanted to exercise their civil liberty to challenge government policies. However, the specific issue in the IRS case was the groups’ application for tax-exempt status, ... MORE