June 27, 2020

Venezuelans take extraordinary steps to beat water shortage

fromAP: Critics of the socialist government blame chronic infrastructure failures on years of corruption and mismanagement that have also left the electrical grid fragile and destroyed Venezuela’s once-thriving oil industry.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Will government mandate COVID-19 vaccinations?

fromTheHill: Government mandated vaccinations for adults would be a major and controversial step. But then government has taken a number of major and controversial steps recently, such as shutting down the economy.
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

California agency blocks release of police use of force and surveillance training, claiming copyright

fromActivistPost:Our elected officials can pass laws regulating the police, and watchdog bodies can review law enforcement policies, but if training materials are kept secret, it provides a back door for manufacturers of surveillance technology and private organizations to influence police practices without oversight or accountability.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make        Police State America         Regulation Nation

Walter E Williams: Insults to black history

fromCreators: Both blacks and whites can benefit from a better appreciation of black history.
Indoctrination and Censorship

The pandemic's economic carnage looks worse than expected

fromReason: If you thought the economic toll wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic was only going to be horrendous, you may have been overly optimistic.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

VIDEO: Black Wisdom Matters - Good Intentions of the Welfare State

fromLibertyPen/YouTube: Thomas Sowell, Walter E Williams, Star Parker, Jason Riley, Bob Woodson and Larry Elder share their insights on how a half century of the welfare state has changed America and the American family.
The Welfare State: Promoting Dependency

May 25, 2020

This sucker's going down: The destruction of demand

fromCharlesHughSmith: Scapegoating savings is the last desperate propaganda ploy of an exploitive system that was never sustainable.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

The CDC's new 'best estimate' implies a COVID-19 infection fatality rate below 0.3%

fromReason: That rate is much lower than the numbers used in the horrifying projections that shaped the government response to the epidemic. 
Indoctrination and Censorship

Washington State loses "hundreds of millions" to Nigerian unemployment claims fraud scheme

fromZeroHedge: The disclosure came as the state was already struggling to process an unprecedented wave of legitimate jobless claims amid one of the worst economic crises in U.S. history. 
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

The drones were ready for this moment

fromDNYUZ: New Yorkers glanced up to see an unsettling sight: a mysterious drone claiming to represent something called the “Anti-Covid-19 Volunteer Drone Task Force” barking orders to pedestrians below.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Why did Arizona Democrats kill a bill protecting citizens from police overreach?

fromReason: It’s all about the revenue. Civil forfeiture brings in money, and lawmakers are more worried about their budgets than residents’ due process and property rights. 
Police State America              The Government is Not Us

Lindsey Graham seeks broad authority to subpoena former Obama officials

fromPolitico: Those who could be targeted include Loretta Lynch, James Clapper and John Brennan, among others. 
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

May 17, 2020

Three reminders from the Bill of Rights

fromFFF: Our ancestors knew that historically crises and emergencies were the time-honored way by which people lost their liberties at the hands of their own government. 
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

The worst is yet to come: contact tracing, immunity cards and mass testing

fromRutherfordInstitute: Yes, COVID-19 has taken a significant toll on the nation emotionally, physically, and economically, but there are still greater dangers on the horizon. 
Police State America       Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Here's who just voted to let the FBI seize your online search history without a warrant

fromGizmodo: Most of those bastards were Republican. Look at these names carefully. All of them SWORE to uphold the Constitution, yet they just gutted the Fourth Amendment, which requires probable cause for a search. 
Police State America       Government is Watching Every Move You Make            The Government is Not Us 

Democrats try to eliminate proof of who you are to vote

fromArmstrongEconomics: "Tucked inside House Democrats’ new coronavirus bill is language that would create a loophole in states’ voter ID requirements, allowing people to cast ballots without having to prove who they are." 
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Take the shutdown skeptics seriously

fromTheAtlantic: This is not a straightforward battle between a pro-human and a pro-economy camp. 
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Can Michael Flynn be sentenced without being prosecuted for a crime?

fromPJMedia: Judge Sullivan has stepped outside his traditional role as an impartial adjudicator and become an advocate for the prosecution. That alone should disqualify him from hearing this motion.
Justice is a Result, Not Just a Process

May 11, 2020

Dirty dozen: The 12 revelations that sunk Mueller's case against Flynn

fromJustTheNews: After a prescient 2017 tip from inside the FBI, a slow drip of revelations exposed the deep problems with the Flynn prosecution.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Coronavirus curfews are counterproductive and un-American

fromReason: Making businesses close early will not stop the spread of COVID-19. It only accustoms folks to the arbitrary power and control of government.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Surveillance plane starts flying over Baltimore, recording everyone's movements

fromPressCorps: The controversial aerial surveillance planes for Baltimore police started flying Friday. It's called the Aerial Investigation Research (AIR) Pilot Program.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Jonathan Turley rips apart Obama’s ‘leaked’ statement about the DOJ and Flynn, and it’s glorious

fromRedState: Even without the whole Democratic effort to undermine Trump with Russian collusion, there were a boatload of things that put the “rule of law” at risk.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Weekend at Biden’s

fromSpectator: The Democrat’s mental decline is a bigger problem than sex accusations.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Government should not be spared from the austerity it is inflicting on society

fromTheDailyBell: Our government should feel the pain as well. After all, we are all in this together.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

May 5, 2020

Your freedoms don’t have to be muzzled just because you’re wearing a mask

fromTheRutherfordInstitute: The government may act as if its police state powers suppress individual liberties during this COVID-19 pandemic, but the Bill of Rights—still stands in theory, if not in practice.
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

Walter E Williams: The nation's report card

fromCreators: The DOE just released results of the quadrennial National Assessment of Educational Progress tests in U.S. history, civics and geography given in 2018 to thousands of American eighth-graders.
Political Correctness and Other Nitwittery

Fever-reading drones just first of a wave of privacy challenges, civil liberties advocates say

fromPLiberty: Police departments in Daytona Beach, Fla., and Connecticut unveiled what was initially touted as a potential new tool against a pandemic: drones capable of taking a person’s temperature from 300 feet in the air.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

A diseased progressive dream

fromAccuracyInMedia: Progressive ideas and global pandemics go together like a strain of COVID-19 and a mucous membrane. One progressive policy after another has been found to be a major cause of the spread of COVID-19.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

VIDEO: Why wouldn't someone buy weed from the legal market?

fromReason: Answer contained within.
The War on Unapproved Voluntary Exchange

How the CDC and the FDA wrecked the economy

fromReason: The failure to conduct early and wide testing left politicians ignorant of basic facts about the COVID-19 epidemic.
Regulation Nation

April 24, 2020

The attorney general defends civil liberties against overreaching COVID-19 control measures

fromReason: While denying Donald Trump's dictatorial impulses, William Barr notes that public health emergencies do not give governments unlimited powers.
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

Hard times in America renew the call for mandatory national service

fromTheHill: Americans have complied in giving up Constitutional rights to comply with government dictates. So what's next? Some say indentured servitude.
The Government is Not Us

Big tech COVID-19 surveillance data and censorship threaten privacy and free speech

fromTheSociable: Big tech companies are collecting enormous amounts of data on the movement of private citizens while censoring free speech and removing any content that goes against official narratives.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make           Indoctrination and Censorship

VIDEO: What is COVID-19 'contact tracing'?

fromFoxNews: A 3 minute discussion of state efforts to track coronavirus patients with a 'contact tracing program' to identify those they’ve been in contact with.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

VIDEO: Ayn Rand - Altruism and Selfishness

fromLibertyPen/YouTube: Rand compares and contrasts the philosophies of altruism and rational self-interest as proper guides to action.

The coronavirus economy will bring inflation

fromNationalReview: It really doesn’t matter which economic theory you subscribe to, they all arrive at the same destination — more inflation.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

April 21, 2020

Suddenly states’ rights are back on the table

fromTheDailyBell: It must be confusing to be a “progressive” these days. Politicians have no principles, only strategies to get or retain power.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Army's Seattle field hospital closes after 3 days, without treating a single patient

fromMilitary.com: The downside of using expert's computer models as a guide to action.
Political Correctness and Other Nitwittery

Can you beat COVID-19 without a lockdown? Sweden Is trying

fromVanityFair: The Swedish experiment is to accept the coronavirus as a problem to be managed, rather than conclusively defeated. But will it mean more deaths?
Regulation Nation

Walter E Williams: Benefits vs. costs and COVID-19

fromTheDailyBell: It must be confusing to be a “progressive” these days. Politicians have no principles, only strategies to get or retain power.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Why Alexis is like having a government spy living in your house

fromTheDailyMail: Couple are left shocked to discover their 'intrusive' Alexa has recorded EVERY request they've ever made - as well as saving their personal messages after using the device to phone and text people.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Fatality rate for COVID-19 Is much lower than people feared

fromReason: The tests indicate that the number of infections in the county is around 40 times as high as the number of confirmed cases.
Political Correctness and Other Nitwittery

April 15, 2020

COVID-19 and the war on cash: What is behind the push for a cashless society?

fromTheDailyBell: The war on cash is a concerted campaign to shift consumers towards a digital mode of commerce that can be monitored, tracked, tabulated, mined for data, hacked, hijacked and confiscated when convenient.
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle                 Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Congress extends recess until at least May 4

fromPolitico: The longer tyrants are socially distanced, the better off freedom-loving Americans are.
Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

The surveillance state thrives during the pandemic

fromReason: Can we take government officials at their word that they'll eventually abandon their new powers?
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

The real cost of anti-price-gouging laws

fromMises: Given that the rationale for anti-gouging laws is to benefit consumers, we ought to check whether consumers are actually made better off.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Tyrants never let a crisis go to waste

fromTheDailyBell: Here’s a roundup of what’s happening around the world in the name of protecting the people:
The Government is Not Us

Some shirts hide you from cameras—but will anyone wear them?

fromArsTechnica: It's theoretically possible to become invisible to cameras. But can it catch on?
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

April 9, 2020

The crackdown on ‘price gouging’ helps no one, except politicians and the media

fromTownhall: Governments can’t alter the laws of economics any easier than they can the laws of physics. Yet, they seemingly never cease trying, either under some private or public pressure to skew economic outcomes.
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Congress proposes 50% tax on guns and ammunition in the US

fromDailyBell: Congress is considering a bill to require citizens to apply for a federal license before being able to purchase a firearm. And the government would have the authority to deny a license without demonstrable cause.
2nd Amendment Assaults

Thermal imaging cameras are still dangerous dragnet surveillance cameras

fromActivistPost: Surveillance cameras in public places can chill free expression, movement, and association; aid in the targeted harassment and over-policing of vulnerable populations.
Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Feds classifying all coronavirus patient deaths as ‘COVID-19’ deaths, regardless of cause

fromNYPost: Obviously, it is in someone's self-interest to inflate the numbers.
Indoctrination and Censorship

HuffPost’s clickbait headline claims Trump invested in coronavirus cure

fromAccuracyInMedia: The amount of Trump’s investment was estimated between $100 and $1,500, which is far from a vested and significant financial investment in the drug.
Media Bias on Parade

To enforce social distancing rules, cops fined a Pennsylvania woman who was driving alone

fromReason: Not every apparent violation of a quarantine order is a risk to other people, and not all need to be 
(or can be) enforced equally. To a mindless hammer, everything is a nail.
Police State America

March 19, 2020

Panic will end but tyranny will not

fromDailyMail: We saw it with 9/11 and we’re seeing it the covid-19: people will give up their freedom and accept expanding government power when they’re afraid.

The Government is Not Us

Joe Biden’s plan to shut down the firearms industry

fromNationalReview: His political attacks on the industry are why we have a law barring attempts to hold arms manufacturers legally responsible for shootings.

2nd Amendment Assaults

To track virus, governments weigh surveillance tools that push privacy limits

fromWallStreetJournal: Geolocation and facial-recognition systems can locate vectors of infections, but they also gather highly personal data.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Civil asset forfeiture should be eliminated entirely

fromStarTribune: Police and prosecutors should be bound by criminal law, a system where citizens—and their stuff—are innocent until proven guilty.

Police State America

Orange County threatens to jail people who walk outside with others not in household

fromDailyMail: Covid-19 has given authoritarians carte-blanche to run roughshod over the rights of citizens

Regulation Nation                      The Government is Not Us

The plastic bag ban backfires

fromWallStreetJournal: While California's governor is quick to close bars under the pretense of stopping the spread of the virus, they promote reusable bags that are notoriously dirty transmitters.

Regulation Nation                      The Government is Not Us

March 13, 2020

Senators push sneaky anti-privacy bill

fromReason: The EARN IT is an attack on encryption masquerading as a blow against underage porn. 

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

To avoid charges of price gouging, eBay bans sale of coronavirus supplies

fromReason: Attempts to impose low prices on emergency supplies often do far more harm than good. High prices bring essential items to where they are needed most.

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Walter E Williams: Rights versus wishes

fromCreators: Sen. Bernie Sanders said: "I believe that health care is a right of all people." He's not alone in that contention. That claim comes from Democrats and Republicans and liberals and conservatives. 

Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

Bernie Sanders is all but done

fromPolitico: It wasn’t just the results on Tuesday. It was the realization that, for the first time, he had no excuse and nothing better to look forward to. 

Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Why you can't solve a public health problem with economic stimulus

fromReason: Is a new stimulus package the right response to a pandemic?   

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Coronavirus vs. the mass surveillance state: which poses the greater threat?

fromRutherfordInstitute: Emboldened by the citizenry’s inattention and willingness to tolerate its abuses, the government has weaponized one national crisis after another in order to expands its powers. 

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

March 2, 2020

Politicians want to destroy Section 230, the Internet's First Amendment

fromReason: Four myths about the law that made the modern internet possible.

Indoctrination and Censorship

John Stossel: Bloomberg the nanny

fromCreators: Bloomberg targeted smoking, flavored tobacco products, fattening sodas, loud music, grass clippings, cellphones in schools, salt, guns, Styrofoam and restaurant menus without calorie counts.

Regulation Nation

Schools are pushing the boundaries of surveillance technologies

fromActivistPost: Schools are experimenting with the very same surveillance technologies that totalitarian governments use to surveil and abuse the rights of their citizens everywhere: online, offline, and on their phones.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

California reinvents the English language yet again and other nitwittery

fromDailyBell: In the latest attempt to sugarcoat turds, California will now refer to “at risk youth” instead as, “at promise youth.”

Political Correctness and Other Nitwittery

Vaping prohibition would create black markets and put American health at risk

fromTownhall: "Democrats are attempting to take things too far and are promoting prohibitionist policies that we know don’t work and often cause more harm than good."

Regulation Nation

How can Bernie Sanders happen in America

fromTownhall: Why would any people trade individual liberty for government control?

Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

February 28, 2020

Trump’s betrayal of Julian Assange

fromRonPaulInstitute: It is ironic that a President Trump who has been victim of so much deep state meddling has done the deep state’s bidding when it comes to Assange and Wikileaks.

Justice is a Result, Not Just a Process

DNA databases are boon to police but menace to privacy, critics say

fromPewTrust: A Maryland lawmaker introduced a bill to regulate genetic genealogy searches — after a proposal last year to ban them failed.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Assange’s persecution has exposed media depravity the world over

fromMedium: Julian Assange started a leak outlet on the premise that corrupt and unaccountable power is a problem in our world, and that problem can be fought with the light of truth.

Media Bias on Parade             The Government is Not Us

Encryption foes in Washington won't give up

fromReason: Government officials keep trying to make us expose our data to them—and the criminals who ride on their coattails.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

Airport chaos looms with 181 MILLION Americans needing new IDs to travel

fromDailyMail: Most American travelers will need to apply for a new ID because two thirds of 276 million state driver's licenses do not comply with a security law.

Regulation Nation

The Feds' bulk collection of our data records has been expensive and useless

fromReason: But, it won't stop because it is a necessary precursor to a police state.
Police State America               Government is Watching Every Move You Make

November 25, 2019

When the villain is Obama, not Trump, news suddenly becomes not worth reporting

fromNYPost: Using, or ignoring, facts in accordance with whether they create the desired impression is the principal agenda of today’s media.

Media Bias on Parade

Roger Stone, convicted for bragging

fromTownhall: The lesson learned is if you are a high-level Trump supporter, you can expect the Deep State to come after you. The left is sending a message to Trump supporters to beware of helping him in 2020.

Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption           Justice is a Result, Not Just a Process

Giving government vast snooping authority is one thing Democrats and Republicans both like

fromReason: They simply disagree over who should be in charge of misusing and abusing those excessive powers.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

VIDEO: Ayn Rand - The Proper Role of the Press

fromLibertyPen/YouTube: More relevant today than ever.

Media Bias on Parade

In Virginia, and elsewhere, gun supporters prepare to defy new laws

fromMSN: The concept is modeled after the “sanctuary city” stance that some localities have taken in response to federal immigration enforcement efforts.

2nd Amendment Assaults

Vaping panic ignores how e-cigarettes save lives

fromReason: H.L. Mencken defined Puritanism as "the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." The rub against vaping, and other smokeless tobacco products, is that people enjoy it.

Regulation Nation

October 21, 2019

FISA court ruled that FBI improperly used NSA surveillance data to snoop on Americans

fromNola.com:  In 2017 alone, the FBI conducted over 3.1 million searches of surveillance data

Government is Watching Every Move You Make

A New Orleans man faced a felony marijuana charge; too many potential jurors wouldn't consider it

fromNola.com: Jury nullification. Learn it, love it, live it.

Justice is a Result, Not Just a Process

The late great state of California

fromMisesInstitute: Are people leaving California? More people are out-migrating to other states than those coming in, but much of that was offset by international migrants resulting in a net population loss of only 38,000 (2018).

The Government is Not Us

Tulsi Gabbard: Canary in the Democratic coal mine

fromAmericanSpectator: The imminent demise of her presidential campaign portends disaster for her party.

Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption

Walter E Williams - Intolerance in academia

fromCreators: There's nothing better than the sounds of pocketbooks snapping shut to bring a bit of sanity to college administrators.

Political Correctness and Other Nitwittery

Mentions of government as top U.S. problem near record high

fromGallup: "Government," which includes negative comments about leadership and politicians, has been the top problem in 31 of Gallup's 34 readings since January 2017.

The Government is Not Us

June 24, 2019

House votes down amendment to ban warrantless spying on Americans

fromDigitalJournal: The Charlatans, who are SO quick to swear on the Bible that they will support and defend the Constitution of the United States, have just effectively repealed the Fourth Amendment.

Government is Watching Every Move You Make           The Government is Not Us

Warrantless arrest and the role of probable cause

fromSearchLight: “Probable cause” are a powerful words for police officers, but that doesn't mean they can arrest a person on a hunch. Although there need not be absolute certainty, there must be more than mere suspicion.

Individual Liberty: America's First Principle

The Jackboots are coming: Mass arrests, power grabs and the politics of fear

fromTheRutherfordInstitute: How do you persuade a populace to embrace totalitarianism, that goose-stepping form of tyranny in which the government has all of the power and “we the people” have none?

Police State America           The Government is Not Us

Sanders-Ocasio-Cortez plan to cap credit card interest rates will backfire on consumers

fromUSAToday: The effective elimination of usury ceilings transformed the credit card market, as many previously-excluded consumers gained access to credit cards for the first time.

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Apparently, Bernie Sanders doesn't know the difference between revenue and profit

fromReason: Has AOC become contagious?

Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market

Media freedom is almost over. Only one thing can save Julian Assange from dying in prison

fromTheCanary: And that’s if public opinion doesn’t stand for it.
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle      The Government is Not Us      Indoctrination and Censorship