Individualism, Collectivism And Other Murky Labels

by Sheldon Richman.   Imagine the following person. He believes all individuals should be free to do anything that’s peaceful and therefore favors private property, free global markets, freedom of contract, civil liberties, and all the related ideas that come under the label libertarianism (or liberalism). Obviously he is not a statist.    ... MORE

Robert Zubrin: The Green War On Poor

Democrats used to care about poor and working people. In a nearly full-page op-ed appearing in the business section of the August 25 New York Times, Cornell professor Robert H. Frank lays out the new green agenda for tax policy. According to Professor Frank, stopping global warming may require carbon taxes of about $300 per ton of carbon    ... MORE

TSA Denies Stonewalling Nude Body-Scanner Court Order

by David Kravets.    The Transportation Security Administration denied Thursday it was stonewalling a federal appeals court’s year-old decision demanding the agency hold public hearings concerning the so-called nude body scanners installed in U.S. airport security checkpoints. On July 15, 2011, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ... MORE

Robby Soave: Campaign For Obama, Get College Credit

Your tax dollars at work.   A public university in Colorado may have violated state law by offering students course credit if they volunteered with President Obama’s re-election campaign. A blog post on the Adams State University website billed the opportunity as a “12 week long organizing internship for the Obama Campaign.” Both the blog  ... MORE

VIDEO: Milton Friedman - Agriculture Subsidies

Barry Farber: Obama's Mainstreaming Of Marxism

The commies like Barrack. So what? An email came though with the subject line, “Yikes! Look who just endorsed Obama for 4 more years!” I scrambled to get past the tease and into the revelation. I expected the villain would be a prominent Republican governor or mayor or some major conservative having one of those fits that swept Arianna Huffington  ... MORE

John Stossel: Because Prohibition Worked So Well ...

Why to we continue the war on drugs? Forty years ago, the United States locked up fewer than 200 of every 100,000 Americans. Then President Nixon declared war on drugs. Now we lock up more of our people than any other country — more even than the authoritarian regimes in Russia and China. A war on drugs — on people, that is — is unworthy of a    ... MORE 

VIDEO: Understanding Inflation

Katie Kieffer: RINOS Play FarmVille

Farming is a game to RINOS (Republicans In Name Only). But farming is not a game. Not in America. We are the world’s No. 1 exporter of wheat, corn and soybeans. If we mess up, global food prices soar, livestock die, and streets erupt in riots. The GOP is supposed to be the party that “gets” economics. Republicans pride themselves ... MORE

Daren Jonescu: The Last Line Of Defense: Property

The fight for property rights is the fight for reason. "Property is theft." Proudhon's classic anarchist paradox is more than a catchy slogan for international leftism.  It encapsulates a complete and comprehensively absurd view of humanity -- one which finds its contemporary apotheosis in President Obama's more prosaic rendition, "You didn't build that."  ... MORE

James V. DeLong: America's Crisis Of Political Legitimacy

Finding the road back to consent and stability.   The Founders were right to posit that a breakdown of the limits of government would cause a breakdown of consent. Only 22 percent of likely voters say the current government has the consent of the governed. Across many decades, my mind’s eye sees Professor Samuel Beer pacing the   ... MORE

Daniel Greenfield: Why You Will Never Buy A Car Again

Obama cars are coming. If you’ve been waiting around to buy a new car, better hurry up. If Obama gets his way, the only car you will be able to buy will be a small hybrid cube and will cost more than you can afford. The Obama administration has finalized new fuel economy rules that will require the fleet-wide average of new cars and trucks sold in ... MORE

VIDEO: John Stossel - Airport Security Screenings

Thomas Sowell: Entitlement Reform

The young, not the elderly, should be alarmed.  For those of us who like to believe that human beings are rational, trying to explain what happens in politics can be a real challenge. For example, that segment of the population that has the least to fear from a reform of Medicare or Social Security is the most fearful — namely, those already receiving    ... MORE

Stephen Mauzy: Why Free Markets

The best political economy imaginable.    To exchange for greater benefit is as natural to humans as any innate bodily function.  Exchange needn't be taught or explicated.  No inculcation need occur.  It just happens.  A kindergartener exchanges his juice box for another kindergartener's cupcake.  Because of inequality of wants --      ... MORE