Blame Government for the Vaccine Shortage by Sheldon Richman October 27, 2004 We now know that when the government tries to suppress the production of a drug, say, heroin, supplies nevertheless remain plentiful. Yet when the government tries to guarantee production of a drug, say, flu vaccine, supplies can run short, endangering the people most vulnerable to disease. Thats government for you. The government, especially the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), interferes ...
The Iraq War Has Made Us neither Safer nor Freer by Jacob G. Hornberger October 25, 2004 In determining whether the invasion of Iraq has been in the interests of America, two questions naturally arise: One, has the invasion made Americans safer from terrorism? and Two, has the invasion made Americans freer with respect to their own government? When the 9/11 attacks occurred, Americans were horribly angry, despite the ...
Does John Ashcroft Understand the Constitution? by Jacob G. Hornberger October 22, 2004 Learning that the U.S. Supreme Court had upheld the rights of habeas corpus, right to counsel, and due process of law in the Yaser Hamdi, Jose Padilla, and Shafiq Rasul cases, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft commented, “The Supreme Court accorded to terrorists, in a variety of cases this ...
Men Without a Country by James Castagnera October 22, 2004 A 19th-century writer, Edward Everett Hale, once published a story called “The Man without a Country.” The protagonist is Philip Nolan, a young U.S. Army officer who unwisely deserted to join the ill-fated effort of Aaron Burr to establish an independent empire west of the Mississippi. In Hale’s ...
Field of (Bad) Dreams by Samuel Bostaph October 20, 2004 Washington, D.C., will soon begin construction of a new taxpayer-funded baseball stadium at an estimated cost of $400 million, give or take $50 million. Thirty-three years after the Washington Senators left town to become the Texas Rangers, a majority vote of the D.C. city council will fill the vacancy by ...
Honor the Country by Distrusting the Government by Sheldon Richman October 18, 2004 President Bush and his supporters base their case for his reelection ultimately on an appeal for trust. Bush asks us to trust that he acted in good faith when he invaded Iraq, even though the intelligence now looks bad. He asks us to trust his strategy for domestic security, even ...
The Welfare State Rewards Liars by Sheldon Richman October 18, 2004 Many bad things can be said about the welfare state the political arrangement, as the 19th-century French liberal Frdric Bastiat wrote, by which everyone seeks to live at the expense of everyone else. But one largely unnoticed feature is that it rewards people for suspending their moral sense. Frankly, it makes winners out of liars. How so? If it is ...
How Conservative Is George W. Bush? by Anthony Gregory October 13, 2004 Given that so many conservatives have come out in favor of George W. Bush, who supposedly isnt as bad as John Kerry, an important question arises: Exactly how conservative is George W. Bush? Bush has expanded the welfare state and increased discretionary spending at a faster rate than any president since ...
Kerry Doesn’t Know What a Right Is by Sheldon Richman October 13, 2004 Not that this disqualifies him from being president, but Senator John F. Kerry proved in Fridays debate that he misunderstands Americas founding philosophy and the U.S. Constitution. (If that disqualified someone from being president, few would qualify.) Kerry showed his ignorance when asked why someone who regards abortion as murder should be forced to pay for it. Regardless of ones ...
No WMD but Plenty of Death and Destruction by Jacob G. Hornberger October 8, 2004 President George W. Bush’s handpicked investigator charged with investigating whether there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has now rendered his final report: There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Period. No stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons. No nuclear weapons. No factories ...
The No-Fault No-Fly List: Washington’s Most Irresponsible Agency Strikes Again by James Bovard October 8, 2004 The Transportation Security Administration got another black eye recently when Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) revealed that he had been blocked from flying five times because his name triggered an alarm on the feds’ No-Fly list. Kennedy’s staff had to make multiple calls to high-ranking federal officials before the attempted travel ban was lifted on ...
Bush’s Brave New World by Sheldon Richman October 6, 2004 President Bush’s little-publicized New Freedom Commission on Mental Health has proposed comprehensive mental-illness screening for all Americans. If this proposal is carried out, which is Bush’s intention, no adult or child will be safe from intrusive probing by “experts,” backed by drug companies, who believe that mental illness ...