Freedom Daily Archive

Unlibertarian Libertarianism

by Laurence M. Vance December 1, 2019

Just like liberals, conservatives, progressives, populists, and constitutionalists — but certainly not as bad — libertarians are not always consistent when it comes to libertarianism. In fact, what some libertarians propose is unlibertarian libertarianism. Libertarianism Libertarianism is the philosophy that says that people should be free from individual, societal, or government interference to live their lives any way they desire, pursue ...

Understanding the Freedom We Have Lost

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 2019

Few people can really understand what life is like in a totalitarian state unless they have lived there or have had the opportunity to visit such a society for an extended period of time. For most Americans it seems like an impenetrable world that is not easily comprehended. How can you imagine living in a society with virtually none ...

The Long Shadow of World War I and America’s War on Dissent, Part 1

by Danny Sjursen December 1, 2019

Part 2 “War is the health of the state.” So said the eerily prescient and uncompromising anti-war radical Randolph Bourne in the very midst of what Europeans called the Great War, a nihilistic conflict that eventually consumed the lives of at least 9 million soldiers, including some 50,000 Americans. He meant, ultimately, that wars — especially foreign wars — ...

A Limited-Government Republic versus a National-Security State

by Jacob G. Hornberger November 1, 2019

The worst mistake that the American people have made in the entire history of the United States was to permit the conversion of the federal government to a national-security state. That conversion has played a major role in the diminishment of limited government and the destruction of our liberty, privacy, and economic well-being. What is a national-security state? It ...

Banning Guns Will Not Make Schools Safe

by James Bovard November 1, 2019

School shootings have become the latest pretext for politicians to destroy the Second Amendment. Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana, declared in a Democratic presidential candidates’ debate, “I was part of the first generation that saw routine school shootings. We have now produced the second school-shooting generation in this country. We dare not allow there to be a ...

Why I Am So Passionate about Ending the Drug War

by Laurence M. Vance November 1, 2019

Since 2009, I have written about ninety articles on the subject of the drug war, many of them for the Future of Freedom Foundation, and some of them for this very publication. I have maintained throughout these articles that the war on drugs is a monstrous evil that has ruined more lives than drugs themselves; that the war on ...

Examples of Dedication to Freedom

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 2019

When Austrian economist Friedrich A. Hayek (1899–1992) wrote his famous book The Road to Serfdom (1944) in the midst of the Second World War, he mentioned in the preface that he had often been told by his socialist colleagues that he would, no doubt, hold an important position in a future planned society, if only he would come around ...

The Roots of Mass Incarceration

by Michael Swanson November 1, 2019

From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime: The Making of Mass Incarceration in America by Elizabeth Hinton (Harvard University Press, 2016), 449 pages. Before the war on the drugs there was the war on crime. In 1975 the police department of Washington, D.C., launched “Operation Sting” in partnership with the FBI and the ...

The Destruction of American Liberty

by Jacob G. Hornberger October 1, 2019

The terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, were a watershed event for the United States, not only because of the large death toll and property destruction but, more important, because they spelled the death knell for American liberty. Americans had already lost a large portion of their freedom when the federal government ...

The “Officer Friendly” Police Fantasy

by James Bovard October 1, 2019

Police in Tempe, Arizona, announced plans in July for a “positive ticketing” campaign to pull over drivers who had violated no traffic laws. A Phoenix TV station reported that the police would give the people they targeted free soft-drink coupons for Circle K as a reward for their “good driving behavior.” Police in other areas have run similar programs ...

Monsters and U.S. Foreign Policy

by Laurence M. Vance October 1, 2019

It looks like the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity will be having some competition. The formation of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft was recently announced. The think tank gets its name from John Quincy Adams. According to the organization’s website, The Quincy Institute promotes ideas that move U.S. foreign policy away from endless war and toward vigorous diplomacy ...

Habits of the Heart and Character of Mind

by Richard M. Ebeling October 1, 2019

In American election cycles all of the possible candidates for government office of both major political parties assure those who may vote for them in primaries and the general election that they are voices for the real or true “American values.” Voting for them is voting for what America has been, is, or should be all about. But what ...