Daily Articles

Why Does NPR Still Exist?

by Laurence M. Vance April 14, 2023

One of the hallmarks of authoritarian countries is that the media is state-run or under the direct supervision or control of the government. The Xinhua News Agency is the official state news agency in China. Al-Akhbar, Al-Ahram, and Al-Gomhuriya are state-owned national newspapers in Egypt. Cuba prohibits privately owned media. According to Reporters Without Borders, China, Egypt, and ...

The Government Is Fomenting Mass Hysteria

by John W. Whitehead April 6, 2023

“This country has been having a nationwide nervous breakdown since 9/11. A nation of people suddenly broke, the market economy goes to shit, and they’re threatened on every side by an unknown, sinister enemy. But I don't think fear is a very effective way of dealing with things—of responding to reality. Fear is just another word ...

What Republicans Aren’t Saying about Food Stamps

by Laurence M. Vance April 4, 2023

According to Democrats and their allies at progressive and liberal outlets, millions of Americans are going to go to bed hungry or starving to death because the extra food-stamp benefits they were receiving because of the “pandemic” ended last month. Now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the food-stamp program is a federal program administered by ...

From Immigrant to Public Intellectual

by Robert E. Wright April 3, 2023

In 1995, a reviewer called Murray Sabrin a “libertarian hero” due to the perspicacity of Murray’s first book, Tax-Free 2000: The Rebirth of American Liberty. Two years later, Murray became the first third-party candidate in New Jersey history to raise enough funds to be able to debate the two "major party" candidates for governor. How did Murray, ...

The Origins of U.S. Monetary Debauchery

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 1, 2023

One of the unsung heroes in American history was a prominent New York City lawyer named Frederick Barber Campbell. Campbell graduated from Harvard Law School in 1894 and was a partner in the law firm of Campbell and Whipp. Its offices were located at 20 Exchange Place, which was in the middle of the Wall Street area of the ...

World Economic Forum Wants to Make You a Serf

by James Bovard April 1, 2023

The January meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, should have set off alarms among freedom lovers around the globe. The annual confab of billionaires, political weasels, and deranged activists laid out plans to further repress humanity. But at least the gathering provided plenty of comic relief for people who enjoy elite buffoonery. Self-worship is obligatory in ...

America’s Comeback

by Laurence M. Vance April 1, 2023

When most Americans hear the word comeback, they immediately think of sports. Whether it is football, basketball, golf, baseball, boxing, or hockey — Americans love a comeback. Like in 2019, when Tiger Woods won the Masters — his first Majors win in 11 years. Like in 2016, when the Chicago Cubs finished the ...

Philip Wicksteed on the Common Sense of Choice and the Market Process

by Richard M. Ebeling April 1, 2023

The British economist Philip H. Wicksteed began his most important work, The Common Sense of Political Economy (1910), with a motto taken from the famous German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832): “We all live it, but few of us know what we are living.” Contrary to the classical economists, who had argued that the market value of things was ...

Circus Politics Are Intended to Distract Us. Don’t Be Distracted

by John W. Whitehead March 30, 2023

“There is nothing more dangerous than a government of the many controlled by the few.” — Lawrence Lessig, Harvard law professor It is easy to be distracted right now by the bread and circus politics that have dominated the news headlines lately, but don’t be distracted. Don’t be fooled, not even a little. We’re being subjected to the oldest con game in ...

Oversight of Billions for Ukraine Is Not What Is Needed

by Laurence M. Vance March 21, 2023

In an interview with ABC News last month, after it was noted that U.S. aid to Ukraine now totals at least $113 billion, President Joe Biden was told that “many” Americans were asking, “How long can we spend like this?” His response was to first question the number of Americans ...

Geofence Surveillance: First, They Spied on Protesters. Then Churches. You’re Next

by John W. Whitehead March 16, 2023

“I know the capability that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision, so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return.”—Senator Frank Church on Meet ...

The Right to Be Let Alone: When the Government Wants to Know All Your Business

by John W. Whitehead March 10, 2023

“Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government’s purposes are beneficent.”—Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis There was a time when the census was just a head count. That is no longer the case. The American Community Survey (ACS), sent to about 3.5 million homes every year, is the byproduct of a government that ...