Daily Articles

The Calling: The Importance of Assuming Self-Interested Politicians

by Steven Horwitz January 17, 2013

With the death last week of Nobel laureate economist James Buchanan, the freedom movement has lost one of its most important thinkers. Unfortunately, Buchanan’s work often gets boiled down to the seemingly trivial observation that politicians are self-interested. Put that way, it’s too easy for people to respond, “Everyone knows that!” Although it’s true that the assumption of self-interested politicians ...

Pork-Barrel Spending: The History of Lipsticking Pigs

by Wendy McElroy January 17, 2013

A December 15, 2012, headline in the New York Post declared, “Obama Sandy Aid Bill Filled with Holiday Goodies Unrelated to Storm Damage.” The announced purpose of the $60.4 billion bill was to provide disaster aid to East Coast individuals and communities devastated by Hurricane Sandy. Instead, the bill was so laden with unrelated and politically inspired handouts ...

Republicans versus the Constitution

by Laurence M. Vance January 16, 2013

The new Congress, the nation’s 113th, was officially sworn in at 2:09 p.m. on January 4. The Republicans lost two seats in the Senate, giving the Democrats an even larger majority of 53 to 45 (plus the two Independents, who will caucus with the Democrats), and 7 in the House, where they hold a smaller majority than before of ...

The Hagel Brouhaha

by Sheldon Richman January 14, 2013

Washington is going through one of its regular melodramas with President Obama’s nomination of former senator Chuck Hagel as secretary of defense. (In light of America’s foreign policy, this is a title worthy of George Orwell; the position should be renamed the “secretary of war.”) To Hagel’s credit, he has the proper enemies on the right. Neoconservative advocates of perpetual ...

Let Them Make Cake

by Scott McPherson January 14, 2013

In times gone by the ability of individuals to improve their lives and the lives of those around them depended on largesse, often conferred by royalty. Patents and monopolies were the product of royal favor, and there were prohibitions against anyone aside from the chosen few entering into certain trades. Improving one’s standard of living was not a matter ...

The Jacob Hornberger Show: January 13, 2013 (video)

by Jacob G. Hornberger January 14, 2013

TGIF: James M. Buchanan and Spontaneous Order

by Sheldon Richman January 11, 2013

On Wednesday, Nobel laureate James M. Buchanan of George Mason University died at the age of 93. Best known for his pioneering work in Public Choice — or “politics without romance,” as he described it — and constitutional economics as a way to limit government power, he also made important contributions to subjectivist economics. His ...

Eleven Years of Guantánamo: End This Scandal Now!

by Andy Worthington January 11, 2013

Eleven years ago, on January 11, 2002, the Bush administration proudly presented to the world one of its major responses to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 — a prison on the grounds of the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, designed to hold hundreds of men and boys seized in the “war on terror” that was ...

The Plunder Continues

by Tim Kelly January 11, 2013

It was clear the fix was in the moment the term “fiscal cliff” was coined to describe the series of spending cuts and tax increases that were set to kick in on January 1, 2013. The American people were told in 2011 that the debt ceiling needed to be raised again to avert an outright default on the national debt. ...

Republicans and the Debt Limit

by Laurence M. Vance January 10, 2013

It’s official: The U. S. government has reached its debt limit. According to the Daily Treasury Statement for December 31, 2012, total public debt increased to $16.432 trillion, exceeding the debt limit of $16.394 trillion. The debt subject to limit, $16.393 trillion, was about as close as it could get without going over. This is a far cry ...

His Majesty Obama and the Debt Ceiling

by Wendy McElroy January 10, 2013

President Obama may be poised to claim an unprecedented executive power. Or not. It depends on whether you credit official denials from White House Press Secretary Jay Carney or public statements from high-ranking Democrats. The monarchical power in question is the ability to raise the debt ceiling at will. It involves bypassing the House of Representatives, which currently has ...

Where Guns Are Outlawed, School Attackers Use Cars and Knives

by Michael Tennant January 8, 2013

In the days since the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, many in the media and government have asserted that the only way to prevent such attacks in the future is to prohibit persons from being able to purchase guns. So what are we to make of the fact that on Christmas Eve a man attacked a group ...