Daily Articles

Forgotten Lessons from the D.C. Sniper Rampage

by James Bovard April 26, 2012

A decade ago, the Washington, D.C., area was traumatized by two guys who rode around shooting people from the trunk of their ancient Chevrolet Caprice. John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo have long since been convicted, and Muhammad was executed for the killings. But the media’s reaction to the official follies during that time should remind Americans to ...

An Echo, Not a Choice

by Sheldon Richman April 26, 2012

With Mitt Romney’s sweep of Tuesday’s primaries, he will almost certainly be President Barack Obama’s Republican opponent in November. Romney has vowed to make the economy the chief issue against Obama, and he is sure to portray the president as an enemy of free enterprise in order to draw a contrast with himself. How fit is Romney’s claim to ...

The Road to the Permanent Warfare State, Part 12

by Gregory Bresiger April 26, 2012

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 |Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 |Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 |Part 12 |Part 13 There has never been a just one, never an honorable one ...

The Right to Refuse Service

by Laurence M. Vance April 25, 2012

Back in 1994, the restaurant chain Denny’s settled a class-action racial-discrimination lawsuit for $54.4 million. Although the restaurant is known for always being open and serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner at any time, day or night, black patrons alleged that they had been refused service, forced to wait longer than white customers, charged more than white customers, and asked ...

The Death of All Banking Freedom?

by Wendy McElroy April 24, 2012

Last week, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) extended its reach and tightened its grip on every cent Americans earn or try to preserve anywhere in the world. The final regulations of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) were announced. Enacted in March 2010 as part of the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act, FATCA seeks to have foreign ...

RT Russia Today: U.S. Funds Military Dictatorship in Egypt (video)

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 24, 2012

In Egypt, up to a hundred thousand demonstrators have again engulfed Cairo's Tahrir Square to protest against the ruling military council. The rally involves supporters from opposite ends of the political spectrum, with secular activists rubbing shoulders with Islamists - joined in a common cause. For more on this, and the wider picture in Egypt, ...

Olive Schreiner, Born Branded and Too Soon

by Wendy McElroy April 21, 2012

Olive Emilie Albertina Schreiner (March 24, 1855 – December 11, 1920) lived with rare courage in a world where women were born into acquiescence. As the daughter of British missionaries to South Africa, she was also born into Empire, the Victorian Era, and racism. At the age of 18, Schreiner spoke with a native black woman who made an ...

Obamacare and Unlimited Government

by Tim Kelly April 20, 2012

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, or “Obamacare,” has undergone oral arguments before the Supreme Court, and its constitutionality is now being pondered by the nine justices. The court’s decision is due out sometime in June. While the 2010 health-care law is atrocious public policy and clearly an unconstitutional power grab by the federal government, there is no guarantee ...

Open Societies and Spontaneous Orders

by Richard M. Ebeling April 20, 2012

Popper, Hayek and the Open Society by Calvin Hayes (London/New York: Routledge, 2009); 284 pages. Friedrich A. Hayek and Karl Popper were two of the most influential and internationally recognized critics of totalitarian collectivism in the 20th century. Hayek’s Road to Serfdom (1944) and Popper’s Open Society and Its Enemies (1945) helped change the intellectual climate at a time when ...

Supremacy of the Tenth

by Rich Schwartzman April 19, 2012

There’s been a small debate going on in the Pennsylvania legislature, one that should be larger, louder, and receiving much more publicity. It’s a debate between proponents of the Tenth Amendment and advocates of the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. At issue is a proposed amendment to resolution H.R. 49. The resolution claims that the state has sovereignty under the ...

The Torture Trials at Guantánamo

by Andy Worthington April 19, 2012

In the last few weeks, Guantánamo has been under the spotlight as, for the first time since Barack Obama took office, the military-commission trial system — the government’s preferred method for trying terror suspects held in Guantánamo — has been readied for trying “high-value detainees,” i.e., those who, as well as being held in Guantánamo, were previously

The Regulatory State Gone Wild

by Laurence M. Vance April 18, 2012

According to a new Heritage Foundation report, “Red Tape Rising: Obama-Era Regulation at the Three-Year Mark,” during the first three years of the Obama administration “a total of 106 new major regulations have been imposed at a cost of more than $46 billion annually, and nearly $11 billion in one-time implementation costs.” All told, some 10,215 new federal ...