Daily Articles

Outsourcing Torture

by Sheldon Richman September 29, 2006

If you want to see the bare essence of the Bush administration, behold its policy of “rendition.” The innocuous-sounding word signifies a policy under which American officials send terrorist suspects — detainees never convicted of crimes — to countries where they will be tortured, keeping the U.S. government’s hands clean of the monstrous treatment. Can ...

Decimating the Constitution with Military Tribunals

by Jacob G. Hornberger September 27, 2006

Given all the glorification being bestowed on three U.S. senators for displaying “principle” in standing against President Bush’s plan to amend the Geneva Convention to permit torture of detainees, followed by their quick compromise abandoning any semblance of principle, it is easy to lose sight of something much bigger: The military tribunals that the ...

The United States of Barbarism

by James Bovard September 25, 2006

The U.S. Senate is cutting a deal with President Bush to make America a banana republic. Last week, three senators reached an agreement with the White House that will de facto permit the CIA to continue torturing people around the world. And the deal will prevent anyone — including Bush administration officials — from being ...

No Immigration Trouble at the Check-Out Counter

by Scott McPherson September 22, 2006

To hear anti-immigrant types and their spokesmen tell it, any intelligent American only needs to look around to see all the trouble that immigrants cause us. A heterogeneous society just won’t work, they say. Too many problems with language differences and clashing cultures. And then there’s the burden on the ...

What Crisis?

by Scott McPherson September 18, 2006

According to the Washington Post, there’s a new crisis brewing in American health care. Not one related to rising costs, substandard service, rationing of services, or any other problem stemming from government’s micro-management of the health-care field, but rather one involving an alleged conflict of consciences. A story in the July 16 issue of ...

Bush’s Evasion

by Sheldon Richman September 15, 2006

Five years after 9/11, as things increasingly sour in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush’s public appearances get increasingly more pathetic. During Bush’s August news conference a persistent reporter wouldn’t let him get away with his claim that Iraq is the central front on the so-called war on terror. “What did Iraq ...

A Real Free Market Benefits Workers

by Sheldon Richman September 6, 2006

Hands are wringing over bleak reports that despite increased productivity, workers are falling behind: real median income — adjusted for government-caused inflation — is said to be falling. Meanwhile, corporate profits are skyrocketing, and the wealthiest are doing fine. In other words, the benefits of economic growth are said to ...

The Federal War on Gold, Part 2

by Jacob G. Hornberger September 1, 2006

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt revolutionized the monetary system of the United States and set the nation on the road of inflationary plunder that has characterized other nations in history. The actions of these two presidents also provide a textbook example for understanding the animosity and antipathy that ...

Beware Income-Tax Casuistry, Part 2

by Sheldon Richman September 1, 2006

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 The United States got its first income tax during the War Between the States, again demonstrating that war harms ordinary people in more ways than militarily. During any war government becomes an especially voracious consumer of the people’s resources and dissent is stifled or suppressed. So it is ...

Hidden Government

by Sheldon Richman September 1, 2006

Americans pride themselves on “self-government.” But when significant policies are undertaken without their notice, much less consent, self-government is a cruel hoax. Reporting by Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker and other sources indicate that the Bush administration actively helped the Israeli government plan an attack on Lebanon. When it ...

The Perils of Emergency Power

by James Bovard September 1, 2006

The New York Times reported on June 23 that President Bush invoked the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to justify warrantless searches of Americans and other peoples financial data. According to Treasury Undersecretary Stuart Levey, the U.S. government may have conducted hundreds of thousands of warrantless searches of Americans and others personal financial data. The Bush administration used broad ...

The New Deal and Roosevelt’s Seizure of Gold: A Legacy of Theft and Inflation, Part 2

by William L. Anderson September 1, 2006

Part 1 | Part 2 The monetary system of the United States at the time of the Depression could not sustain inflation very long because the country was on a gold standard. If people sensed that the government was printing too many paper dollars, by law they could redeem those dollars from the government’s store of gold. Moreover, ...