Daily Articles

Bush at War

by James Bovard May 1, 2003

This article was posted March 5, 2003. Bob Woodward, the famed Watergate investigator and now a senior editor at the Washington Post, was granted unprecedented access to George W. Bush and to some of the top players in his administration in the wake of September 11. The result is a new book — ...

Free-Market Environmentalism

by Bart Frazier May 1, 2003

One of the most important lessons that economics teaches is that incentives matter. Economics is not a field that is normally associated with the environmental movement, but the recognition of the importance of incentives has led to a schism in the movement between those environmentalists who turn to the state to protect the environment and those who instead rely ...

Étienne de La Boétie, Part 2

by Wendy McElroy May 1, 2003

Part 1 | Part 2 The beginning of a tyrant’s rule was the most difficult period because those who had not consented to his rule would obey reluctantly, and brute force might be necessary. Brute force could put down dissent in the short term but it was never a good option. Violence bred martyrs, it increased popular resistance against ...

A Historian Looks at Tax Havens

by Charles Adams May 1, 2003

The recent attack on tax havens by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has depicted about 20–30 countries, called tax havens, as destructive of the high tax systems of the world, especially Europe. The OECD argues that its members should gang up on these nations and shut down their financial centers unless ...

Book Review: Bad Neighbor Policy

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 2003

Bad Neighbor Policy: Washington’s Futile War on Drugs in Latin America by Ten Galen Carpenter (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003); 282 pages; $24.95. The U.S. government’s war on drugs has been going on since 1914, when new federal regulations were imposed making many narcotics illegal. Through most of the 19th century, opium and cocaine were obtainable legally from pharmacies with few ...

Building Democracy in Iraq

by Sheldon Richman May 1, 2003

So the Bush administration is going to bring democracy to Iraq. Leaving aside the dubious connection between democracy and freedom (it wasnt Operation Iraqi Democracy), theres a rather large potential problem in realizing that ambition: what if the Iraqis want to do something contrary to the administrations wishes? Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has already declared that the U.S. government ...

Boycott the Boycotters

by Sheldon Richman April 30, 2003

I’m not much for consumer boycotts, but if I were to boycott anyone, it would be those who are calling on Americans to boycott the French. Chief among them is the Fox News Channel’s Bill O’Reilly. Since I already don’t watch his program, I guess I can’t boycott him. ...

What’s Wrong with Looting? It’s the American Way!

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 30, 2003

Responding to the massive looting committed by Iraqis as part of their newly found “freedom,” Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld observed, “Stuff happens. It’s untidy. And freedom’s untidy. And free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things.” The reason for his indifference is simple: ...

U.S. Torture and Mistreatment of POWs and Criminal Suspects

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 28, 2003

Iraqi POW Death Under Scrutiny" CBS News. Rules of War Apply to Us Too, by Robyn E. Blumner St. Petersburg Times. Guantanamo example may hurt POWs, by Ivan Roman Orlando Sentinel. Hypocrisy In U.S. Demands That Call For Respect Of Geneva Conventions Dar Al-Hayat.

A Stupid War

by Scott McPherson April 25, 2003

President Bush and his allies claimed emphatically during the months leading up to the invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein was an evil madman in possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), requiring an immediate preemptive invasion to topple his dictatorial regime and avert a nuclear, biological, or chemical ...

Why Not Send Moussaoui to Havana and Be Done With It?

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 25, 2003

Fidel Castro recently did us the favor of showing how a communist regime wages a “war on terrorism.” Three accused hijackers were captured on the high seas attempting to escape communist tyranny and come to the United States. They were taken into custody, given a trial, and convicted; their appeals were denied, and they were ...

Social Fantasy and Libertarian Reality

by Scott McPherson April 25, 2003

The idea you can bring unskilled people into the country and not impose huge costs on taxpayers is a fallacy. Its a kind of libertarian fantasy. So said Steven A. Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), on the occasion of his organizations releasing a report on the rise in welfare use by immigrants. According to ...