Daily Articles

Declare War before Waging War, Part 2

by Doug Bandow February 1, 2002

Part 1 | Part 2 Naturally, presidents and their aides have been creative in coming up with reasons to short-circuit the Constitution’s clear requirement. Those who thus torture the Constitution include many conservatives who normally proclaim the importance of “original intent. ” Except when they want to empower politicians to do what they want. One ...

Did the Founders of the Constitution Forget the Bill of Rights?

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 1, 2002

After the Constitution was ratified in 1788, the states adopted the first ten amendments, which became known as the Bill of Rights. Given the importance of the provisions in those amendments, an obvious question arises: Why didn't the Framers of the Constitution include those provisions in the original Constitution, thereby obviating the ...

Government Needs to Lose Weight

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 2002

How ironic that just as an already-bloated government is taking on major new powers, it is exhorting us to lose weight. But that’s exactly what Surgeon General David Satcher is calling for. In his recently released “Call To Action To Prevent and Decrease Overweight and Obesity,” Satcher writes, “Our ...

What the Enron Bankruptcy Doesn’t Mean

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 2002

A big company fails, maybe even commits wrongdoing, and in some people’s eyes that proves free markets are bad. This is what passes for logic these days. The full story on Enron is not known yet. But for the sake of discussion, let’s assume the worst: namely, that company management deliberately ...

Regulation Gave Us the Enron Scandal

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 2002

When pundits and politicians say the Enron scandal demonstrates the need for federal regulation of business, you have to be a little suspicious. They think everything demonstrates the need for federal regulation of business. It’s a reflex, that’s all. What seems to have been forgotten in all the blather about ...

FDR’s New Deal Legacy Is the Life of the Lie

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 1, 2002

The change that took place in the United States in the 1930s and 1940s was as remarkable as the Russian Revolution which had taken place decades before. Through his domestic and international New Deal philosophy and programs, President Franklin D. Roosevelt revolutionized the political and economic system of the United States. It is ...

Anti-Dumping Laws

by Robert W. McGee February 1, 2002

ANTI-DUMPING LAWS have been with us since the early decades of the 20th century. Ostensibly aimed at preventing unfair trade practices, they have in recent decades been used mostly to punish foreign producers for offering their products to domestic consumers at low prices. Rather than being used to protect the public (from low prices), they have been used to ...

Book Review: The Race to the Top

by Richard M. Ebeling February 1, 2002

The Race to the Top: The Real Story of Globalization by Tomas Larsson (Washington, D.C.: Cato Institute, 2001); 164 pages; $18.95. “Globalism” has become the new, fashionable catchword for a process that has been developing with increasing intensity for more than 200 years — the internationalization of the division of labor. Of course, in one sense, international trade is as old as ...

An Astounding Remark

by Sheldon Richman January 20, 2002

When Attorney General John Ashcroft told the nation, "To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists," he wasn't blazing any new trails. He was merely doing what despots and would-be despots always do: attempting to intimidate into silence those who dare to question ...

The Bill of Rights at Work

by Jacob G. Hornberger January 15, 2002

The unfolding developments in the John Walker Lindh case and the Guantanamo "detainees" situation reflect why Americans should be so grateful to our early ancestors for demanding the first ten amendments to the Constitution as a condition of adopting the Constitution. Recall that there was tremendous resistance among the several states to the adoption of the ...

Curing the Political Disease of Terrorism

by Jacob G. Hornberger January 12, 2002

Since the U.S. government's bombing of Afghanistan has failed to bring Osama bin Laden to justice "dead or alive," the U.S. government has now decided to permanently extend its empire to that part of the world. Moreover, the bombing has killed thousands of innocent civilians, whose surviving friends and family members now have the incentive ...

Protecting Our Way of Life?

by Sheldon Richman January 10, 2002

Even when responding to a monstrous and unjustifiable provocation such as September 11, the U.S. government threatens our liberty. We have much to fear from the power in Washington. At least Osama bin Laden never says he has our interests at heart. We can't be lulled into trusting him. Not so with the U.S. government. It ...