Daily Articles

CAPSULE COMMENTARY: “Republicans Sell Principles”

by Jacob G. Hornberger August 1, 2000

"Republicans have once again showed their hypocritical, compromising stripes. Republican House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert has written a letter to President Clinton offering his full support for a one-dollar increase in the minimum wage, a government program that every reputable economist recognizes renders an economic attack against those at the ...

Electing Our Daddy

by Jacob G. Hornberger August 1, 2000

With the presidential campaign season upon us, one cannot help but ask whether we are electing a president ... or a daddy. After all, both George W. Bush and Al Gore are promising to take care of us in most aspects of our lives and even to make us more caring and compassionate ...

No One Is Qualified to be President

by Sheldon Richman August 1, 2000

The Democrats' chief argument against George W. Bush is that he's not qualified to be president. They're right He's not qualified. But neither is Al Gore. Or Dick Cheney. Or Joseph Lieberman. No one is qualified to be president. No one. This is not a statement born of cynicism. It's cold fact. How ...

How the State Became Immaculate, Part 1

by James Bovard August 1, 2000

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 The founding fathers took a dim view of claims of the unlimited beneficence of government. George Washington declared, “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence — it is force.” John Adams wrote in 1772: “There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free ...

Ambush at the Border

by James Bovard August 1, 2000

More Americans than ever before are traveling abroad this summer. Yet few people realize the rude surprises they could face upon returning to America. The Customs Service has become one of the nation's most intrusive, abusive agencies and the average traveler is at the feds' mercy. You might think that you ...

The Black Hole of Higher Education

by George Leef August 1, 2000

ONE OF THE GREAT growth industries in America in the second half of the 20th century was higher education. Prior to World War II, there were only 1.5 million students enrolled in some 1,700 colleges and universities. Spending per student was about $450. By the late 1990s, the student population had grown to 14.4 million ...

Crime Creation

by Richard O. Rowland August 1, 2000

THE HAWAII TAX on cigarettes is the highest in the nation; $1 per package, $10 per carton. That’s after the federal government applies its tax. If you want to display your protest to a mindless drivel of government laws and rules, one way to do it is to smoke. So, cigarette smoking is appealing to teenagers, many of whom are ...

Book Review: From Subsistence to Exchange and Other Essays

by Richard M. Ebeling August 1, 2000

From Subsistence to Exchange and Other Essays by Peter Bauer (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000); 153 pages; $24.95. FREE-MARKET ECONOMIST Peter T. Bauer is 85 years old this year. During the 55 years since the end of the Second World War, Bauer has been one of the most articulate and insightful critics of economic planning and government intervention in the ...

Lynching

by Sheldon Richman August 1, 2000

The most refreshing reporter on television, ABC's John Stossel, is the target of nothing less than the modern equivalent of a lynching. Stossel is the popular investigative reporter who focuses on scientifically dubious consumerism and environmentalism. On a recent 20/20 segment he took up -- and debunked -- the ...

Sighting in the Second Amendment

by Jacob G. Hornberger July 1, 2000

WE SHOULD NOT let the hoopla associated with the Million Mom March cause us to lose sight of the real purpose and meaning behind the Second Amendment: the ability to protect ourselves from the tyranny of our own government. Virtually all the arguments in the gun-control debate have revolved around gun violence in American society. The proponents of registration, licensing, ...

CAPSULE COMMENTARY: “The I.R.S. Stealeth, Clinton Giveth”

by Jacob G. Hornberger July 1, 2000

"President Clinton has announced that he is giving $78 million to Ukraine to help close the Chernobyl nuclear reactor. At about the same time, a study by Syracuse University disclosed that the Internal Revenue Service is cracking down on lowest-paid Americans. Is there a relationship? Well, the U.S. government does not ...

CAPSULE COMMENTARY: “Cuban Baseball Star Escapes Again”

by Jacob G. Hornberger July 1, 2000

"Several weeks ago, the U.S. government captured 25-year-old Cuban baseball star Andy Morales and 30 other Cuban refugees on the high seas and forcibly repatriated them to Cuba. After his return, Cuban government gendarmes closely followed him, harassed him, and beat him up. So, what did Morales do? What any ...