Daily Articles

A Libertarian Visits Cuba, Part 1 (of 3)

by Jacob G. Hornberger September 1, 1999

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 Last spring, I spent a most fascinating week in one of the world's last bastions of communism - Cuba. I had applied for a license from the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the U.S. Department of the Treasury to travel to Cuba to conduct an informal study of ...

Time to Curb SWAT Rampages

by James Bovard September 1, 1999

SWAT teams are finally getting some overdue bad press. Usually the SWATers are starring in some TV pseudo-docudrama where they go smashing into someone's home and discover him with a dumb look and a bong. However, people are now beginning to ask questions about the wisdom of the routine use of massive police force. Prof. ...

Monetary Central Planning and the State, Part 33: Murray N. Rothbard and the Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar

by Richard M. Ebeling September 1, 1999

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 | Part 14 | Part 15 ...

Repatriation: The Ugly Side of Immigration Laws

by Jacob G. Hornberger September 1, 1999

Recently, off the shores of Miami, Florida, the American people were exposed to the ugly side of immigration laws-the forcible repatriation of illegal immigrants to their country of origin. Television viewers watched in horror as U.S. Coast Guard officials, using water cannons and pepper spray, attacked Cuban refugees in ...

Group of Odd People

by Sheldon Richman September 1, 1999

What a sorry lot the GOP is. The frontrunner, Gov. George W. Bush, bases his campaign on the slogan "prosperity with a purpose." Pardon me? I have no idea what that means, but I don't like the sound of it. A president of the United States, and the irants ...

Justice, Not Compassion

by Sheldon Richman September 1, 1999

If the 2000 presidential race continues as it has begun, we might all best take a long nap and wake up when it's over. It might be so insipid that we could all suffer a terminal case of boredom. How many of us are looking forward to a year and a ...

Parity: Bureaucratic Tyranny by Moral Fraud

by James Bovard September 1, 1999

The word "fairness" sometimes has the same mesmerizing effect upon people's critical faculties that the phrase "divine right" had a few centuries ago. Modern morality is based on "push-button fairness": the government announces a new regulation, enforcers twist arms, and — voilà! — fairness triumphs. The vast expansion of ...

Child Labor and the British Industrial Revolution, Part 1

by Lawrence W. Reed September 1, 1999

Part 1 | Part 2 Everyone agrees that in the 100 years between 1750 and 1850 there took place in Great Britain profound economic changes. It was the age of the Industrial Revolution, complete with a cascade of technical innovations, a vast increase in industrial production, a renaissance of world trade, and a rapid growth of urban populations. Where historians ...

The Power of Truth

by Leo N. Tolstoy September 1, 1999

The power of the government is maintained by public opinion, and with this power the government, by means of its organs — its officials, law courts, schools, churches, even the press — can always maintain the public opinion which they need. Public opinion produces the power, and the power produces public opinion. And there appears ...

Book Review: Property and Freedom

by Richard M. Ebeling September 1, 1999

Property and Freedom by Richard Pipes (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999); 328pages; $30. In his 1848 treatise, The Principles of Political Economy, John Stuart Mill stated: "The laws and conditions of the production of wealth partake of the character of physical laws. There is nothing optional or arbitrary in them.... It is not so with the distribution of ...

Exploiting JFK Jr.’s Death

by Sheldon Richman August 2, 1999

Advocates of activist, overbearing government claim to be against exploitation. But they did not hesitate to exploit John F. Kennedy Jr. in death. Do you believe for a moment that the death of the son or daughter of any other ex-president (or even an ex-president himself!) would have set off the shameful media frenzy we ...

Watering Down the Separation of Powers

by Jacob G. Hornberger August 2, 1999

Maryland Governor Parris N. Glendening is exercising political power that would be the envy of dictators all over the world. Declaring an emergency due to the current drought, Glendening has issued orders criminalizing the usage of water in Maryland. The governor's decrees prohibited watering lawns; topping swimming pools; washing paved or outdoor surfaces; and ...