The Slippery Slope from Censoring ‘Disinformation’ to Silencing Truth by John W. Whitehead February 23, 2021 “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”― George Orwell This is the slippery slope that leads to the end of free speech as we once knew it. In a world increasingly automated and filtered through the lens of artificial intelligence, we are finding ourselves at the mercy of inflexible algorithms that dictate the boundaries of our liberties. Once artificial intelligence becomes a fully integrated part of the government bureaucracy, there will be little recourse: we will be subject to the intransigent judgments of techno-rulers. This is how it starts. Martin Niemöller’s warning about the widening net that ensnares us all still applies. First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not ...
Republican Politicians Are Incorrigible Drug Warriors by Laurence M. Vance March 15, 2021 The federal government considers growing, distributing, buying, selling, possessing, or using marijuana to be a criminal offense, punishable by fines and imprisonment. Possession of marijuana will get you a maximum sentence of one year in jail and a minimum fine of $1,000 for a first conviction. Yet there are fourteen states (plus the District of Columbia) where the recreational use of marijuana is legal. In the Supreme Court case Gonzales v. Raich (2005), the Court ruled that the federal government has the authority to prohibit marijuana possession and use for any and all purposes because the Controlled Substances Act did not exceed Congress’s power under the commerce clause as applied to the intrastate cultivation and possession of marijuana for medical use. Yet there are thirty-five states (plus the District of Columbia) where the medical use of marijuana is legal. The federal government classifies marijuana as a Schedule I controlled substance under the Controlled Substances Act with “a high potential for abuse,” “no currently ...
Biden’s Immigration Crisis by Jacob G. Hornberger March 18, 2021 The immigration crisis taking place at the U.S.-Mexico border confirms three points that I have been making for many years. The first point is that no matter who is elected president and no matter what new policies are adopted to resolve America’s decades-old immigration crisis, it won’t do any good. That’s because America’s system of immigration controls is an inherently defective system. That’s because it is based on the concept of “central planning,” a socialist concept that involves government planning of immigration. Central planning is an inherently defective system. Just ask anyone who lived in the Soviet Union or anyone who lives in Venezuela, Nicaragua, North Korea, or Cuba today. There is no way that a central planner can effectively plan the movements of millions of people, especially in the context of supply of and demand for labor in a complex labor market. The result ...
Marijuana Wins by Laurence M. Vance February 1, 2021 Who really won the 2020 election? Was it Donald J. Trump or Joseph R. Biden? This is a question that will be argued for years to come. And because it is a highly partisan political question, it may never result in a satisfactory answer. There was one clear winner in the 2020 election, though, and it wasn’t Trump or ...
Rule by Fiat: When the Government Does Whatever It Wants by John W. Whitehead April 19, 2021 “We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force.” — Ayn Rand Rule by brute force. That’s about as good a description ...
The Terrorist Haven Fallacy on Afghanistan by Jacob G. Hornberger April 20, 2021 Interventionists are saying that U.S. forces need to stay in Afghanistan because otherwise that country will, once again, become a “haven” for anti-American terrorists. They still just don’t get it. It never ceases to amaze me how blind and obtuse interventionists can be. Anti-American terrorism is not like the flu or like Covid-19. It doesn’t ...
Building Up the State Means Pulling People Down by Richard M. Ebeling May 7, 2021 I still vividly recall sitting with a high school friend on the evening of July 20, 1969 and watching on television as astronaut Neil Armstrong stepped down onto the surface of the moon, a few minutes before 8 p.m., west coast Pacific time, and saying his famous words, “One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” ...
The Conservative Case for Welfare by Laurence M. Vance May 14, 2021 In the third COVID-19 stimulus package — the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) — which was passed in the U.S. Congress without a single Republican vote, the Child Tax Credit (CTC) for tax year 2020 was increased from $2,000 per child, with $1,400 of this being refundable, to a fully refundable $3,000 per qualifying child (aged ...
Monetary Inflation’s Game of Hide-and-Seek by Richard M. Ebeling May 18, 2021 The May 12, 2021, press release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for the month of April sent the stock markets tumbling for two days and generated fodder for the news pundits with the announcement that the CPI measure of the cost-of-living had increased 4.2 percent at an annualized ...
The Continuing Disaster of the U.S. Drug War in Latin America by Ted Galen Carpenter April 1, 2021 The following is a statement to the Western Hemisphere Drug Policy Commission: Charting a New Path Forward, Committee on Foreign Affairs, U.S. House of Representatives, December 3, 2020: I wish to express my appreciation to the chairman and members of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs for the opportunity to submit this statement. The Western Hemisphere Drug Policy Commission is ...
Inflation Is a Dangerous Way to Get Rid of Debt Burdens by Richard M. Ebeling June 2, 2021 Suppose you lent someone $100, and when they paid you back they only handed you, say, $99 or $80. Would you consider the borrower to have kept his promise and contractual obligation? Or would you think that he had cheated you out of a part of the money you had lent him in good faith? Well, there are those ...
Advancing Liberty in the Pandemic by Future of Freedom Foundation June 8, 2021 What has happened to freedom in the last year in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic? Join FFF president Jacob G. Hornberger as he examines that question. Go to the podcast. Please subscribe to our email newsletter FFF Daily here.
