The Legacy of Milton Friedman, Part 1 by Future of Freedom Foundation March 25, 2010 Part 1 | Part 2 It has been more than a year since Milton Friedman passed from our lives. What a world he departed. The desire for liberty burns ever brightly. The forces of statism resist ever strongly. How we miss his presence. Although he has left us, his ideas live on. They remain eternally relevant to the age-old struggle to preserve individual liberty from state encroachment. Milton Friedman was born 95 years ago in Brooklyn. He was the son of immigrant parents from the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Think of the world that he was born into. For a couple of years his family lived in La Belle Epoch, a time of peace, increasing trade, and growing prosperity. People could travel without passports. The great empires were gradually liberalizing. It ...
The Capsizing of American Democracy by Future of Freedom Foundation April 2, 2010 American democracy is capsizing as a result of the vast increase in the number of government dependents and government employees. This has created a voting bloc that overwhelms every other potential force. H.L. Mencken quipped in the 1930s that the New Deal divided America into those who work for a living and those who vote for a living a division truer now than ever before. In the era of the Founding Fathers, few things were more dreaded than dependency not being ones own man, not having a truly independent will because of reliance on someone or something else to survive. One of the glories of America was the possibility that common people could become self-reliant with hard work and discipline. Prof. John Philip Reid, the author of The Concept of Liberty in the Age of the American Revolution, summarized 18th-century political thinking: Property was ...
Ellsbergs Lessons for Our Time by Future of Freedom Foundation May 1, 2010 Daniel Ellsberg is the kind of American who should receive a Medal of Freedom. Except that the Medals of Freedom are distributed by presidents who routinely give them to useful idiots and apologists for their wars and power grabs. It should be renamed the Medal for Enabling or Applauding Official Crimes in the Name of Freedom. Ellsberg knowingly risked spending a life in prison to bring the truth about the Vietnam War to Americans. He had hoped truth would set Americans free from the spell of official lies. But the experience in Iraq indicates that Americans have learned little if anything from the Vietnam-era deceits. Flora Lewis, a New York Times columnist, writing three weeks before 9/11, commented in a review of a book on U.S. government lies on the Vietnam War, There will probably never ...
Would-Be Rulers without Clothes by Future of Freedom Foundation April 2, 2010 In a presidential debate with Sen. Barack Obama in Texas, Sen. Hillary Clinton scoffed at the idea that buying medical insurance should be voluntary. It would be as though Social Security were voluntary Medicare, one of the great accomplishments of President Johnson, was voluntary.... We would not have a social compact with Social Security ...
The Bricker Amendment: A Battle against the Imperial Presidency by Future of Freedom Foundation March 28, 2010 Executive agreements shall not be made in lieu of treaties.... The President shall publish all executive agreements except that those which in his judgment require secrecy shall be submitted to the appropriate committees of Congress in lieu of publication. Part of one of the proposed Bricker amendments The powers not delegated to ...
The Forgotten Iraqi-Sovereignty Sham by Future of Freedom Foundation September 29, 2008 The Bush administration and the Iraqi government are wrangling over the future role of the U.S. government in Iraq. The Bush team wants far more power over Iraqis than the current Iraqi government wants to concede. Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said in April 2008 that the ...
Reaching Out to the Left, Part 2: The Issues by Future of Freedom Foundation April 2, 2010 Communicating libertarian ideals to the Left can be a challenge, but it can also help bolster our own understanding of our principles. Often, libertarians try to appeal to the Left by emphasizing our areas of agreement, which are conventionally seen as mostly including personal liberties and war. But even when we discuss those issues, it ...
On the Limits of Government, Part 2 by Future of Freedom Foundation April 2, 2010 In 1776 the Continental Congress submitted to a candid World the self-evident truths that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.... Government, the Declaration of Independence proclaimed, is merely the means ...
Are Democrats Better on Privacy and Surveillance? by Future of Freedom Foundation April 1, 2010 The Bush administration has probably illegally violated Americans privacy more than any presidency in at least a generation. Many Americans are understandably ready to throw out Republicans who trampled the Bill of Rights. But is the solution to elect a Democrat? Many liberals were shocked in July when putative Democratic Party presidential nominee Barack Obama voted in favor of the ...
More Bush Freedom Hokum by Future of Freedom Foundation April 1, 2010 Perhaps no American president has praised freedom as often as George W. Bush. From his declarations that the United States was attacked because of freedom, to the names Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom, to his proclamations of ...
How Abu Ghraib Was Politically Defused, Part 1 by Future of Freedom Foundation March 29, 2010 Part 1 | Part 2 It is now more than four and a half years since Americans first saw the photos depicting the brutalizing of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. At that time, some commentators thought that the photos would be a political disaster for ...
When Government Replaces God and Family by Future of Freedom Foundation March 27, 2010 Freedom is the emancipation from the arbitrary rule of other men. Mortimer Adler It is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. It knows best what we need and what must be done. We must trust in its absolute power, knowledge, and presence in all areas of our lives. ...
