He “gave back” by creating by RICHARD LORENC. This week, I’m beginning a new series that will profile exceptional individuals. The criteria for being an exceptional individual is simple: The person will have changed the way people think and behave purely through persuasion. Thus, no one who ever occupied an official post in government will qualify. […]
The evidence says bigger isn’t better by COREY IACONO. How much government spending is enough, and how much is too much? While some spending on infrastructure, defense, and courts is probably beneficial, many economists suspect that public spending has decreasing marginal benefits: after a certain point, further spending results in slower growth by crowding out […]
“Food freedom” shows the importance of free association to community by WILLIAM SMITH. “Americans of all ages, all conditions, all minds constantly unite. Not only do they have commercial and industrial associations in which all take part, but they also have a thousand other kinds: religious, moral, grave, futile, very general and very particular, immense […]
My fiancé is white. I’m not. We plan to jump the broom this summer, to honor my heritage and the hardships of couples like us. The tradition was born under anti-miscegenation laws that forbade blacks from marrying. And signing an official state marriage license feels inappropriate, considering the racist history behind it. Anti-miscegenation laws had been a part of […]
The connection between language and liberty is profound by SARAH SKWIRE. I have been thinking and writing a great deal about ISIS and its attempts to destroy art, language, culture, and history. This means I have also been thinking a lot about Mark Dunn’s novel Ella Minnow Pea, which is a funny and troubling exploration of language and oppression. […]
Why do we settle for such an unnatural, inorganic plan? by JEFFREY A. TUCKER. I was at a restaurant for lunch and had time to visit with the waitress, who turns out to be a college graduate from a good institution. She has a degree in European languages. Here she is waiting tables with nondegreed […]
During a recent conference, a man around 50 pulled me over to the side. He said he had a serious question to ask me about his daughter’s education. I said, “of course,” but I already suspected what the question was, because I’ve been asked it a hundred times. “I’m preparing to spend some $100,000-plus on […]
Market competition is creating a better Internet, without the FCC by JULIAN ADORNEY. Over the past few years, millions of concerned citizens have called on the FCC to pass Net Neutrality. Many claimed that without tight regulation, Internet service providers (ISPs) would wreak all kinds of mischief, from creating “slow lanes” for ordinary users to blocking access to certain sites. After […]
Imagine a product that leaves your home covered in soot. Worse, imagine it makes your entire neighborhood smell like rotten eggs. The stuff discovered in Lima, Ohio, did just that. “Even touching this oil,” writes historian Burton Folsom, “meant a long, soapy bath or social ostracism.” Why even bother to pump such “skunk oil” out […]
The government buys 5 million barrels of oil for its stockpile by JEFFREY A. TUCKER. It’s a sweet thing when Uncle Sam becomes a mega-buyer of your product. While the price of oil continues to plunge to record lows, drivers are celebrating, and oil executives are sweating it out. But never fear, the government is […]
Forty-three years ago today Milton Friedman published his article “The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase its Profits.” It is to Friedman’s credit that most of this short article rings as true today as it did on September 13, 1970. It is at the same time disappointing that this piece remains timely precisely because […]
The United States Postal Service (USPS) lost $5.5 billion last year. That is the eighth annual loss in a row and the third-highest ever. The only silver lining is that the loss was below the red-ink tsunami of $15.9 billion in 2012. Why does the federal government deliver the mail? Why does it have a monopoly over […]
Jeffrey Rogers Hummel on President Martin Van Buren (1837–1841) Martin Van Buren was the least bad president in American history. Although other chief executives had some libertarian accomplishments, he was by far the most consistent. Domestically, Van Buren kept government spending and taxes low, and also brought to culmination the Jacksonian program for the “divorce […]
ABOUT L.J. LANE L.J. Lane is a web-based political cartoonist. He believes the best antidote for fear and anger is laughter. You can read more of his cartoons at noodledoodles.net.
Avoiding hypocrisy in an unfree world by SANDY IKEDA. What do you think of someone who espouses the principle of nonaggression but lives off the fruits of aggression? How moral is it to oppose political power while benefiting from political power? Is it contradictory to write, lecture, and actively protest government intervention while at the […]