EDITORIAL Showing 151 - 200 of 1951
Truman, A-Bombs and the Killing of Innocents
August 07, 2015
Seventy years ago today [August 6] a president of the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, a city full of innocent Japanese. It was the second time in three days that Harry Truman had done such a thing: He had bombed Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Th ...
In Greece, Reliance on Public Funds Is the Central Problem
August 06, 2015
Greece is a hot topic at the moment, mostly with the continued negotiations over bailouts from the European Union and, through institutions like the IMF, the world at large. Much of the discussion paints the image that Greece is only a debt-restructuring away f ...
Ron Paul: Champion of God's Peace
August 06, 2015
Ronald Reagan used to be called the Teflon president, on the grounds that no matter what gaffe or scandal engulfed him, it never stuck: he didn’t suffer in the polls. If Reagan was the Teflon president, the military is America’s Teflon institution. Even peo ...
They Live, We Sleep: A Dictatorship Disguised as a Democracy
August 05, 2015
We're living in two worlds, you and I. There's the world we see (or are made to see) and then there's the one we sense (and occasionally catch a glimpse of), the latter of which is a far cry from the propaganda-driven reality manufactured by the government and ...
Practicing Freedom: Markets, Marriage and Migration
August 04, 2015
Liberty is a demanding ideal to believe in and live by. It requires consistency of principle and acceptance of much in the actions of others that we may disagree with or even find personally repulsive. Unfortunately, too many in our society do not sufficiently ...
Politics Is Not the Path to Pro-Life Victory
August 03, 2015
During my time in Congress, I regularly introduced legislation forbidding organizations that perform abortions from receiving federal funding. The US Government should not force taxpayers to subsidize an activity they believe is murder. Thus, while I was horrif ...
'Thieves Emporium': Part 4 – The State Strikes Back
August 02, 2015
The counterfeiting business, like any other, has fundamental economic constraints. At one end, operators must produce a product. That, in turn requires very specialized equipment and supplies, all of which cost money. The better the product is to be, the more i ...
'Production Versus Plunder' Part 18: The Re-conquest
August 01, 2015
It takes more than raw power to run a successful state; people must believe that laying their wealth at your feet is a righteous thing to do. This week, we'll look at a big part of how this idea came to Europe. Continued from last week… THE RE-CONQUEST The Ch ...
Nowadays, Health Insurance Isn’t Really Insurance
July 30, 2015
Due to Obamacare, my health plan has become something other than insurance. It is now, for the most part, nothing other than a wealth transfer scheme to benefit the politically connected over others. In order to identify the difference between health insurance ...
Drivers, Beware: The Costly, Deadly Dangers of Traffic Stops in the American Police State
July 29, 2015
Samuel Dubose, also unarmed, was pulled over for a missing front license plate. He was reportedly shot in the head after a brief struggle in which his car began rolling forward. Levar Jones was stopped for a seatbelt offense, just as he was getting out of his c ...
The Freedom to Move: Personal Liberty or Government Control, Part II
July 28, 2015
There are many economic fallacies that surround the issue of freer or open immigration into the United States, and few of them can stand up to serious critical examination. The Fallacy that Immigrants "Steal" Jobs from Americans: Opponents of more open immigrat ...
Do We Need to Bring Back Internment Camps?
July 27, 2015
Last week, Retired General Wesley Clark, who was NATO commander during the US bombing of Serbia, proposed that "disloyal Americans" be sent to internment camps for the "duration of the conflict." Discussing the recent military base shootings in Chattanooga, TN, ...
Doomsayers Doomed in Washington State Marijuana Debate
July 27, 2015
Legal recreational marijuana use in the state of Washington is now two-and-a-half-years old and retail sales of marijuana have been legal for one year. What are the results of this experiment? Who was wrong and who was right on legalization? A new study has bee ...
'Thieves Emporium': Part 3 – Twin Banknotes
July 26, 2015
Seven years before Dancing Fawn made her first crossing, two men sat in a large, well-appointed Federal Government office. One, the older, leaned over his heavy desk with the air of patient expectation. The other, the younger of the two, sat at a table in the m ...
'Production Versus Plunder' ~ Part 17: Plato's Apostle
July 25, 2015
There's a reason why Hobbes and Rousseau are revered thinkers to this day: they saved the legitimacy of rulership as the Divine Right of Kings was failing. Performing the same job more than a thousand years earlier was a man named Augustine of Hippo. We'll exam ...
No 'Compensation' to Israel for Iran Deal
July 24, 2015
In The Joys of Yiddish, Leo Rosten defined chutzpah as "that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan." Today we have a new paradigm for chutzpah: the Israeli governmen ...
Central Banks and Our Dysfunctional Gold Markets
July 23, 2015
Many investors still view gold as a safe-haven investment, but there remains much confusion regarding the extent to which the gold market is vulnerable to manipulation through short-term rigged market trades, and long-arm central bank interventions. First, much ...
The American Nightmare: The Tyranny of the Criminal Justice System
July 22, 2015
Justice in America is not all it’s cracked up to be. Just ask Jeffrey Deskovic, who spent 16 years in prison for a rape and murder he did not commit. Despite the fact that Deskovic’s DNA did not match what was found at the murder scene, he was singled out b ...
Falsifying History in Behalf of Agendas
July 22, 2015
In an article on April 13, I used the so-called Civil War and the myths with which court historians have encumbered that war to show how history is falsified in order to serve agendas. I pointed out that it was a war of secession, not a civil war as the South w ...
The Freedom to Move: Personal Liberty or Government Control, Part I
July 21, 2015
The immigration issue has once more bubbled to the surface in America because of the provocative statements and assertions by one of the Republication contenders for the party's presidential nomination. Immigrants – especially illegal immigrants – are accus ...
Iran Agreement Boosts Peace, Defeats Neocons
July 20, 2015
Last week's successfully concluded Iran agreement is one of the two most important achievements of an otherwise pretty dismal Obama presidency. Along with the ongoing process of normalizing relations with Cuba, this move shows that diplomacy can produce peacefu ...
'Thieves Emporium': Part 2 – The Envelope
July 19, 2015
The young mother got off the bus less than a block from the Cleveland Boxing Club with only twenty minutes until her meeting. She planned to have more time to get to know the neighborhood, but the buses were running late because of some lake-effect snow. Now, s ...
'Production Versus Plunder' ~ Part 16
July 18, 2015
Rome, it must be said, adapted greatly as it failed. This rather begs the question of what types of ruling adaptations we will be seeing in the not-too-distant future. Continued from last week… THE CHURCH IS ESTABLISHED Of course, Constantine hoped that his m ...
Rothbardian Thoughts on Strategy
July 18, 2015
In thinking about libertarian strategy, I find it useful to revisit the framework set out by Murray Rothbard in "For a New Liberty" (FNL). What counts here is not that Rothbard, a builder of the modern libertarian movement, was the author, but that it is an elo ...
Of Mass Murders and Psychotropic Drugs
July 17, 2015
Each time a gunman goes on a killing spree, there is no shortage of psychological analysis in every mainstream news outlet as to why the person snapped when they did. Every environmental factor these individuals had ever been exposed to has been made the object ...
How Student Loans Create Demand for Useless Degrees
July 17, 2015
Last week, former Secretary of Education and US Senator Lamar Alexander wrote in the Wall Street Journal that a college degree is both affordable and an excellent investment. He repeated the usual talking point about how a college degree increases lifetime earn ...
Greece: Sound and Fury Signifying Much
July 16, 2015
All of Europe, and insouciant Americans and Canadians as well, are put on notice by Syriza's surrender to the agents of the One Percent. The message from the collapse of Syriza is that the social welfare system throughout the West will be dismantled. The Greek ...
Freedom or the Slaughterhouse? The American Police State from A to Z
July 15, 2015
For those whose minds have been short-circuited into believing the candy-coated propaganda peddled by the politicians, here is an A-to-Z, back-to-the-basics primer of what life in the United States of America is really all about. A is for the AMERICAN POLICE ST ...
An 'Austrian' Economist's Advice for Greece and the EU
July 14, 2015
For months, now, the mass media and the financial markets have anxiously watched and waited to see the outcome of a war of words, accusations and threats that have been fought between Greece and its Eurozone and European Union partners. Over several decades Gre ...
Greece Today, America Tomorrow?
July 13, 2015
The drama over Greece's financial crisis continues to dominate the headlines. As this column is being written, a deal may have been reached providing Greece with yet another bailout if the Greek government adopts new "austerity" measures. The deal will allow al ...
Introducing 'Thieves Emporium': Part 1 – A New Wilderness
July 12, 2015
With this introduction, prepared by the author for our readers, The Daily Bell is pleased to present the first installment of 'Thieves Emporium,' by Max Hernandez. ... We are, for the first time in the history of the human race, experiencing something new in ...
'Production Versus Plunder' ~ Part 15
July 11, 2015
Rulers specialize in creating scapegoats, for the purposes of uniting people behind them ("We'll defeat these intruders!") or for grabbing the wealth of the "others." The later emperors of Rome did both of these things in a unique way, by changing religions. Co ...
Portugal's Experiment in Drug Decriminalization Has Been a Success
July 10, 2015
This month, Portugal celebrates fourteen years of drug decriminalization. The grand experiment is now considered a happy success considering it was adopted out of desperation and in the face of dire warnings from proponents of the global drug war. What Led to D ...
The Orwellian-Keynesian Path
July 09, 2015
Greece defaults. The Dow plummets 350 points in one day. Ugly, ominous DEBT builds up like a giant snow cliff hanging over the economic valleys of the West. Is this the end of the Great Keynesian Charade brought to us by the collectivists with the advent of 191 ...
Are Big Banks Using Derivatives To Suppress Bullion Prices?
July 09, 2015
We have explained on a number of occasions how the Federal Reserves' agents, the bullion banks (principally JPMorganChase, HSBC, and Scotia) sell uncovered shorts ("naked shorts") on the Comex (gold futures market) in order to drive down an otherwise rising pri ...
'I Aim to Misbehave…'
July 08, 2015
A Subversive Fourth of July Resolution... or Is that Revolution? The quote is from "Firefly," a damned fine television show, albeit cancelled, cut down by Fox before it had the chance to take off, one that spawned a legion of fans of such devotion that an equal ...
Jade Helm, Terrorist Attacks, Surveillance and Other Fairy Tales for a Gullible Nation
July 08, 2015
Once upon a time, there was a nation of people who believed everything they were told by their government. When terrorists attacked the country, and government officials claimed to have been caught by surprise, the people believed them. And when the government ...
A Declaration of Independence from Big Government
July 07, 2015
Many forms of personal liberty are under attack today, from economic regulations that hinder people from their peaceful pursuits of earning a living and improving the material conditions of life to an increasingly intrusive surveillance state that seems to foll ...
For Normal Relations With Cuba, End US Interventionism
July 06, 2015
Last week we saw an encouraging sign that the 50 year cold war between the US and Cuba was finally coming to an end. President Obama announced on Wednesday that the US and Cuba would restore full diplomatic relations and that embassies could be re-opened in eac ...
Greeks Vote NO To EU-Imposed Austerity
July 06, 2015
With 90% of the votes counted, the Greek people have voted 61% to 39% against accepting the latest round of austerity that the EU is trying to impose on the Greek people for the benefit of the One Percent. What is amazing is that 39% voted for the One Percent a ...
'Production Versus Plunder' ~ Part 14
July 04, 2015
Empires beyond their limits do their best to enforce "austerity" upon their populace, but never agree to curtail their very expensive grandeur. This afflicted Rome, much the same as it afflicts today's European powers. Today we'll see how one Roman emperor foun ...
Clarence Thomas's Confused Notion of Freedom
July 04, 2015
Compared to Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, his colleague Clarence Thomas is well regarded by at least some devotees of liberty. This is not totally unjustified. Thomas has demonstrated a familiarity with the philosophy and history of natural law and natu ...
Greece: Sunday's Vote Will Determine Liberty Or Serfdom
July 03, 2015
According to history books, democracy originated in Greece. Of course, historians could be mistaken, but this is the prevailing view among Western populations with enough awareness to be interested to know. What we are witnessing today, July 2, 2015, is that af ...
Economic Stagnation and the Global Bubble
July 02, 2015
You’d think with all the “stimulus” from Washington over the fifteen years since the dotcom bust, American capitalism would be booming. It’s not. On the measures which count when it comes to sustainable growth and real wealth creation, the trends are sl ...
Battling Racism Through the Marketplace
July 01, 2015
After a psychotic man murdered nine people in a black South Carolina church last week, much of the nation has turned its attention to whether the Confederate flag should be removed from all public forums. Although this reaction itself speaks volumes about the c ...
The Emergence of Orwellian Newspeak and the Death of Free Speech
July 01, 2015
How do you change the way people think? You start by changing the words they use. In totalitarian regimes – a.k.a. police states – where conformity and compliance are enforced at the end of a loaded gun, the government dictates what words can and cannot be ...
F.A. Hayek and Why Government Can't Manage Society, Part II
June 30, 2015
It is seventy years, now, since near the end of the Second World War Austrian economist, and much later Nobel Prize winner, Friedrich A. Hayek published his most famous article, "The Use of Knowledge in Society," in September 1945, demonstrating why it is impos ...
Obamacare's Best Allies: The Courts and the Republicans
June 29, 2015
By ruling for the government in the case of King v. Burwell, the Supreme Court once again tied itself into rhetorical and logical knots to defend Obamacare. In King, the court disregarded Obamacare's clear language regarding eligibility for federal health care ...
'Production Versus Plunder' ~ Part 13
June 27, 2015
It's an amazing fact, but humans nearly always assist their oppressors by obeying them. And not only that, but they defend their obedience and persist in it, even as their oppression gets worse. This week we'll examine one of the deep reasons why. Continued fro ...
Dumping the Euro Isn’t a Cure-All: Easy Money Lets Governments Avoid Free-Market Reforms
June 26, 2015
The Greek drama continues to unfold with the risk of “grexit” becoming increasingly likely. Yet, a large majority of the Greek people want to keep the euro. This, however, would require the Greek government to live within its means — something it has not ...
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