Hornberger's Blog

Immigration Is Not Citizenship

by Jacob G. Hornberger March 6, 2017

I recently met a Dutch woman who has lived here in the United States for around 40 years. She told me that when she was 14 years old, she told her parents that her dream was to move to the United States. I asked her why and she said the reason was because she decided that there would be ...

Donald Trump, Social Engineer

by Jacob G. Hornberger March 3, 2017

At his daughter Ivanka’s urging, President Trump is showing us his liberal or progressive side by urging Congress to enact tax-code legislation relating to childcare and paid leave. Of course, this shouldn’t surprise anyone given that conservatives have, one, long supported other liberal programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, and, two, have long supported the income-tax ...

Donald Trump, Standard Conservative

by Jacob G. Hornberger March 1, 2017

In the second month of Donald Trump’s presidency, it is crystal clear that he is nothing more than a standard conservative, one with a unique personality but a standard conservative nonetheless. Consider the drug war. After decades of manifest failure, death, destructiveness, and loss of liberty among the American people, what does Trump want to do ...

Hypocrisy, Left and Right, on Immigration

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 28, 2017

Leftists (or liberals or progressives, if you prefer) are lamenting the plight of illegal immigrants who are being arrested and deported by President Trump’s ICE gendarmes. Playing the standard defender of the “poor, needy, and disadvantaged,” they are criticizing Trump for being cruel and heartless with his deportations of illegal immigrants who have been in the United ...

Debt Ceiling Déjà vu

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 27, 2017

Two days ago, President Trump sent out a tweet crowing that the national debt went down by $12 billion in the first month of his administration, as compared to the first month of the Obama regime, when it went up by $200 billion. If Trump really believes that he is responsible for that reduction in the amount of the national ...

What Part of “Obsolete” Does Trump Not Understand?

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 24, 2017

An online dictionary defines “obsolete” as “out of date” and lists such synonyms as outdated, outmoded, and old-fashioned. All right then. What part of “obsolete” does President Trump not understand? Throughout his campaign for president, he told audiences that NATO was “obsolete.” That’s the word he used. Indeed, at least once since he was elected president, he again referred to this ...

The Futility and Corruption of the Drug War

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 23, 2017

I just finished watching the much-acclaimed series “Narcos” on Netflix. What a fantastic program. And what an excellent depiction of the futility and corruption of the war on drugs. The series is a true-life account of Pablo Escobar, a Colombian drug lord who headed up the Medellin drug cartel, a black-market drug group that smuggled hundreds of tons of cocaine ...

Libertarianism and Immigration Enforcement

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 22, 2017

For the past several years, there has been a running debate within the libertarian movement between libertarians who favor government immigration controls and those who favor open borders. As an advocate of open borders, I have never been able to figure out how those libertarians who favor government-controlled borders are able to reconcile their position with the libertarian non-aggression principle, ...

A Second FFF-HBCU Conference on the Drug War

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 21, 2017

  If you live within driving distance of Orlando, Florida, or just happen to be in the area, I would like to invite you to attend FFF’s conference, “End the Drug War,” at the Florida A&M University law school (201 Beggs Avenue, Room 240, Orlando, FL 32801) on Wednesday, March 22, 2017, from 6:00 pm – 8:30 p.m. Admission price: ...

Trump’s Militarism and Isolationism

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 20, 2017

I cannot recommend too highly an op-ed that appeared in yesterday’s Washington Post, entitled, “Quit Calling Donald Trump an Isolationist. He’s Worse than That” by Stephen Wertheim, a Fellow in History at King’s College at the University of Cambridge. It is an absolutely excellent analysis of Trump, foreign policy, militarism, and isolationism. Those who support U.S. interventionism around the ...

What’s Wrong with Talking to Russia?

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 17, 2017

Amidst the feeding frenzy that has taken over Washington, D.C., and the U.S. mainstream media over Russia, forgive me for asking a politically incorrect question: What’s wrong with talking to Russia? After all, is the United States at war with Russia? Well, you might think so if you read the editorial in Wednesday’s New York Times, entitled “Time to Investigate ...

Bribes, Catapults, and Corruption Trump Trump’s Wall

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 16, 2017

Donald Trump is obviously a smart man. One cannot build up a billion-dollar financial empire without being smart. Unfortunately, however, Trump is not so smart when it comes to some things, like the drug war. He thinks that simply by cracking down in the drug war and becoming more ruthless than previous presidents, he’s going to be the one who ...