Free Society

Progressive Promises and the Cost To Liberty

by Richard M. Ebeling July 9, 2019

Promises, promises, promises. It is the season for political promises. The candidates competing to be the Democratic Party candidate for president in 2020 are out in force trying to outbid each other with promised horns-of-plenty to any and all who might be voting in that party’s primaries beginning in a mere matter of months.  There are a handful of ...

Learning Liberty and the Power of Principles

by Richard M. Ebeling July 1, 2019

In The Constitution of Liberty, free-market economist and social philosopher F.A. Hayek, quotes in a footnote the famous nineteenth-century scientist Louis Pasteur: “In research, chance only helps those whose minds are well prepared for it.” What Pasteur was, no doubt, getting at is that unless the researcher already has been trained in the principles and methods of his own ...

The Hypocritical Double Standards of Political Outrage

by John W. Whitehead June 27, 2019

“She was asked what she had learned from the Holocaust, and she said that 10 percent of any population is cruel, no matter what, and that 10 percent is merciful, no matter what, and that the remaining 80 percent could be moved in either direction.”—Kurt Vonnegut Please spare me the media hysterics and the outrage and ...

The Omnipresent Surveillance State

by John W. Whitehead June 12, 2019

“You had to live—did live, from habit that became instinct—in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.”—George Orwell, 1984 Tread cautiously: the fiction of George Orwell has become an operation manual for the omnipresent, modern-day surveillance state. It’s been 70 years since Orwell—dying, beset by fever and bloody coughing ...

What Would a Free Society Actually Look Like?

by Laurence M. Vance June 1, 2019

It is a common occurrence at sporting events. Someone is singing the U.S. national anthem — “The Star-Spangled Banner” — and when he gets to the last line of the first verse (although the song has four verses, the first verse is the only one that is ever sung), the crowd starts cheering and shouting after the singer utters ...

Adam Gurowski: Polish Champion of American Liberty

by Richard M. Ebeling June 1, 2019

America! What a wonderful word. America! A word that has carried with it hopes and dreams, promises and possibilities; a new start and second chances. It has meant freedom, opportunity, and prosperity. Only in America! For many in faraway lands the word “America” still carries with it connotations of a better life, liberty, and enterprise. But what do these ideas ...

The Plague of Meddling Political Busybodies

by Richard M. Ebeling May 29, 2019

Who knows what might be better or best for you? You or those in the government? We all make mistakes and misjudgments, but who is most likely to have a wider and deeper appreciation of your wants and desires, you or a bureaucrat in an often-faraway government agency? Who is more likely to have an insight into the options ...

A Graduation Message for a Terrifying Age

by John W. Whitehead May 21, 2019

“No matter who you are, no matter how strong you are, sooner or later, you'll face circumstances beyond your control.” — Cersei Lannister, Game of Thrones Those coming of age today will face some of the greatest obstacles ever encountered by young people. They will find themselves overtaxed, burdened with excessive college debt, and struggling to find worthwhile employment in ...

D Is for a Dictatorship Disguised as a Democracy

by John W. Whitehead May 9, 2019

When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; a culture-death is a clear possibility. — Professor Neil Postman, ...

Tax Cut or Welfare Increase?

by Laurence M. Vance May 3, 2019

The Democratic senator from New Jersey and presidential candidate Cory Booker wants to cut the taxes of 150 million Americans. But is what he’s proposing a tax cut or a welfare increase? After declaring his intention to run for president, Booker unveiled a new proposal called the Rise Credit that would expand the existing Earned Income ...

What 19th-Century Foreign Writers Said about American Freedom and Prosperity

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 2019

If you look at the results of relatively open and competitive market economies over the years, the decades, and especially the last two centuries, the only conclusion that can reasonably be reached is that free market liberal-oriented societies provide the conditions and opportunities for constant and continuous material and social betterment for the vast majority of those living in ...

When Dissidents Become Enemies of the State

by John W. Whitehead April 18, 2019

“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” — George Orwell When exposing a crime is treated as committing a crime, you are being ruled by criminals. In the current governmental climate, where laws that run counter to the dictates of the Constitution are made in secret, passed without debate, and upheld by secret courts that ...