Free Society

“Great National Purposes” Mean Less Freedom

by Richard M. Ebeling August 31, 2015

With the seventieth anniversary this year of the end of the Second World War, a number of commentators have focused on the presumed “unity” of America seven decades ago to “win the war” against global tyranny and international aggression by Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. Individuals put aside their individual personal and petty interests to support and fight for ...

The Raping of America: Mile Markers on the Road to Fascism

by John W. Whitehead August 28, 2015

“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”—Martin Luther King Jr. There’s an ill will blowing across the country. The economy is tanking. The people are directionless, and politics provides no answer. And like former regimes, the militarized police have stepped up to provide a façade of ...

We Are the Government: Tactics for Taking Down the Police State

by John W. Whitehead August 21, 2015

“The people have the power, all we have to do is awaken that power in the people. The people are unaware. They’re not educated to realize that they have power. The system is so geared that everyone believes the government will fix everything. We are the government.”—John Lennon Saddled with a corporate media that marches in lockstep ...

Agenda for a Freer and More Prosperous America

by Richard M. Ebeling August 17, 2015

There is little that happens in society in general and the market economy in particular that most on the political “left” do not think needs more government intervention, regulation, and redistribution to make “better.” One recent example of this is a lengthy “report” primarily prepared by Nobel Prize-winning economist, Joseph E. Stiglitz, for the Roosevelt Institute. Released in June 2015, ...

Don’t Be Fooled by the Political Game: The Illusion of Freedom in America

by John W. Whitehead August 13, 2015

The shaping of the will of Congress and the choosing of the American president has become a privilege reserved to the country’s equestrian classes, a.k.a. the 20% of the population that holds 93% of the wealth, the happy few who run the corporations and the banks, own and operate the news and entertainment media, compose the ...

They Live, We Sleep: A Dictatorship Disguised as a Democracy

by John W. Whitehead August 5, 2015

“You see them on the street. You watch them on TV. You might even vote for one this fall. You think they’re people just like you. You're wrong. Dead wrong.”—They Live 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 ...

Practicing Freedom: Markets, Marriage, and Migration

by Richard M. Ebeling August 3, 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 value the right of the individual to live his own life as he choses. They wish ...

Freedom or the Slaughterhouse? The American Police State from A to Z

by John W. Whitehead July 15, 2015

“Who needs direct repression when one can convince the chicken to walk freely into the slaughterhouse?”—Philosopher Slavoj Žižek Despite the best efforts of some to sound the alarm, the nation is being locked down into a militarized, mechanized, hypersensitive, legalistic, self-righteous, goose-stepping antithesis of every principle upon which this nation was founded. All the while, the nation’s citizens seem content ...

Overtime Pay and a Free Society

by Laurence M. Vance July 10, 2015

If there is only one thing that every American worker who gets paid by the hour knows about labor law aside from the minimum wage, it is that employers must pay time and a half for all hours worked over 40 hours. What many American hourly workers probably don’t realize, however, is that some salaried workers are eligible for ...

Libertarian Angle: Racism, Gun Control, and Craziness

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 23, 2015

Each week, FFF president Jacob Hornberger discusses the hot topics of the day. This week, the gun massacre in Charleston. The Libertarian Angle airs weekly.

The Tyranny of Trigger Words and College Safe Spaces

by Richard M. Ebeling June 8, 2015

The media has been full of stories recently about the new sensitivity on college and university campuses concerning the avoidance in courses or assignments of the use of “trigger words” or phrases that may have a “hurtful” affect on students when thoughtlessly used in the teaching environment. Student and other groups on campuses have insisted that professors provide advanced warning ...

Employment and a Free Society

by Laurence M. Vance May 5, 2015

The city of SeaTac, Washington, is the home of the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. It is also home to the highest minimum wage in the country. SeaTac’s minimum wage of $15 an hour took effect on January 1, 2014, the result of a ballot initiative. The minimum wage in the cities of San Francisco and Seattle is scheduled to gradually ...