Freedom Daily Archive

John McCain’s Disastrous Militaristic Legacy

by James Bovard December 1, 2018

When Sen. John McCain passed away in August, he was lauded far and wide for his long career of public service. Rep. John Lewis, the famous civil-rights activist, hailed McCain as a “warrior for peace.” In reality, McCain embodied a toxic mix of moralism and militarism that worked out disastrously for America and the world. In his funeral eulogies, McCain ...

Businesses That Should Not Exist

by Laurence M. Vance December 1, 2018

Among other things, libertarians — and even most conservatives — are known for extolling the virtues of capitalism, the free market, commerce, trade, free enterprise, and entrepreneurship. They are generally defenders of business as long as there is an absence of protectionism, crony capitalism, and corporate welfare. Even so, from a libertarian perspective, there are still some businesses that ...

Liberal Internationalism: True and False, Part 1

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 2018

Part 1 | Part 2 For more than the seventy years of the post–World War II era, the prevailing global order in the West was and has been called “liberal internationalism.” It has had two components, a political one and an economic one: “democracy” and “capitalism.” Both are being challenged at the present time in various parts of the world, ...

The Roots of Voluntary Exchange Lie in the Middle East

by Nima Sanandaji December 1, 2018

It is today commonly believed that free markets and free-market ideology are new Western inventions. In my book The Birthplace of Capitalism: The Middle East, I challenge that notion by pointing out that enterprises, financial institutions, market-based economies, and the intellectual support for economic freedom evolved millennia ago in the Middle East. The book (which is awaiting its international ...

Deadly Policing in New York City

by Matthew Harwood December 1, 2018

I Can’t Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street by Matt Taibbi (New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2017); 336 pages. On the first day of law school, Yale Professor Stephen L. Carter walks into his contracts class with a message: “Every law is violent.” He then proceeds to tell his students that they should be willing to ...

The TSA’s Secret Watchlist for Travelers Who Don’t Kowtow

by James Bovard November 1, 2018

“I need a witness!” exclaimed the worried Transportation Security Administration screener at Reagan Washington National Airport a few months ago. Because I had forgotten to remove my belt before going through a TSA scanner, he explained that I must undergo an “enhanced patdown.” I told him that if he jammed my groin, I’d file a formal complaint against him. ...

O Canada, and the Drug War

by Laurence M. Vance November 1, 2018

The maple leaf — the ubiquitous symbol of Canada — may soon give way to the marijuana leaf. Joining the countries of Uruguay and Georgia, Canada has legalized marijuana for recreational use — with restrictions, of course. In late 2013, Uruguay officially legalized marijuana. It did not, however, leave things up to the free market. The government controls the marijuana ...

Three Jeers for Government Regulation

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 2018

The appeal of and the rationales for government intervention and regulation of private enterprise never seem to disappear. Time and time again, as soon as some theoretical argument for or historical instance of interventionism has been challenged and demonstrated to be false and a failure, another one soon arises to replace it. Truly, the price of economic liberty is eternal ...

“The Birth-Right of an American”

by Scott McPherson November 1, 2018

Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American.... unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people. — Tench Coxe, Pennsylvania Gazette, February 20, 1788 On ...

Understanding the JFK Assassination, Part 1

by Jacob G. Hornberger October 1, 2018

Part 1 | Future parts to be published in FFF's ebook The JFK Autopsy 2 A common refrain about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy is, “I guess we will never know what really happened on November 22, 1963.” The reason people express that sentiment is that they have in mind what is called “direct evidence.” Given that there ...

Karl Marx and the Great Socialist Revival

by James Bovard October 1, 2018

Socialism’s popularity is reviving in America. A self-proclaimed socialist won the Democratic nomination for a congressional seat in the Bronx, and Democratic Socialist candidates are thriving in many areas of the nation. The Washington Post reported in July that it’s “been a good summer for the Democratic Socialists of America,” who have “never had more adherents or more clout.” ...

Canons of Libertarianism

by Laurence M. Vance October 1, 2018

The grandfather, godfather, and icon of conservatism, Russell Kirk (1918–1994), although he wrote lengthy philosophical treatises on “the six canons of conservative thought” and “ten conservative principles,” has largely been forgotten and is rarely invoked by mainstream conservatives today. Kirk was born on October 19, 1918 — a month before the armistice that ended World War I. That makes this ...