A Purple Heart for Dan Rather? Not!

Will Dan Rather please shut up? The veteran teleprompter reader for CBS News wants Americans to know that when he sits behind his hollow anchor desk, he isn’t just warming a chair. Rather actually fancies himself fighting on the front lines against terrorism....

“Get the Hell Out of My Way!”

That’s what John Galt, the individualist hero of the novel Atlas Shrugged, — Ayn Rand’s great celebration of laissez-faire capitalism — said to the federal bureaucrats. And there’s no better message to send to Washington today....

With Allies Like These Who Needs Enemies?

Of the five countries described below, can you identify the one(s) excluded from the US-led coalition in the war on terrorism? Country A is free and democratic, a steadfast ally of the United States. Its citizens know what it means to be victimized by terrorism, and...

Of Halloween Spoilsports and Spiders

This will be my 16-month-old daughter’s first Halloween on foot. Last year, she was a baby bunny who toured the neighborhood in Daddy’s arms. This year, she’ll be a kitten — clambering up porch steps, clutching her goody bag, and marveling at...

Social Security “Trust Fund”

According to the unanimous preliminary report of the special commission appointed to look into Social Security, the amount of money coming into the system will be insufficient to pay out what was promised by 2016. By 2030, the choice will be to reduce Social Security...

“Ignorance” Pays in a Mixed Economy

While people might be motivated by non-economic factors, from a strictly economic point of view it simply doesn’t pay individual voters to learn about and take action against the myriad assaults emanating from the political area. That’s what my colleagues...

Privacy for Government, But Not For Private Citizens

It began three years ago in an ugly encounter between a motorist and the police. It ended earlier this summer in a dreadful opinion by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. And as the noted civil-liberties lawyer Harvey Silverglate observes in a characteristically...