The basic and crucial political issue of our age is: capitalism versus socialism, or freedom versus statism. For decades, this issue has been silenced, suppressed, evaded, and hidden under the foggy, undefined rubber-terms of “conservatism” and “liberalism” which had lost their original meaning and could be stretched to mean all things to all men. – AYN RAND
A majority of Americans, according to a recent poll, now call going into Iraq a mistake. Many Iraqis apparently failed to get the memo. A poll commissioned by the Coalition Provisional Authority found 63 percent of Iraqis expect conditions to improve after the...
Nobel Prize economist Ronald Coase long ago warned of a political risk--that of wishing to be an "economic statesman," which he defined as a person who gives answers when there were none to give. The newest such risk was the Securities and Exchange Commission ruling...
Did you learn that the United States is rich because we have bountiful natural resources? That has to be nonsense. Africa and South America are probably the richest continents in natural resources but are home to the world's most miserably poor people. On the other...
A recent front-page story in the Wall Street Journal told of rising hunger and malnutrition amid chronic agricultural surpluses in India. India is now exporting wheat, and even donating some to Afghanistan, while malnutrition is a growing problem within India itself....
The big news in town is that "Ladies Night" is illegal. Earlier this month, it had top billing on the marquee at La Costa, a seashore bar at the intersection where New York meets Philadelphia. But New Jersey's top civil rights official, J. Frank Vespa-Papaleo, has...
On June 18, Congress cleared the way for the president to sign into law a bill committing $25 million over five years to save turtles. As expensively ridiculous as this taxpayer-funded initiative seems, its creation and ultimate passage cannot be blamed solely on...
Can John Kerry be better than our current president, George W. Bush? This question begs another, better at what? The principle issue of importance in the 2004 election is the War on (Islamic) Terrorism. George Bush's negatives on this topic are many. Principally, he...
Two hundred years ago Thomas Jefferson sent Lewis and Clark to explore the vast spaces of North America from St. Louis to the Pacific Ocean. Jefferson understood the enormous challenges for the growth of knowledge and liberty on a continental scale. These were the...
SpaceShipOne, the first privately funded manned spacecraft, shattered more than the boundary of outer space: it destroyed forever the myth that space exploration can only be done by the government. Just a week earlier, a Bush Administration panel on space exploration...
The Iranian state is rushing headlong into disaster and I'm not referring to an imminent invasion by the United States. Iran is developing nuclear weapons and is attempting to filibuster international agencies which are attempting to monitor Iranian actions. For the...
At a symposium at my college reunion last week, my classmates -- refugees from the '60s, still lefties after all these years -- were complaining that America wasn't enough like Europe. You know, compassionate and unstressed, with free health care, two-month vacations,...
Michael Moore, once a scruffy maker of cheap, funny, satirical documentaries, now puffs himself with the plaudits of the metrosexuals of Hollywood and Cannes. Having portrayed Americans as a bunch of gun-happy lunatics in "Bowling for Columbine," he's now shooting at...
I'm going to be on vacation all next week, riding horses on the western slope of the Rockies at the fabulous Home Ranch in Clark, Colorado. No phones. No TV. No Internet. No markets. So I'll miss the Federal Reserve's meeting on June 30. It'll probably make history by...
The Islamic world is at war with Western civilization. We have the military might to thwart them. The question is: Do we have the intelligence to recognize the attack and the will to defend ourselves from annihilation?
Random thoughts on the passing scene: The best thing about buying a house is that it puts an end to the exhausting process of house-hunting. Although Ronald Reagan was the only actor to become President, he was one of the few politicians who was not acting. Do the...
Parents who are worried because their children are receiving a steady diet of politically correct propaganda in the schools and colleges often ask for suggestions of things they should get for their children to read, in hopes of de-programming them. The summer is a...
Spain's Crown Prince Felipe has married former TV anchorwoman Letizia Ortiz, in the country's first royal wedding in nearly a century. This occurred to the delight of thousands of onlookers who braved heavy rains, as well as representatives of the Royal Families of...
In what on the surface could only be described as an acute case of masochistic dementia, Philip Morris USA owner Altria Group Inc. is now protesting the promotion of its own brand.In a May 20th letter to Paramount Pictures, Philips Morris Senior Vice President Howard...
Whenever there is a budget deficit, politicians automatically want taxes raised. In our private lives, whenever we find ourselves running out of money, most of us think about cutting back on our spending. Not so in government. Despite California's record budget...
When I worked in Saudi Arabia as a technical consultant in the 1990s, my coworkers and I were astounded upon receiving our first paycheck: we actually were paid the full amount we had earned. Gross pay minus net pay equaled zero. Never before or since in my lifetime...
From President Bush to Ted Kennedy we hear the same refrain about Islamic terrorists; "These people have hijacked a peaceful religion. Islamic militants are a few radicals who do not represent Islam." We are expected to believe that it is not the philosophy, the...
With all the noise being made -- from traffic noise to Al Gore's ranting -- you might never suspect that there was a National Day of Silence. What you might also not suspect is that this day is observed in schools and colleges across the country, where students agree...
After 444 days of humbling Jimmy Carter, the rulers in Tehran decided to conclude their drama at the U.S. embassy before they had to face the new president.
This must be the golden age of symbolism. In war-torn Iraq, its political leaders are demanding that foreign workers who are trying to rebuild that country must be subject to the Iraqi legal system. Do you have any idea what the Iraqi legal system is? Are you prepared...
The following is the correspondence between Ed Cline and John Lewis, Ph.D. concerning Dr. Lewis' recent op-ed "The Threat of a Faith-Based Defense of America, Capitalism Magazine, June 6, 2004: Dear Dr. Lewis: Your remarkable and succinct summation of the religious...
The factor dominating the strategic situation is the long-overdue end to the Federal Reserve's patience in maintaining low interest rates. The single most important matter now facing the market is the urgent need for the Fed to raise interest rates -- now! This week's...
"Ronald Reagan 'tortured' blacks." One Sunday morning, as I drove to my local tennis court to play a match, I heard a black radio commentator give that assessment of the now late, great 40th president. Imagine my conflict. After all, here I am, about to selfishly work...
President Bush has hit the campaign trail to save the Patriot Act, which will expire in 2005. In calling for its continuation, the President said, "we can no longer rely on false hope." Which false hope is that? The hope that America's free society will protect us...
Suppose you saw a fat, old, ugly, cigar-smoking man married to a beautiful young lady, what prediction would you make about the man's income? If you're like most, you'd predict that this guy has a lot of money. In effect, that fat, old, ugly, cigar-smoking man is...
Yosemite National Park is one of the beauties of nature that has brought me back every year for more than 20 consecutive years. But, in recent years especially, there seem to be two Yosemites -- the one discussed in the media and the one I see with my own eyes. On the...
"I happen to love Cleveland," says Elliott Schlang as we sip our drinks in the dark and stylish bar of the Jefferson Hotel, which, to my parochial Northeast Corridor mind, is about as far from Cleveland as you can get. I happen to love Elliott Schlang, and the fact...
The hyperbole of remembrance that follows the death of any President, as has certainly followed the death of Mr. Reagan, will subside eventually and it will be left to historians to analyze what it was he did as President and whether or not that had any value. The...
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