In Washington, nothing’s certain except death, taxes and special-interest lobbying groups. So it makes sense that the death tax has its own lobbyists. That’s right. “Americans for a Fair Estate Tax” knows a Senate vote is coming soon, and...
POLITICS
JobBay
As much of Europe struggles with double-digit unemployment this year, the United States has been creating an average of 200,000 new jobs a month. One of our great advantages is the relative ease with which Americans can start new businesses. Physical disability, the...
Our Gift to Iran
The most important effect of America‘s attack on Iraq has been the removal of Iran‘s strongest regional opponent, and an increase in the regional power of Iran . As I wrote in Capitalism Magazine in June of 2004: “[President Bush] threw down a...
Rebuilding New Orleans — and America
The physical devastation caused by hurricane Katrina has painfully revealed the moral devastation of our times that has led to mass looting in New Orleans, assaults on people in shelters, the raping of girls, and shots being fired at helicopters that are trying to...
How to Avoid Investing in Crooked Businesses
Reading Kurt Eichenwald’s fascinating book on Enron Corp., “A Conspiracy of Fools,” is enough to make an investor throw up his hands (or his lunch), sell all his stocks and buy a bundle of nice short-term U.S. Treasury bonds. Eichenwald shows, in...
Developers are Not the Devil and Profit is Not a Sin
The ability of the human mind to rationalize is one of the mysteries — and the marvels — of the ages. A recent e-mail from a reader in Santa Barbara, California, was a classic example of a widespread rationalization of the severe home-building restrictions...
“Muslim Opinion” Be Damned: Hatred of America is Irrational and Undeserved
To listen to most of our foreign-policy commentators, the biggest problem facing America today is the fact that many Muslims are mad at us. “Whatever one’s views on the [Iraq] war,” writes a New York Times columnist, “thoughtful Americans need...
The Human Price of California’s Statist Housing Policies
They say time is money but a lot depends on whose time and whose money. For example, in California the San Mateo County Planning Commission has spent five years deciding what can and cannot be done with the site of an old racetrack that is no longer economically...
What To Do About Gasoline Prices
Nationally, the average per gallon price for regular gasoline is $2.50. Are gasoline prices high? That’s not the best way to ask that question. It’s akin to asking, “Is Williams tall?” The average height of U.S. women is 5’4″, and...
The Lessons of Hiroshima
Those who claim that the use of atomic bombs in Japan was not necessary often point to Japan’s weakened military condition, and the possibility that the war could have been ended without Japan’s unconditional surrender. Such an attitude fails utterly to...
United States and Canada: A Tale of Two Medicares
In 1997, George Zeliotis, a Quebec citizen, learned that he needed hip-replacement surgery. But his troubles were just beginning. As is standard in Canada for non-emergency surgery, Zeliotis was put on a waiting list behind everyone else in Quebec who needed the same...
What “Oil Crisis”, Part 2
Soaring oil prices have revived the old bogeyman that the world is running out of oil. Economics is a great field for nostalgia buffs because the same old fallacies keep coming back, like golden oldies in music. Back in 1960, a best-selling book titled “The...
Israel’s Deadly Appeasement Process Continues
The Israeli withdrawal from Gaza is being portrayed as a wise (albeit unpleasant) move by Ariel Sharon. By addressing a longtime grievance of the Palestinians and their supporters–the presence of Israeli security forces and Jewish residents on the Gaza...
Security or Hysteria?
Driving through downtown Washington, D.C., a few weeks ago, I asked myself: What’s happened to the character of the American people? There were barricaded landmarks, armed guards and people waiting to be searched. Several weeks ago, I visited downtown...
What “Oil Crisis”?
With oil prices passing the record-breaking $60 a barrel level and heading even higher, the word “crisis” is now being used and all sorts of political “solutions” are being proposed. Is there really a crisis? One of the dictionary definitions...
U.S. Must Stop Iran from Developing Nuclear Weapons
Gerhard Schroder’s suggestion to “take the military option off the table” in dealing with Iran’s advancing nuclear program should be dismissed. No amount of “negotiations” and “incentives” will persuade the Iranian...
What Do Islamist Terrorists Want?
What do Islamist terrorists want? The answer should be obvious, but it is not. A generation ago, terrorists did make clear their wishes. Upon hijacking three airliners in September 1970, for example, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine demanded, with...
Civil Rights Today
When I think of the behavior of today’s civil rights organizations, I often think of the March of Dimes. In 1938, President Roosevelt helped found the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis to fight polio, an epidemic that crippled thousands of Americans....
California’s Socialized Medicine Rising
This month, in a 73-page position paper, California ‘s insurance commissioner, John Garamendi, proposed a government takeover of medicine. That the bureaucrat who would be governor prescribed more government intervention is not surprising. But, because the...
Bright Children: Stepchildren of the American Education System
Bright children and their parents have lost a much-needed friend with the recent death of Professor Julian Stanley of Johns Hopkins University. For decades he not only researched and ran programs for intellectually gifted students, he became their leading advocate in...
Socialized Medicine: A Symbol of Canadian National Identity?
What if your doctor told you that you had to wait a year to replace your painful, arthritic hip? If you’re an American with health insurance you wouldn’t stand for such a delay; you’d switch doctors or hospitals and get the operation done quickly....
The “Animal Rights” Movement’s Cruelty to Humans
The “animal rights” movement has pulled off a deadly deception: promote a vicious, anti-human policy, while feigning benevolent, compassionate motives. The deception takes the form of opposing life-saving medical research–in the name of opposing...
Why Iran Sneers
The “Washington Post” recently reported: “Iran resumes processing yellowcake uranium in Isfahan, rejecting a European deal and ignoring warnings of possible U.N. sanctions.” (8/9/05, front page) What makes the Iranian government unique is that...
Corporate Welfare at It’s Worst: Advanced Technology Program
Members of Congress will soon return home for August recess. While there, many will express outrage over the 33 percent increase in government spending since 2001, and the $400 billion budget deficit. They will offer vague pledges to rein in government. Taxpayers have...
It Takes an Individual
Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) is challenging Senator Hillary Clinton’s (D-NY) long-held liberal bromide that “it takes a village” to raise a child with the long-held conservative bromide that “it takes a family” to raise a child. Both...
The Axis of IP Evil
The U.S. commerce secretary, Carlos Gutierrez, last month took a ritual stroll through a Beijing market that teemed with pirated versions of “Star Wars” and “Seinfeld,” along with bogus North Face windbreakers, Calloway golf clubs and Samsonite...
No Place for American Heroes — in the Media
Back in June, this column pointed out that it is impossible to fight a war without heroism — but that you would never know that from the mainstream media. Nothing heroic done by American troops in Iraq is likely to make headlines in the New York Times or be...
Shoving Government Health Care Down Your Throat
One of the few bright spots in paying for health care today has been the introduction of Health Savings Accounts (HSAs), in conjunction with low-premium, high-deductible insurance policies. In what is perhaps the most popular medical insurance reform in history, more...
The Morality of Dropping the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Every August, there are some Americans who insist on wringing their hands over the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, so it was perhaps inevitable that such people would have an orgy of wallowing in guilt on the 60th anniversary of that tragic...
Don’t Look a Gift Horse in the Mouth
Alan Greenspan had his “conundrum,” and I’ve got mine. Greenspan’s conundrum: why are long-term interest rates staying so low for so long? Mine is why stock-market volatility is so low despite a global economic background that, on the face of...
Kant vs. Darwin: Creationism (“Intelligent Design”) vs. Evolution is Philosophical Debate
Evolution versus creationism, or Darwinism versus Intelligent Design, is not a scientific debate (that debate has long been settled) — it is a philosophical one.
Dealing with Terrorism
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, admitted that the problem of Iran’s growing nuclear weapons capability has to be “dealt with.” She didn’t say exactly how or when, but later on in the...
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