Archive for January, 2011
Florida Ruling Requires Government to Stop Implementing Obamacare
As I continue digesting Judge Vinson’s ruling, I notice two key things beyond the facts that the “individual mandate is unconstitutional”:
1. In performing his severability analysis — determining which parts of the overall legislation survive — the judge threw out all of Obamacare:
In sum, notwithstanding the fact that many of the provisions in the Act can stand independently without the individual mandate (as a technical and practical matter), it is reasonably “evident,” as I have discussed above, that the individual mandate was an essential and indispensable part of the health reform efforts, and that Congress did not believe other parts of the Act could (or it would want them to) survive independently. I must conclude that the individual mandate and the remaining provisions are all inextricably bound together in purpose and must stand or fall as a single unit. The individual mandate cannot be severed. This conclusion is reached with full appreciation for the “normal rule” that reviewing courts should ordinarily refrain from invalidating more than the unconstitutional part of a statute, but non-severability is required based on the unique facts of this case and the particular aspects of the Act. This is not a situation that is likely to be repeated.
2. In discussing whether to issue an injunction – a judicial command to do or refrain from doing something — the judge determined that his declaratory judgment in this context was the same as an injunction. That is, a federal court saying that a piece of legislation is unconstitutional is effectively the same as a decision mandating the government to act:
Declaratory judgment is, in a context such as this where federal officers are defendants, the practical equivalent of specific relief such as an injunction . . . since it must be presumed that federal officers will adhere to the law as declared by the court. [Quoting a D.C. Circuit opinion written by none other than then-Judge Antonin Scalia]
In short, if I read the opinion (plus this final judgment) correctly — quite apart from both the lofty philosophical principles I applaud Judge Vinson for adopting and the nitty-gritty technical details of his individual mandate analysis — Obamacare is dead in its tracks. Now, Judge Vinson himself or the Eleventh Circuit (or even the Supreme Court) may issue an emergency stay of this or any other part of the ruling, but as of right now, the federal government must stop implementing Obamacare.
NB: The New York Times and Washington Post report that Judge Vinson has already stayed his own ruling pending appeal, but this is an incorrect reading of the opinion, for the reasons stated above. Moreover, the court’s docket, which is now closed for the day, contains no such stay — nor has plaintiffs’ counsel received notice of one.
Update: For further developments on the practical effects of Judge Vinson’s ruling, see “ObamaCare After Judge Vinson’s Ruling” and “After Florida, What’s to Be Done about ObamaCare?“
ObamaCare Goes Down
POLITICO Arena asks a second question today:
How badly does today’s ruling hurt the Obama administration’s health reform efforts?
My response:
In finding Obamacare unconstitutional, Judge Roger Vinson hit a home run today for the Constitution. From the start, he made it clear that this case, brought by 26 states, two private citizens, and the National Federation of Independent Business, “is not really about our health care system at all. It is principally about our federalist system, and it raises very important issues regarding the Constitutional role of the federal government.”
The core of the opinion, as many of us have long argued, is whether Congress, under its power to regulate interstate commerce, can regulate “inactivity” by requiring individuals to buy health insurance or be fined. It cannot, Vinson ruled, citing a long line of opinions, legal and political, starting with James Madison, the principal author of the Constitution.
Moreover, because Obamacare contains no severability clause, the entire act must fall. Finally, because this is a declaratory judgment, further implementation of the act is enjoined, so a separate injunction is not needed. It’s a new day.
Update: Although there are reports that Judge Vinson has stayed the effect of his decision, which would mean that the administration could continue implementing ObamaCare, the court’s docket, which is now closed for the day, shows no such stay.
ObamaCare Falls
Federal Judge Roger Vinson has struck down the entire so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as unconstitutional. Excerpts from the opinion:
It is difficult to imagine that a nation which began, at least in part, as the result of opposition to a British mandate giving the East India Company a monopoly and imposing a nominal tax on all tea sold in America would have set out to create a government with the power to force people to buy tea in the first place…
The individual mandate is outside Congress’ Commerce Clause power, and it cannot be otherwise authorized by an assertion of power under the Necessary and Proper Clause. It is not Constitutional.
[O]n the unique facts of this particular case, the record seems to strongly indicate that Congress would not have passed the Act in its present form if it had not included the individual mandate. This is because the individual mandate was indisputably essential to what Congress was ultimately seeking to accomplish. It was, in fact, the keystone or lynchpin of the entire health reform effort…
Because the individual mandate is unconstitutional and not severable, the entire Act must be declared void.
What’s more, it appears that the Obama administration must seek intervention from a higher court if it wants to keep implementing ObamaCare. Even though Vinson declined to issue an injunction forbidding the administration to implement the law, he did so because of:
a long-standing presumption “that officials of the Executive Branch will adhere to the law as declared by the court. As a result, the declaratory judgment is the functional equivalent of an injunction”…”declaratory judgment is, in a context such as this where federal officers are defendants, the practical equivalent of specific relief such as an injunction”…Thus, the award of declaratory relief is adequate and separate injunctive relief is not necessary.
In other words, absent intervention from a higher court, HHS must now sit on its hands.
Health Care Ruling a Victory for Federalism and Individual Liberty
Today’s ruling vindicates the constitutional first principle that ours is a government of delegated, enumerated, and thus limited powers. Like Judge Hudson in the Virginia case, Judge Vinson recognized that the individual mandate represents an unprecedented and improper incursion beyond those powers: the federal government, under the guise of regulating commerce, cannot require that people engage in economic activity.
And this is as it should be: if the only limit on congressional power were Congress’ own assessment of the wisdom of each assertion of such power, the Constitution would be obsolete — as would any conception of checks and balances. James Madison, the author of the Federalist Paper (51) explaining how man’s non-angelic nature requires explicit limits on those who govern, would spin in his grave. As even would Alexander Hamilton — perhaps the Framer most favorably disposed to strong central power — who cautioned that courts should not be in the business of evaluating the “more or less necessity” of a piece of legislation but rather define judicially administrable rules to guide (but also limit) Congress’s actions.
And so today’s ruling, in a lawsuit that now has 26 states as plaintiffs — with two others challenging the health care “reform” separately — represents the latest and most significant victory for federalism and individual liberty. This will not end until the Supreme Court has its say, but the tide is clearly running in freedom’s favor.
I will comment further once I’ve had a chance to read through the ruling.
Obamacare Ruling Expected, Correct
Judge Vinson’s ruling today that Obamacare’s individual mandate is unconstitutional, following on the heels of Judge Hudson’s similar ruling in the Fourth Circuit, should give the new Congress all the confidence it needs to rescind this provision and more. Indeed, the idea that government could order a person to buy a product from a private vendor, or be fined for failing to do so, is so foreign to our Constitution for limited government that it’s a wonder that Congress ever imagined it had such a power to begin with.
The Congress that passed Obamacare is now gone. It will be an early test for members of the new Congress, including those many Senate Democrats up for reelection in 2012, whether they will study these well-reasoned opinions and come to a better understanding of the constitutional limits on their power. There are far better, more constitutional ways to enable Americans to obtain health care than through the massive government intrusion into the healthcare market that Obamacare ordered. There is nothing quite like a little freedom to enable Americans to solve their own problems.
I Said Believe!
Since its beginning, one of the primary drivers behind public schooling — government schooling — has been a desire to compel belief, whether in “American” values, God, the primacy of science, or myriad other things that some people have thought it essential for all people to accept. The result has been constant conflict that, rather than uniting diverse people — a companion goal of public schooling — has divided them. And not only have crusades to force belief created ongoing conflicts, there’s generally been little evidence they’ve actually changed the targeted beliefs. So we’ve gotten all the downside of trying to force alterations to hearts and minds without actually changing them.
Case in point, the seemingly endless war over the teaching of human origins.
Despite decades of keeping religion out of the public schools, the latest polling shows that 40 percent of Americans believe that God created human beings in their present form about 10,000 years ago, while only 16 percent think that human beings evolved without the participation of God.
New research from a couple of Penn State political scientists elucidates one reason – besides simple, honest disagreement — that this is the case. While law can prohibit the teaching in public schools of such alternatives to evolution as creationism and intelligent design, it cannot actually make biology instructors teach evolution. And, it turns out, a major reason many teachers tiptoe around evolution is that they fear the backlash that would come from forcing a singular view on diverse people.
According to Michael Berkman and Eric Pultzer, roughly 60 percent of respondents in the National Survey of High School Biology Teachers reported that they either steer clear of evolution or dance around it not necessarily because they reject the theory, but because they don’t want trouble. “Our data show that these teachers understandably want to avoid controversy,” the researchers said. It’s a finding that confirms an anecdotal New York Times report from a few years ago, and that fits with other analyses of public schooling that conclude that often the easiest thing for public schools to do is simply avoid any disputed topic.
So what do we do?
For starters, stop making education policy based on the notion that some things are so important all people must be forced to believe in them. You simply cannot compel belief — at best, you’ll get the parroting back of what you want to hear, not true acceptance. Worse, you’ll very likely create a situation where no one gets what they want and everyone ends up with empty, incoherent, compromised curricula.
The ultimate solution is to let parents choose options for their children without first having to pay for the “one, best system,” and to let educators provide schooling tailored to the values and needs of whomever they wish to serve. Then everyone will be be able to access coherent curricula rather than being saddled with educational mush.
Of course, many people will choose to have their children learn things with which neither you nor I agree. We can make that clear to them by selecting different options for our own children and openly debating conflicting opinions. What we cannot do is continue to try to impose our beliefs on them: not only is it incompatible with a free nation and antithetical to social unity, it often ends up keeping everyone from getting what they believe is best for their children.
One for the Annals of Rent-Seeking
An article at HealthPolicySolutions.org (“a project of the Buechner Institute for Governance at the School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado Denver”), about how ObamaCare is causing Colorado’s child-only health insurance market to implode, contains this startling admission by the top lobbyist for Colorado’s health insurance companies:
“Requiring all the carriers to sell this sort of plan creates a level playing field,’’ said Ben Price, executive director of the Colorado Association of Health Plans. “This is one of those unusual situations where we’re asking for more competition. If everyone else is in the market, the risk is spread across the entire market. Each company can afford to take on more risk.”
Catch that? A lobbyist who admits that his job is to restrict competition, effectively stealing from consumers for the benefit of his clients! How refreshing!
Wait, it gets better.
The legislation he’s advocating would tell any carrier that wants to sell insurance directly to Colorado consumers that they must also sell child-only coverage — despite the losses that ObamaCare’s price controls are likely to cause them in that sub-market. The legislation would actually reduce competition in Colorado’s individual market, because it would place an additional (and costly) requirement on market entry.
In other words, this guy is so good at his job, he keeps lobbying for less competition even when says he isn’t. Bravo, sir. Bravo.
Sen. Rand Paul Proposes Serious Cuts
Freshman Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) has raised the bar in Washington by releasing a bill that would make substantial, specific, and immediate cuts in federal spending. While policymakers on both sides of the aisle have largely paid lip service to stopping Washington’s record run of fiscal profligacy, Paul’s proposal makes good on his campaign promise to seriously tackle the federal government’s bloated budget.
Paul’s bill would target $500 billion in cuts for fiscal 2011 alone. While audacious by Washington standards, cutting federal spending by that amount would still leave us with a projected $1 trillion deficit this year. Nonetheless, the federal government’s scope would be dramatically curtailed, which would pay dividends in coming years as the economy is unshackled from numerous failed federal interventions.
A description of Paul’s proposed cuts can be viewed here, but some of the bolder ideas merit a comment or two.
First, Paul would eliminate most Department of Education spending, with the exception of higher education subsidies. He correctly notes that the federal government’s increased involvement in education has been “detrimental” and that “the mere existence of the Department of Education is an overreach of power by the federal government.”
Second, the Department of Energy, which is becoming a chief source of corporate welfare, would be zeroed out. Paul would eliminate subsidies for all energy industries — from fossil fuels to so-called “green” energies. He notes that the government’s interference in energy development should be ended and the free market allowed to “start taking the reins.”
Third, the Department of Housing and Urban Development — one of most visible examples of government failure — would be eliminated. Among the HUD programs that Paul singles out, it is his criticism of housing vouchers that deserves the most applause as they remain popular in some Republican and conservative quarters.
Paul deserves credit for proposing cuts at the Department of Defense, although the savings would be relatively small. However, his proposal would cut the Department of Homeland Security almost in half, and would zero out billions of dollars in foreign aid. The latter is well-timed given the situation in Egypt, a major recipient of U.S. foreign aid dollars.
Finally, Paul would chop a quarter of the Department of Health and Human Service’s budget, although he doesn’t take on Medicare or Medicaid. He is reportedly at work on separate legislation that would address Medicare and Social Security. Because Paul’s proposal is focused on immediate cuts, his decision to tackle the big mandatory spending programs separately shouldn’t be viewed as a cop out.
Thus far, the spending cut bar in Washington has been set pretty low. Policymakers from both parties and varying ideological backgrounds have been timid in spelling out precisely what they would cut. By getting specific, Paul has raised the bar, which will hopefully put pressure on others — in particular, the congressional Republican leadership — to move beyond a vague, myopic fixation on nondefense discretionary spending.
Protests in Egypt Continue
The new Egyptian cabinet was sworn in today amidst a seventh day of protests across the country. For the White House, the continual tweaking of their response to the crisis, and declining to call for Mubarak to step-down, has left many in Egypt and the region wondering if the United States does in fact want to see the arrival of democracy to Cairo, or if it is simply content with allowing the status-quo to remain, with minor reforms. Or perhaps they are just waiting for the chips to fall where they may.
This illustrates the conundrum facing the Obama administration. Over at The Skeptics, I examine this a bit further:
The Obama administration is stuck with a policy not entirely of its own making – decades of U.S. taxpayer support for the Mubarak regime – but it also seems trapped by the dominant worldview in Washington that is preoccupied with finding a solution to every problem in the world. This global view flows from deeply flawed assumptions about the likelihood of a worst-case scenario transpiring in every case, and then exaggerating the impact of that worst-case on U.S. security. In many instances, the impact is presumed to be nearly catastrophic. In actuality, they almost never are.
Might Egypt be an exception? It is an important country in its own right, traditionally a center of the Arab world. Its population of 80 million people is larger than that of Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon combined. Egypt is the second leading recipient of U.S. foreign aid, behind only Israel, and it straddles one of the most important choke points in the world, the Suez Canal. Given its size, influence and location, there is the possibility that this spreads elsewhere. Protests have also broken out in Yemen, Algeria, and Sudan. The Saudis and Jordanians are nervous.
So how should the U.S. respond? In the short-term, the U.S. government needs to strike a balance, and not be seen as pushing too hard for Mubarak’s ouster; but Washington should not anoint a would-be successor, either. The message should be: this is for the Egyptian people to decide.
Click here to read the entire post.
A Pacifist Finds Her Call to Arms
The ongoing war of words between Glenn Beck and Frances Fox Piven over the prospect of workers rioting in the streets isn’t just a two-way dance. Stanley Kurtz has provided insight into Piven’s work over the years in his book, Radical-in-Chief, and a prominent figure of the left, Barbara Ehrenreich, has fired back. In an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, Ehrenreich said that the reaction to Piven’s writings shows that America is “no longer a democracy but a tyranny of the heavily armed.”
Ehrenreich’s position contains a kernel of truth, but the real armed tyranny is the one Piven seeks to impose.
We have a window into Ehrenreich’s thoughts on violent struggle from her book on the subject, Blood Rites: Origins and History of the Passions of War. I attended a presentation Ehrenreich gave during my senior year of college precisely because of the contrast it might provide to my own views. Ehrenreich was a pacifist seeking to understand the passions that drive war so that they might be stifled or stamped out, while I was about to take a commission in the Army and head off to Infantry Officer Basic Course and Ranger School.
Ehrenreich traces man’s capacity for conflict back to the time when he was not at the top of the food chain. Early man’s violent instinct grew out of necessity; the need to build primitive weapons and fight in groups to kill natural predators, primarily lions and other big cats.
A rallying instinct lies at the heart of a successful hunt. Members of a hunting party must be willing to lay down their lives for each other, facing a beast with speed and natural weapons that would overwhelm each man individually. The bond produced by this group experience surpasses anything that develops on the football field. Indeed, combat is the only place where the phenomenon exists today.
In Ehrenreich’s view, this rallying instinct made the move from a hunter-gatherer society possible, but it also facilitated conflict between tribes and nations. Tribes rallied around the skin of an impressive kill or a totem symbolizing their most-feared predator when in conflict over land and natural resources.
As we began to aggregate our self-interests into larger groups, the totem became a flag, and the rallying instinct became nationalism or patriotism. The political class, the villains in Ehrenreich’s telling of the tale, could then use patriotism to manipulate the masses toward war.
While Ehrenreich takes a few feminist detours along the way, her theory on the origin of a rallying instinct I understood — patriotism — rang true. Ehrenreich’s assertion that we all have a remnant of this tribal instinct is consistent with thinkers across the spectrum. Blood Rites may make an appropriate companion to Victor Davis Hanson’s The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern.
Ehrenreich admitted defeat at the end of the presentation. She noted that while some of the best of man’s nature is brought forth by war — think of a grunt throwing himself on a grenade to save his brothers in arms — she saw no way to turn these selfless instincts against war itself.
This is why Ehrenreich’s defense of Piven is a bit disappointing (though not surprising — both are Honorary Chairs at the Democratic Socialists of America). Piven’s citation of the riots in Greece as an example for American workers to follow is hardly an example of non-violence in action.
More disturbing is Ehrenreich’s blindness to — or obfuscation of — the fact that government is organized violence, and a push for government to do more is not a pacifistic stance. The rule of law is the threshold at which the government will spill blood and confiscate treasure. Changing the rule of law to guarantee equality of outcomes, not simply equality of opportunity, is a proposal for violence.
Government enforcement of a redistributive policy — taxes to support more handouts have to come from somewhere — is done with at least the implicit threat of violence sanctioned by the state. Try and resist and at some point men with guns — the police, IRS, or Marshals — get involved. SEIU President Andy Stern put this option on the table, explaining that his organization was using the “power of persuasion” before getting government to use the “persuasion of power.”
Ehrenreich talks a good game about seeking peace, but in the end she’s simply cheerleading from the other side of the battlefield. But this battlefield should remain rhetorical. The threats against Piven are inexcusable. We should oppose redistributive instincts — peacefully — now, not after the coercion of government takes the field in support of progressive efforts to “spread the wealth around.”
U.S. Should Stand With the Egyptian People
Oppressed people rarely get opportunities to express their anguish and disillusionment. Today in Egypt for the seventh straight day, thousands of ordinary citizens are pouring out onto the streets, demanding the expulsion of President Hosni Mubarak, calling for an end to emergency laws giving police extensive powers of arrest and detention, and claiming the legitimate right to run their own country. It is well past time for U.S. policymakers to stand with the Egyptian people and rethink Mubarak’s purported role as an “anchor of stability” in the Middle East.
Many in Washington fear that the path Egypt takes after Mubarak might not lead to a freer and more prosperous future and that an Islamist government led by the Muslim Brotherhood, or the Ikhwan, will assume power. This concern, however legitimate, is largely beside the point.
First, the Ikhwan is popular for very legitimate reasons. Like Hezbollah, Ikhwan’s social-welfare programs provide Egyptians cheap education and health care. Opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei has even formed a loose union with the movement, which over the years has become relatively more moderate.
Second, even if Egypt’s revolution does not bring about the political or economic freedom that Washington deems fit, it is not for the United States to decide whether Egyptians choose wisely the interests and concerns that lie within their limited grasp. Events have certainly moved quickly, and fundamental change is a gradual and often painful process, but Americans should not be reluctant to embrace a political emancipation movement for fear that it might be worse than whatever it replaces. After all, history shows that forces erected to suppress individual freedoms eventually break down or unravel, often in spite of the United States. Even if the Brethren does take control, it’s emergence would be a natural consequence of the lifting of Mubarak’s repressive police state. Over the weekend, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton insisted repeatedly that Egypt’s future will be decided by the Egyptian people, not by Washington, even though the notion that U.S. officials can be neutral simply by not taking sides is demonstrably false, as protesters are being arrested by a U.S.-backed security apparatus and sprayed with tear gas manufactured in the United States.
Third, it is not clear at all that Mubarak is a reliable American client. Yes, he has kept peace with Israel, but the veneer of control under this Caesarist despot has faltered in the past several days. His curfew, rather than discourage Egyptians from rising up, has given them the opportunity to stand on the threshold of a political renaissance. In fact, reports on the ground suggest that lives may have changed completely. For instance, what was depicted over the weekend as a massive prison break was apparently Mubarak releasing criminals from jails in order to unleash terror in the streets and punish Egyptians for recent riots. Is Mubarak really the political figure that America should be supporting? Does this question really need to be asked?
The Obama administration can extend diplomatic support to a political emancipation movement in Egypt, thereby visibly abandoning its long-time dictatorial client and pushing other U.S.-backed autocrats to end censorship, political repression, and address their people’s demands for economic and political reforms. This change, however belated, can help salvage a decent relationship with a successor government and with the population of the country– similar to moves President Ronal Reagan made during the 1980s toward both South Korea and the Philippines. Although such a stance would likely do little to limit recruitment levels of militant outfits in North Africa, it does have the potential to substantially enhance America’s image in the Muslim world.
Although Mubarak has promised reforms, economic growth cannot act as a substitute for political liberty. Mubarak oversees a corrupt and exploitative political system that relies on patronage and cronyism. Economic opportunity and political expression have stagnated over the last fifty years (not just the last 30). Mubarak is now grasping at straws, pledging to institute economic reforms and policies that will just keep him in office longer. Despotic leaders like Mubarak love to adopt pseudo-economic reforms to mask their coercive measures and perpetuate the status quo, but in the end, the institutionalized oppression imposed by ruling elites cannot endure. Sooner, rather than later, Washington and Cairo must acknowledge and embrace the Egyptian people’s instinctive desire for freedom.
Beyond Exports: A Better Case for Free Trade
Free trade is about much more than increasing opportunities to export. But most people wouldn’t know that from listening to President Obama or other “pro-trade” politicians or media or business community advocates. The most common message purveyed by those advocating particular trade agreements or even free trade generally is that more trade equals more exports equals more economic growth equals more jobs. Sure, that may be a salient point—particularly in an environment where policymakers are looking to grow the economy and create jobs. But it is only one argument in the comprehensive case for free trade—an argument, by the way, that renders free trade advocacy more difficult when made in the absence of the other arguments.
In a Cato Free Trade Bulletin released this morning, Scott Lincicome and I update and reinforce the comprehensive case for free trade that we have been making at the Center for Trade Policy Studies since 1998. And we recommend that “to win the hearts and minds of a skeptical American public, trade advocates need to broaden their arguments to include more than just happy talk about potential export growth.”
Here is the introduction:
The 112th Congress begins its term amid renewed optimism about prospects for U.S. trade liberalization. Big labor’s stranglehold over the congressional trade agenda was broken with the election in November. The U.S. government finally appears willing to end its disgraceful ban on Mexican trucks. And in his State of the Union address, President Obama implored Congress to pass the trade agreement with South Korea as soon as possible, and articulated his commitment to bringing the other two pending bilateral agreements, as well as the Transpacific Partnership negotiations and the Doha Round, to successful conclusions.
After four years of stasis on the trade front, the new environment is a welcome change. Removing barriers to trade — in both directions — is essential to sustained economic recovery and long-term growth.
But how long will this window of opportunity remain ajar? Despite trade’s benefits, American sentiment toward it is lukewarm in the best of times, and always vulnerable to manipulation by politicians and media charlatans looking to blame foreigners for domestic shortcomings. Before the end of this year, the 2012 presidential election campaigns will be in high gear — and trade has been a particularly dirty word in stump speeches and political debates in the past. Indeed, one of the reasons for the energetic trade policy push in 2011 is that the political environment next year is expected to be less hospitable to trade initiatives.
The fact that public opinion about trade is so malleable and arguments for restricting it so resonant at times speaks to a failure of free trade’s proponents to make their compelling message stick. It is sad but true that so many Americans need to be reminded of the benefits of being free to choose how and with whom to conduct commerce. But in an atmosphere where demagogues peddle myths to mislead the public into believing that it is preferable for government to limit their choices and direct their resources to chosen ends, it is crucial that the case for free trade be made more clearly, comprehensively, and consistently than it has been in the past.
Thus, in addition to securing the immediate goal of concluding and passing trade liberalizing agreements in 2011, advocates of trade in Congress, the administration, the business community, think tanks, academia, and among the general public should update their arguments and invest in the process of winning the trade debate once and for all. Some of the most compelling arguments for free trade have been only modestly summoned or absent from the discussion for too long.
The full paper, “Beyond Exports: A Better Case for Free Trade” is here.
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