Author Archive
Tuesday Links
- Gene Healy on the role of the presidency in the BP oil spill:
When Hurricane Katrina hit, liberals who had spent years calling President Bush a tyrant suddenly decided he wasn’t authoritarian enough when he hesitated to declare himself generalissimo of New Orleans and muster the troops for a federal War on Hurricanes.
Now the party of “drill, baby, drill” — the folks who warn that Obama’s a socialist — is screaming bloody murder because he’s letting the private sector take the lead in the well-capping operation. It’s almost enough to make a guy cynical about politics.
- A man in Maryland is facing felony charges today. His crime? Recording a traffic stop with a video camera. It’s time to change Maryland’s wiretapping laws.
- Rethinking Darfur: A new study examines policy proposals to helping a devastated land.
- Podcast: “The Trouble with Comstock” featuring Roger Pilon.
Thursday Links
- Neal McCluskey: The federal government needs to stop with the fear mongering about education. We don’t need a teacher bailout.
- Jeffrey Miron makes the case for marijuana legalization in California.
- Václav Klaus: When will the Eurozone collapse?
- Podcast: “Terrorism and the US Military” featuring Christopher A. Preble.
Wednesday Links
- Special interest groups are lobbying to reverse legalizing direct wine shipping. Translation: Prepare to spend more on booze if they get their way.
- A lesson in free market economics … from Montenegro?
- Nat Hentoff on Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan’s record on free speech: “I know that a solicitor general is required to argue the legal positions of the administration that hired her — but to this extent?”
- Mark Calabria explains Sen. Dodd’s financial overhaul bill in a nutshell: “Give the bureaucrats more power and discretion, without any accountability. Its main achievement is to set up a new agency that will largely determine who, what and how it will regulate.”
- Podcast: “Obama’s Drug War” featuring Gene Healy.
Tuesday Links
- Cato Chairman Robert A. Levy on Rand Paul’s “principled stumble.”
- Daniel Griswold: Fears of immigrant crime are unfounded. “Perceptions about immigrants and crime do not square with the most basic data. After years of witnessing a rise in the number of illegal immigrants in their state, the people of Arizona are in reality less likely to be victims of crime than at any time in the past four decades.”
- Gene Healy on Obama’s continuation of the drug war: “The president lacks the moral authority to lock people up for behavior he engaged in as a young man.”
- Why China holds the key to maintaining peace in East Asia.
- Podcast: “Kagan and Speech” featuring John Samples.
Monday Links
- Julian Sanchez in Newsweek: Why Rand Paul is right…and wrong.
- Four policies that can reduce illegal immigration.
- It’s time to stop using the BP oil spill to grind old political axes and move the debate forward on energy policy.
- Podcast:”Avoiding the Skid of Greece” featuring Jeffrey A. Miron.
Friedman Prize Essay Contest Winners
Last month Cato On Campus announced a student essay contest for free tickets to the Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty dinner, which will honor Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji this week.
In 500 words or less, responders answered the question, “In light of the selection of Akbar Ganji for the receipt of the 2010 Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty, who would you nominate for a second prize this year and why?”
Students from around the world sent replies. Topics ranged from Russian labor camp dissidents to U.S. politician Ron Paul; from economics professors to space exploration; from free markets in charity to an individualist psychiatrist. A common thread that ran throughout all of the entries was entrepreneurial spirit and a unwavering value of individual liberty.
Cato on Campus chose three winners. Congratulations to:
Yasmin Green, an International Studies M.A. student at St. John Fisher College, who wrote about George Ayittey, an advocate of liberty through social entrepreneurship in Africa. ”A man who believes that ‘Africa is poor because she is not free,’ Ayittey has worked to promote ideas and institutions that are consistent with the achievement of liberty, and individual rights,” wrote Green.
Joseph Hammond, a Middle East History M.A. student from California State University – Long Beach, who the Iranian protesters after the 2009 election. Hammond advocated that the many Iranians who demonstrated their dedication to becoming politcally recognized would be a “perfect compliment to Akbar Ganji.”
Liya Palagashvili, an Economics B.A. student at George Mason University, who identified economist Peter Boettke as an economist serving in the tradition of Milton Friedman. “In the classroom, Dr. Boettke advances his students in the ideas of liberty,” she wrote. “Outside of the classroom, Dr. Boettke inspires liberty through his writing,” which “is influential in providing a thorough understanding of liberty and the consequences of a nation that violates liberty.”
Congratulations to all the winners. If you’re a student and want to get more involved, check out Cato On Campus.
Wednesday Links
- A few questions to ask Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.
- How to treat a taxaholic.
- In England there are 4 million government security cameras, one for every 14 Britons. Are we headed in that direction?
- The E.U.’s aggressive bailout plan: An experiment in levitation?
- Podcast:“Understanding ‘Epistemic Closure’” featuring Julian Sanchez.
Monday Links
- Cato legal scholars Ilya Shapiro, Roger Pilon and Walter Olson analyze the Kagan SCOTUS pick.
- They have it backwards: How one “free-trade agreement” might include new trade barriers.
- Another day, another unwelcome surprise in the new health care law.
- In 2009, 7,600 people died in drug-related episodes in Mexico. Here’s what we can do to put an end to it.
- Podcast: “National ID Means National DMV” featuring Christopher Calabrese.
Tuesday Links
- David Rittgers on the New York bomb plot: “This is one of the few cases in which police surveillance cameras earn their keep. When it comes to deterring crime and terrorism, police on the beat are still the sharpest tool we have. The Times Square plot was foiled by an alert person and a prompt police response — not by a camera. …But cameras aid in the response — helping piece together the plot and track down those responsible.” More on this from Roger Pilon.
- Quiz Time: If government spending is growing faster than GDP, can the resulting deficit problem be solved by: (A) decreasing the rate of growth of government spending, (B) increasing tax rates, (C) decreasing the rate of growth of government spending and increasing tax rates? Click here to find out how you did.
- Gene Healy: Busting the Myth of Camelot.
- Doug Bandow on what to do about North Korea: “Beijing should take the lead in forging a new, active policy designed to both denuclearize the Korean peninsula and promote political and economic reform in the North.”
- Podcast: “Alcohol and the Commerce Clause” featuring Ilya Shapiro.
Monday Links
- The case for letting Greece default: “Bailing out the troubled nation will only create more problems for it–and for the rest of Europe.”
- How a scholarship program in Florida could produce a new era of school choice.
- John Samples on Congressional efforts to undermine the Citizens United ruling: “The Disclose Act is a cynical partisan ploy that violates the letter and the spirit of the First Amendment.”
- Congressional Budget Office warns that as many as 10 million American workers will lose their current insurance under Obamacare.
- Podcast: “Will Tea Parties Rise above ‘Historical Footnote?’” featuring John Samples.
Wednesday Links
- All eyes on Pennsylvania’s 12th District: The May 18th special election “may provide an early glimpse for anyone wondering how big a millstone the health care law will be for Democrats this fall.”
- Richard Rahn: It’s going to be much harder to start a business in America under the new proposed financial regulations.
- The experts discuss: “How do we regulate or restrict new Wall Street creations, like synthetic C.D.O.’s, without squelching innovations that might enhance market efficiency?”
- Members of Congress react to the Citizens United ruling.
- Podcast: “Don’t Tape Me Bro” featuring David Rittgers.
Tuesday Links
- Arnold Kling: “The case for auditing the Fed is obvious.”
- The key to reducing illegal immigration: A robust temporary-worker program.
- Surprise! The “financial reform” bill is full of kickbacks to well connected cronies: “The public needs to understand that, far from protecting the little guy and sticking it to the fat cats, this bill keeps good, old-fashioned political patronage alive and well.”
- When did this happen? “Historians find long-lost clause of U.S. Constitution giving federal authorities unlimited jurisdiction over the American palate.” Oh wait, it didn’t.
- Podcast: “The New Old Urban Renewal” featuring Eileen Norcross.
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