Blogs

A Violation of the Rights of the Parent

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way. But it’s got to get done.” -- State Attorney Glenn Ivey of Prince George’s County, Maryland, on the vaccination of 2300 children whose parents object to the county’s policy of forced immunizations. According...

Posted to dget by dget on Wed, Nov 14 2007

Filed under: Forced Vaccination, Education Free and Compulsory, Rothbard, Patental Rights, Forced Immunization, Paternalism, police state

A Candy Bar Inflation Puzzle (+ hint + answers)

A candy bar maker produces a chocolate bar of a size which permits 10 nominal bites and which sells for a price of $1.00. Ongoing monetary supply inflation has increased the manufacturer's factor costs and forced him to decide between increasing the...

Posted to Austrian Analysis by Anecdote by Don Lloyd on Thu, Oct 18 2007

Rob Bradley cheers on coal, but are all those who want to better manage commons and environmental impacts "Malthusian" idiots, or only in the case of coal?

Rob Bradley has a new post up at MasterResource , cheering on big (and now "clean") coal, which has apparently received assurances from the Obama administration - after being bad-mouthed by NASA scientist Jim Hansen , Steven Chu and Obama himself...

Posted to TT's Lost in Tokyo by TokyoTom on Thu, Feb 5 2009

Filed under: energy, carbon pricing, Enviro Derangement Syndrome, Coal, obama, Rob Bradley, Jim Hansen, climate change

Bob Murphy - fan of cost-benefit analysis (in the face of climate risks)!

Austrian-leaning economist Bob Murphy , whose efforts last year to discount the work of Yale's William Nordhaus on how cost-benefit analysis merits current action on climate change I previously examined , is back with more, this time defending Nordhaus'...

Posted to TT's Lost in Tokyo by TokyoTom on Wed, Feb 4 2009

Filed under: carbon pricing, Nordhaus, Bob Murphy, climate change, Weizman

The Religious Right and the Republican Revolution

Since the election of Ronald Reagan as President in 1980 the United States has seen a monumental shift of political power. Prior to this the South had been a Democratic stronghold as a result of the Civil War. Even a hundred years after, it had not been...

Posted to Not-a-Lemming by FutbolGuru on Fri, Mar 13 2009

Filed under: socialism, Communism, Republican, democrat, Religion, Religious right, left, moral majority, hippies

Insurrection vs. Pacifism: A False Dillema

There is a general traditional strategic split among anarchists between insurrectionary anarchism and pacifist anarchism. Insurrection is generally associated with either individual or public violent revolution, although if one wants to be specific it...

Posted to Brainpolice by Brainpolice on Wed, Jun 3 2009

Filed under: Anarchism, Ethics, Means and Ends, Self-interest, Philosophy, Frederich Neitzsche, Egoism, Insurrection, Pacifism, Strategy

Ron Bailey of Reason congratulates Al Gore

[updated] A great new post by libertarian Ron Bailey of Reason here: Congratulations to Al Gore But be wary of the man's proposed solutions for global warming. Ronald Bailey | October 12, 2007 http://www.reason.com/news/show/122960.html 1. Here are...

Posted to TT's Lost in Tokyo by TokyoTom on Mon, Oct 15 2007

Filed under: climate, tragedy of commons, environment, property, ostrom, gore, yandle, Ron Bailey, fisheries

A View from the Trenches, July 11th, 2011: "Buy the product, avoid the producer"

Through our past letters we have turned more and more negative, we acknowledge. We’ll go through a quick summary of our thoughts since the beginning of the year: We had been optimistic until March, hoping that the European Financial Stability Facility...

Posted to A View from the Trenches by Martin Sibileau on Mon, Jul 11 2011

Thoughts On Punishment

I think I reject the traditional concept of punishment (this is not to say that I'm opposed to measures that compensate victims though, because that isn't really punishment in the way I'm thinking of it, since the emphasis is on the victim's...

Posted to Brainpolice by Brainpolice on Sat, Oct 4 2008

Filed under: Ethics, Crime and Punishment

"Clean coal" leaves a big mess; which faceless employee, manager or shareholder committed this tort?

Yes, I'm referring to the bursting of the TVA holding dam in Kingston, TN a few days ago, leaving a Christmas Eve present of millions of cubic feet of wet fly ash several feet deep over hundreds of acres downstream, including now valueless private...

Posted to TT's Lost in Tokyo by TokyoTom on Fri, Dec 26 2008

Filed under: Enviro Derangement Syndrome, Coal, limited liability, TVA

Finnish government preparing to nationalize the stock market in the name of protectionism

The Finnish government has presented a plan to consolidate all "non-strategic" government-owned stocks under a government company called Solidium Oy . And in addition, the company would be given authority to buy stocks to "maintain domestic...

Posted to libertas by Libertas est Veritas on Wed, Oct 22 2008

Fighting over the President's Council on Bioethics (and human "dignity") - is Steven Pinker wrong?

[Update below.] When government is involved in making decisions about the use of tax dollars or regulatory power to favor or hinder particular activities, it is not surprising that political struggles often ensue between groups that wish to obtain a policy...

Posted to TT's Lost in Tokyo by TokyoTom on Mon, May 26 2008

Filed under: government, tribalism, Steven Pinker, Council on Bioethics, dignity

The best real-world argument for private roads?

Could it be the Internet? There is no central planning authority dictating traffic routing, yet users get to where they want; information is readily available, accessible; goods are proficient and easily accessed; commerce is booming and, arguably, the...

Posted to Apropos Austrian Aphorisms by thedo on Sun, Sep 20 2009

Filed under: private roads, internet

The Nail in the Coffin of "The Right"

It is common for many libertarians, especially those in America, to assume that they have a natural alliance with "the right". This is based on certain assumptions, such as the notion that contemporary libertarianism grew out of the old American...

Posted to Brainpolice by Brainpolice on Fri, Apr 25 2008

Filed under: Racism, Collectivism, Religion, Capitalism, Socialism, Libertarianism, Economics, Philosophy, conservatism, Corporatism, liberalism, Nationalism, History

Rethinking the Auto Bailout

I certainly agree with all who were against the bank bailout, as the banks work hand in hand with the Fed to create inflation and rob us of our money, but the auto industry is not in the same boat as the banking industry. In practice I am in favor of...

Posted to Attackdonkey by Attackdonkey on Mon, Dec 15 2008

Filed under: liberty, justice, pay, state., refom, governmet, taxes, bailout