Blogs

diamonds and Kimberley process certificates

Diamonds are traded internationally. They are extracted and processed by multinationals, who release them at substantial prices to global markets. There however also small miners who supply uncut diamonds on a small business basis. They are often active...

Posted to Torsten by Torsten on Fri, Sep 19 2008

Filed under: diamonds, uncut diamonds, international markets, barriers to entry

gold dust

It is sometimes argued that gold is a crisis proof investment. One is then usually offer gold bullion, but what about gold dust ? Gold that has been mined, but wasn't processed further yet. Is it wise to purchase commodity gold or should one rather...

Posted to Torsten by Torsten on Fri, Sep 19 2008

Filed under: commodities, crisis, gold bullion, gold coins, gold dust

Taxes are patriotic?

Joe Biden says paying higher taxes is patriotic, here . Anyone who can explain to me how a presidential or vice-presidential candidate can think this, and get away with it wins nothing more than respect. In addition to that, the justification offered...

Posted to A Discourse on Current Events by duffmann808 on Fri, Sep 19 2008

Filed under: socialism, freedom, biden, fallacy, democrat

A bunch of links I don't want to loose

Whenever I come across a website or online article worth reading I bookmark it. Doing some spring cleaning today and want to delete these from my sidebar but not loose track of them forever. They're obviously relevant here: 1. James Wilson at Volokh...

Posted to Austrian Addiction by Austrian Addiction on Thu, Sep 18 2008

Filed under: crime, News, Prisons, proportionality, guns, commentary, vengeance

A line by line critique on Obama's Economic Ad

Link

Posted to Free Markets, Free Minds, Free Me. by ViennaSausage on Wed, Sep 17 2008

Filed under: statism, Obama, critique

Should libertarians still vote for Obama?

Alex Tabarrok thought they should about a week ago because the costs of warfare in terms of economics and liberty are both so great and often under-estimated. This is an argument I find convincing, but now I'm not so sure. In recent comments about...

Posted to Austrian Addiction by Austrian Addiction on Wed, Sep 17 2008

Filed under: regulation, obama, libertarianism, bush

commodities

I would be interested in more articles on commodities . If anyone can provide I would appreciate this. A distinction should be made between commodity futures and commodities traded as physical products of mines and factories.

Posted to Torsten by Torsten on Wed, Sep 17 2008

Filed under: commodities, futures, trading

Rough diamonds - a means of storing value?

Some say rough diamonds are storing the highest value on the smallest space, but could they function as currency? There is a debate about what currency to use. Most Austrians would favour a gold based money and oppose fiat money(money created on the books...

Posted to Torsten by Torsten on Tue, Sep 16 2008

Filed under: commodities, value, currency, diamonds, purchasing power, fiat-money

Is self-ownership a misnomer?

If something is owned, then by definition there is something external to it that is doing the owning. Likewise, something that is owned is by definition something external to the agent that owns it. Taking this very basic point into account, does it really...

Posted to Brainpolice by Brainpolice on Tue, Sep 16 2008

Filed under: Objectivism, Ethics, Rational Egoism, Individual Sovereignty, Natural Rights, Libertarianism, Philosophy, Human Nature

Primera universidad privada, gratuita y rentable del mundo nace en Colombia

Tomado de el Diario EL TIEMPO de Bogotá, Colombia Septiembre 15 de 2008 Muhammad Yunus, profesor universitario que ha sacado a 4 millones de familias de la pobreza enseñándoles a construir sus propios sistemas de protección...

Posted to Rodrigo Diaz by Rodrigo Diaz on Mon, Sep 15 2008

Paying Students to Get Good Grades...

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/content/education/chi-money-for-grades-11-sep11,0,7506945.story This article basically says that the Chicago school district will start paying students for grades. A first reaction from the title made me furious...

Posted to A Discourse on Current Events by duffmann808 on Fri, Sep 12 2008

My ego's like my stomach.

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 As Tim Kasher wrote, "My ego's like my stomach, it keeps shitting what I feed it", and lately no matter what news coverage I look at I feel like I might need to do...

Posted to A Discourse on Current Events by duffmann808 on Fri, Sep 12 2008

UK jury approves damage to power plant in defense of a commons/ other private property; libertarians and conservatives freak out

See this surprising decision in the UK , letting climate-change protesters/trespassers off the hook for damages resulting from spray-painting a coal plant smokestack, on the grounds that a UK law "allows damage to be caused to property to prevent...

Posted to TT's Lost in Tokyo by TokyoTom on Thu, Sep 11 2008

Filed under: cordato, AGW, Ron Bailey, adler, Dolan, Block, climate change, Iain Murray, rothbard, bratland

Another tech idea I'd love to see

If a hurricane hits your neighborhood dead on then your top concern is probably your house and furniture (other precious items can be taken along in an evacuation). But when the hurricane doesn't do much pervasive damage, the priorities and burdens...

Posted to Austrian Addiction by Austrian Addiction on Thu, Sep 11 2008

Filed under: Technology, hurricanes

Socialists

I go to a relatively open school, in the sense that I hear many different and contrasting ideas every day, and there is no fear of being outcasted because you have a different idea. While I love this fact, and respect what it lends to our University community...

Posted to A Discourse on Current Events by duffmann808 on Wed, Sep 10 2008

Filed under: speech, socialism, stupidity, freedom