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The Daddy Knows Best Inaugural Address
Fatal conceit alert! Here’s the text of the Inaugural Address, with some comments from your humble servant. For everywhere we look, there is work…
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President Barack Obama Already Dealing with Global Warming
Anyone who lives in the nation’s capital knows that it has been FREEZING, with well below average temperatures. Even today, inauguration day, started out with…
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Bad Economic Metaphors: Priming the Pump
President Obama faces the immediate challenge of getting funds again flowing through the financial system. And, apparently, his advisors are relying on “pump priming”—pouring…
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Whither Union Transparency?
As Barack Obama is sworn in as the nation’s 44th President today, Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.) will likely be the next Secretary of Labor. As…
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Departing President Bush to Establish “Freedom Institute”
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Britain Prays for Obama Miracle
With a trillion dollar national debt, a currency crisis and their own bank bailout having conclusively failed, Britain is on the edge of bankruptcy. That…
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A Tide Turning?
Very interesting new poll from Rasmussen that suggests a significant reversal in public opinion over the causes of global warming. Forty-four percent (44%) of…
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HIGH NOON–Inauguration Global Warming Temperature Watch
When President Bush leaves office today, will the capital be warmer or colder than when he was sworn in eight years ago? It’s not scientifically…
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Economic Hype We Can Believe In?
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Stimulus Bill Lacks Bold Ideas for Reform
USATODAY.com reports that the stimulus plan has swelled to $850 billion but lacks the bold ideas that are needed for the economy to truly…
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The Dishonesty of Poltical Adjectives
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Land Grab Bill: Senators Check Principles at the Door
I have heard several Republican congressional leaders say that the party has learned its lesson from their disastrous losses in the past two elections. From…
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$6 Billion For Broadband, Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And LOL At The Recovery Act
Speeding its way across the Internetz today are copies of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Eager policy analysts, lobbyists, and grassroots organizations…
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Barack Obama and the Price of Change
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PEOTUS Behavioral Targeted Advertising Adventure
The prevention of regulation and the Rule of Law pounding its mighty fist within a medium or sector of business is generally something that is…
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VIDEO: Barack Obama and the Price of Change
How much will President Obama’s plans for economic stimulus and other federal spending cost the American taxpayers? We do the math.
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Telecom Lobbyists in the DTV Henhouse?
With the election of a new president and new Democratic majorities in Congress, the era of corporate influence is over in Washington, D.C. Or, at…
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John Berlau on Tim Geithner’s Qualifications
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FEMA — Fraudulent Emergency Mismanagement Agency
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D.C. Event: BB&T’s John Allison on the Financial Crisis
Our friends at the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights are hosting what promises to be a fascinating public lecture on the state of…
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How gullible are we?
Scrolling through the $825 billion dollar monstrosity, my first question is–how many unemployed construction workers do they think there are? Don’t they realize that…
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Regulate First, Think Never?
Twitter can be very useful. Walter Olson of Overlawyered.com sent out a tweet this morning about an Amazon list of toys that…
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Obama’s Trillion Dollar “Stimulus” Fantasy, at $300,000 per Job
Barack Obama claims his trillion-dollar stimulus package, financed through new deficit spending, will “create or save” 3 million jobs. That’s pure fantasy —…
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We Can’t Afford Much More Stimulus!
The deficit for this year already exceeds that for all of last year. Reports Reuters: The United States racked up a record $485 billion…
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Fat and Boring Is No Way to Go through Life, Son
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Traveling Eco-Friendly
Even most of us free market people like a clean environment. But I’ll admit that I also like the conveniences and comforts provided by advanced industrial…
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Chris Horner and “Red Hot Lies” on C-SPAN’s Book TV
Senior Fellow Christopher C. Horner talks about his new book “Red Hot Lies: How Global Warming Alarmists Use Threats, Fraud, and Deception to Keep…
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The Paycheck Fairness Act: Equal Pay Baloney From the Press
“News” stories on legislation often read like lazy summaries of press releases put out by the bill’s sponsors. That’s particularly true for so-called “equal pay”…
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Why State Funded Energy R&D Doesn’t Work
The fundamental shortcoming of government funded R&D is government's inability to successfully perform the development part.
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RIP Patrick McGoohan, No. 6
Patrick McGoohan, star of the most brilliantly obscure TV series of all time, The Prisoner, has died at the age of 80. Growing up…
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Bipartisanship Washington-Style
President-elect Barack Obama has received plaudits for reaching across the aisle. That includes appointing Republican Rep. Ray LaHood to be Transportation Secretary. But no budget…
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Geithner should withdraw nomination for failure to pay self-employment taxes
Treasury Secretary Nominee Timothy Geithner’s failure to pay four years’ worth of self-employment taxes for Social Security and Medicare is absolutely astonishing. And as…
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LibertyWeek 25: The Silver Lining to the News
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Paulson speaks
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Stimulating Who, Exactly?
Great point by Carter Wood over at the excellent Shopfloor blog of the National Association of Manufacturers. Building on my point at NRO…
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A State-Level Counter to Card Check
As disappointing as the 2005 Kelo v. New London ruling was for supporters of strong property rights, the ensuing months saw a healthy — and…
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“Smart”: The new ‘green’
Recently in the …
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Deregulate Detroit
I have an expansion of my original “deregulatory bailout” plan for Detroit in The Detroit News today. I’m also quoted in their editorial…
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So What if We Wasted $350 Billion?!
Washington is so awful it’s funny. There really is nothing you can do but laugh. Consider the status of the second $350 billion tranche of “TARP”…
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Bus Drivers Drive as Politicians Dither (and Spend)
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Nannychusetts Fights Obesity
The paternalists continue on the march. But don’t worry, it’s for our own good! Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby writes: THE WORTHIES who govern…
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Tiger, photographer and local government officials
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The Shock of the Not New
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Vladimir Putin: Chevron’s Man of the Year?
What does Chevron think of Vladimir Putin's recent cut-off of Russian gas to the Ukraine and beyond? Looking at their recent ad campaign, it seems…
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The Answer to Global Warming?
The Washington Post sponsors the weekly “Style Invitational,” officially deemed a humor contest but very often covering matters of great substance. This week the…
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Dishonoring the Heroic Passengers on Flight 93
We all should be thankful for the heroics of the passengers of Flight 93 on September 11. They prevented the hijackers from crashing another plane…
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SEIU’s California Scheming IV — and Illinois, too
Service Employees International Union (SEIU) finalized a contentious merger of several California locals into a statewide “superlocal.” Sal Rosselli, the head of one of the…
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Bonding with Bill Richardson
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Ecuador’s Mining Law and the 70% WFT
Ecuador, the only Latin American country that lacks large-scale mining operations, is passing a new mining law that will lift a six-month ban on mining…
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Stimulating Alternative Energy
In his speech on the stimulus package Thursday, President (Elect) Obama promised to double alternative energy use in three years. How likely is this?…
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Democrats Poised for Yet Another Land Grab
In these troubled times, Congress’ plate is piled high with vital legislative priorities. Naturally, upon getting to work this week, the Senate is zeroing in…
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Stimulus Roadblock
They’ve waited for this day. Billions of dollars potentially at their disposal. But environmental groups may not be able to use it because of something…
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Elephantine Mistake
In the 80s and 90s, Zimbabwean elephant management was a magnificent illustration of how property rights and markets combine to protect and even…
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The Bureaucratic Mind at Work
In an increasingly rare example of investigative journalism, the UK Times finds a ‘ghost bus’ designed to spare ministers’ blushe. The bus, which is…
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Amazing How Many People in Europe are Sick
Europe has a very generous social welfare system--basically, just say you aren't feeling quite right, and you get paid. Surprise, surprise ... people take advantage…
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CEI in Time Magazine
Our CEI colleague Drew Tidwell and I fired off a letter to Time Magazine recently; one of their columnists fell for the old broken window…
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Short-seller praised by Mass. Democrat at Madoff hearing
In the House Financial Services Committee hearing Monday on Bernard Madoff’s $50 billion alleged Ponzi scheme, some good points were raised by Congress members…
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Come Sail on our Internship
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Change Is Coming, To Benefit Trial Lawyers
Obama promised change, and it’s already happening, at the expense of the poor, consumers, and small business. “Regulations set to take effect next month could…
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Massive in Massachusetts
The people of Massachusetts, who until now have been entirely clueless about the fat content of any food, will finally be set free from their…
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Pittsburgh, Knocking off the Rust
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Soderbergh: Historically Illiterate or Willfully Ignorant?
In a new interview, Steven Soderbergh, the incredibly overrated Hollywood director whose new paean to the disgusting Che Guevara is getting a lot…
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Tightening Energy Rationing by Strategy
Many energy companies have embraced cap and trade schemes as a means to minimize the cost of reducing their carbon emissions, something that they feel…
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Next on the Bail-Out List: The Porn Industry?
It seems everyone in America is suffering. So obviously everyone is entitled to a bail-out. At least, that is the theory being advanced by America's…
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Sunstein Nomination
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Stimulating Rent Seeking
President-elect Obama’s proposed economic stimulus package (on which Doug Bandow commented recently) isn’t even in Congress yet, and the the rent-seeking has already started.
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Stimulus Exit Strategy
Along with a deflating perfect storm bubble, the US economy is facing a crisis in confidence. These trillion numbers–1,1,3, and 10.6; Obama’s stimulus…
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Let the Sunstein In
I was cheered this morning by the news that Cass Sunstein of the University of Chicago is to be the next head of…
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Thousands Die After Zimbabwe Dictator Nationalizes Water Systems
Thousands of people have died of cholera in Zimbabwe after the country’s left-wing dictator Robert Mugabe nationalized municipal water systems to seize their revenue,…
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Stopping Wasteful Spending: Better Latte Than Never
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Costa’s Confusion on Net Neutrality
As PC Magazine ends its run as a print publication and moves to an online-only model, columnist Dan Costa pens a good, yet confused, column.
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The Thaw Could Melt Our Cynical Hearts
Fans of eco-apocalyptic movies will be happy right now. The past few months have seen a veritable bonanza in human-killing eco-excellence.
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Nationalized Health Care: Growing the Nanny State
Advocates of the Nanny State have long been with us. What was Prohibition but an early manifestation of government treating everyone as children to protect…
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LibertyWeek 24: Pro-Freedom Pop Culture
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Soundbites vs. The World
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New ABC Show Glorifies Failed Immigration Policies, Drug War
ABC is debuting its new show “Homeland Security USA” tonight at 8pm eastern time. Presumably the show is intended to make us all proud…
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Krugman is No Liberal
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Ron Asheton, RIP
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Expanding Government, Corrupting Business
Tossing money at most anyone who shows up in Washington touting a sob story in the company of a lobbyist is doing more than impoverishing taxpayers. The…
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Wasn’t Sea Ice Supposed to be Disappearing?
I’m totally confused. The world was supposed to be ending, and one alleged sign was the disappearance of sea ice. But the ice is back. …
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A Nobel Low: Krugman Calls Small Government Philosophies Racist
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Card Check Loses Support, but Threat Isn’t Over
Today in The Wall Street Journal, Kimberley Strassel dissects the shifting political prospects for the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), commonly known as the…
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Obama Enjoys Bottled Water
According to news reports, the Obama family was welcomed into their temporary home at the Hay-Adams Hotel with a complementary supply of Fiji bottled water.
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Green for the Greens, Lumps of Coal for Everyone Else
Mark Tapscott, in today’s Washington Examiner, explodes the propaganda from the “Reality Campaign,” a coalition of leftist environmental groups, which has all but…
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Economy Worsens, Congress Gives Itself a Raise
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The EU Propaganda Machine
Government propaganda is always irritating, especially because that means politicians are taxing citizens to pay for a snow job for those same citizens. The European…
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More Money For Your Mattress
America's biggest maker of mattress springs has been hard at work...in Washington. After all that work, the Department of Commerce is in bed with the…
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No Money in Washington, D.C.? No Matter!
Washington, D.C. is another world. Today the company newsletter, otherwise known as the Washington Post, had an article entitled “U.S. Debt Expected to Soar…
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Prediction 2009: No Net Neutrality Regulation
Perhaps this is just wishful thinking, but I think that 2009 may see the death of calls for net neutrality regulation and may even see…
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The Goldwater Century
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On Stalin’s Endurance
In a recent poll conducted in Russia on who is the “greatest” Russian ever, Joseph Stalin came in third (after Alexander Nevsky, who repelled…
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Remember, the Government Wants to Manage Your Health Care!
Just think how wonderful it would be if government guaranteed everyone health care. Just like in Great Britain! Just ask Lynne Neilson what she thinks…
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Irrational Massachusetts Child Support Guidelines
Massachusetts has long had some of the most excessive child support guidelines in the nation: for just one child, the father is ordered to…
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Carney on the “Year of the Bailout”
Following Iain Murray’s farewell to 2008’s bailout-o-rama, Former CEI Brookes Fellow Tim Carney, in his Washington Examiner column, bids farewell to “The Year…
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A Silver Lining in the Terrible Madoff Ponzi Scheme?
Point of Law carries a news item called “Left-Wing Legal Groups Reeling from Madoff Affair.” Bernard Madoff, the architect of a $50 billion ponzi…
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Gold Is Not the Enemy – Poverty Is
National Geographic magazine has published an article titled The Price of Gold focusing on the high price of gold and the…
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Thank You, 2008, and Good Riddance!
For supporters of freedom and markets, the Year of Our Lord 2008 has been close to a disaster. As D:Ream used to sing, things can…
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The End of the Global Warming Frenzy
Sunday was a beautiful day in Washington. The temperature hit the high 60s and I wore shorts. I dreamed it was spring. But as the…
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LibertyWeek 23: Madoff About You
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The New Energy Blog in Town
CEI mentor and friend Julian Simon called energy the “master resource” in his 1970 book Population Matters. He called it that because “energy enables…