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Unions Claim Moral High Ground, Kick Off Sleazy Smear Campaign
Openmarket.org UNITE-HERE, the nation’s largest hospitality union, has assembled a new coalition of pro-union organizations to target Hyatt hotels with the goal of organizing…
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Unions Claim Moral High Ground, Kick Off Sleazy Smear Campaign
UNITE-HERE, the nation’s largest hospitality union, has assembled a new coalition of pro-union organizations to target Hyatt hotels with the goal of organizing the chain’s…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week In Regulation
85 new regulations, from prairie dogs to corporate jets.
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Update On TSA’s Lawlessness Over Body Scanners
As I noted previously, the Transportation Security Administration has failed to comply with a court order demanding that they initiate a notice-and-comment rulemaking regarding…
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Who’s Really Responsible For Making Sure Teens Don’t Smoke?
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CEI Podcast For August 2, 2012: Cybersecurity Bill Fails
Today the Senate shot down a controversial cybersecurity bill that Associate Director of Technology Policy Studies Ryan Radia believes would have been a disaster.
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Obama’s jobs council a total flop
The Washington Times When President Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness last gathered in January, he boasted, “This has not been a show council. This…
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The Great Hollywood Swindle
When is a market not a real market? When it trades in fake goods — products or services that could not exist if government didn’t…
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Maryland’s Public Pension Debacle Is Likely to Repeat Itself
The Maryland public employee pension system announced this week that it had achieved a dismal return rate on its investments of 0.36 percent — a…
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Postal Service Set To Default On Multi-Billion Dollar Retiree Payment
Openmarket.org Today, the United States Postal Service (USPS) takes one step closer toward a taxpayer bailout. The blame falls squarely on the shoulders of…
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Why Stop At Assault Weapons?
After the horrific events of the shooting in Aurora, countless pundits are calling for the reinstatement of the federal assault weapons ban. I agree with…
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Today’s Links: August 1, 2012
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Postal Service Set To Default On Multi-Billion Dollar Retiree Payment
Today, the United States Postal Service (USPS) takes one step closer toward a taxpayer bailout. The blame falls squarely on the shoulders of the current…
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EPA Attack On Asthmatics Coming To An End?
CEI warned policy makers a couple decades ago that an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) phase out of over-the-counter sales of CFC containing asthma inhalers…
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Milton Friedman Turns 100
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Regulation Of The Day 225: Boobie Pillows
Kern County, California's government takes morality very seriously. Chapter 9.12.010 of the County Code states that “No vendor shall vend stuffed articles depicting the female…
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Unruly Lead Paint Rule
The U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform recently released an interesting report on regulatory impediments to job creation. Among the…
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Chick-Fil-A And Free Speech: New York City Council Speaker Pressures University To Punish Restaurant For Speech
New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn wants to kick Chick-fil-A out of New York because its CEO said he opposed gay marriage. She…
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Harassing Newborns And Their Mothers: Mayor Bloomberg’s Latest Overreach
The New York Post reports, “Mayor Bloomberg is pushing hospitals to hide their baby formula behind locked doors so more new mothers will breast-feed.” When…
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Miraculous Markets: Water Into Wine
Libertarians are often accused of “worshiping” the free market. But the truth is, markets can perform miracles. A car growing in Iowa? David Friedman (son…
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Groupon Marketing class action settlement
There was a lot of publicity about the “$8.5 million” Groupon will pay to settle a class action over expiration dates; several class members complained…
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Today in the News; July 30, 2012
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week In Regulation
86 new rules last week, covering everything from Florida tomatoes to tug boat races.
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Amendment to Cybersecurity Act Would Deter Federal Government Privacy Abuses
[caption id="attachment_58589" align="alignright" width="150"] Lord Acton's beard absolutely knows that power corrupts[/caption] In the ongoing debate over the Senate’s Cybersecurity Act of 2012 (…
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Maryland’s Unconstitutional School Discipline Quotas
Crimes and infractions are not evenly distributed across racial groups, as the Supreme Court noted in United States v. Armstrong, 517 U.S. 456 (1996). …
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Politics In A Nutshell
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Today’s Links: July 27, 2012
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Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick One Signature Away From Health Care Mistake
Massachusetts is the latest in a string of states to transform private home health care providers into government employees. The disingenuous legislation will raise the…
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Today’s Links: July 26, 2012
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I Never Said Title IX Was Unconstitutional, Or Only Applied To Sports, Contrary To Media Matters’ Claims
Over the years, I have often written about applications of Title IX to areas other than sports, once handled Title IX cases as a…
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New Regulations Threaten To Wipe Out Community Banks
The new Basel III capital requirement regulations are supposed to strengthen the international financial system, with their avowed effect being to: improve the banking…
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Alternative Teacher Certification: Opening the Education Market
Almost everyone can remember that one teacher who changed their life; the teacher who stimulated education and personal development of their students by virtue of…
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Bloomberg Calls for Anarchy
Openmarket.org Here we go. Another mass shooting, another round of mass stupidity from progressive politicians and pundits. Latest example: In the wake of the…
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Bloomberg Calls for Anarchy
Here we go. Another mass shooting, another round of mass stupidity from progressive politicians and pundits. Latest example: In the wake of the horrific shootings…
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Bloomberg Soda Ban Blocks Sale of Low-Calorie Drinks
As I’ve written before, Mayor Bloomberg’s big-soda ban is ill-conceived, unjust, invasive, and useless, among other things. As Seth Goldman, the CEO of Honest…
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Today’s Links: July 25, 2012
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CEI Podcast for July 24, 2012: Unfunded Mandate Reform
Research Associate David Deerson explains why past efforts to rein in unfunded mandates failed, and why new legislation that Congress is set to vote on…
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Groups Urge Boehner To Hold Firm And Not Give In To Agricultural Special Interests
CEI joined 11 other groups in a letter today to House Speaker John Boehner urging him not to give in to special interest…
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Don’t Blame Capitalism for Washington State’s Liquor Privatization “Failure”
There is no alternative way, so far discovered, of improving the lot of the ordinary people that can hold a candle to the productive activities…
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Billions of Tax Dollars Spent Raising False Hopes Among Homeowners
The Obama Administration's Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) gave "banks $1,500 bonus payments and servicers $1,000 bonus payments for each loan modification they processed. This…
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Today’s Links: July 24, 2012
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The Positive-Sum Tendency Of Market Interaction: A Point Which Bears Repeating
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Cut Down On Unfunded Mandates, Part III
In my last post, I discussed the ways in which Rep. Virginia Foxx’s (R-N.C.) Unfunded Mandates Information and Transparency Act (UMITA) updates and improves…
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Time To Reform Unfunded Mandates
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Pension Fund Activism Threatens Workers’ Retirement Security — And Taxpayers
While the underfunding of union pensions cannot be ascribed to any one cause, there is one that is troubling because it is so avoidable: pension…
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To Fix The PBGC, Free Its Premiums
Setting the heavily underfunded Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) on a sound financial footing has got to be one of the toughest jobs anywhere. The…
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The Coming Public Pension Meltdown
While the impact of the Governmental Accounting Standards Board’s (GASB) new public pension reporting requirements won’t be known for some time, some indications of its…
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Cut Down On Unfunded Mandates, Part II
In my last post, I explained the concept of unfunded mandates, and why we need to find a way to curb Congress’s ability to pass…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week In Regulation
81 new rules and 1,283 Federal pages last week, covering everything from sippy cups to perch fishing in Alaska.
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Revised Cybersecurity Act Makes Meaningful Progress On Privacy
em>By Ryan Radia and Berin Szoka A new version of the Cybersecurity Act of 2012 was introduced last night (PDF), and a vote on…