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Causes of Public Pension Underfunding Are Not Hard to Identify
As if on cue, nearly every time state and local government officials try to rein in public employee pension costs in order to bring their…
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The Futility of Religious Profiling at Airport Security Checkpoints
“Obviously, Muslims would be someone you'd look at, absolutely,” former-Senator Rick Santorum said during a GOP presidential debate last year. “Radical Muslims are…
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Today’s Links: May 30, 2012
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Injunction Imposed Over Blog Posts That Criticized Convicted Terrorist-Turned-Left-Wing Activist
In 2005, a New Mexico judge appalled people across America by issuing a restraining order against David Letterman after a wacky woman accused Letterman…
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Paycheck Fairness Act Contains Unfair Provisions, Would Result in Equal Pay for Unequal Work
“Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., scheduled a vote on the Paycheck Fairness Act when the Senate returns from its week-long recess,” reports Susan…
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Today’s Links: May 29, 2012
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When Schools Are Like Jails — Or Worse
A 17-year-old Texas honor student has been jailed for missing too much school. Diane Tran works both full-time and part-time jobs, in addition to taking…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
95 new final rules published last week, covering everything from crocodiles to the definition of "unblockable drain."…
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Magical Thinking in Liberal Land
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Classic Obfuscation: The New America Foundation’s Search for the “Public Interest”
Milton Friedman once quipped that “Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program.” Perhaps he would add the outmoded idea of the “public interest”…
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No, Obama Is Not “the Smallest Government Spender Since Eisenhower”
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Today’s Links: May 25, 2012
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Carbon Tariffs Again in the Spotlight
Here it comes again — talk of an EU carbon tax. This time it’s a member of the new administration of new French President Francois…
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CEI Podcast for May 24, 2012: Driverless Cars
A prototype driverless car made by Google recently made the rounds in Washington, DC, and Land-use and Transportation Policy Analyst Marc Scribner got to take…
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Senate Vote Today on FDA, Supplements, and Energy Drinks
Today, the Senate will vote to reauthorize and modify the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) prescription drug and medical device user-fee program (…
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MWAA: A Government-Authorized Fiefdom
Should Congress’s power extend to creating taxpayer-funded government entities that are free from state and federal laws concerning ethics, transparency, and disclosure? No, but it…
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Empty Cupboards: The Legacy of the Greatest Generation
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Is the Obama Administration Anti-Business?
If President Obama has found it hard in responding to critics who accuse him of being “anti-business,” he really only has his own administration’s policies…
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EEOC Restricts Speech in Viewpoint-Discriminatory Manner in Dawson v. Donahoe: De Facto Ban on Confederate Flags
The First Amendment generally protects even offensive speech, so if you wish to wear a t-shirt celebrating a bloodthirsty thug like Mao, Stalin, or Che…
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Facebook’s Fall and the Post-Sarbanes-Oxley “Cheers IPOs”
How Over-Regulation is Robbing Investors of Wealth from Smaller IPOs When I wrote pieces here and at the Daily Caller late last week injecting a…
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An Economics Disaster
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Today’s Links: May 23, 2012
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H.R. 1909 — Unfinished Free-Market Business to Lift Barriers to Lending
They said it couldn't be done. That Congress couldn't pass a bipartisan bill in an election year to help the economy. Particularly one that lessens…
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Techno-Phobic California Politicians “NHTSA” Google’s Driverless Car
Last week, I wrote about Google’s amazing new self-driving car, which CEI General Counsel Sam Kazman and I had the opportunity to test-ride in…
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Congress Must End Taxpayers Vulnerability to Government Waste
Openmarket.org Fraud and abuse continue to be a barrier to effective government. According to the Cato Institute’s 2009 report, fraud or improper payments in government amount…
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Obama: Promises Broken, Promises Kept
President Obama has broken many of his promises aimed at the general public and jobless Americans, but he has kept promises to his left-wing base…
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Congress Must End Taxpayers Vulnerability to Government Waste
Fraud and abuse continue to be a barrier to effective government. According to the Cato Institute’s 2009 report, fraud or improper payments in government…
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Today’s Links: May 21, 2012
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Regulating Obama’s Regulators — And Those of Future Presidents
This month, President Obama released a new Executive Order building upon and making permanent the quest for regulatory savings in his…
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A Fit of Sanity on ITAR
Over at Space Politics, Jeff Foust reports that the House has passed a bill allowing the administration to remove satellites from…
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EPA’s Design to Strong-Arm the Chemical Industry
If you believe the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, its Design for the Environment (DfE) program is an example of a voluntary effort to protect…
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Rep. Nick Rahall Responds, Agrees with Me on MAP-21’s “Sleight of Hand” Pay-Fors
This morning on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal,” House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Ranking Member Nick Rahall (D-W.V.) was read a passage from a blog post…
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The Future of Automobility Is (Almost) Here: Google’s Self-Driving Car
[caption id="attachment_55209" align="alignleft" width="350" caption="CEI General Counsel Sam Kazman about to take a spin in the Google car. (Photo by Marc Scribner)"][/caption] This morning,…
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Give a Man a Fish
Those with an interest in conserving our oceans’ fish stocks and those with an interest in promoting private property should both be interested in my…
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Land of the Free? Part 2: The Real War on Women
"How could it be illegal to sell something that it's perfectly legal to give away?" -- George Carlin The recent extra-curricular exploits of American Secret Service…
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Today’s Links: May 18, 2012
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Before Immigration Was Regulated: Pre-20th Century Migration
Early large-scale human migration is the story of dispersal, spreading out as resources were used up and populations expanded past sustainability. The Agricultural Revolution brought…
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Facebook, Overregulation, and the “Cheers IPOs”: Unshackling the Next Facebook and Its Investors
Whether or not a retail investor buys shares of Facebook when it finally goes public tomorrow -- and OpenMarket provides public policy, rather than investment,…
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CEI Podcast for May 17, 2012: Ethanol’s Overstated Benefits
Senior Fellow Marlo Lewis takes apart a study claiming that ethanol lowers gas prices by more than a dollar per gallon in some regions.
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Tuna-Dolphin Issue — Again a WTO Decision
No, tuna-dolphin is not a hybrid fish, but the subject of a long-standing trade dispute between Mexico and the United States arising from a 1990…
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Today’s Links: May 17, 2012
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Bailouts Wanted — All Taxpayers Solicited!
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Government Lost Tons of Money in the Auto Bailouts, Despite Benefiting from Blind Luck
As John Lott notes, “Having just $34 billion to show after a $100 billion-plus investment would get a chief executive of any private company…
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Senate Rejects Obama Budget, 99-0
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Let’s Lose LOST
The Law of the Sea Treaty would drastically undermine American sovereignty, giving massive powers to the U.N. (aka the Dictators’ Club of New York), but…
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Cut Military Spending to Prevent Tax Increases; Obama Administration Endangers Anti-Terrorism Efforts by Exposing Undercover Agent
The Cato Institute has identified $17-20 billion in readily-achievable savings to the 2013 military budget. Such cuts can help stave off tax increases. As…
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Today’s Links: May 16, 2012
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Court Slaps NLRB — Again
In yet another victory for workers and job creators, a federal district court has struck down the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) ambush election rule.
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Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Survey of the Regulatory State
The latest edition of my colleague Wayne Crews’s annual snapshot of the regulatory state, “Ten Thousand Commandments,” is out. This year’s lowlights include: Estimated…
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More First Amendment Violations from Obamacare, Thanks to HHS
Obamacare will drive up costs for most patients and insurance policyholders. Yet "health-insurance companies must tell customers who get a premium rebate…