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Credit Spiral
So, say you've had a good relationship with a credit card company and been paying off substantially more than minimum payment over recent months. You've…
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Will Obama go after farm bill pork?
Cutting some of the pork in the 2008 farm bill may be on President-elect Obama's plate. In his press conference November 25 to…
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Load Up the B-52s with Dollars!
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Barack Obama Wants to Cut the Budget
Like, oh, maybe 40 of the presidents before him, Barack Obama says that he wants to cut out wasteful programs. At least George W. Bush,…
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World Toilet Day Passed Me By
I was traveling last week and missed World Toilet Day. You didn't notice it either? Too bad. The toilet is a humble creation, one that…
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LibertyWeek 18: The LOST Episode
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Legal High-Seas Hostage Taking?
Ratification of the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) would mean a loss of sovereignty and burdensome extraterritorial regulation of U.S. extractive industries. In…
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Holder for Attorney General: Bad, But It Could Be Much Worse
President-elect Obama is poised to appoint Eric Holder as the next attorney general. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, Holder…
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Slowdown may affect green investment, says NYT
An article today in the New York Times notes that the worldwide economic slowdown may hold up investments in clean energy projects to…
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IHT profiles Václav Klaus
The International Herald Tribune takes a look at the in-coming president of the European Union, Václav Klaus, the president of the Czech…
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America the Ungovernable
With respect to the ongoing series of bailouts, my colleague Iain Murray pointed out that some sensible British commentators note that one of the ways…
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Bailout Turning All Banks into Freddie/Fannie
Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae were the catalyst for our current financial crisis. By buying up risky sub-prime mortgages, Freddie & Fannie encouraged banks…
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EFCA’s Unambiguous Language
A recent Washington Times editorial rightly calls the bluff on organized labor’s dubious claim that millions of American workers would eagerly join unions if…
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Socialize Medicine, Kill Cancer Patients
Any American who travels to Europe as I just did is likely to get hit with the argument that the United States is inhumane because…
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Fitzgerald v. Barnstable School Committee: School Board Virtually Concedes Vast New Liability
There's an interesting case pending in the Supreme Court, Fitzgerald v. Barnstable School Committee, that could make Title IX irrelevant in many cases, by creating…
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FT says “nay” to Hillary choice for State
As pundits bet that Sen. Hillary Clinton is a done deal for Secretary of State, today’s editorial in the Financial Times calls it a…
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Geithner choice is ‘more of the same’ — was Paulson’s bailout cohort
If news accounts are true, and Presidet-Elect Barack Obama has indeed decided on Timothy F. Geithner to be his Treasury Secretary nominee, it represents a…
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Student Eye Opener
Cheers to Dewey Crowley for his eye-opening article in the Bowdoin College paper The Bowdoin Orient. His piece on bottled water should be…
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Free Speech Free Zone
Ithaca: Where the 1960s Never Ended. Ithaca, New York, home to my noble alma mater, has long been considered a place where…
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America’s Other Auto Industry, the Successful One
CNN has a great story about the successful auto companies in America, namely those that aren’t named “GM,” “Chrysler,” or “Ford.” Turns out, folks…
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Happy Anniversary, Big Tobacco
In the 1990s, state attorneys general launched massive, unprecedented lawsuits against major tobacco companies, claiming the companies owed the states for the past costs of…
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Hollywood Rep. to Wield Power Over Copyright Law
My colleague Cord asked me about proposing a tech agenda for Congress given the ascendancy today of Henry Waxman to Energy and Commerce Chairmanship;…
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More on Waxman and Tech
As Cord mentioned earlier, Henry Waxman has been named incoming Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, of which the Subcommittee on Telecommunications…
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Too Bad Daschle Isn’t at SEC — Backed Sarbanes-Oxley Relief
President-Elect Barack Obama just nominated former Senate Democratic Leader Tom to be his Secretary of Health and Human Services. Much is being written about Daschle…
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Chairman Waxman on USF & Net Neutrality
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Daschle: Good, Wrong, and Terrible
President-elect Obama has named Tom Daschle to head the Department of Health and Human Services. By some measures the largest department in the government,…
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Celebrate Coal (or, How I Just Tripled My Carbon Footprint)
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Is Beer Next?
In my prior post on bottled water bans on campus I asked: If greens can get water banned, what next? Students over 21…
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John Berlau on the Auto Bailout
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Academic Nanny State
Both universities and elementary schools are going after bottled water, as if that were the greatest threat facing students today! At the grade and…
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The Least Objectionable Legislator Award
My occasional "Least Objectionable Legislator Award" today goes to Michele Bachmann (R-MN) for a solid statement at today's hearings on the Bailout on Wheels,…
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The Big Tobacco Deal’s 10th Anniversary
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LibertyWeek 17: One New Cabinet – Some Assembly Required
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LibertyWeek 17: One New Cabinet, Some Assembly Required
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University of Socialism to be Founded by Iran, Venezuela
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Obey GE
This is “Green Week,” NBC's annual effort to show you how to “green your routine.” It sounds innocuous enough, but “Green Week” is actually part…
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From Each According to his Profitability…
That seems to be the motto of Illinois, at least of those legislators who decided to tax casinos in order to prop up…
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Hillary at State — not good for trade
Controversy continues over the strong possibility of President-elect Barack Obama naming Sen. Hillary Clinton as the new Secretary of State. Politico today notes…
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The Auto Industry Has a Rich History of Failure
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GM Fiction & Scare Tactics
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Pure Hype about Bottled Water
The company producing Pur Filters is touting the fact that its filters can remove trace pharmaceuticals and even some (but they don’t guarantee it…
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The Government Money Hole
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To Blame Laissez-Faire, Anti-Market Media Must Do Better
Like many of us at CEI, it looks like my former boss Phil Gramm isn't interested in helping anybody pretend that today's financial crisis was…
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Are We Socialists Yet?
The term socialist got tossed around a lot in the recent presidential campaign. But Robert Higgs of the Independent Institute says we’re already there. And…
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Brits Say Care More Expensive, Lower Quality than in Estonia
Ah, socialized medicine. Everyone is guaranteed care, right? And the government saves so much money that is wasted in America. Well, so much for the…
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President Bush — In defense of free markets and capitalism
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Were Lada factories this bad?
As the Senate prepares to debate the proposed $25 billion bailout bill for the Big Three Detroit automakers, it’s worth pointing out — as…
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Championing civil liberties — mostly
I’ve been a closet admirer of Senator Russell Feingold (D-WI) since he singlehandedly opposed the Patriot Act in the Senate. According to…
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Will the G20 Only Make Matters Worse?
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How Not to Solve a Crisis
…is the title of a useful contribution to the discussion from the International Policy Network in London and the Lion Rock Institute in Hong…