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The Deregulator Who Wasn’t
Washington Examiner columnist Conn Carroll refutes President Barack Obama’s attempt to blame the nation’s ongoing economic problems on his predecessor. In a recent interview,…
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Today’s Links: April 30, 2012
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
81 new regulations passed last week, covering everything from Medicare to fishing for northeast skate.
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Diversity Training Doesn’t Work, But It Persists Anyway, Due to Compulsion
Diversity training doesn't work, according to an article in Psychology Today. In it, Peter Bregman notes, “Diversity training doesn't extinguish prejudice. It…
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Alcohol Regulation Roundup: April 27, 2012
It's time once again for a review of the ever-changing, increasingly complex, regulation of alcohol around these United States. This should give you something to…
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My Weekend with Hitchens at NASCAR
Last weekend, there was a public memorial service at Cooper Union in New York to commemorate the voice of the late Christopher Hitchens. I…
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Today’s Links: April 27, 2012
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The Awful Truth about the Highway Bills
If you ever needed additional proof that the politics of Washington are not just broken, but soaked with gasoline and set ablaze in a ditch…
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CEI Podcast for April 26, 2012: The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA)
Associate Director of Technology Studies Ryan Radia goes over CISPA's privacy problems and discusses the bill's political prospects.
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TSA in the News
Pat-down reduces a woman to tears in Madison, WI, a supermodel is searched with surprising thoroughness, and a frustrated flyer strips naked in Portland, Oregon.
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Land of the Free? Our Insane and Unjust Drug War
Americans have long beat their chests and bragged about their liberties. But more and more these are empty boasts -- the land of the free…
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Today’s Links: April 26, 2012
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Cy pres in the First and Third Circuits
On Tuesday, the First Circuit issued a landmark decision on cy pres, In re Lupron Marketing. Though odd litigation decisions by the objectors led…
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Congressional Hearings Question National Toxicology Program’s Science
Today, the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee and House Small Business Committee held a joint hearing on the National Toxicology Program's (NTP)…
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SB 1070 Author: “I’m a Civil Libertarian”!
[caption id="attachment_54026" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Russell Pearce with white supremacist J.T. Ready"][/caption] "As a civil libertarian… I don't want a police state. I want a…
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Violence Against Women Act Reauthorization: Don’t Let that Pesky Constitution Stand in the Way of a Law With a Nice-Sounding Title
Senators “will let legislation on domestic violence” known as the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act “pass the upper chamber despite having concerns about its…
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What the Washington Post Cited: “Severe Shortage of Skilled Factory Workers As Government Encourages Students to Pursue White Collar Jobs”
The Washington Post cited my blog post, “Severe Shortage of Skilled Factory Workers As Government Encourages Students to Pursue White-Collar Jobs,” in a…
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SB 1070 Summary: Read Arizona’s Controversial Immigration Law!
Arizona’s controversial immigration law -- SB 1070 -- heads to the Supreme Court this week. One can only hope that the Justices do a…
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Super Mario Hasn’t Saved Italy’s Entrepreneurs
Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti is full of optimism these days. He has claimed to achieve “historic” reform in Italy’s labor market and to beat…
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Gag Rule for Hedge Funds Challenged in Supreme Court on First Amendment Grounds in Bulldog Investors v. Galvin
Usually, you can advertise and discuss a product, even if not everyone is allowed to buy it. Thanks to the First Amendment, you can advertise…
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$15 Trillion for… What, Exactly?
In a new study, Cato’s Michael Tanner finds that “Despite nearly $15 trillion in total welfare spending since Lyndon Johnson declared war on poverty…
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Stimulus Aided the Politically Connected at Massive Cost to Taxpayers
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Today’s Links: April 24, 2012
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A Bad Week For Shuttlyndra Supporters
Two serious blows were struck against the Senate Launch System this week, though based on previous behavior, when knocked down by…
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Regulation of the Day 219: Cat Cafes
In a city as big as Tokyo, there is plenty of room for niche businesses. One niche is the neko café; neko is the Japanese…
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Today’s Links: April 23, 2012
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
84 new rules, 1,675 Federal Register pages, including new regulations for medical exams for commercial drivers, Chilean pomegranates, and springsnail habitats.
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CEI Weekly: Happy Tax Day!
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An America of Inequalities
Increasingly, ordinary people get prosecuted for trifles, while politically connected people get a pass for the exact same crime, or far worse behavior. A whale-watcher…
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No, Paranoid Progressives, the Koch Brothers Had Nothing to Do With Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” Law
In primitive societies, people blame their misfortunes on witchcraft and other imaginary phenomena. The American Left blames the Koch brothers for everything, with equally little…
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Regulation Roundup
Alpaca tax breaks, IRS seeks power to confiscate tax delinquents' passports, and more.
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Today’s Links: April 20, 2012
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ALEC Unfairly Demonized Over “Stand Your Ground” Laws
The pro-free-market American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is under fire for its support of self-defense laws, known as "Stand Your Ground" laws. It began after…
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The Tax Man Cometh — and Taketh
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CEI Podcast for April 19, 2012: Right to Work Laws and Compelled Speech
Indiana is becoming a right to work state, which means unions will no longer be able to force workers who don't want their representation to…
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Today’s Links: April 19, 2012
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What the Redskins Can Teach Loudoun County
Proponents of Phase II of Dulles Rail often appeal to the notion that having a metro station marks a community as significant. Metro seems to…
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FDR on FDIC
Robert Samuelson’s column (April 8, 2012) discussing President Franklin Roosevelt’s reservations about the longer term implications of Social Security should not be surprising. In…
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How to Fix U.S. Water Policy? Less Government, More Market Pricing
Late last week I received an invitation to testify in the Water and Power Subcommittee of the House of Representatives Natural…
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Today’s Links: April 18, 2012
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Ambulance Chasers Feast on Americans with Disabilities Act Claims
Thanks to generous attorney-fee provisions contained in federal civil-rights law, trial lawyers are feasting on Americans with Disabilities Act claims at the expense of…
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Today’s Links: April 17, 2012
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Another Dubious TSA Trifecta
Stolen iPads, harassing drag queens, and a former TSA chief calls for reform -- three years after his departure.
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Tax Day Approacheth
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Regulation of the Day 218: Bagpipes
Street musicians were recently banned from playing bagpipes in Vancouver, British Columbia. Just in time for the city’s Scotland Week celebration, Mayor Gregor Robertson happily…
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The Space Property Rights Discussion Continues
As I (sort of) predicted last week, Tanja Masson-Zwaan, president of the International Institute of Space Law, has weighed in on…
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Today’s Links: April 16, 2012
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
77 new regulations were published last week, the Federal Register grew by 1,475 pages, and the federal government is liberalizing its golden nematode policy.
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CEI Weekly: Justice Department Sues Apple Over E-Books
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Department of Transportation Bureaucrats Fail Tolling 101
Peter Samuel's extremely valuable TOLLROADSnews brings us this gem, "FHWA Office of Highway Policy Information - sloppy & stupid”: So under Toll Facilities, New…
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Today’s Links: April 13, 2012
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Union Recalcitrance on Race Relations
Openmarket.org Recent events have exposed unions’ troglodytic views on race relations. Basically, unions seek to preserve the current racial makeup of their workforce, regardless of…
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Union Recalcitrance on Race Relations
Recent events have exposed unions’ troglodytic views on race relations. Basically, unions seek to preserve the current racial makeup of their workforce, regardless of changes…
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CEI Podcast for April 12, 2012: Apple, E-Books, and Antitrust
Yesterday the Justice Department sued Apple and five major publishers over their e-book pricing model, alleging price fixing. Associate Director of Technology Studies Ryan Radia…
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99% Spring: An Anatomy of Destruction
Openmarket.org The establishment left’s weeklong protest training, deemed the 99% Spring or Shareholder Spring, is an effort to train 100,000 activists in civil disobedience…
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Competition in Water Infrastructure
Today, CEI released a report on how increased competition could make a big difference in the cost to taxpayers for upgrading water infrastructure.
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On the waterfront: Mob stench still fouls New York Harbor
CEI Policy Analyst Trey Kovacs and Research Associate Jack Mann Featured in New York Post As he tries to clean house at the bloated…
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Modernity is Amazing
A man separated from his family 25 years ago as a small child used Google Earth and Facebook to find them and reunite.
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Today’s Links: April 12, 2012
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99% Spring: An Anatomy of Destruction
The establishment left’s weeklong protest training, deemed the 99% Spring or Shareholder Spring, is an effort to train 100,000 activists in civil disobedience to achieve…
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Big Push for Costly “Comparable Worth” Legislation Coming? Lilly Ledbetter Returns to the Stage
Lilly Ledbetter, who made false claims about her pay discrimination lawsuit, has returned to the political arena, as you can see at…
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A Free Market Defense of Retransmission Consent
Unshackling a market from obsolete, protectionist regulations can be a very challenging undertaking, especially when the lifeblood of a regulated industry is at stake. The…
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One Small Step for Human Spaceflight
The International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) have been a thorn in the American space industry’s side for almost fourteen years, ever since Congress moved…
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Why Matt Taibbi’s Anti-JOBS Act Screed Couldn’t Suck Worse
I have had a range of reactions when reading Matt Taibbi's pieces in Rolling Stone. Most of the time, I vehemently shake my head, but quite a few times…
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San Francisco Judge Dismisses Lawsuit against McDonald’s over Happy Meals
"In San Francisco, Judge Richard Kramer has dismissed the Center for Science in the Public Interest’s lawsuit on behalf of parent Monet Parham seeking to…
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Sources of Economic Error
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Staggering Law School Debts Will Lead to Exploding Debt Disaster for Graduates and Taxpayers
Federal financial aid policies have encouraged law students to borrow increasing amounts to attend law school, despite the glut of lawyers (oddly, government…
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Today’s Links: April 10, 2012
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Grow Economy by Cutting Law School Subsidies
The economy remains slow, recovering from the recession at an unusually low rate, partly due to economically-harmful Obama administration policies. "U.S. stocks fell, dragging…
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Regulation of the Day 217: Being Rude
The mayor of La Torba, Spain recently issued a 65-point Courtesy Charter making it illegal to burp in public or slurp your soup, among other…
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Today’s Links: April 9, 2012
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Further Space Property Rights Responses
Since my previous post on media reaction to CEI's press briefing on Thursday, Popular Science has provided a…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
A new Prison Bureau regulation allows inmates to publish under their own name as of May 3, plus more.
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CEI Weekly: Private Property Rights in Outer Space
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Regulation Roundup
Public school bans a 3-year old with cerebral palsy from using her walker at school, plus more.
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Fred Weekly: Crony Capitalism
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Leon Panetta, Master Negotiator
Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has admitted to racking up over $800,000 in government travel costs for weekend trips back to his home in California.
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NLRB’s Union Ambush Election Rule
Center for Individual Freedom Trey Kovacs, policy analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, discusses the dangers of the National Labor Relations Board's attempt to impose…
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Initial Media Reactions to CEI’s Space Property Rights Paper
On Monday, CEI published an Issue Analysis on a possible new approach to establishing private real estate off planet under the…
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RIP Jim Marshall, Businessman, Innovator, Father of Loud
Culture and politics don’t mix. That was well illustrated by the Justice Department’s dubious raid on Gibson Guitar last year. The feds raided Gibson over alleged…
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CEI Podcast for April 5, 2012: The Export-Import Bank
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Live Streaming at 11:00 AM EDT — Securing Property Rights in Space
On Thursday, April 5, the Competitive Enterprise Institute will host a Capitol Hill briefing to introduce a new study by Adjunct Scholar Rand…
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Public Choice: A Primer
The good folks at the London-based Institute for Economic Affairs have just released an excellent book by Eammon Butler, Public Choice: A Primer.
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Witch Hunt Continues on Bisphenol A
This week the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) yet again reaffirmed the safety of the chemical Bisphenol A (BPA), but the witch hunt for…
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Multiemployer Pensions, the Tragedy of the Commons, and the “Last Man Standing” Rule
The “tragedy of the commons,” as described by the late ecologist Garrett Hardin, generally refers to the depletion of a finite resource caused by…
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Understanding Spontaneous Order
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Obama Administration Wrongdoing: One Scandal Uncovered, But Others Hidden Because Inspector General Slots Left Vacant?
Via The Washington Post: The chief of the General Services Administration resigned, two of her top deputies were fired and four…
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What Left-Wing Law Professors Really Think About You, and the Role of Lawyers
You're just a lab rat to be socially re-engineered by activist judges and lawyers -- who think they know how to run your life better…
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Pink Slime and the Slimy Tactics of America’s Food Elitists
Last week, the Media Research Center’s Dan Gainor wrote a nice article examining how the mainstream media has been complicit in smearing…
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Economic “Recovery” Is Slow and Weak Due to Obama Administration Policies
Typically, after the economy suffers an unusually severe recession, it bounces back in an unusually rapid recovery -- what some economists and others refer to…
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Regulation of the Day 216: Selling Ice Cream to Kids
A group of parents in Brooklyn's Park Slope neighborhood want to ban ice cream vendors from parks. One parent wrote, “I should not have to…
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Funding Government by the Minute
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
2,191 new pages were added to the 2012 Federal Register last week, for a total of 19,487 pages. At this pace, the 2012 Federal Register…
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A Response to Cato’s Tim Lee on “Private” Turnpikes
Cato Institute adjunct scholar Tim Lee has an article up on The Atlantic‘s website, entitled “The Mirage of Free-Market Roads.” In it, he lays out his…
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CEI Weekly: Celebrate Human Achievement Hour Tomorrow!
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Throw Dulles Rail Under the Bus
Openmarket.org Last week, the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority and the Fairfax Board of Supervisors granted the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors a 30-day extension…
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Today’s Links: March 30, 2012
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Will Congress stop NLRB?
CEI Labor Policy Analyst Trey Kovacs and Research Associate Jack Mann Featured in The Washington Examiner Imagine an election in which one candidate may campaign…
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Throw Dulles Rail Under the Bus
Last week, the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority and the Fairfax Board of Supervisors granted the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors a 30-day extension to review…
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TSA Trifecta
First, a TSA manager at Dulles airport has been arrested for running a prostitution ring. Second, two Miami TSA employees were arrested for trashing a…