Essays

Anthony Gregory: The Cataclysm of World War II

"World War II was the great event of the 20th century. It greatly altered political boundaries, ushered in the Cold War, effected a total transformation in American governance, and consumed more lives than any other event of comparable duration. The Allied cause stands as the most celebrated of war efforts. U.S. mobilization for it is presented as the greatest government undertaking in American history. The evils of the Axis Powers, particularly Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, were so grave, their crimes so unspeakably brutal and vast, that it is just assumed that the force that violently opposed their reign of terror must have had justice on its side." Continue reading →

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Jeffrey Tucker: Fun and Fascinating Bitcoin

"The emerging cryptographic monetary standard entirely bypasses the age of fiat money and the age of central banking. It takes money out of the realm of public policy and central planning and places it in the hands of the people actually using it. Of all the features of Bitcoin, this one is perhaps the most beautiful. It has emerged from within the social order and was not imposed from above. How long will it take before the full implications reveal themselves? It took email some 20 years to go from obscure to common. Digital phone technology needed about the same swath of time. Bitcoin, however, could be different. Information travels farther and faster than ever before." Continue reading →

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Abraham Lincoln and the Federal Reserve System: A Forgotten Connection

"There were two traditions in the United States in 1832: the Jeffersonian and the Hamiltonian. In the election of 1832, the two traditions clashed self-consciously. Until Lincoln's inauguration in 1861, the Jeffersonian tradition was dominant in the United States. After that, only Grover Cleveland was self-consciously Jeffersonian. This serves as background to the little-known story of the man whose ideas led to the Federal Reserve System, an immigrant named Paul Warburg. He was from a distinguished banking family in Germany. He married the daughter of the founder of Kuhn-Loeb, and he became a major figure in that investment bank, beginning in 1902." Continue reading →

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Common Core: A Lesson Plan for Raising Up Compliant, Non-Thinking Citizens

"When viewed in light of the government’s ongoing attempts to amass power at great cost to Americans—in terms of free speech rights, privacy, due process, etc.—the debate over Common Core State Standards, which would transform and nationalize school curriculum from kindergarten through 12th grade, becomes that much more critical. Essentially, these standards, which were developed through a partnership between big government and corporations, are being rolled out in 45 states and D.C., and will create a generation of test-takers capable of little else, molded and shaped by the federal government and its corporate allies into what it considers to be ideal citizens." Continue reading →

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Putin was wrong: The exceptionalism of the United States is alive and real

"Exceptional can also mean exceptionally bad in some or all respects. And here I would like to enumerate a points on which I can easily affirm the concept of American exceptionalism: The United States enjoys the highest obesity rate among 28 major nations. This is due in large part because of the government sponsored carbohydrate bubble. The United States has killed thousands of people through unmanned drones; the ratio of innocent to terrorists is perhaps 50 to 1. The United States is running the biggest budget deficit and borrows over 40 cents for every dollar it spends. It must borrow more money to be able to claim that it is not a banana republic. [..]" Continue reading →

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The American Economy is Not a Free-Market Economy

"Those inclined to dismiss Lewis’s claim as exaggerated must confront the solid body of evidence he amasses. Everyone knows that governmentally-sponsored mortgages helped to fuel the housing bubble that burst in 2008 with disastrous consequences. As Lewis points out, though, the situation is much worse than most people imagined. 'By the end of 2007 government-sponsored mortgages accounted for 81% of all the mortgage loans made in the US and by 2010 this had risen to 100%.' Government dominance is of course bad for the economy, but it works to the benefit of a small group of the powerful. A great strength of the book is that Lewis names names: he tells us who the predators are." Continue reading →

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The Big-Picture Economy, Part 3: Scarcity, Risk and Debt

"Scarcity of credit is the source of sound risk assessment and the discipline of aligning interest rates to risk and inflation. Manipulating rates to near-zero and opening the credit floodgates has incentivized everything sound economic policy avoids: moral hazard, speculation, leverage and reliance on marginal credit expansion for profits and 'growth.' 'Growth' that depends on manipulated interest rates and easy credit is a sand castle awaiting the rising tide; its destruction is assured." Continue reading →

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Ron Paul: Internet Sales Tax Could Crush Small Businesses

"It is amazing that some of the same conservatives who rightly worry over Obamacare’s effects on job creation and economic growth want to impose new taxes on the most dynamic sector of the economy. The main proponents of this bill are large retailers and established Internet business. Big business can more easily afford to comply with a national Internet sales tax. In many cases, they are large enough that they already have a 'physical presence' in most states and thus already have to collect state sales taxes. These businesses are seeking to manipulate the political process to disadvantage their existing and future small competitors." Continue reading →

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The System Of The World – An Infographic

"This is The System Of The World. It lays out in logical frankness how the various layers of the facade we call 'democracy' and 'free markets' interoperate and together create a grotesque caricature of the ideals they purport to serve and keep us all enslaved. Join us on a trip through The System." Continue reading →

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The Taper Caper

"Under normal conditions, you'd be smart to assume that the Fed won't taper until unemployment falls below 7% and inflation rises above 2%. But there's a curveball: Bernanke will almost certainly step down as head of the Fed in January 2014. Rumors say that he wants to begin tapering before he leaves, for obvious reasons. Such action would increase the odds of history viewing him favorably. If Bernanke tapers, he can take credit for putting the US on a responsible path before handing the reins over to the next guy or gal. Whatever happens after that is Janet Yellen's problem (or whoever-replaces-Bernanke's problem)." Continue reading →

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