October Letter to the Editor by Dr. Richard Davis

Over the last few weeks a few people have offered monetary contributions for my campaign and have seemed a bit surprised when I refused. Let me repeat here that I am accepting no cash contributions. I encourage supporters to pass the word along asking others to vote for me and to seek out groups I might address with my positions, but I will accept no campaign money.

I DO realize that this is NOT how the current system works: the Republicans and Democrats, individually and collectively, take in huge numbers of campaign contribution dollars. When they get into power, they then dole out vastly larger numbers of (tax) dollars in the form of grants, subsidies, tax breaks, government contracts, “stimulus packages”, “bailouts”, various entitlement programs, and so on.

I believe this is not only wrong but self-destructive for the country. Neither Congress nor the executive branch seems to have any clear idea that there are limits to the resources you can expend, however limitless may be the means to expend them.

I also recognize that, even if elected, I cannot change this by myself. My hope is that other candidates in other districts share my concern and goals for this country and its citizens. Only when enough voters in enough districts demand the kind of changes I seek for can we really hope to get those changes. Even so, we need to start somewhere. Why not here?

Sincerely,

Richard J. Davis, D.D.S.

Libertarian for Congress

The Furlough Day Smoke and Mirror Scheme

Like many states Maryland is facing a serious financial crisis that is going to require hard choices not just symbolic gestures. Programs need to be cut. Departments need to be merged. A new crop of legislators need to be elected to end this 20th Century way of doing business.

One idea of using furlough days to help trim the budget is nothing more than band-aid on a cut that needs stitches. However, it is so nice for the governor and other elected officials to take furlough days along with state employees to show solidarity. It does trim the budget somewhat yet not quite enough to make a serious difference and there is still the unintended consequence shooting your self in the foot.

Essentially they are cutting an employee's pay. Which in turn reduces how much they pay income tax. They have also targeted employees who are contracted through grants. Many of these are not career state employees, they are hired for a purpose directed through an agreement to receive a grant, donation, or whatever source of funding that project received. Many of these people work in universities, colleges, for the state, or local counties and municipalities. The unintended consequence could place these grants in jeopardy if the money is not spent as spelled out in the fine print.

An example would be Jane was hired to do a specific task through a grant of $200,000 from DHS, let's say 4 years at $50,000 per year is what she signs in her contract. This money is set aside specifically to pay her. Jane is not a career state employee. Yet, in the great wisdom of our governor, she is furloughed for 10 days which is roughly $2,083.00. This is in violation of her contract, it is also in violation of the amount that the state agreed to in the terms of the grant.

This situation causes several concerns. Are there penalties for changing the contract? Could the grant funding be pulled if the state does this to people hired through grants? Could this affect future grants the state tries to get through this entity?

The other issue is County governments and local municipalities are looking at doing the same thing. Certainly caution is always the best avenue and hopefully these issues have been vetted. It certainly would be moronic if these decisions are made only to find out it is going to cost us more money in legal fees, penalties, or the loss of the income because we were trying to save a few bucks.

Libertarians suggest Nobel announcements should be moved to April Fool's Day

WASHINGTON - The Libertarian Party today suggested that, in the future, the announcement date every year for Nobel Prizes be moved to April 1.

"Unlike the gullible people who listened to The War of the Worlds radio broadcast in 1938 and thought Martians really were attacking the United States, when I heard this morning that Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize, I changed the channel in disbelief. But, the same thing was being said in multiple places," Libertarian National Committee Chairman William Redpath said.

"The gravity of the Nobel awards has not been augmented by some of their recent selections, including today's announcement, last year's award of the Economics prize to Paul Krugman, or the 2007 Peace Prize to Al Gore, whose global warming theories he will not defend in open debate. Maybe an early Springtime announcement date would be more appropriate."

Redpath continued, "I didn't know that it was the role of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee to be handicapping the future performance of individuals and organizations. Nonetheless, we congratulate President Obama on his award and hope that three-and-a-quarter or seven-and-a-quarter years from now the Nobel Peace Prize Committee will be seen as prescient.

"President Obama will best fulfill the promise of peace that the Nobel Committee apparently sees in him by not trying to cure all the ills of the world, but by working to make the United States an example for the other nations of the world through implementation of a Libertarian foreign policy--military non-interventionism combined with free trade policies in fact, and not just in rhetoric. With those guiding principles, the world will be a freer, safer and more prosperous planet at the conclusion of the Obama Administration."

For more information, or to arrange an interview, call LNC executive director Wes Benedict at 202-333-0008 ext. 222.

The LP is America's third-largest political party, founded in 1971. The Libertarian Party stands for free markets and civil liberties. You can find more information on the Libertarian Party at our website.

Despite New Deficit-Cutting Claim, Baucus Bill Is Just Tax-and-Spend

by Michael D. Tanner

The Senate Finance Committee's version of health care reform is being hailed as a model of bipartisan moderation. One Republican may even vote for it.

And it's undeniably an improvement over the bill approved early by the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, or the one making its way ever so slowly through the House.

But that's a low bar. In reality, the Finance Committee bill still represents a radical government takeover of the U.S. health care system.

Let's start with the price tag. According to the report just released by the Congressional Budget Office, the bill will cost roughly $829 billion over the next 10 years. And, significantly, it is even projected to reduce the budget deficit over 10 years by $81 billion. Of course, both those numbers are misleading.

The $829 billion cost is for the next 10 years, 2010-2019, but the most expensive provisions of the bill don't take effect until July of 2013. The cost over the bill's first 10 years of actual operation is closer to $1.3 trillion.

In addition, the bill assumes that Congress will implement a 21% reduction in Medicare payments that is already scheduled under current law. The only problem is that Congress has been supposed to make those reductions since 2003 — and never has. There is no reason to believe it will do so this time either.

Most importantly, the bill does not achieve its deficit reduction by controlling spending or reducing health care costs. In fact, by the end of the 10-year budget window, the cost of the program is expected to be growing at 8% per year. But revenue from the bill's new taxes would be growing between 10% and 15% per year.

In particular, the bill imposes a 40% excise tax on health insurance plans that offer benefits in excess of $8,000 for an individual plan and $21,000 for a family plan. Insurers would almost certainly pass this tax on to consumers via higher premiums.

As inflation pushed insurance premiums higher in coming years, more and more middle-class families would find themselves caught up in the tax — providing the government with more revenue.

The overall tax increases in the bill are more than double the amount of deficit reduction. This isn't a health care efficiency bill or a cost-containment bill. It is a tax-and-spend bill, pure and simple. READ MORE @ CATO

Jon Stewart on ACORN

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The Durable Internet: Preserving Network Neutrality without Regulation

by Timothy B. Lee

An important reason for the Internet's remarkable growth over the last quarter century is the "end-to-end" principle that networks should confine themselves to transmitting generic packets without worrying about their contents. Not only has this made deployment of internet infrastructure cheap and efficient, but it has created fertile ground for entrepreneurship. On a network that respects the end-to-end principle, prior approval from network owners is not needed to launch new applications, services, or content.

In recent years, self-styled "network neutrality" activists have pushed for legislation to prevent network owners from undermining the end-to end principle. Although the concern is understandable, such legislation would be premature. Physical ownership of internet infrastructure does not translate into a practical ability to control its use. Regulations are unnecessary because even in the absence of robust broadband competition, network owners are likely to find deviations from the end-to-end principle unprofitable.

New regulations inevitably come with unintended consequences. Indeed, today's network neutrality debate is strikingly similar to the debate that produced the first modern regulatory agency, the Interstate Commerce Commission. Unfortunately, rather than protecting consumers from the railroads, the ICC protected the railroads from competition by erecting new barriers to entry in the surface transportation marketplace. Other 20th-century regulatory agencies also limited competition in the industries they regulated. Like these older regulatory regimes, network neutrality regulations are likely not to achieve their intended aims. Given the need for more competition in the broadband marketplace, policymakers should be especially wary of enacting regulations that could become a barrier to entry for new broadband firms.

CLICK HERE for detail policy analysis at Cato

Nuclear No-Contest

by James P. Hogan

Before the 1950s, the future confronting the human race was bleak. With the global population increasing and becoming more dependent on energy-dense technologies to sustain its food supplies and rising living standards, there seemed no escape from the catastrophe that would come eventually when the coal and the oil ran out. But few worried unduly. It was only after an escape from the nightmare presented itself with the harnessing of nuclear processes and the prospect of unlimited energy that people began to worry. People can be very strange.

Toward Higher Energy Densities

For reasons that have mainly to do with politics and the media's thirst for sensationalism, nuclear energy has been a subject of much disinformation and alarmism for several decades. In fact, nuclear is safer, cleaner, and potentially cheaper and more abundant than any other proven source of energy that the human race has come up with. But beyond this, its real significance is that it represents the next natural step in the evolutionary progression that has marked the history of energy development.

From unaided muscle power, through the use of animals, wood, wind and water, to coal, and oil, finding better ways of doing the work involved in living has reflected the harnessing of more concentrated energy sources. A lot is written about how much energy can be obtained from this source or that source. But if you really want to do things more easily and efficiently – and open up ways to doing new things that were inconceivable before – what counts is energy density. How much can be packed into a given volume. It's easy to calculate how much energy it takes to lift three hundred people across the Atlantic, and how much wood you'd need to burn to release that much energy. Okay, now try building a wood-burning 757. It won't work. The mountain of logs will never get itself off the ground. You need the concentration of jet fuel.

Some people argue that we don't need nuclear power because we already have other ways to generate electricity. This misses the whole point. It would be like somebody in an earlier century telling Michael Faraday that we didn't need electricity because we already had other ways to heat water. What made electricity so different was its ability to do things that were unachievable to any degree with existing technologies, and the whole field of electrical engineering and electronics that we take for granted today was the result. A similar distinction sets nuclear processes apart from conventional sources. All forms of hydrocarbon and other chemical combustion involve energy changes in the outer electron shells of atoms. The energies associated with transitions of the atomic nucleus are thousands of times more intense, and hence represent a breakthrough to the next regime of energy control that the growth of human populations and wealth creation require. The so-called alternatives do not.

READ MORE AT LEW ROCKWELL

The Empirical Evidence Against Big Government

Negative Interest Rates

by Gary North

There is considerable discussion about the possibility that the Federal Reserve could and possibly should create a monetary environment in which interest rates are negative.

First, why should it do this?

Second, is this even possible?

Third, if it is possible, under what conditions could/should the FED do this?

I am not speaking here of real interest rates, i.e., the cost of borrowing discounted by the rate of price inflation. That environment existed in the late 1970s when Federal Reserve policy under the pipe-smoking Arthur Burns and then the long-forgotten G. William Miller produced negative real interest rates. Prices were rising at rates higher than T-bill rates or T-bond rates. Investors lost wealth by investing in these assets rather than gold or silver.

There is considerable discussion about the possibility that the Federal Reserve could and possibly should create a monetary environment in which interest rates are negative.

First, why should it do this?

Second, is this even possible?

Third, if it is possible, under what conditions could/should the FED do this?

I am not speaking here of real interest rates, i.e., the cost of borrowing discounted by the rate of price inflation. That environment existed in the late 1970s when Federal Reserve policy under the pipe-smoking Arthur Burns and then the long-forgotten G. William Miller produced negative real interest rates. Prices were rising at rates higher than T-bill rates or T-bond rates. Investors lost wealth by investing in these assets rather than gold or silver.

Check Treasury rates on my site: the department on "Yield Curve."

Check the Median CPI and CPI on my site's department, "Federal Reserve Charts." Or just type "Federal Reserve Charts" on Google. My department is the top link.

READ MORE AT LEW ROCKWELL

Pay More, Get Less

by Michael D. Tanner

That's it?

For the past six months, six members of the Senate Finance Committee, led by Chairman Max Baucus, have been laboring mightily to design a health-care bill. Yesterday they finally brought forth their product — and it leaves us with more questions than answers.

Despite months of work, Baucus hasn't really produced a bill yet, only a 223-page summary of what he hopes a bill will contain.

Here is some of what we know and don't know:

First, he claims the bill would cost only $856 billion. (Remember when that sounded like a lot of money?) In fact, that likely understates the true cost. The Congressional Budget Office only looks at a 10-year budget window, that is, 2010 to 2019. But most of the bill wouldn't even start until 2014. Thus, the "10-year cost" covers only five years of actual spending. Future costs are expected to increase dramatically.

The proposal isn't all bad. Most significantly, it drops the idea of a government-run "public option" in favor of co-ops. Government involvement with these co-ops would essentially be limited to providing start-up grants. The co-ops are unlikely to have much, if any, impact on the cost or availability of health insurance, but are far preferable to a government-run plan.

Baucus would also take the first tentative steps toward letting people buy health insurance across state lines. He'd allow states to establish interstate compacts for insurance purchases starting in 2015, and also let insurers develop national products that could be sold in any state. National plans would be exempt from state-mandated benefits.

This doesn't go far enough, and risks simply transferring regulation and mandates from the state to the regional or national level. Still, it looks like a tiny step in the right direction.

But in the end, this is still a plan that will make Americans pay more and get less.

Its centerpiece is a heavily punitive individual mandate — a requirement that every American buy a government-designed minimum-insurance package. Failure to comply would result in a fine that could run as high as $3,800 for a family of four.

Moreover, the mandate may not apply just to those without insurance today. While Baucus' summary says that those with "grandfathered" plans wouldn't have to change their current policies to satisfy the mandate, it's vague about what qualifies as "grandfathered."

Plus, employer-provided plans — that is, the policies of the vast majority of us — would have just five years to comply with the new insurance regulations, and "grandfathered" plans wouldn't be eligible for any subsidies. There's thus an excellent chance that most people wouldn't actually be able to keep their current plans.

Some seniors would also be forced out of their current arrangements. Baucus would cut payments to Medicare Advantage — which is likely to push many insurers out of the program, while others would raise the premiums they charge seniors. Millions would likely be forced back into traditional Medicare.

(The plan also targets two other GOP health-care reforms of recent years: It would impose new restrictions on Health Savings Accounts and limit the ability of workers to take advantage of tax-free Flexible Spending Accounts.)

Baucus also wants a mandate for employers to provide insurance to workers, though it's less severe than the mandate in the House bills. He has no specific requirement for employers to provide insurance — but any employer who failed to do so would have to pay the cost of all subsidies that the government provides his or her workers to help them pay for insurance on their own, up to $400 a worker.

READ MPRE @ CATO

Peter Schiff Announces Candidacy for Senate

Those Who Do Not Remember History Are Condemned to Say That "Taking Our Country Back" is a Code Word For Racial Animus

Nick Gillespie

Yesterday on C-SPAN's Washington Journal, University of Pennsylvania sociologist author Michael Eric Dyson appeared, talking about racial animus against President Barack Obama. Dyson is smart, prolific, and ... possessed of an extremely weak memory when it comes to the cliches of the American political scene. At one point, in response to a self-identified black conservative who claimed that criticism of Obama stemmed from policy differences rather than prejudice, Dyson responded

...even though you can look out [at the Taxpayer March on Washington and various Tea Party demonstrations] and say, "Hey, I didn't see anyone say an epithet or hurl a nasty remark against Mr. Obama," you know, some of those posters that had him decked out in what they perceived to be African gear were offensive. The vitriol directed against him—"We want our country back"—I mean, there are code words that are being distributed and we can't be ignorant and pretend that we don't get the code words...

At the September 12 march, I did not personally see any signs such as the ones described by Dyson, though there were a few birther references and posters about how Obama should be president of Kenya (as pathetic and misguided as it gets, for sure). The vast, overwhelming sentiment was precisely as advertised and didn't stray from a very basic and unified message: Voter and taxpayer revulsion at bailouts and government spending that started under Bush and has gotten worse and worse under Obama.

The whole section with Dyson is here and is well worth watching, though I disagree strongly with him about the role of race in contemporary policy discussions, especially about health care (as does the Obama White House, which has gone to pains to dissociate itself from Jimmy Carter's recent proclamation on the matter). However, the idea that saying we're going to take "our country" back is anything other than a transpartisan cliche is ridiculous to the nth degree. Indeed, here's a quote by none other than Barack Obama, circa June 2007, telling an audience:

"It's going to be because of you that we take our country back."

The setting for that comment? The 2007 "Take Back America" conference, a confab of leftys. Read more here.

Or there's this:

Folk, Labor Musicians Unite for Third Anti-Bush CD Hail to the Thieves, Volume III: Songs to Take Our Country Back! is a rousing call to action from the likes of Billy Bragg, Anne Feeney, Utah Phillips and folk musicians across the country. This new CD lays out the case against George Bush and his cronies with 20 songs, poems and stories in the best of the traveling, storytelling folk tradition.

I raise this because the selective amnesia of virtually all participants in traditional right-left, liberal-conservative, Democratic-Republican politicking is not only frustrating as hell, but completely self-serving. It's one of the reasons why people are turned off by politics (not such a bad thing, perhaps). You know you're not going to have a serious discussion, but rather one that is completely relativistic and revisionist, typically designed to score points in the here and now at the expense of anything approaching history. Republicans were pissed when the Dems dissed George Bush as retarded draft dodger, and now Dems are outraged by all slagging of Obama & Co. Conservatives who spent eight years of accusing Bill Clinton of sodomizing interns in zeppelin hangars at the Mena, Arkansas airstrip thought civility had ended when the first Bushitler poster hit the streets sometime around January 2001. And on and on.

A little historical perspective goes a long way toward alleviating anxiety about the current debased state of U.S. political discourse, which is never as bad today as it will be tomorrow. And never as great as when Rachel Jackson was being attacked as a bigamist, Grover Cleveland as an absentee father, and Dwight Eisenhower as a "conscious, dedicated agent of the Communist conspiracy."

NICK GILLESPIE ON FOX NEWS' FREEDOM WATCH WITH JUDGE NAPOLITANO

Why do politicians treat the Constitution like a pair of stretch pants?

'What You're Left With Is Libertarianism'

Red Eye host Greg Gutfeld on what guys like to read, what meth addicts do to toasters, and why liberals and conservatives are so annoying

Katherine Mangu-Ward

Insomniacs who channel surf to Fox News at 3 a.m. may think they have drifted off into a dirty, hilarious febrile dream. Instead of perky anchors and partisan shouters working over the headlines of the day, a pug-faced ne’er-do-well named Greg Gutfeld leads a motley crew of comics, C-list celebrities, and occasional reason editors through a running news-of-the-weird joke fest covering (in no particular order) free markets, unicorns, drug legalization, very attractive women, and very gay sex. Airing since February 2007, Red Eye w/Greg Gutfeld is just the latest stop in Gutfeld’s checkered career.

In 1987 Gutfeld took his first journalistic job, somewhat unconventionally for a Berkeley graduate, at the conservative American Spectator, running errands for the magazine’s famously erratic editor in chief, R. Emmett Tyrell. After a failed stint as a screenwriter, Gutfeld got a job at the health-oriented lifestyle magazine Prevention, where he started drinking and drugging at a prodigious rate. Gutfeld went on to edit the lads-and-abs magazines Men’s Health (where he was fired for making fun of Girl Scouts, cat lovers, and his boss), Stuff (where he was fired for an incident involving several midgets for hire at a publishers’ conference), and finally the British edition of Maxim, where he hung his hat while writing Lessons From the Land of Pork Scratchings: A Miserable Yank Discovers the Secret of Happiness in Britain (Simon & Schuster). Gutfeld has written “traitor” columns for women’s magazines such as Cosmopolitan, Glamour, and Mademoiselle, telling women what men really think. He claims to have been rejected for a job at reason in 1988.

In 2005 Gutfeld gained a new audience by writing satirical, liberal-mocking posts at The Huffington Post (sample line: “Is Al Franken patenting the pubic hair and Elmer’s glue cure for baldness, or is he just keeping the idea to himself?”). This helped lead him to his current gig, where in addition to hosting the hour-long Red Eye, he writes the Daily Gut blog. The unifying theme throughout his career has been boobs, as in both breasts and morons. Another theme to his jobs: Gutfeld was fired or forced to resign in disgrace from virtually all of them.

Associate Editor Katherine Mangu-Ward spoke with Gutfeld on stage at Reason Weekend in Orlando, Florida, in April.

reason: Describe the evolution of your political outlook.

Greg Gutfeld: As a teenager, I was a liberal. It helped me in school. Where I went to school, if you collected signatures for the nuclear freeze, you got extra credit. I realized the more you seemed to care about something, the more the teachers cared about you and your friends. If you share the liberal assumptions, you don’t have to think too much about it.

I thought that was great because it really helped me with grades, but after a few debates in school where I actually had to think about things, I realized I was a complete fraud. I started to re-examine myself when I went to Berkeley. It was a really bad idea. It was just walking around with a target on your back.

I became a conservative by being around liberals and I became a libertarian by being around conservatives. You realize that there’s something distinctly in common between the two groups, the left and the right; the worst part of each of them is the moralizing. On the left, you have people who want to dictate your behavior under the guise of tolerance. Unless you disagree with them. Then the tolerance goes out the window. Which kind of negates the whole idea of tolerance. That’s the politically correct moralizing. Then when you become a conservative, the other kind of moralizing comes from religion. But if you remove both of those from the equation, what you’re left with is libertarianism.

From the right, you’ve got free markets. From the left, you have free minds. To me, that’s the only sensible direction. As you grow older, you kind of end up there. Especially if you drink and do a lot of drugs.

reason: Speaking of which, let’s talk about your editorship of Men’s Health.

Gutfeld: I was the only editor of any health magazine that did a feature on how smoking is good for you.

Actually, one of my primary interviewees was Jacob Sullum from reason. He turned me on to all these tobacco companies that were actually doing amazing research on Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. But nobody in the media would cover it because smoking is bad. I would get all these amazing medical journals at Men’s Health, and I loved them mainly for the weird pictures that I would copy and send out to my friends, enlarged arms and weird faces. I believe I was the original Internet.

I read a lot of this passive-smoking stuff, and I realized it was just bullshit. What they’re trying to do is create science to legislate. I wanted to write about this, and I’d just become editor of Men’s Health. When you get a job like that, you’re supposed to do the right thing. I did the wrong thing.

The article I wrote was called “I Smoke and I Work at Men’s Health.” We recreated a Parliament ad with me in the middle smoking. It was really cool and wonderful. I interviewed every satanic person in the tobacco industry and cited their science. It was a fantastic article, and it dropped like a stone in journalism. People just hated it. But I couldn’t help it, because this is real health journalism. Once they stop demonizing substances, they’re going to find out that these things can actually help people.

Health editors are generally very miserable people. They constantly think there’s something wrong with themselves. Meanwhile, they hate pharmaceutical companies.

Here are companies that have to bend over backwards to tell you what’s wrong with their product. Those commercials, 90 percent of the commercials are them telling you not to buy it. Meanwhile, health editors are lying to you. They’re telling you that New Age practices work. So you have these people that are making fun of drug companies who are liars, and the drugs companies that can’t afford to lie. I realized that the pharmaceutical companies to me were bigger than the space program. They spend billions of dollars on tiny little things that change your life, and no one gives them credit for it.

Men’s Health is where I started to get very pro-business. Like, you know what? Corporations are not these evil monoliths that they depicted in Michael Clayton. They’re just groups of people who work really hard to create good things that make our lives better, and they’re treated like crap by editors who are paranoid weirdos.

reason: When I was on Red Eye, we talked about some findings about marijuana and life extension. It’s not just the big pharma drugs that can help people, right?

Gutfeld: Yeah. And I won’t just say marijuana. I’ll say Ecstasy, acid, cocaine. People take these things for the sake of oblivion, but they also work. If you treat them like any other substance, you can actually derive what makes them work and turn them into things that help you. Pot helps people who are in pain. There are studies that show that Ecstasy helps heal problem marriages.

READ MORE AT REASON

Ben Franklin's Speech to the Constitutional Convention - September 17, 1787

As recorded by James Madison, the following is Ben Franklin's speech to the Constitutional Convention. Ben Franklin was to weak to give the speech so he had fellow Pennsylvanian James Wilson deliver the speech for him.

Mr. President

I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them: For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information, or fuller consideration, to change opinions even on important subjects, which I once thought right, but found to be otherwise. It is therefore that the older I grow, the more apt I am to doubt my own judgment, and to pay more respect to the judgment of others. Most men indeed as well as most sects in Religion, think themselves in possession of all truth, and that wherever others differ from them it is so far error. Steele a Protestant in a Dedication tells the Pope, that the only difference between our Churches in their opinions of the certainty of their doctrines is, the Church of Rome is infallible and the Church of England is never in the wrong. But though many private persons think almost as highly of their own infallibility as of that of their sect, few express it so naturally as a certain french lady, who in a dispute with her sister, said "I don't know how it happens, Sister but I meet with no body but myself, that's always in the right — Il n'y a que moi qui a toujours raison."

In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better Constitution. For when you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men, all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views. From such an assembly can a perfect production be expected? It therefore astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does; and I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded like those of the Builders of Babel; and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats. Thus I consent, Sir, to this Constitution because I expect no better, and because I am not sure, that it is not the best. The opinions I have had of its errors, I sacrifice to the public good. I have never whispered a syllable of them abroad. Within these walls they were born, and here they shall die. If every one of us in returning to our Constituents were to report the objections he has had to it, and endeavor to gain partizans in support of them, we might prevent its being generally received, and thereby lose all the salutary effects & great advantages resulting naturally in our favor among foreign Nations as well as among ourselves, from our real or apparent unanimity. Much of the strength & efficiency of any Government in procuring and securing happiness to the people, depends, on opinion, on the general opinion of the goodness of the Government, as well as of the wisdom and integrity of its Governors. I hope therefore that for our own sakes as a part of the people, and for the sake of posterity, we shall act heartily and unanimously in recommending this Constitution (if approved by Congress & confirmed by the Conventions) wherever our influence may extend, and turn our future thoughts & endeavors to the means of having it well administred.

On the whole, Sir, I can not help expressing a wish that every member of the Convention who may still have objections to it, would with me, on this occasion doubt a little of his own infallibility, and to make manifest our unanimity, put his name to this instrument.

Let The Individual Live Free

September 12, 2009

Dear Editor:

As we continue to face a difficult economy, I feel there are a number of things all Americans should be asking themselves: as an individual, are YOUR family, job, healthcare, and retirement truly matters of national importance?

If so, then our present system and our present course may well be appropriate. However, in this case, if our economy is to survive, there will need to be greatly increased federal influence and control in all these areas.

If not then we ALL need to be taking back more control in these areas of our lives. In this case we must greatly reduce many areas where the federal government influences the economy, as it is nearly impossible for an individual to plan in these areas when faced with frequent, numerous, and sudden changes in tax policies and regulations combined with the prolonged periods of inflation and deflation that we have seen over the last hundred years.

Most of all, the fluctuating inflation resulting from a currency with no stable backing, where it is possible to simply print more “dollars” as policy or “need” indicate (known as “counterfeiting” if done privately) make it difficult to make long term investment plans, whether for business, retirement, or home purchase.

If you believe this, then it is time to return the focus of the federal government to national defense/security, foreign relations, and interstate commerce. Let it focus on getting these things right and let us live our individual lives as we see fit.

Sincerely,

Richard J. Davis

Libertarian for Congress

www.davis4congress.com

rjdavislp@gmail.com

Bill Buzzell's Sunday Opinion

by Bill Buzzell

The U.S. Postal Service was established in 1775 - they've had 234 years to get it right; it is broke, and even though heavily subsidized, it is not able to compete with private sector FedEx and UPS services.

Social Security was established in 1935 - they've had 74 years to get it right; it is broke.

Fannie Mae was established in 1938 - they've had 71years to get it right; it is broke.

Freddie Mac was established in 1970 - they've had 39 years to get it right; it is broke.

Together Fannie and Freddie have now led the entire world into the worst economic collapse in 80 years.

The War on Poverty was started in 1964 - they've had 45 years to get it right; $1 trillion of our hard earned money is confiscated each year and transferred to "the poor"; it hasn't worked.

Medicare and Medicaid were established in 1965 - they've had 44 years to get it right;they are both broke; and now our government dares to mention them as models for all US health care.

AMTRAK was established in 1970 - they've had 39 years to get it right; last year they bailed it out as it continues to run at a loss!

This year, a trillion dollars was committed in the massive political payoff called the Stimulus Bill of 2009; it shows NO sign of working; it's been used to increase the size of governments across America , and raise government salaries while the rest of us suffer from economic hardships. It has yet to create a single new private sector job.

Our national debt projections (approaching $10 trillion) have increased 400% in the last six months.

Cash for Clunkers" was established in 2009 and went broke in 2009 - - after 80% of the cars purchased turned out to be produced by foreign companies, and dealers nationwide are buried under bureaucratic paperwork demanded by a government that is not yet paying them what was promised.

So with a perfect 100% failure rate and a record that proves that each and every "service" shoved down our throats by an over-reaching government turns into disaster, how could any informed American trust our government to run or even set policies for America's health care system - - 17% of our economy?

Maybe each of us has a personal responsibility to let others in on this brilliant record before 2010, and then help remove from office those who are voting to destroy capitalism and destroy our grandchildren's future.

"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labours of the people under the pretence of taking care of them." Thomas Jefferson


"We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. And I have just one interest, and if I am wrong ... somebody else can have my job. I want to see this country prosperous. I want to see people get a job. I want to see people get enough to eat. We have never made good on our promises ... I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started ... And an enormous debt to boot!"
Henry Morganthau, FDR's Treasury Secretary In a speech to Congress in May, 1939
HERE WE GO AGAIN!
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When Compassion is Cruel

Justice demands that killers serve out their full sentences

Steve Chapman

People don't always get what they deserve in this world, so it is gratifying to see when someone does. It happened Wednesday when a California parole board insisted that Susan Atkins, a 61-year-old amputee with incurable brain cancer, live her few remaining months in prison rather than the embrace of her loved ones.

This may sound like pointless excess inflicted on someone whose crime, committed 40 years ago, is ancient history. But even to mention Atkins without first mentioning her victims is an affront. In 1969, she repeatedly thrust a knife into an innocent woman who was eight and a half months pregnant, killing her and her unborn child.

It's a crime that might be forgotten except that Atkins was a member of Charles Manson's murderous cult. Her victim, actress Sharon Tate, stabbed 16 times, was one of seven people slaughtered in Los Angeles in a two-night spree that Manson, insanely, thought would ignite a massive race war.

Atkins and her co-defendants were convicted and sentenced to die, but her sentence was reduced to life in prison when the state supreme court abolished capital punishment in 1972. Her illness served as grounds to ask the parole board for "compassionate release" so she could peacefully expire outside of prison.

Even her prosecutor, Vincent Bugliosi, endorsed the idea. "She's already paid substantially for her crime, close to 40 years behind bars," he told The Los Angeles Times. "She has terminal cancer. The mercy she was asking for is so minuscule."

But the parole board unanimously refused. No doubt the board members recalled that in a 1993 parole hearing, Atkins acknowledged that when she had her own opportunity to grant clemency, she chose not to. Tate begged Atkins to spare her baby, to no avail.

"Compassionate release" already has a bad name in this country because it was the basis for Scotland's decision to free the only person convicted in the 1988 airline bombing over Lockerbie, which killed 270 people. Abdel Baset al-Megrahi was serving a life sentence but, afflicted with terminal prostate cancer, was sent home to Libya to live out his remaining time on Earth.
READ MORE REASON

Gun Owners' Next Victory in D.C.

by Robert A. Levy

The Supreme Court, in District of Columbia v. Heller, declared that Washington's 32-year ban on all functional firearms violated the Second Amendment. Justice Antonin Scalia's majority opinion, however, applied only to possession of guns in the home. The court did not address, and was not asked to address, firearms carried outside the home. That's the issue posed in a new lawsuit against the District by Tom Palmer (disclosure: my colleague at the Cato Institute) and four other plaintiffs — represented by Alan Gura, the lawyer who successfully argued Heller before the court.

After Heller, the District relaxed its ban on residents seeking "to register a pistol for use in self-defense within that person's home." But D.C. law still states that "[n]o person shall carry within the District of Columbia either openly or concealed on or about their person, a pistol, without a license." Currently, the city affords no process by which to issue such a license. A first violation of the carry ban is punishable by a fine of up to $5,000 and imprisonment for up to five years.

Does the Constitution mandate that the nation's capital allow firearms to be carried outside the home? The right to bear arms, the court said in Heller, is an "individual right unconnected to militia service." To "bear" means to "carry." More specifically, when used with "arms," the opinion said, "bear" means "carrying for a particular purpose — confrontation." Nothing in that formulation implies a right that can be exercised only within one's home.

ndeed Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, although she dissented in Heller, cited Black's Law Dictionary to suggest in a prior opinion that the Second Amendment entails a right to "wear, bear, or carry ..... upon the person or in the clothing or in a pocket, ..... armed and ready ..... in a case of conflict with another person." That language, says Michael O'Shea in the West Virginia Law Review, "reads like a literal description of the practice of lawful concealed carry, as engaged in by millions of Americans in the forty-eight states that authorize the carrying of concealed handguns." Read More

THE NEXT GREAT LEAP BACKWARDS FOR CONSUMER "RIGHTS"

George Will is Right

It's time for the U.S. to leave Afghanistan

David Harsanyi | September 2, 2009

This week, prominent conservative pundit George Will wrote a column advocating the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan. His piece, not surprisingly, was met with instantaneous anger, disdain, and derision from most of the right.

"But let's be honest," wrote noted neoconservative William Kristol on The Washington Post's blog. "Will is not calling on the United States to accept a moderate degree of success in Afghanistan, and simply to stop short of some overly ambitious goal. Will is urging retreat, and accepting defeat."

Tossing around the words "retreat" and "defeat"—or, as one critic more creatively asserted, Will's column "could have been written in Japanese aboard the USS Missouri"—is the rhetorical equivalent of the vacuous "chicken hawk" charge leveled at any civilian who supports military action. It's emotive and hyperbolic, and I probably have used it myself, but it's not an effective argument.

Judging from their harsh reaction to Will, it's not clear when, if ever, some conservatives believe the U.S. should withdraw from Afghanistan. Even less clear is how the victory narrative is supposed to play out. Does this triumphant day arrive when every Islamic radical in the region has met his virgins? If so, after eight years of American lives lost, the goal seems farther away than ever.

Or is victory achieved when we finally usher this primitive tribal culture, with its violent warlords and religious extremism, from the eighth century all the way to modernity? If so, we're on course for a centuries-long enterprise of nation building and baby-sitting, not a war. The war was won in 2002.

If the goal is to establish a stable government to fill the vacuum created by our ousting of the Taliban and al-Qaida, we've done quite a job. Most Americans can accept a Marine's risking life and limb to safeguard our freedoms. But when that Marine is protector of a corrupt and depraved foreign parliament—one that recently legalized marital rape and demands women ask permission from male relatives to leave their homes—it is not a victory worth celebrating. READ MORE REASON

Reason.tv: "Gallo Be Thy Name"—Ernest & Julio as thugs, winemaking entrepreneurs, and great Americans

Rethinking the Good War

by Laurence M. Vance

"Rarely in history has a war seemed so just to so many." ~ Michael Bess

"Participation in the war against Hitler remains almost wholly sacrosanct, nearly in the realm of theology." ~ Bruce Russett

On September 1, 1939 – 70 years ago – Germany attacked Poland and officially began World War II. Although over 50 million people died in the war – including 405,000 Americans – it is considered to be the Good War. The fact that most of deaths were on the Allied side (the "good" side), the majority of those killed were civilians, hundreds of millions were wounded – including 671,000 Americans – and/or made refugees, homeless, widows, or orphans, hundreds of billions of dollars worth of property was destroyed, hundreds of billions of dollars more were wasted on armaments, and untold millions underwent an incomprehensible amount of suffering, misery, and loss doesn’t seem to matter either. World War II is still universally recognized as the Good War.

How is it possible to make such a description of such carnage on a grand scale?

As John V. Denson explains in his essay "Franklin D. Roosevelt and the First Shot" in his book A Century of War: Lincoln, Wilson, and Roosevelt:

Part of the mythology that surrounds this war is that it was the "last good war." It was a "just" war because it was defensive. Despite President Roosevelt’s supreme efforts to keep America neutral regarding controversies in Europe and Asia, the Japanese launched an unprovoked surprise attack at Pearl Harbor, thereby "forcing" America into the fray. It was also a "noble" war because America fought evil tyrannies known as Nazism in Germany and fascism in Italy and Japan.

From the American point of view, World War II is basically considered to be the Good War for two reasons: Pearl Harbor and Hitler.

But setting aside for a moment the facts of Roosevelt’s duplicity and culpability, as well as the U.S. provocation of Japan: Was it necessary for 405,000 American soldiers to die to avenge the 2,400 (1,177 were from one ship, the USS Arizona) who were killed at Pearl Harbor? Was it moral to incinerate hundreds of thousands of civilians in Japanese cities because Japan bombed the Pearl Harbor Naval Base, a military target? And setting aside for another moment the folly of U.S. intervention in World War I, which prevented a dictated peace settlement and paved the way for the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles, thus facilitating the rise of Hitler: Was it necessary that tens of millions were slaughtered to prevent Hitler from slaughtering millions? Was it wise to join forces with a brutal dictator like Stalin, who had already killed millions, with the result that he enslaved half of Europe under communism?

It is time to rethink the Good War. READ MORE AT LEW ROCKWELL

Circumcision for All; Free Choice for None

by Stephanie R. Murphy

I was shocked, surprised, and flabbergasted to hear it. I’m sure that you'll never believe it, either. The federal government is – get this, readers – butting into your most personal and private business.

OK, you’ve caught me in a rare moment of sarcasm. Maybe I wasn't really that surprised. After all, government bureaucrats attempt to control what types of substances you put into your body, what kind of work you do with your body, and even how you can legally dispose of your body after death; it makes perfect sense that they would also scramble for power over what parts of your body should remain attached. Yes, that’s right. The CDC is now considering a campaign for universal circumcision in the US.

The reason for pushing this one-size-fits-all policy stems from the results of several studies, all done in Africa, which have demonstrated the benefits of male circumcision for reducing the transmission of HIV.

The studies on circumcision and HIV transmission are very interesting. They are large, randomized, controlled trials; the methodology is solid. They show, on average, a 40–60% reduction in the risk of a circumcised, HIV negative man contracting the virus from an HIV positive woman, as compared to an uncircumcised man. The precise mechanism of circumcision’s protective effect is unknown. There are many potential explanations, none of which are mutually exclusive. First, the foreskin has a relatively high population of cells that are receptive to being infected by HIV. Second, it acts as a reservoir which may trap infected secretions. Third, the foreskin has a higher propensity to ulcerate (become scraped) and become infected with other sexually transmitted infections that cause open sores. It seems that removing the foreskin also removes several potential avenues for HIV entry into the body.

However, when considering the benefits of circumcision, there are some significant caveats. For one, circumcision is not a panacea; it does not completely prevent transmission of HIV, it just lowers the probability that a man will contract the virus during any given sexual encounter with an HIV positive woman. It should be noted that these studies only examined the effect of circumcision on transmission of the virus from an HIV positive woman to an HIV negative man. While this is a relatively common scenario in Sub-Saharan Africa, HIV epidemiology in the US is different. Overall rates of infection are lower. Also, HIV in the US is relatively more common among men who have sex with men (MSM). There is no evidence that circumcision protects against HIV acquisition in MSM. Circumcision also does nothing to protect anyone against acquiring HIV via bloodborne routes, such as sharing needles with an HIV positive person. It should go without saying that men can protect themselves from acquiring HIV in other ways besides getting circumcised, such as practicing safe(r) sex and avoiding intravenous drug use. These methods are much more reliable than the 40 – 60% risk reduction conferred by circumcision.

READ MORE AT LEW ROCKWELL

RON PAUL AUGUST 26, 2009 TED KENNEDY'S DEATH MAY BE USED TO PUSH HEALTHCARE

Government Destruction Tour: Detroit

Missouri LP to testify at MIAC hearing

From the Missouri LP:

Missouri Libertarian Party Vice Chair Cisse Spragins will be testifying at a Missouri House of Representatives Interim Committee on State Intelligence Analysis Oversight public hearing August 31st in Grandview, MO.

In March, a "Strategic Report" on "The Modern Militia Movement" written by the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) was leaked to the press.

The memo claimed that membership in, among other groups, the Libertarian Party and/or the display of what it calls “political paraphernalia” in support of the party or its 2008 presidential nominee (former US Congressman Bob Barr) could be an indicator that someone is involved in a “militant militia”.

The memo was retracted in late March and Department of Public Safety (DPS) Director John Britt issued apologies for the report’s reference to specific Presidential candidates, including Libertarian Bob Barr and Republican Ron Paul, and for the references to specific political organizations, including the Libertarian Party and the Campaign for Liberty. Van Godsey, the Director of MIAC who signed off on the report was reassigned.

By working closely with key lawmakers and continuing to apply pressure, the Missouri LP along with other freedom groups ultimately succeeded in getting the Legislature to create a special interim committee to investigate the report. Hearings are being held around the State. The first hearing was held in Jefferson City in June and the second in St. Louis in July. Hearings in Kansas City and Springfield are planned for later in August or September.

The successful media campaign resulted in a great deal of media coverage in Missouri, including TV interviews. Even some national coverage with the Missouri LP quoted in an article published by CNN and an appearance on Fox Freedom Watch with Judge Napolitano.

Missouri LP Chair Glenn Nielsen testified at the St. Louis hearing.

For more information and video please see:

http://www.showmefreedom.org/2009/July/MIACHearing.shtml

Missouri LP Vice Chair Cisse Spragins is considering a run for the US Senate in 2010 to replace retiring Missouri US Senator Chritopher "Kit" Bond.

Glenn Nielsen
State Chair
Missouri Libertarian Party
http://lpmo.org

LP Monday Message: Voters want more options

posted by Staff on Aug 31, 2009

August 31, 2009

Dear Friend of Liberty,

Like you, most Americans are unhappy with the Republican and Democratic parties. Earlier this month, a Zogby poll found that 58% of people think the U.S. needs more than two major political parties.

People are also unhappy with Congress. (No surprise there.) In fact, according to a Rasmussen poll released yesterday, 57% of people would like to throw out the ENTIRE CONGRESS and start over.

Many of these dissatisfied voters are libertarians -- but a lot of them don't know it. Past polls have shown that only about 2% of people identify themselves as libertarians, even though a much higher percentage have libertarian opinions on political issues.

The Libertarian Party is working to change that. We are out there, showing that there's more to politics than "Democrat or Republican," and more than "liberal or conservative." We are bringing the desperately needed libertarian option to American voters.

The Democrats and Republicans are working hard to take away our liberties, but with your help, the Libertarian Party can become a major political force and restore those liberties.

Sincerely,

Wes Benedict
Executive Director
Libertarian National Committee

P.S. If you have not yet become a member of the Libertarian Party and wish to do so, please click here and join the only political party dedicated completely to cutting taxes and maximizing liberty. If you need to renew, please do so by clicking here.

A Path to Fiscal Sanity

by Jagadeesh Gokhale

Cut the deficit by spending less? Sounds crazy, but it just might work.

It has been known since the early 1980s that the U.S. federal budget embodies a large structural imbalance — one that persists through the economy's ups and downs. In 1980, Ted Kennedy referred to this during his campaign for the presidency; Bush I, Clinton, Bush II, and Obama commented on it during theirs.

Estimates of how large this imbalance is, and of what it would take to solve it, have been available for two decades. These analyses consistently show two things: It would be costly to put off dealing with the problem, and federal debt will surge once the baby-boomers begin to retire during the late 2000s.

They are retiring now.

When questioned on entitlement reforms, legislators dutifully genuflect to the need for policy adjustments. But until now, that budget fix was one for the future. Immediately after being elected, lawmakers adopted a "business as usual" attitude, seeking more benefits for today's voters by appropriating vast sums for their pet projects.

And again, in the aftermath of the 2008 financial meltdown, policymakers on both sides of the aisle scrambled to bail out banks, automakers, insurance companies, traders, consumers, and so on, and the Fed injected huge amounts of cash into the financial markets. The cherry on top of this spending binge is the Obama administration's proposed health-care "reform" — which entails additional trillions of dollars.

The recent announcement that U.S. deficits will total $9 trillion over the next ten years suggests that "business as usual" will rapidly come to an end. That's the problem with long-term budget constraints — they inexorably draw closer, eventually forcing hasty and ill-conceived policies via a budget crisis.

What to do?

Estimates from the Social Security and Medicare trustees and the Congressional Budget Office, academic studies, and other reports suggest that the total federal fiscal imbalance amounts to 8 percent of future U.S. productive capacity. Since only about one-half of the nation's total income is subject to taxes, Americans would have to immediately and permanently devote another 16 percent of their taxable incomes toward resolving it. READ MORE

Kennedy's Big Government Paternalism

Remembering the darker side of the liberal senator's legacy

Cathy Young | August 31, 2009

Ted Kennedy's death of brain cancer at 77 could not have occurred at a more symbolic moment. By the end of his life, the late senator became the lion in winter of old-style American liberalism—and one of his final political acts, at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, was to pass on the mantle to Barack Obama, the prime champion of liberalism's new incarnation.

The praise bestowed on Kennedy today by political allies and rivals alike is testament to his superb political skills, including his capacity for bipartisan legislative work. Yet the grief that accompanies the passing of a public figure of such stature should not obscure the fact that his career also illustrates the darker side of the liberal legacy.

Kennedy championed a plethora of liberal causes that are surrounded by an aura of nobility: the defense of the poor, the disabled and the sick, the rights of women and minorities. Yet many of the measures he supported are prime examples of the discrepancy between idealistic causes and unintended effects. Thus, the vast majority of economists agree that increasing the minimum wage—one of the legislative achievements with which Kennedy is credited—leads to increased unemployment among the most vulnerable portion of the labor force, pricing the least skilled workers out of the labor market. Affirmative action, which Kennedy helped uphold on the federal level, tends to result in race discrimination against working-class whites (and, in many cases, Asians as well) and often backfires against its supposed beneficiaries as well. Some of Kennedy's other noble causes have been largely symbolic: thus, the Violence Against Women Act and hate crimes legislation create federal penalties for offenses that are already criminally prosecuted by the states.

Kennedy's liberalism was rooted in the belief that guidance by the government, especially the federal government, is the most effective way to improve people's lives. Indeed, the bipartisan efforts for which he was often hailed were invariably about collaboration with nanny-state Republicanism—the "No Child Left Behind" Act of 2001 being a prime example. This "Uncle Sam knows best" mentality extended to some sympathy for regulation of the media market for the "common good": Kennedy led an attempt to restrict Rupert Murdoch's ownership of local media in Massachusetts and, in 2007, foiled a Republican effort in the Senate to bar possible reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine (which would cripple the independent media by requiring equal time for different points of view).

Support for interventionist government was hardly a viewpoint unique to Ted Kennedy. What Kennedy brought to this political philosophy, however, was the paternalistic mindset of noblesse oblige: the idea that the aristocracy has a special responsibility to protect and look out for the little people. The Kennedy clan is probably the closest there has ever been to an American aristocracy. READ MORE REASON

2 Trillion Tons......

LFR Card Check 2009 HD Generic

NotSoSure.org: "Restaurant" A Metaphor for Government-run Health Care (Part 1 of 3)

NotSoSure.org: "Testing" Gov't Run Health Care (Part 2 of 3)

NotSoSure.org: Grandma, Meet Politicized Health Care (Part 3 of 3)

Daniel Hannan MEP: The devalued Prime Minister of a devalued Government

Health Care Omerta in the U.K.

It's fine for Brits to talk trash about the National Health Service, but not to Americans.

Michael C. Moynihan | August 25, 2009

A few weeks ago, I sat down with Daniel Hannan, the Milton Friedman-loving member of European Parliament representing South East England, to discuss his infamous showdown with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, his opinion of the British National Health Service (NHS), and what the Republicans could learn from the recent successes of Britain's Conservative Party. When I asked Hannan his opinion of Tory party leader David Cameron—who, I argued, “lurched towards the center” in search of popularity—he demonstrated unswerving party loyalty. Cameron, he admonished, was hardly a Tory wet and is more committed to free-market ideas than his old guard Thatcherite critics were willing to admit.

The following day, Hannan repeated his criticisms of the NHS on the Fox News Channel, warning Americans that his country's health system was a "60-year failure" that he "wouldn't wish on anybody." He delivered a stark verdict:

I find it incredible that a free people living in a country dedicated and founded in the cause of independence and freedom can seriously be thinking about adopting such a system in peacetime and massively expanding the role of the state when there's no need.

Had Hannan muttered dark warnings about the British health service's sustainability on the floor of the European Parliament, the Labour Party would surely have made political hay out of it, arguing as they often do that the Tories, if given power, would speedily dismantle the NHS and replace it with a more American-style system. But this was something else entirely. To go to America, to appear on Fox News, and denounce Nye Bevan's "post-war achievement" was too much for both Labourites and squishy Conservatives. READ MORE REASON

BRITISH MEP DANIEL HANNAN ON YOUTUBE SUPERSTARDOM, THE NHS, AND HIS LIBERTARIAN PLAN FOR BRITAIN

Abolish the DHS

by Gene Healy

Does "time with my family" ever actually mean "time with my family" in Washington? Tom Ridge gave the standard resignation line when he stepped down as Secretary of Homeland Security shortly after the 2004 elections, but last week he revealed that there was much more to the story.

In a forthcoming book, Ridge complains that the weekend before Election Day, Bush administration officials leaned on him to raise the color-coded threat level. Dismayed, Ridge refused the demand, and concluded he needed to resign. "I wondered," Ridge writes, "Is this about security or politics?"

That's a question we ought to ask about DHS as a whole. Since its creation in 2003, the department has done little to provide genuine security and much to encourage a pernicious politics of fear. We'd be better off without it.

The Homeland Security Advisory System is a case in point. Even before Ridge's revelation, two separate studies showed that Bush received a boost to his approval ratings with each escalation of the terror threat level. The warning has been raised above yellow ("elevated") 16 times, but it's never been lowered to blue or green, the bottom rungs on DHS's Ladder of Fear. Yet, with Spinal Tap logic ("this goes to 11!") the department insists on keeping all five levels.

The department itself is a dog's breakfast of 22 federal agencies brought together in the hope of providing better coordination on a common mission. But turf battles left key antiterror agencies like the FBI out of the reorganization, and DHS finished last or next to last on every measure of employee morale in a 2006 Office of Personnel Management study.

The truth, as analyst Jeffrey Rosen points out, is that DHS is 'an institutional money pit that has more to do with symbols than substance." Indeed, a congressional investigation in 2008 documented some $15 billion in failed contracts that have run wildly over budget or been cancelled before completion. READ MORE @ CATO

Cash for Clunkers - The Uncle Sugar Washer & Dryer & Refrigerator Extravaganza Remix!

Betting Against the Fed

by Steve H. Hanke

Added to cato.org on August 21, 2009

This article appeared in the September 7, 2009 issue of Forbes.

The Federal Reserve is scrambling to convince the public that it is not a secretive institution that acts at the behest of Wall Street, but the public isn't buying the Fed's line. According to a Gallup Poll conducted in mid-July, the Fed received the lowest approval rating of the nine government agencies and departments evaluated — even lower than the Internal Revenue Service.

Trying to show the softer side of the central bank, Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke took us on a tour of his hometown of Dillon, S.C. on a 60 Minutes segment in March, and in July he fielded questions from newsman Jim Lehrer and an auditorium full of people for more than an hour in a televised town hall meeting.

Both events were carefully choreographed — and unprecedented. During his face time Bernanke explained many things, including the Fed's strategy for shrinking its balance sheet and withdrawing the ocean of excess reserves from the banking system. Unfortunately, he did not address my main beef with the bank: that it clings to a flawed inflation-targeting regime with a horrible history of monetary policy failures. READ MORE

What Would Jesus Do? Ask Obama

The president's troubling use of religion to sell health care reform

David Harsanyi | August 21, 2009

"For with thee is the fountain of life; in thy light shall we see the public option."

Yes, it's finally come to this. We've dragged the Almighty Lord into the debate. It's Yahweh or the highway.

This week, President Barack Obama claimed his version of health care reform is "a core ethical and moral obligation," beseeching religious leaders to promote his government-run scheme. Questioning the patriotism of opponents, apparently, wasn't gaining the type of traction advocates of "reform" had hoped.

"I know there's been a lot of misinformation in this debate, and there are some folks out there who are frankly bearing false witness," Obama said, invoking the frightening specter of the Ten Commandments.

On Team Righteous, we have those who meet their moral obligations; on the other squad, we must have the minions of Beelzebub—by which, of course, we mean profit-driven, child-killing, mob-inciting insurance companies.

Why wasn't this multidenominational group of pastors, rabbis, and other religious leaders offended that a mere earthly servant was summoning the good Lord in an effort to pass legislation? Certainly, one of the most grating habits of the Bush administration was how it framed policy positions in moral absolutes.

As CBS News recently reported, Obama has thrown around the name of God even more often than George W. Bush. Then again, no group couches policy as a moral obligation more than the left. On nearly every question of legislation, there is a pious straw man tugging at the sleeves of the wicked.

What isn't a moral imperative these days? As if they were chiseling commandments into stone tablets, Democrats refer to budgets as "moral documents." Thou shalt compost, or climate change will descend upon the lands and smite the wicked and innocent alike. Extend alms to the downtrodden moneylenders and carmakers, for it is just, and the president commandeth thee.

READ MORE

Transparency Chic

Someday your government may have as little privacy as you do.

Katherine Mangu-Ward | August 24, 2009

Newborn babies have their own blogs and grandmothers are on Facebook. We Google potential dates. Privacy is dead. But one kind of information is still cozily locked away, safe from prying eyes: the law. President Obama may have come to Washington promising greater transparency, but progress has been less than impressive.

While the feds stumble toward openness, geeks and developers who made oversharing a way of life are bringing their can-do attitude to government transparency. Can't find what you're looking for on Regulation.gov? Try the new, user-friendlier OpenRegs.com. Frustrated by the terrible interface of Obama's Recovery.gov? Check out the easily-searchable Recovery.org.

But with the possible exception of the ever-leaky CIA, no aspect of government remains more locked down than the secretive, hierarchical judicial branch. Digital records of court filings, briefs and transcripts sit behind paywalls like Lexis and Westlaw. Legal codes and judicial documents aren't copyrighted, but governments often cut exclusive distribution deals, rendering other access methods a bit legally questionable. Supreme Court decisions are easy to get, but the briefs and decisions of lower courts can be hard to come by. Last week, a team from Princeton's Center for Information Technology Policy took a pot shot at legal secrecy, setting in motion a scheme to filch protected judicial records and make them available for free online. One of the developers, Harvard's Stephen Schultze, says he went digging for some First Amendment precedent last fall and was shocked by the outdated technology he found. Knowing that "there's a certain geek cache to openness projects these days," Mr. Schultze and Princeton computer science grad students Tim Lee and Harlan Yu went straight to work.

Their almost-definitely-probably lawful system works like this: Right now, lawyers, nonprofits and researchers who use PACER, the clunky database maintained by the federal court system, must hand over their credit-card numbers and pay eight cents a page for records. Eight cents a page might not seem like much until you realize that the system isn't keyword searchable.

That's right: In 2009, judicial records in the U.S. are essentially unsearchable. Digital records—with confidential personal information (theoretically) redacted by attorneys—must be downloaded in unwieldy, badly labeled chunks. This is incomprehensible to anyone under 30. But it's a sad fact of life for those who pay lawyers hundreds of dollars an hour to dig up what would could be Googled in any other field. READ MORE

The Appendix: Useful and in Fact Promising

Charles Q. Choi

The body's appendix has long been thought of as nothing more than a worthless evolutionary artifact, good for nothing save a potentially lethal case of inflammation.

Now researchers suggest the appendix is a lot more than a useless remnant. Not only was it recently proposed to actually possess a critical function, but scientists now find it appears in nature a lot more often than before thought. And it's possible some of this organ's ancient uses could be recruited by physicians to help the human body fight disease more effectively.

In a way, the idea that the appendix is an organ whose time has passed has itself become a concept whose time is over.

"Maybe it's time to correct the textbooks," said researcher William Parker, an immunologist at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C. "Many biology texts today still refer to the appendix as a 'vestigial organ.'"

Slimy sac

The vermiform appendix is a slimy dead-end sac that hangs between the small and large intestines. No less than Charles Darwin first suggested that the appendix was a vestigial organ from an ancestor that ate leaves, theorizing that it was the evolutionary remains of a larger structure, called a cecum, which once was used by now-extinct predecessors for digesting food.

"Everybody likely knows at least one person who had to get their appendix taken out - slightly more than 1 in 20 people do - and they see there are no ill effects, and this suggests that you don't need it," Parker said.

However, Parker and his colleagues recently suggested that the appendix still served as a vital safehouse where good bacteria could lie in wait until they were needed to repopulate the gut after a nasty case of diarrhea. Past studies had also found the appendix can help make, direct and train white blood cells.

Now, in the first investigation of the appendix over the ages, Parker explained they discovered that it has been around much longer than anyone had suspected, hinting that it plays a critical function.

"The appendix has been around for at least 80 million years, much longer than we would estimate if Darwin's ideas about the appendix were correct," Parker said. READ MORE