Some food for thought regarding the TSA. Created by: OnlineCriminalJusticeDegree.com Hat Tip: United Liberty

Over at Megan McArdle’s place, she’s on a leave of absence for some as-yet-unnamed project. In her stead, Katherine Mangu-Ward picks up one of Megan’s common refrains about Americans and obesity: Fat people know they’re fat. They know why they’re fat. And they know that being fat kinda sucks. This may seem obvious, but think [...]

If there is one positive thing Herman Cain has contributed to the national debate it would be this renewed discussion about tax reform. While I am skeptical of some of the specifics of his 9-9-9 plan, if nothing else, Cain has forced the other candidates to come out with proposals of their own. Gov. Rick [...]

Wow. It’s one thing to carry the necessary delusion that comes with most people in a startup… That self-delusion, the belief that you can’t fail (despite the high proportions of startups that fail), is what is required to overcome the often monumental odds most startups face. But is it merely delusion to submit THIS* to [...]

…but California is living proof that a supermajority requirement doesn’t “make it virtually impossible to raise revenue,” it only encourages stupid politician tricks.

I was passed this story by a relative, and thought it was absolutely genius: Would you take advantage of a federal loophole that gives you a free first-class flight anywhere on Earth? That’s what hundreds — possibly thousands — of shrewd travel enthusiasts are doing, in light of a 2005 law that unwittingly created a [...]

From Megan McArdle, a list of reasons why the Federal Government is too big to fail (or even pause): The nation’s nuclear arsenal is no longer being watched or maintained The doors of federal prisons have been thrown open, because none of the guards will work without being paid, and the vendors will not deliver [...]

Can the Republicans trust Democrats and compromise by raising taxes in exchange for spending cuts in this debt ceiling debate? Ron Paul says “no” in his first 2012 political ad. Why not trust Democrats? Ask former President George H.W. Bush what happened to him when he broke his infamous “Read my lips” promise that he [...]

Ezra Klein, on education & health care costs: I’m not going to end this post with some wan paragraph explaining how to transform these two industries into something closer to their potential. My ideas on health-care reform are available elsewhere on the blog and I don’t know enough about education to say anything worthwhile. But [...]

So the big debate is whether the gov’t should sell their post-IPO shares in GM. At current prices, they’d [unsurprisingly] be losing money on the sale, compared to the amount put up in the bailout. So we have to ask — was it worth it? To determine that, we can’t base our entire calculation on [...]

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor has set up a website called YouCut to solicit ideas from regular people for suggestions on specific programs and policies that should be cut or eliminated. From the website: YouCut – a first-of-its-kind project – is designed to defeat the permissive culture of runaway spending in Congress. It allows you [...]

One point that I often try to make when debating policy with friends and family is that virtually all policies have unintended consequences. How could anyone be opposed to such idealistic acts of legislation such as the War on Poverty, Social Security, Medicare, hate crimes legislation, affirmative action, the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), the [...]

As of today, it should be clear to everyone in this country, that our system for dealing with criminals (I won’t call it a “criminal justice” system since justice has so little to do with it), is utterly broken, beyond any conventional concept of repair. At this point, again I say, it should be clear [...]

Title: It’s More Expensive to do Nothing Producer: Humane Exposures Films Directed by: Alan Swyer Non-violent offender is arrested, convicted, does his time, re-enters society and the cycle repeats. This is the typical cycle of recidivism in the American criminal justice system thanks largely to the “tough on crime” approach of state and federal policy. [...]

Obama on Saturday: “We’ve made Medicare more solvent by going after waste, fraud, and abuse – not by changing seniors’ guaranteed benefits” Really? And how aggressively have you been “going after” them? It took private sleuths hired by Medicare an average of six months last year to refer fraud cases to law enforcement. According to [...]

I saw a chart today that took me aback. At the Cato @ Liberty blog, a look at aggregate state debt over the last decade: I had well expected that state governments were growing their budget in accordance with the boom economies of the past decade (especially rising property tax collections through the boom), but [...]

As Chris pointed out last week, Republicans might be able to get us to at least a divided Congress in November. One expects that if they do, they’ll stand athwart the tracks as the big-government train approaches, yelling STOP! But their bark is worse than their bite: Yeah! Go Red team! Go Democracy! via TJIC, [...]

As our readers can no doubt see, things have moved to a snail’s pace here. I’m not sure I expect that to change soon [at least for me]. However, I came across this post at TJIC, referencing a post at Coyote Blog, that is an absolute must read. This is a government that is arbitrary, [...]

So the receptionist at the office started* walking around handing out envelopes — envelopes larger than a paycheck — which is sometimes not a good sign. But lo and behold, opening the envelope revealed a nice crisp, clean $10 bill courtesy of [a proxy for] the government! This is an employment survey designed to assess [...]

The Senate passed Porkulus III by a vote of 70-28 with 13 Republicans demonstrating their party’s new found fiscal conservatism by crossing over to vote with every Democrat present for the bill. Like the first Porkulus signed by George W. Bush in 2008 and the Porkulus II passed last year, Porkulus III forks over billions [...]