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 [...]

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. [...]

Resolved, that The Powers That Be™ believe the following: Foreclosures are bad. Falling house prices are bad. Banks losing lots of money is bad. It’s not hard to understand why. Politicians sell a version of The American Dream where it’s all lollipops and homeownership, and people getting tossed from their property or deeply underwater on [...]

In an interview with The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, some incredible quotes came from the aging Cuban dictator: (Reuters) – Fidel Castro said Cuba’s economic model no longer works, a U.S.-based journalist reported on Wednesday following interviews with the former president last week. Jeffrey Goldberg, a writer for the Atlantic Monthly magazine, wrote in a blog [...]

Over at Liberty Pundits, Melissa Clouthier argues that libertarians and conservatives are natural allies: Libertarians want the government to bug out. Conservatives want the individual to empower himself. Libertarians believe in rational self-interest. Conservatives believe help and charity come from a giving heart–not from the government’s pointed gun. Their motivations might be different, but their [...]

While most of us were in the middle of a slow week following a holiday, Obama decided to issue a recess appointment for the job heading Medicare & Medicaid. Could it be that he issued it as a recess appointment because he didn’t want us digging too deeply into what the good Dr said? Below [...]

David Cameron today apologized for the  British Armies conduct on Bloody Sunday. Great… now do something of substance. Either treat the north as a real part of the rest of the damn country, or get the hell out. The UK is firmly wedded to a lot of government involvement in industry, in finance, in development… [...]

This is utterly depressing: WASHINGTON — Two weeks after President Barack Obama signed the big health care overhaul into law, Americans are struggling to understand how — and when — the sweeping measure will affect them. Questions reflecting confusion have flooded insurance companies, doctors’ offices, human resources departments and business groups. “They’re saying, ‘Where do [...]

As we all know, most of ObamaCare is pushed out to 2014 or so. But Ezra Klein, ever helpful, points out this nice PDF which explains what will occur nearly immediately. Ezra is always celebrating the cost-control measures of ObamaCare, so let’s see how these provisions stack up: 1. SMALL BUSINESS TAX CREDITS—Offers tax credits [...]

“I mean, say what you like about the tenets of the Republican party, Dude, at least it’s an ethos…” Apologies to Joel and Ethan Coen… There has been a recent meme circulated by the leftosphere, that the Republicans… in fact any opponent of the Obama agenda… are nihilists. Now, I have to say, I don’t [...]

I’ll blockquote Peter Suderman over at Reason blockquoting the CAP’s “wonk room” blog on this one: The short version of the argument is that C-SPAN’s coverage would put pressure on legislators to perform for the cameras and thus make the bill worse: C-SPAN is grounded in the belief that transparency produces superior legislation. And maybe [...]

…Doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have any choice at all. The first freedom is the freedom to fail… And when it comes to choosing our leaders in this country… whoooo boy have we failed big time, for a long time. So fellow gunblogger Tam, being an Ovarian American, got a bit tweaked at a comment over [...]

Ezra Klein quotes approvingly from Bruce Bartlett’s new book, The New American Economy: The Failure Of Reaganomics And A New Way Forward: The reality is that even before spending exploded to deal with the economic crisis, the government was set to grow by about 50 percent of GDP over the next generation just to pay [...]

In the lead up to the vote on H.R. 3962, the “Affordable Health Care for America” Act (scare quotes intentional), Barack Obama offered this encouragement to legislators to vote for the bill: “This is their moment, this is our moment, to live up to the trust that the American people have placed in us,” Obama [...]

So it is done: 220-215. Two-hundred and twenty United States Representatives put their support behind 20 pounds and 2,000 pages of abusive legislation in the form of innumerable mandates enforced by 110 new government agencies. One of those mandates, though, cuts so violently to the core of our freedoms that it cannot go unanswered: Buy [...]

Leslie Carbone, local Virginia blogger and author of Slaying Leviathan: The Moral Case for Tax Reform spoke at an Accuracy in Media sponsored even in D.C. last week. Here’s the video: And, here’s my review of Leslie’s book, which I highly recommend.

Peter Suderman writing for The Wall Street Journal has written an excellent article about the (apparent) unlearned lessons of government run healthcare. But unlike many others who use Canada and the UK as examples, Suderman insists that we only need to look at states like New York, Massachusetts, Washington, and Tennessee for their respective failed [...]

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c Arizona State Capitol Building for Sale www.thedailyshow.com Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview The above video clip from The Daily Show, while very humorous, illustrates a fundamental problem of government: shortsightedness. In this example, the State of Arizona is offering [...]

Ahh, the infamous strawman. Take one aspect of an argument, assume it is not part of a cohesive whole, and argue against it as if it negates everything else at hand. I.e. libertarians and conservatives argue that capping drug prices just MIGHT reduce drug innovation, and Ezra Klein acts as if we’d keep everything else [...]

The Senate Finance Committee is finishing up work this week on a “compromise” Obamacare bill that’s being billed as better than pure Obamacare because it doesn’t include “death panels”, a public option, and free healthcare for illegal aliens. The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee said Monday that he will propose an overhaul of the [...]