Free Republic

Marginalism and the Morality of Pricing Human Lives Dwight Lee is Ramsey Professor at the Terry College of Business, University of Georgia, and an adjunct fellow at the Center for the Study of American Business at Washington University in St. Louis. When I ask students in my large economics classes if some things are just too important to put a price on, someone always answers, "human life." This seems like a reasonable answer. After all, how many people would sacrifice their lives for cash, no matter how much was offered? What is the point of being a rich corpse? But ...

http://www.nytimes.com/2000/09/14/nyregion/14EMIS.html Bill Covering Carbon Dioxide Seeks to Reduce Other Pollution By KIRK JOHNSON New York City Council leaders proposed a law yesterday that would give New York the nation's first air- emission standard for the release of carbon dioxide. But they were the first to admit that carbon dioxide was not their real target. The bill, proposed by the Council speaker, Peter F. Vallone, is aimed at forcing the city's older electricity generating plants to reduce overall pollution levels. "This is a back-door way of doing that," Mr. Vallone said. The carbon dioxide bill, which was written with the aid ...

Just Plain False This morning's New York Times is full of sentences in news stories that stand in plain contradiction to reality. Consider: A story in the international section about a meeting between President Clinton and the president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, contains the following sentence: "Mr. Clinton is eager to resolve the decades-long standoff in the five months left of his presidency, but officials say that in reality the end of September, just before Israeli elections, is the last opportunity to reconvene a gathering of Middle East leaders." There are no major Israeli elections scheduled for just after the ...

DEFENDING AMERICA David H. Hackworth May 17, 1994 HEARING ON SOMALIA: EXCUSES, EXCUSES World War II hero Capt. Ken Eggleston is dead, but his command techniques in nailing the guy responsible for a screw-up remain a legacy. When he found something wrong in his unit in Italy, he'd bark, "Who's in charge around here'?" And after an investigation, he'd zero in on the guilty party. The captain was needed last week at Sen. Sam Nunn's hearing on Somalia, for, after five hours of testimony, no one who issued the orders that left 18 U.S. warriors dead and 78 wounded had ...

SAN DIEGO (APBnews.com) -- A ferret rights activist told a judge today that he would rather spend a year behind bars than allow animal control officers to make random visits to his home to see if he has ferrets, which are illegal in California. In a display of leniency that disappointed a prosecutor, a judge took activist Pat Wright up on his offer, but only sentenced him to 45 days in jail, not a year. Wright is the founder of Ferrets Anonymous, an organization that has been working for years to legalize the small, weasel-like creatures in the Golden State. ...

Comparative Advantage Dwight Lee is Ramsey Professor at the Terry College of Business, University of Georgia, and an adjunct fellow at the Center for Study of American Business at Washington University. One of the most powerful and straightforward economic concepts is "comparative advantage." As important and simple as this concept is, however, it seldom seems to inform public discussions of international trade. Almost everyone "knows" that we can’t compete with countries that have cheap labor—if we have free trade with such countries either wages will be driven down or many workers will lose their jobs. As Will Rogers once observed, ...

Cutting-Edge Day Trips LONDON (Reuters) - Frenchmen seeking a vasectomy can now take a day trip to Britain for the operation -- but Paris newspapers refuse to tell them about the "away day" with a difference. The operation is illegal in France under a 200-year-old Napoleonic law but the opening of the Channel Tunnel has created an unlikely new medical opportunity. Frenchmen can take the Eurostar train to the southern English town of Ashford, undergo the 10-minute operation and be back home by the evening. Marie Stopes International, the family planning organization, sought to place advertisements in leading French ...

Report: Congress Panel May Test Waco Bullets Updated 3:10 PM ET October 24, 1999 WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One of the congressional committees investigating the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, may order ballistic tests on some bullet casings found at an FBI sniper position, according to a New Yorker magazine story to be published Monday. A report by the Texas Rangers subpoenaed by a House panel and made public last month said ammunition often used by snipers was found in a house used by both the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. The report ...

Man Who Killed Wife Gets Four Months In Jail FORT WORTH, Texas (Reuters) - A man convicted of shooting his wife, then returning to finish her off when he found he had more bullets, was sentenced on Friday to four months in jail after a jury recommended probation. Jimmy Watkins, 34, was sentenced by a state judge one day after jurors, who had found him guilty of murder, recommended he receive 10 years probation rather than the life prison term sought by prosecutors, a clerk for Judge Robert Gill said. Under terms of the jury's recommendation, the judge could have ...

Let's End Abstinence Hypocrisy by  Ruth Conniff    (Link to Article)  Thursday, September 30, 1999 In an old "Saturday Night Live" skit, Al Franken talks about the draft. When he was young and foolish, he opposed involuntary conscription, but now that he is older (and no longer eligible) he favors it. Sexual hypocrisy This is pretty much the model for the national debate about abstinence. And here is my big chance to join in. Two months ago, at the age of 30, I got married. And now I am ready to stand with Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich in ...

This is really a homecoming for me. My dad was a member of the American Legion. We lost him in December, three weeks shy of his 91st birthday. My uncle, Whit LaFon, has been active in the American Legion almost all his life. He is a past National Executive Comitteeman, and past Tennessee Department Commander. And he’s here. And of course you better believe I’m honored to be a member of the American Legion myself -- Department of Tennessee, Post 57. And I was honored to wear my country’s uniform during the Vietnam War. It is for this reason ...

Al Gore Unveils Agenda to Improve Health Care for America's Working Families September 7, 1999 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Kiki Moore (202) 263-6141 Los Angeles, CA -- Al Gore today unveiled his vision to improve health care coverage for Americans who currently have access, and expand coverage for those who do not, including ensuring that all children have access to affordable health coverage by 2005. "The steps I am proposing today will guarantee access to affordable health coverage for every child in America – and will provide more affordable health care options for millions more adults," said Al Gore. ...

Media often cover trivia, ignore major issues — such as slavery By A.M. Rosenthal Link to Article       After a lifetime in daily journalism, I still worry when real news is treated as no news at all.       Journalists write about what interests them and, they hope, a slice of their particular audiences large enough to keep their newspaper or TV station a daily habit.       In free countries, the variety of journals and broadcasts guarantees information on every subject that touches on what is important in human life, with large dollops of what is deliciously unimportant.       Together ...

Jewish World Review   August 31, 1999 /19 Elul, 5759 Dr. Laura Free speech for all http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- I KNOW THERE IS A LOT of generalizing going on, especially in the arena of liberal vs. conservative. However, as with all generalizations, a lot of it is true! One particular point of truth is the issue of free speech. I have come to learn that those who identify themselves as liberals have an entirely different view of free speech for themselves than they afford those whom they identify as conservative commentators. It appears that when a liberal makes a statement, it ...

http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- AS STUDENTS AND PROFESSORS head back to campuses around the country in the next few weeks, one person who won't be returning to classes is Professor Mary Daly, who taught at Boston College for 33 years. For most of her tenure, the self-described "radical, lesbian feminist" refused to allow male students into her classes in feminist ethics at the now co-ed Jesuit school (it once was an all-male college). The college put up with Daly's exclusionary policies for 25 years --- until last fall, when threatened with a suit by the Center for Individual Rights on behalf of ...

  Spontaneous Order by Nigel Ashford "Many human institutions are the result of human action, but not of human design." Adam Ferguson Nigel Ashford is senior lecturer in politics at the University of Staffordshire in England and coauthor of A Dictionary of Conservative and Libertarian Thought (Routledge, 1991). This article is adapted from his paper "Principles for a Free Society," a primer for former communist countries. Reprinted by permission of the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation of Stockholm. Order has been a central preoccupation of political thinkers and philosophers throughout the ages. It is widely understood today as a state of ...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) - Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Court reportedly has condemned to death instigators of last month's mass protests, Iran's worst unrest since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Meanwhile, Iran's spiritual leader named a new chief of the nation's judiciary, removing a powerful hard-liner responsible for a crackdown on the liberal media. It was unclear whether the new chief had different political leanings than his hard-line predecessor. The Islamic Revolutionary Court also gave long jail terms to several other defendants, the evening Kayhan daily reported. The paper, which is believed to have close ties to Iran's hard-line judiciary, quoted ...

Assume you need surgery to remove a brain tumor. Two physicians in your town offer to perform this operation. Dr. Smith specializes in neurosurgery; it's his sole occupation. Dr. Jones, however, divides his time among a variety of occupations. Along with performing neurosurgery, he practices dentistry, gynecology, podiatry, and radiology. He also spends part of each day teaching political science at the local college, and another part of each day as an investment counselor. Which surgeon will you use? If your brain tumor hasn't yet seriously diminished your capacity for rational thought, you'll choose Dr. Smith the specialist. Dr. Jones ...

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY | EW DAILY | July 7, 1999 | American Pie, MPAA, Drop Dead The stars of the summer's most controversial films talk about teen carding. Kirsten Dunst, Tim Robbins, and the leads of ''American Pie'' say real teenage life is full of sex, so what's the big deal? EW Daily News http://cgi.pathfinder.com/ew/daily/0,2514,1640,starsofsummersmost.html Teenage life is full of sex, so what's the big deal? by Liane Bonin They don't call it an Rrrrrr rating for nothing. Ever since theater owners instituted a carding system for underage teens, the issue of what makes some movies too hot for PG-13 ...

CNS) - Conservative UN observers and a coalition of Catholic and Muslim nations have lambasted the final report of the International Conference on Population and Development five-year review, commonly known as ICPD+5. ICPD+5 is the review of the Programme of Action voted on at the Cairo Population Conference in 1994. The review took shape over a rancorous three day session that ended Thursday - a session that pitted a loose coalition of Third World nations and the Vatican fighting to limit UN funding for abortions and adolescent sex education around the world against representatives from developed countries. "This is a ...