Free Republic

For all the well-paid analysts and sophisticated computer systems that dominate trading, Wall Street still can't seem to focus on more than one thing at a time.For now, the focus has returned to the European debt crisis, as the issues that cut down Greece, Portugal and Ireland have hit Spain hard. But very soon, as Election Day approaches, the attention will turn back to U.S. debt and deficit issues, which, as in Spain, are caused by too much debt and a government trying to avoid its budget-cutting duties. Remember last summer's debt-ceiling debacle and the market meltdown caused partly by...

The biggest threats to U.S. national security are the nation's domestic policies and not Iran, China, North Korea or Russia says Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations. (Snip)A Council on Foreign Relations Task Force released a report last month that found the nation's ailing public school system "threatens the country's ability to thrive in a global economy..(snip)Haass says these policy failures and intransigence by lawmakers to seriously and vigorously tackle the looming budget crisis portends a weaker U.S. in an increasingly competitive global economy. (Snip)Entitlement reform, typically a "third rail in American politics," will be the...

The latest data show that book sales are way up this season. So much for the prediction that books will be killed by technology. On the contrary, technology has enabled the great literature of the ages and the present to be put in the hands of everyone. I can’t think of a better time to begin refurbishing Laissez-Faire Books (founded in 1972), because it is the market that laissez-faire celebrates that has made all the literature we love more accessible than ever.Addison Wiggin, president of Agora Financial, and I were discussing the various challenges ahead of us as we infuse...

The ubiquitous greenery of the season has me thinking conifers and stock market crashes. There is much to be learned from the coned evergreen trees that form vast forests across the Northern Hemisphere. As the oldest trees on the planet, the mighty conifers have survived threats of catastrophic extinction since the time of the hungry herbivorous dinosaurs. The conifer's secret to longevity lies in a paradox: Their conquest has been largely the result of episodes of massive forest destruction. When virtually all else is gone, conifers show their strength and prowess as nature's opportunists. How? They have adapted to evade...

Last week, the Senate rejected proposals by both Democrats and Republicans to pay for an extension of the 2 percent temporary payroll tax cut enacted a year ago. The Democratic plan to finance it with a 3.25 percent surtax on millionaires garnered significantly more votes than the Republican plan to cut the number of federal jobs and freeze the pay of federal workers.  (Snip)Republicans like to pretend that cutting spending is economically costless, even stimulative, whereas raising taxes in any way whatsoever is so economically debilitating that it dare not be contemplated. This view is complete nonsense.  (Snip)Careful studies by...

While we were students of the state education apparatus, how many of us had to write research papers where we were asked to "change the world"?I'm sure we can all remember a writing prompt similar to this: "If I could change one thing about the world, it would be …" or "How I can make the world a better place."Often, these writing prompts were given to us when we were not even old enough to think about abstract concepts like war and politics.Were these assignments teaching us to think critically? In some cases, this is possible. For the most part,...

One of the most famous scenes in movie history comes from “Casablanca,” when a corrupt official shuts down Humphrey Bogart’s cafe. Bogart asks the French captain — who also happens to be a gambling aficionado — why he’s closing the joint down. His response is a classic.“I am shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on here.”Political commentators have referred to Capt. Renault’s uproarious line for years when calling out hypocritical politicians. But few political narratives ever fit that scene as tightly as President Barack Obama’s bipolar approach to Wall Street.To fully understand the extent of Obama’s double-speak, it...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Every 2012 contender attended college. They all graduated. They went to schools like the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia, Texas A&M, Morehouse, Penn State and Emory.But decades have passed since these Presidential candidates first stepped onto campus as freshmen. Is it time for an Econ 101 refresher course? (Snip) America's Econ 101 professors say yes. In their view, the candidates continue to offer ideas and policies that wouldn't pass muster in their classes -- populated by 18 year-old college students."There are so many economic 'misstatements' being made," said Jonathan Lanning, a professor at Bryn Mawr who is...

Sealed With A Kiss"We have come to a time for choosing; we will preserve for our children this the last best hope for man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.....history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening." Ronald Reagan, 1964    Dark Ages or Renaissance? Can there be any clearer or easier choice? Determining how to avoid the one in order to embark on the other is bit more daunting. The concept of paradigm change...

Learning From History- More of The Great Debate "What is past is prologue." William Shakespeare"Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."George Santayana    The first step of the learning process is a review of the relevant history and identifying what works, what doesn't, what can be changed, how it should be changed, and who can change it. It is sometimes helpful to identify the people who have placed obstacles in the path of progress and those who have misled or derailed the train of human progress.    George Bernard Shaw, a socialist who did not like the lessons...

MY VOTE IS FOR SALE    The problems America faces today originate in Washington. It is fallacious reasoning to suggest that the problem lies with the people of the United States. Our government was formed as a constitutional (read that as a written contract that carefully defines and severely restricts who and how the contract can be changed) republic after the Founders overwhelmingly rejected the idea of a democracy. Our republic was predicated on the theory that those elected to public office would have some combination of higher moral standards, greater intellectual competence, more educational skills, and broader experiences than the...

"It is remarkable to see how relatively numerous in declining empires are the people capable of making the right diagnosis and preaching some sensible cure. It is no less remarkable, however, that wise utterances remain generally sterile, because, as Gonazles de Cellorigo forcefully put it while watching impotently the decline of Spain, "those who can, will not; and those who will, cannot." Carlo M. Cipolla: "The Decline of Empires"  The Red Shift     In the 1920's, Edwin Hubble, while studying the stars of distant galaxies, found that for some, their emission spectra had peaks at 411.54 nm, 435.50 nm, 487.75 nm,...

The Limbaugh Institute for  Advanced Conservative Studies LIACS    The Reagan Wing, modeled in part after GOPAC, will need a recruiting and candidate selection arm. As the mission of the Reagan Wing becomes known, some citizen-statesmen will volunteer for service. As the Reagan Wing begins to enjoy some successes even more volunteers will be forth coming. But given the number of socialists in Congress, the Reagan Wing should be prepared to actively recruit citizen-statesmen on an ongoing basis. And while focused on Congress, the Reagan Wing should be recruiting for state and local offices as well. Committed to excellence, the...

The Reagan Wing"We have come to a time for choosing; we will preserve for our children this the last best hope for man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.....history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening." Ronald Reagan 1964       Washington's Farewell Address was typical of the Founders who were a group of concerned citizens willing to become statesmen for a time because they knew they had contributions that needed to be made. Once their...

Social Security Is Not A Sacred Cow It's A Trojan Horse That Has An Achilles Heel"See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime...It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of plunder." The Law- Frederick Bastiat, 1850.     Not even President Reagan was willing...

Voting-Who Needs It, if Government isn't the problem?"It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of plunder." Frederic Bastiat, 1850 Excerpted from Fee.org's pdf version of Bastiat's The Law, pp. 10-18"....But universal suffrage using the word in its strictest sense is not one of those sacred dogmas which it is a crime to examine or doubt. In fact, serious objections may be made to universal suffrage. "In the first place the word universal conceals a gross fallacy. For example, there are 36 million people...

TERM LIMITS    Admission of the fact that the voting patterns of the people or that the desires and wishes of the people who vote influences the behavior of elected office holders is not only an acknowledgement of the superiority of a Republican form of government whether it is recognized as such or not by the people who are opposed to term limits, but it is also an acknowledgement of the absolute need for term limits in order to preserve our Constitutional Republic.    The foundation of the theory of a representative Republic as a form of government is that voters will...

Talking Points for the "Occupy Wall Street" Protesters John P. Hussman, Ph.D. Just a note - by the end of last week, Greek 1-year yields had surged to 144%. European leaders have shifted from promising to prevent a Greek default to promising instead to ensure that European banks are well capitalized. Here, I would repeat that it is essential for policy makers to make a distinction between liquidity and solvency. Banks that are solvent, and countries that are solvent, should be within the ring-fence, in the sense that it is sensible for policy makers to follow Bagehot's Rule - freely...

Creative Destructionism    Capitalism has been described as "creative destructionism". Market Based Management (MBM) is a management system built on the logical framework of Austrian economic theory. The path of evolution of a politically effective plan built around the ideas of liberty more closely resembled the creative destructionism of capitalism than a well-organized management plan, but the finished product can readily be described in the terms used to describe MBM. As part of the Great Debate that defines the advantages of capitalism over the liabilities of socialism, one of the primary goals of our politically effective plan is to help people...

Gresham's Law of PoliticiansIt has been said that politics is the second oldest profession.I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.Ronald Reagan       Those who believe that government can help the unfortunate are mistaken. With the passage of time, socialism gradually undermines any short term humane benefits that occur. Eventually, through its erosion of the incentives to self-improvement and through its erosion of the incentive to be productive as well as through its displacement and corruption of genuine enlightened charity, socialism ends up doing the most harm to the very people it was intended to...