What Were They Thinking? (Lew Rockwell, LRC): “Last spring, most people thought the war planners were decisive geniuses who had pulled off an amazing feat of military management. Donald Rumsfeld boasted: “Never have so many been so wrong about so much.” War critics didn’t believe him, but it took time for the full evidence of failure to emerge. Today, the war critics are the prophets and the war planners are regarded as hopelessly naïve architects of a quagmire. Bush’s wars have not only failed to achieve their stated aims, they have left the world more unsafe, unstable, and violent.”
The Truth About the War On Terrorism (Grichar reviews Bovard, LRC): “Even more important, liberals and so-called conservatives need to read this volume. In addition to sparking their interest in what has happened, it could change their mind and help bring the U.S. out of the horrible mess that past and current presidents – with the tactic approval of Congress – have gotten us into.”
A New Road to Serfdom(Hans H.J. Labohm, TechCentralStation): “The Road to Serfdom still contains insights that today are as visionary and relevant as when they were published for the first time in 1944.Imagine the Zeitgeist of the thirties and forties! The free market economy was under siege, because it was believed to generate chaos with its business cycles and monopoly power. The planned society envisaged under socialism was supposed to be not only more efficient than capitalism, but socialism -- with its promise of social justice -- was expected to be fairer. It was considered the wave of the future. Only a reactionary, it was argued, could resist the inevitable tide of history. In this context The Road to Serfdom appeared with a seemingly anachronistic message.
Jobless Claims Jump (CNN): “Jobless claims jumped last week, the government said Thursday, higher than Wall Street analysts expected, to a level above the benchmark 400,000 that signifies job-market weakness. “
US Productivity Soars (WashPost): “Productivity - the amount an employee produces for each hour of work - soared at an annual rate of 6.8 percent in the April-to-June quarter, even stronger than the government’s first estimate of a 5.7 percent growth rate.”
Greenspan’s Flutter(CSM): “In a speech last week, Alan Greenspan argued against critics who want the central bank to use stricter rules in adjusting interest rates and the nation’s money flows, and to know better how markets will react to its decisions. Speaking more like Heisenberg than Newton, the Federal Reserve chairman said: “Uncertainty is not just an important feature of the monetary policy landscape; it is the defining characteristic of that landscape.”
Universal Slashes CD prices (USAToday): “The price cuts are also the music industry’s latest attempt to slow illegal file sharing by consumers. The RIAA has served more than 1,300 subpoenas to identify traders and expects to file lawsuits as early as this week.”
Auditors Find IRS Centers Wanting (WashTimes): “The investigators concluded that approximately 500,000 taxpayers who visited the centers during the course of the study, from July to December last year, could have received incorrect responses to their tax-law questions.”
Bush’s Latest Blarney (S. Corrigan, Mises.org): “Know that there is nothing more inimical to economic recovery—as well as to personal liberty—than the doctrine encapsulated by Bush in the words: “We have a responsibility that when somebody hurts, government has got to move.”
Posted by Mises.org News
