How did the US go from a nation that revered liberty to one with despotic governance? While political forces already were trying to push the US in a direction of centralization, the Civil War completed the job. We see the results of those centralized outcomes daily.
Without the discipline of profit-and-loss, the desires and goals of the bureaucrats, limited only by the prescriptions and budget of the legislature, necessarily guide policy.
Unrestricted birthright citizenship is increasingly rare, and with only a few exceptions, it persists only in countries with negative or near-zero rates of in-migration.
Why do we study history? Some study it as a way to confirm their own political ideologies, something that often happens when historians look at the US Civil War and its Reconstruction aftermath. According to Ludwig von Mises, one cannot bring an ideological lens and honestly approach history.
Has the statist tide turned from where we were culturally and politically four years ago? Or is this just a temporary lull before the political culture takes another hard left turn?
John Maynard Keynes is often credited with presciently criticizing the harsh anti-German measures of the Treaty of Versailles. But, it turns out that Keynes was playing both sides.
Governments seem united in their drive to destroy sound money and replace it with worthless paper. As technologies advance, however, so does the ability of people to undermine government, and with it, the development of sound money.
Trump promises to levy new tariffs and trade restrictions, along with subsidies for favored industries. This latest version of “industrial policy” will fail again, it has in the past.
The Biden presidency is over and not a minute too soon. Biden‘s five decades of public life has always been one of a mediocre grifter, but he saved his worst for his four years in the White House, where he managed to combine incoherence and incompetence with a lust for power.
European Union regulators are levying draconian new requirements for aviation fuel that will surely force up costs for airlines operating in the EU. While these new rules will have zero effect on the climate, the effects on their airlines and their passengers will be negative.
