Last week, Jerome Powell insisted that he’s not going to change his mind on allowing interest rates to rise while allowing the assets on the Fed’s portfolio to (very slowly) roll off the balance sheet. At the Federal Reserve’s annual Jackson Hole conference, Powell’s speech lasted only ten minutes. Powell had a fairly simple message.

The biggest uncertainty with libertarianism is not whether it is moral but whether it is achievable.

Some form of libertarianism is what ought to be. Aggressive violence can’t be moral under any circumstances. The state is an institution that relies on aggressive violence for sustenance and is, therefore, an immoral entity.

But, despite being immoral, it still exists. I’m beginning to question whether it will ever cease to exist in any form or if we, as individuals, have control over what it looks like.

“Follow the money.” This is a common watchword among those distrustful of the state. If you want to know what politicians or state institutions are really up to, the common wisdom goes, you have to stop listening to what statists do and say, and start paying attention to who is paying them to do and say it.

[Dr. Gilbert Berdine of the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center and Ryan McMaken discuss the policy makers’ justifications for vaccine mandates over the past two years. Will any of these policy makers admit to any mistakes?]

Jedediah Purdy is a legal academic probably best known for his work in environmental law, and his just-published Two Cheers for Politics (Basic Books, 2022) shows his wide knowledge of political philosophy. But a central argument of the book is a textbook case of a fallacy to which Ludwig von Mises was keen to call our attention.

It gives me no joy to write this piece.

Even a cursory review of the redacted version of the affidavit submitted in support of the government’s application for a search warrant at the home of former President Donald Trump reveals that he will soon be indicted by a federal grand jury for three crimes: Removing and concealing national defense information (NDI), giving NDI to those not legally entitled to possess it, and obstruction of justice by failing to return NDI to those who are legally entitled to retrieve it.