Faced with growing American frustration over more than $100 billion spent on a failed proxy war in Ukraine, President Biden’s handlers have hit on a gimmick to convince us that this foreign aid is actually an investment in our own economy! In his recent television address, Biden explained that as we transfer more weapons to Ukraine we then will build new weapons at home to replace them. That, explained Biden, means more American jobs and a stronger American economy.

It’s important to remember these pre-crisis days, where the Fed sounds like they’re doing a great job to steer the economy, and where economic stimulus isn’t even on their agenda. This is not an endorsement of the current state of the economy, but rather a reference point to look back upon when things get worse in the future.

From the onset of the current Israeli-Hamas conflict, the statements from the Joe Biden administration and Congress were crystal clear: America is the indispensable nation, and we’re rich and powerful enough to be able to afford two wars to guarantee the safety of the world. Even with the displeasure over an unstoppable growth in debt and a declining economy, the message to both the domestic and international audiences is DC will get involved wherever it need be.

Dorothy and her companions in the movie The Wizard of Oz feared lions and tigers and bears as they journeyed through the woods to visit the wizard. But real people living today might fear frighteningly large numbers more than large wild animals.

The role of the infinitely small is infinitely large.”

― Ray Kurzweil, The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man. —GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, “MAXIMS FOR REVOLUTIONISTS”

― Ray Kurzweil, The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology

In 2002, President George W. Bush cited the now famous “axis of evil”—Iraq, Iran, and North Korea—as he tried to get the American people to look beyond those responsible for the 9/11 attacks and greenlight a global military campaign to “rid the world of the evil-doers.”

The Great Money Bubble: Protect Yourself from the Coming Inflation Storm
by David A. Stockman
Humanix Books, 2022; 229 pp.

We’re about six weeks into fiscal year 2024, but if this year looks anything like last year, we can assume the federal government will continue to pile up debt at astonishing rates. 

The U.S. Attorney’s office in the Eastern District of Louisiana just sent out a press release reporting that a New Orleans federal judge has sentenced a 28-year-old man, Derek Nolan, to 15 years in a federal penitentiary for drug-related crimes. 

For decades, I have worked to make the Mises Institute the world center for Misesian and Rothbardian economics it has become, and I’m glad to say that our Board of Directors has chosen a new president, Tom DiLorenzo, who is a great scholar and who will lead the Institute to new victories for freedom and Austrian economics. In this week’s column, I’d like to discuss some of Tom’s ideas.