War and Inflation

You can line up 100 professional war historians and political scientists to talk about the 20th century, and not one is likely to mention the role of the Fed in funding US militarism. And yet the story of central banking is one step removed from the story of atom bombs and death camps. It is the most important priority of the state to keep its money machine hidden behind a curtain. Anyone who dares pull the curtain back is accused of every manner of intellectual crime. We must end the conspiracy of silence on this issue.

Milei Snubs the Spanish Political Establishment

Argentinian president Javier Milei recently snubbed the Spanish political class by visiting Spain and refusing to meet with any government officials, attending a rally of the opposition party Vox, and insinuating that the socialist Spanish president’s wife—currently at the heart of an anticorruption case—was corrupt. In retaliation, the Spanish president recalled his country’s ambassador from Buenos Aires.

Argument by Fiat

The economist and social critic Glenn C. Loury has written a book sure to attract attention, but in what follows, I don’t propose to address what is likely to be the principal source of that attention. In Late Admissions: Confessions of a Black Conservative (W.W. Norton, 2024), Loury has offered an account of his life that reads like a romantic thriller. Readers in search of salacious gossip will find it in abundance.

What If Public Schools Were Abolished?

In American culture, public schools are praised in public and criticized in private, which is roughly the opposite of how we tend to treat large-scale enterprises like Walmart. In public, everyone says that Walmart is awful, filled with shoddy foreign products and exploiting workers. But in private, we buy the well-priced, quality goods, and long lines of people hope to be hired.

The SCOTUS Chevron Decision: Pros and Cons

Many people who appreciate free markets are hailing the recent Chevron decision. Striking down Chevron curtails the powers of many officials in regulatory agencies, but how does this really affect entrepreneurs and markets? There are two important things to note here. First, striking down Chevron didn’t remove any regulations from US industry, this ruling transferred powers to interpret regulatory rules. Second, there are two sides to regulatory capture.

The Absurdity of “Open Borders”

Some libertarians argue that libertarianism requires support for “open borders,” but this is a mistake. “Open borders” is the view in the existing world of states, the state ought to admit as many people who want to come to the United States as possible. Of course, you don’t have the right to occupy property that is privately owned. But much of the property in the United States is “public,” which means that it is up to those who run the state to decide what to do with it.