Starbucks just raised prices this past winter. And now again?

1,028 leading economists have taken out an ad in the Wall Street Journal to oppose anti-China trade protectionism now before Congress. They style their effort as a reprise of the 1930 petition sent by a similar number of economists to President Herbert Hoover urging him to veto the Smoot-Hawley Tariff bill, which he went on to sign anyway.

After a recent book publication on Hoppe’s thought in Italy, now a Thesi di Laurea in law (equivalent of a JD) on Hoppe’s critique of democracy has been accepted at the University of Padua. “La Fondazione Teorica Della Democrazia: La Lettura Critica Del Pensiero Di Rousseau in Hans-Hermann Hoppe,” by Rossella Trieste.

John Derbyshire explains why he is tempted by Ron Paul’s views on government but must ultimately reject them. His argument seems to be that if government is small, it’s fine to favor small government. But if it is vast and imperial, we should favor that too. Doesn’t this reduce “conservatism” to nothing but status quo cheering of the state? I suppose that this has long been their esoteric doctrine, but it is amusing to see it stated so overtly.

...it’s easier to use the new $200,000 note issued by the RBZ. It is worth US$13 at the official exchange rate or $1 on the black market.

In the 30’s and 40’s when the world was young and naive, Freud and his fellow psychotherapists had legions of followers. Theories of human behavior flourished like mosquitos on Summer nights. If we could just find the causal factors, human behavior would be as predictable as the union of hydrogen and oxygen producing water.

One mainstream theory said the personality was structured by birth trauma — tough birth, tough individual. a psychiatrist — Otto Rank popularized this theory.

Hoppe’s latest paper is On The Origin Of Private Property And The Family, an abstract of a long chapter within the framework of a major book project (version also published here). A Spanish translation has already appeared: Sobre El Origen De La Propiedad Y La Familia. Other recent Spanish translations of Hoppe works include:

Last week the Dow Jones industrial average fell 4.2%, the steepest drop since March 2003. Financial shares took a beating on growing evidence that problems in the sub-prime mortgage market are spreading, making financing the corporate buy-outs that drove the market’s rally more difficult.

Many financial market participants are of the view that there is a definite deterioration in credit conditions, which means less liquidity for private equity, stock buy-backs, and business expansion. Fed officials, however, have downplayed this claim.