by John W. Whitehead. The Founders' worst fear. If the United States is a police state, then the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is its national police force, with all the brutality, ineptitude and corruption such a role implies. In fact, although the DHS’ governmental bureaucracy may at times appear to be inept and bungling, ... MOREIs Dept. of Homeland Security America’s Standing Army?
by John W. Whitehead. The Founders' worst fear. If the United States is a police state, then the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is its national police force, with all the brutality, ineptitude and corruption such a role implies. In fact, although the DHS’ governmental bureaucracy may at times appear to be inept and bungling, ... MORENo Magic Strong Enough To Make IRS E-mails Vanish
by Adriana Cohen. Another federal fairy tale. In a highly suspect news dump, the IRS announced days ago that years
of critical emails that took place between disgraced former IRS official
Lois Lerner and key players in government tied to the IRS targeting
scandal have “magically” disappeared. Even Democrats aren’t buying it. Everyone
knows ... MOREJeffrey Tucker: The War Is On You
Why governments needs an enemy. After 25 years of war on Iraq, the U.S. has what to show for it? A
handful of dust. And at what cost in lives and property? It boggles the
mind to consider the breadth and depth of the suffering. Iraq was the great experiment following the Cold War for how the U.S.
military machine could be used to make ... MOREThe Redskins And The Role Of Government
by Jonathan S. Tobin. Yesterday’s ruling by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board on a suit challenging the right of the Washington Redskins football team to protect their trademark is being hailed as a turning point in the battle to force the team and its stubborn owner to give up the fight to keep the controversial name. An appeal of ... MOREAndrew Napolitano: Another Pointless War?
Reopening the soldier slaughterhouse. As we watch the collapsing government in Baghdad surrounded by a highly disciplined and serious force of Sunni-oriented fighters that has taken control of the most populous third of the country, we must, in John Adams' words, resist the temptation to slay the world's monsters. This time around, ... MORE
Caught on Tape: Texas Cop Executes Handcuffed Suspect
by John Prager. Warning: Execution video. In early 2014, a grand jury elected not to charge an El Paso, TX police officer in the shooting death of a prisoner, but newly released video is causing some to question if that is a good idea. After the Texas AG instructed the city of El Paso to fulfill the El Paso Times’ request for the video it has become ... MOREIt's Good To Be a Terrorist, Not So Good To Be a Veteran
by Steve Forbes. Government's healthcare priorities. The roughly 150 jihadists at Gitmo have approximately 100 doctors, nurses and health care personnel assigned to them to handle their post-traumatic stress or anything else that ails them, with zero wait time. If Thomas Francis Breen, a 71-year-old Navy veteran who died of bladder cancer ... MOREObamacare Increased 2014 Premiums By Average Of 49%
by Avik Roy. A 3,137-County Analysis. There are hundreds of aspects of Obamacare that people argue over. But
there’s one question that matters above all others: does the Affordable
Care Act live up to its name? Does it make health insurance less
expensive? Last November, our team at the Manhattan Institute published a study
indicating ... MORENSA Claims Our Surveillance System Is Too Complex to Stop
by Joe Wolverton, II. The National Security Agency (NSA) claims that its computers are so
powerful that to try to protect data from erasure would have “an
immediate, specific, and harmful impact on the national security of the
United States.” This is the argument put forth by the surveillance agency to excuse
itself from preserving data ... MOREA. Barton Hinkle: IRS Scandal Implicates Democrats
Using government power to limit political speech. "Special interests are planning and running millions of dollars" in ads, warns President Barack Obama. But despite their "benign-sounding names," adds Democratic operative David Axelrod, some of them are "front groups for foreign-controlled companies." Together, they are trying to ... MOREJohn Stossel: Here Comes Tomorrow
Robots will make our future better. Ray Kurzweil — inventor of things like machines that turn text into speech — has popularized the idea that we are rapidly approaching "the singularity," the point at which machines not only think for themselves but develop intellectually faster than we. At that point, maybe we no longer talk about "human ... MORE
The Data Is Clear: Free Markets Reduce Poverty
by D.W. MacKenzie. Some Catholic clergy have, once again, denounced supporters of laissez-faire capitalism.
Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga claims that the free market economy
is “a new idol” which creates inequality, excludes the poor, and that
“this economy
kills.” Cardinal Maradiaga does not speak alone. He quoted Pope ... MORELicense-Plate Readers Are Newest Police State Tool
by Ali Winston. One story of the collateral damage. Denise Green had just dropped off her sister at the 24th Street Mission BART station after picking her up from the hospital. Green, who was driving a 1992 red Lexus, noticed a San Francisco police car with its lights on pull up behind her as she passed through the intersection of Mission Street ... MORE
Smartphone: Searchable Wallets Or Pocket PCs?
by William Jackson. The political-appointees in robes will decide. Smartphones contain a wealth of information that can translate into evidence in civil and criminal court cases, and law enforcement agencies increasingly are mining this data in their investigations. “If law enforcement or the government want to see your data, they can ... MOREThomas Sowell: A Bitter After-Taste
Squandering the sacrifice of soldiers. The news from Iraq that Islamic terrorists have now taken over cities that American troops liberated during the Iraq war must have left an especially bitter after-taste to Americans who lost a loved one who died taking one of those cities, or to a survivor who came back without an arm or leg, or ... MOREWalter E Williams: Slavery Reparations
Just another hustle. Calls for slavery reparations have returned with the publication of Ta-Nehisi Coates' "The Case for Reparations" in The Atlantic magazine (May 21, 2014). In making his argument, Coates goes through the horrors of slavery, Reconstruction, Jim Crow and gross racial discrimination. First off, let me say that I agree with reparations ... MOREBrendan Greenley: David Brat Is A True Ayn Rand Acolyte
It’s been a long time since I read Atlas Shrugged. I didn’t finish it. In my defense, I was 19, and I think we can all agree that the book doesn’t succeed as a novel, in the way that when you open a novel you expect characters and a plot. But I’ve been curious, given the increased prominence of the book since 2010, how in this ... MORETexas Police Are Making Millions With 'Civil Forfeiture'
by Michael Allen. Police in Texas are raking in tons of money, property and cars, all
thanks to a controversial legal maneuver called "civil forfeiture." Under this obscure law, someone's property can be forfeited to a
local police force, even if the property owner has not committed a
crime, notes Forbes. In a civil forfeiture, the ... MOREChris Stobing: The Militarization Of America's Police State
Surveillance at the local level. “We believe in transparency here, you have a right to know what the
police are up to in your country.” – Camden Police Chief Scott Tomson. On VICE News,
Vikram Gandhi went to Camden, New Jersey to preview the latest
technologies and strategies that are being employed to help local law
enforcement in the ... MOREKatie Kieffer: Let Students Carry On Campus
Why force students into being sitting ducks? Pepper spray, police and cardboard signs failed to prevent the June 5 Seattle Pacific University shooting. Let’s stop mass violence on college campuses by defending college students’ right to carry firearms on campus. Tragically, this is the third column this year that I must write defending ... MORETaxpayers Cough Up Record Amount As Deficits Increase
Government's unquenchable thirst for revenue. Federal tax revenues continue to run at a record pace (in inflation-adjusted dollars) in fiscal 2014, as the federal government’s total receipts for the fiscal year closed May at an unprecedented $1,934,919,000,000, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement. Despite record revenue, the ... MOREStar Parker: In Today’s America, “Mainstream” Means Left
America has no center today. Just when Tea Party obituaries were being sounded around the country, Washington fixture of 42 years, Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran, loses to upstart Tea Party candidate Chris McDaniel. And one week later, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, in the blockbuster of this year’s political season, is booted out of ... MORE
Peter Schiff: Debt Is No Salvation
Credit is destroying what savings built. Thus far 2014 has been a fertile year for really stupid economic
ideas. But of all the half-baked doozies that have come down the pike
(the perils of “lowflation,” Thomas Piketty’s claims about capitalism
creating poverty, and President Obama’s “pay as you earn” solution to
student debt), an idea hatched ... MOREJaana Woceshyn: Income Levels Is Not A Social Issue
Don't take your eye off the ball. I have resisted writing about the perceived problem of inequality in income and wealth; Thomas Piketty’s book, Capital in the 21st Century, has received too much unjustified attention already. But I gave in because I think what I have to add to the debate helps in rejecting Piketty’s argument that ... MOREThe Government Wants You Ignorant Of Cops Tracking You
by Trevor Timm. Thought the NSA was bad? All across America, from Florida to Colorado and back again, the country's increasingly militarized local police forces are using a secretive technology to vacuum up cellphone data from entire neighborhoods – including from people inside their own homes – almost always without a warrant. This ... MOREReport: DEA Obstructing Research On Marijuana Benefits
by Mary Emily O'Hara. Public service is not in their self-interest. This Monday, the Drug Policy Alliance and the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies released a report titled “The DEA: Four Decades of Impeding and Rejecting Science.” Using case studies from 1972 to the present, the report argues the ways the US Drug Enforcement ... MOREJacob Sullum: Pot, Poker, and Prohibitionism
GOP becoming party of unprincipled killjoys? Mike Lee calls for "a new conservative reform agenda" based on
"three basic principles," one of which is federalism. "The biggest
reason the federal government makes too many mistakes is that it
makes too many decisions," the Republican senator from Utah
explained in a speech at the ... MORE
Drug Warriors Kill Another In No-Knock SWAT Raid
Read about your public servants in action. Gun-wielding, black-suited law enforcers busted into a home with a battering ram, terrifying everyone inside and leaving one man dead. Newly released helmet-cam video of the incident shows in graphic detail how this violent no-knock raid produced yet another casualty in the vicious War on Drugs. ... MORESean Trende: What Cantor's Loss and Graham's Win Mean
Lessons to be learned. Eric Cantor's loss in the Republican primary Tuesday night sent shockwaves through the establishments of both parties. The previously dominant "Tea Party is dead" narrative has been unceremoniously dumped. Some in the media seem to be pursuing two new storylines: “Support for immigration reform dooms ... MORE
Jamaica Decriminalises Marijuana For Personal Use
by Paul Donnelly. Government also hopes relaxation will attract tourists. Jamaica has announced its intention to plan to reform its drugs laws and decriminalize small amounts of marijuana, in a bid to attract more tourists to the island. The announcement made by Mark Golding, the Justice Minister, said that the cabinet is minded to allow ... MORE
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