In Constitutional Republics, Presidents Don't Have 'Kill Lists' | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary

In Constitutional Republics, Presidents Don't Have 'Kill Lists' | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Limits on government are necessary to preserve a liberal democratic order and protect individual liberty. The potential for abuse is greatest where state power is most extreme. There is no more extreme power than the power to kill."

"the authorization of force passed in response more than a decade ago targeted people who since have been mostly killed or captured — those who "planned, authorized, committed, or aided" the 9/11 attacks. To legitimize presidential action today, Congress should vote for a declaration of war directed against present threats to America."

"if the U.S. is fighting a war, it should be conducted by the military under the president as commander-in-chief. The CIA should develop intelligence for use by the Pentagon in targeting its weapons, in this case drones. But the military should do the shooting."

"According to The Times, the administration "in effect counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants, according to several administration officials, unless there is explicit intelligence posthumously proving them innocent. Counterterrorism officials insist this approach is one of simple logic: People in an area of known terrorist activity, or found with a top al-Qaida operative, are probably up to no good." So living next to or talking with a possible terrorist now is a death sentence?"

"Allowing the president and his aides to compile kill lists in secret with no charges filed, no outside review of evidence, and no oversight of decisions should concern every American. Unreviewable and unaccountable power is inconsistent with a constitutional republic."

Private Law in the Emerald Isle - Finbar Feehan-Fitzgerald - Mises Daily

Private Law in the Emerald Isle - Finbar Feehan-Fitzgerald - Mises Daily: "the brehons(arbitrators) had to be extremely careful, for if they were found guilty of giving a false legal opinion, they forfeited their fee, and the inaccurate brehon was also liable for damages."

The Case for Ending Aid to Israel | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary

The Case for Ending Aid to Israel | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Money from America has conditions, most notably the requirement that Israel purchase U.S. weapons, which raises Israeli acquisition costs. Gazit estimated that America’s “gift” may cost around $600 million. That’s a fifth of the nominal “foreign aid.” That money, at least, is primarily a subsidy to U.S. arms makers.

Washington also links aid between Israel and Egypt. The latter typically receives two-thirds of whatever Israel collects. The transformation across the Nile could upend the arrangement, especially if Cairo abandons peace with Israel, but so far the relationship continues.

Jordan, too, receives bountiful American subsidies—about $700 million last year."

"Thus, the more money given by America to Egypt and Jordan, the more Israel must spend on its military."

"Not only does American assistance not provide Israel with an economic advantage, it requires Israel to expend additional amounts from its own internal security reserves."

The article gives details on how it also hurts their defense contractors.

"The guaranteed payment irrespective of Israel’s defense needs “leaves the system with no incentive to become more efficient,” warns Gazit. Former prime minister Ehud Olmert argued that Israel could cut its military outlays with no harm to its security but that American money reduces the pressure to do so."

"Perhaps even worse is how U.S. “assistance” further inflates Israel’s already bloated government."

Audit the Fed Clears House Panel | Ron Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign CommitteeRon Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign Committee

Audit the Fed Clears House Panel | Ron Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign CommitteeRon Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign Committee: "Issa maintained it was ironic that Congress took an intense interest in the $2 billion and counting in losses suffered recently by JPMorgan Chase when it “pales in comparison” to the Fed’s multi-trillion dollar portfolio."

Why Obama Strikes out in Court | Ilya Shapiro | Cato Institute: Commentary

Why Obama Strikes out in Court | Ilya Shapiro | Cato Institute: Commentary: "This term alone, the high court has ruled unanimously against the government on religious liberty, criminal procedure and property rights. When the administration can't get even a single one of the liberal justices to agree with it in these unrelated areas of the law, that's a sign there's something wrong with its constitutional vision."

House rejects bid to slash rural airline subsidies | Fox News

House rejects bid to slash rural airline subsidies | Fox News: ""This is about the easiest choice the House could possibly make, to put an end to the so-called Essential Air Service that lavishly subsidizes some of the least essential air services in the country," McClintock said. "Rural life has both great advantages and disadvantages, and it is not the job of hardworking taxpayers who choose to live elsewhere to level out the differences.""

"the wide reach of the program contributes to the sweeping support it gets, both from Democrats but also from conservative Republicans who suspend their anti-big-government rhetoric when their districts are affected."

Romney: Man of Pastel | Michael D. Tanner | Cato Institute: Commentary

Romney: Man of Pastel | Michael D. Tanner | Cato Institute: Commentary: Romney said “If you take a trillion dollars for instance, out of the first year of the federal budget, that would shrink GDP over 5 percent. That is by definition throwing us into recession or depression. So I’m not going to do that, of course.”

As the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein noted, “You couldn’t have gotten a clearer definition of Keynesian budgeting from Obama.”

China's Nukes in the 1960s: Lessons for Today's Iran | Ted Galen Carpenter | Cato Institute: Commentary

China's Nukes in the 1960s: Lessons for Today's Iran | Ted Galen Carpenter | Cato Institute: Commentary: During the early and mid-1960s, there were similar panicked warnings about China’s nuclear ambitions.

"The assumption that the leaders of Maoist China were so reckless that they might well turn East Asia into a pile of radioactive rubble came through clearly in those editorials. Even though China did not at that time have intercontinental ballistic missiles, the National Review editors were not reassured. They warned that China already had planes that could drop bombs anywhere in Asia, and that “a ship can carry a Chinese bomb into the harbors of New Orleans, San Francisco, New York, or London.” Given that danger, the United States could not sit passively “like a man who merely watches and waits while the guillotine is constructed to chop his head off.”"

Fixing One of the World's Most Broken Education Systems | Marian L. Tupy | Cato Institute: Commentary

Fixing One of the World's Most Broken Education Systems | Marian L. Tupy | Cato Institute: Commentary: "I established an open-door policy and a rapport with teachers' unions, which the previous minister ignored and treated with suspicion. I allowed parents to pay performance incentives to teachers whose salaries were a mere $100 per month back then. Those policies resulted in teachers returning to work and today the teacher attendance rate is excellent. I set up an education transition fund that allowed the USA, UK, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Netherlands, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand to bypass Zimbabwe's government and help to finance our education system directly. I also managed to break a domestic textbook publishing cartel — three Zimbabwean companies that colluded to make windfall profits. I authorized UNICEF [the United Nations Children's Fund] to hold an international tender and the cost of books came down to 70 cents from five dollars. Textbook ratio fell to 1-to-1 and is now the best in Africa."

Mostly allowing the free market to work...

Dr. Paul Diagnoses Dr. Obama | Ron Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign CommitteeRon Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign Committee

Dr. Paul Diagnoses Dr. Obama |Ron Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign CommitteeRon Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign Committee: "The fundamental problem with health care costs in America is that the doctor-patient relationship has been profoundly altered by third party interference. Third parties, either government agencies themselves or nominally private insurance companies virtually forced upon us by government policies, have not only destroyed doctor-patient confidentiality. They also inescapably drive up costs because basic market disciplines — supply and demand, price sensitivity, and profit signals — are destroyed … Obamacare, via its insurance mandate, is more of the same misdiagnosis"

Cut The Federal Budget By Killing Republican Sacred Cows | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary

Cut The Federal Budget By Killing Republican Sacred Cows | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Republicans are posturing as the party of fiscal responsibility, but they continue to protect their sacred cows. Unless the GOP is willing to slash corporate welfare and cut unnecessary military outlays, Republicans don't deserve to be taken seriously when they talk about fiscal responsibility."


"Today the national debt is $15.7 trillion—almost a 50 percent increase since January 20, 2009, when President Barack Obama took office."

"according to the CBO, the debt to GDP number is "only" 73.2 percent. It averaged 37 percent over the last 40 years."

"The Ex-Im Bank extends taxpayer-backed loans, loan guarantees and insurance to the clients of some of America's largest corporations, all of which have access to private financing."

Ohio Merits a Seat on the Fed | Mark A. Calabria | Cato Institute: Commentary

Ohio Merits a Seat on the Fed | Mark A. Calabria | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Section 10 of the Federal Reserve Act requires that, in regard to members of the board, "not more than one of whom shall be selected from any one Federal Reserve district," "

"Jeremy Stein and Jerome Powell were recently sworn in as members of the Board of Gov ernors of the Federal Reserve System. According to his paperwork, submitted to the Senate, Professor Stein is from Massachusetts. Current Fed governor Dan Turullo is also from Massachusetts. Mr. Powell is from Maryland, as is current governor Sarah Bloom Raskin."

How well to legal protections work? Only as well as people are willing to follow them.

The Looming Reversal of Centralization - Gary North - Mises Daily

The Looming Reversal of Centralization - Gary North - Mises Daily: "For four decades, soft-core critics of the pension/Medicare systems have come to voters with this announcement: "The two systems can be reformed, but we must act now. If we delay, they will bankrupt the government." Yet the systems are never reformed."

A Religious Fire Bell in the Night | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary

A Religious Fire Bell in the Night | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Many of America's biggest security threats emanate from its nominal allies, such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Without them neither the Taliban nor al Qaeda would have been nearly so strong."

JFK airport evacuated after TSA agent's metal detector found to be unplugged | Fox News

JFK airport evacuated after TSA agent's metal detector found to be unplugged | Fox News: ""How can you expect the public to feel confident of the mission of the TSA if they don't even know if the lights are turned on?""

Phoenix boy, 14, shoots armed intruder while watching three younger siblings | Fox News

Phoenix boy, 14, shoots armed intruder while watching three younger siblings | Fox News: "the teen heard a bang on the door, rushed his siblings upstairs and got a handgun from his parent's bedroom. When he got to the top of the stairs, he saw a man breaking through the front door and point a gun at him.

The boy shot the 37-year-old man, who is in critical condition but expected to survive and be booked into jail."

The Secession Solution - Chris Bassil - Mises Daily

The Secession Solution - Chris Bassil - Mises Daily: "One of the problems with a statewide referendum on the issue of gay marriage, or any domestic matter, is that it implicitly assumes that the state — as opposed to the county, city, neighborhood, place of business, or any other pool of people — is the appropriate unit for collective decision making. It suggests that state residency is a common denominator fundamental enough to bind 9.7 million people to one another's opinions, interests, and backgrounds — complex, diverse, and contradictory though they may be."

Leave Your Laptop in Your Bag « LewRockwell.com Blog

Leave Your Laptop in Your Bag « LewRockwell.com Blog: " the traveler in front of me left his laptop in his bag. I have no idea why laptops must be removed from their bags, nor do I really care because every TSA rule is arbitrary and pointless to discuss.


But why did it delay all of the travelers behind this gentleman 10 minutes? Because TSA welfare cretins must follow the rules, just like the Soviets in Gary North's story. The person examining the bags going through cannot inspect the bag that he flagged for review. He cannot use discretion and allow it to pass (after all, if prudent judgment was his strength, he wouldn't be working for TSA.) The officer has to yell "bag check!" and wait for a supervisor to come over. And wait. And wait. And wait."

Code crackers break 923-bit encryption record | Security & Privacy - CNET News

Code crackers break 923-bit encryption record | Security & Privacy - CNET News: "pairing-based cryptography of this length was fragile"

"breaking the 923-bit encryption, which is 278-digits, would have been impossible using previous "public key" cryptography; but using pairing-based cryptography, scientists were able to apply identity-based encryption, keyword searchable encryption, and functional encryption."

A Trap for Small Businesses | Walter Olson | Cato Institute: Commentary

A Trap for Small Businesses | Walter Olson | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Last month, the feds swooped down on a successful Maryland dairy business, South Mountain Creamery, seizing $70,000 in its bank accounts and formally charging its owners, Randy and Karen Sowers, with the offense of bank "structuring.""

"The feds charged last month that Randy Sowers had been arranging bank deposits so as not to put in more than $10,000 at once, a threshold that triggers the requirement to file paperwork with the feds. There was no allegation that Mr. Sowers was engaged in tax evasion or other underlying illegality, aside from seeking to avoid large deposits."

Property Means Preservation - Doug French - Mises Daily

Property Means Preservation - Doug French - Mises Daily: "Private game reserves do all they can to ward off poachers. After all, rhinos, as members of the Big Five, are rare and expensive to replace. But at government-owned Kruger National Park, four park employees were recently arrested for being accomplices in a rhino-poaching operation."

The Current Wisdom: No Climate-Related Acceleration in Sea Level Rise | Patrick J. Michaels | Cato Institute: Daily Commentary

The Current Wisdom: No Climate-Related Acceleration in Sea Level Rise | Patrick J. Michaels | Cato Institute: Daily Commentary: "the rate of increase in the ocean’s heat content—which raises sea level—has recently slowed."

Mechanical failure reportedly sends JetBlue flight careening through skies | Fox News

Mechanical failure reportedly sends JetBlue flight careening through skies | Fox News: "The plane was loaded with five hours' worth of fuel. Because the A320 is incapable of dumping excess fuel, the pilots circled the area south of the Vegas Strip until they’d burned enough to allow the crippled plane to land safely."

Spending Lies Run into Facts | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary

Spending Lies Run into Facts | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Every president who has run for office since at least Richard Nixon, including even Mr. Obama, has promised to cut government spending when campaigning. And most members of Congress make the same pledge when running for office. Once they’re in office, their behavior almost always changes."

"President Reagan managed, with a partially Democratic Congress, to reduce spending during his last six years, after an increase in his first two years. And President Clinton, with the new Newt Gingrich Republican Congress, was even more successful in cutting spending during his last six years."

When the government is split between parties, spending is lowest.

Christians retaliate after three more churches bombed in Nigeria - CSMonitor.com

Christians retaliate after three more churches bombed in Nigeria - CSMonitor.com: "Speaking by phone, Mr. Zakka said the Christian community had been very patient, "but retaliation is the only solution for now because the government fails to address the insurgency caused by the terrorists.""

What about just defense?

The Harm in Hate-Speech Laws - David Gordon - Mises Daily

The Harm in Hate-Speech Laws - David Gordon - Mises Daily: "you do not own your reputation, since this consists of the ideas other people have of you, and you cannot own other people's thoughts."

Trim Nuclear Fat from the Pentagon Budget | Benjamin H. Friedman and Christopher Preble | Cato Institute: Commentary

Trim Nuclear Fat from the Pentagon Budget | Benjamin H. Friedman and Christopher Preble | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Even by the most merciless arithmetic, this triple threat is unnecessary. Congress should take the advice of experts like former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff James Cartwright and decommission either the bomber or ICBM leg while cutting the forces in the remaining two legs, leaving a deployed warhead total under 500."

"Monumental leaps in our ability to precisely aim conventional and nuclear weapons have greatly reduced the number and size of the weapons we need to threaten enemies. And the U.S. military's vast advantage over all rivals makes it even less plausible that we will ever be desperate enough to resort to a nuclear strike."

"The peace among rich states increasingly seems to depend on factors beyond mutual terror. Only poor, threatened states now develop nuclear weapons for security."

D.C. Wants a Bite at the Apple | David Boaz | Cato Institute: Commentary

D.C. Wants a Bite at the Apple | David Boaz | Cato Institute: Commentary: "For more than a decade, Microsoft went about its business, developing software, selling it to customers and — legally — making money.

Washington politicians and journalists sneered at the company’s naiveté. A congressional aide said, “They don’t want to play the D.C. game, that’s clear, and they’ve gotten away with it so far. The problem is, in the long run they won’t be able to.”

A major antitrust case and a few other inquiries later, Microsoft got the message. They now play the game."

With Alaska's Pebble Partnership, The EPA Waves the Precaution Flag | Patrick J. Michaels | Cato Institute: Commentary

With Alaska's Pebble Partnership, The EPA Waves the Precaution Flag | Patrick J. Michaels | Cato Institute: Commentary: " The Assessment is designed to be used for regulation based upon the “precautionary principle”. This darling of the global left states that “if something has the potential to cause harm, it shouldn’t be done”. The UN’s a big fan and reports are that they have been sniffing around parts of Bristol Bay looking for a way to get in on the Pebble issue. In fact, its Framework Convention on Climate Change—the scaffold upon which the failed Kyoto Protocol on global warming was erected-is based on the precautionary principle, noting that a lack “full scientific certainty” should not provide grounds to preclude regulation."

How could they travel there to do research when the travel causes harm? What doesn't have "the potential to cause harm"?

"Under the precautionary principle, there is simply no way that antibiotics would ever have been marketed, had scientists had known of the potential for bacteria to mutate into resistant strains. There would be no airplanes or cars (they can and will crash, you know). Even today, New Jersey and Oregon won’t let you pump gas because your car could explode (and the price of gas must therefore go up)."

"Wouldn’t it be a shame if the cost of slamming Pebble shut was to price hybrids even more out of the market?"

Cyberrisks to U.S. electric grid a matter of timing | Security & Privacy - CNET News

Cyberrisks to U.S. electric grid a matter of timing | Security & Privacy - CNET News: "Two companies, Open Access Technology International (OATI) and GlobalSign, which are authorized by the NAESB to issue digital certificates to the industry, argue that a 30-year expiration for digital certificates is fine."

30 years seems like a very long time! RSA was only invented 35 years ago! Is it save to use the same key when RSA is twice as old as now? With computing power doubling every 18 months, in 30 years computers will be 1 million times as powerful!

Romney amends budget goals, assails Obama's record | Fox News

Romney amends budget goals, assails Obama's record | Fox News: "Mitt Romney told business leaders Wednesday that he would try to put the federal budget on track to be balanced within eight to 10 years, acknowledging it could take longer than two presidential terms to get the job done as he had previously hoped.

Romney told members of the Business Roundtable that "I will, in my first 100 days," take steps that will lead to a $500 billion reduction in the deficit by the end of his first term. Cutting some government programs, sending others back to states and hiring fewer government workers and reducing their salaries will "get us to a balanced budget within eight to ten years," he said."

The situation is so dire that we need to stop the bleeding within the next decade! :-/

Hearkening Back to the USSR | Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar | Cato Institute: Commentary

Hearkening Back to the USSR | Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Back in the 1970s, the U.S. government passionately pleaded for untrammeled emigration as a fundamental human right. In 1975, the U.S. imposed trade sanctions on the Soviet Union for levying an exit tax on citizens wishing to emigrate (mostly Jews). In a complete reversal of that moral passion, Senator Charles Schumer has now introduced legislation to levy a tax of 30% on assumed capital gains of people like Eduardo Saverin, co-founder of Facebook, for giving up American citizenship and emigrating to Singapore. The exit tax proposed on Saverin and others like him is thousands of times higher than anything the Soviet Union dreamed of."

Barnes & Noble: Ebooks Should Be Expensive So Amazon Won't Kill Us And Make Ebooks Expensive | Techdirt

Barnes & Noble: Ebooks Should Be Expensive So Amazon Won't Kill Us And Make Ebooks Expensive | Techdirt: "the argument is that we're better off having expensive ebooks today, because if we don't, we might have expensive books in the future"

Free Markets Require Increased Legal Immigration | Alex Nowrasteh | Cato Institute: Commentary

Free Markets Require Increased Legal Immigration | Alex Nowrasteh | Cato Institute: Commentary: "What should not be contentious, however, is the commitment for increasing legal immigration by anyone supporting free-market principles.

The current immigration system is the antithesis of a free-market economy and resembles nothing so much as a Soviet-style economic central planning bureau.

The government fixes quotas and subquotas on the number of immigrants by skill, country of origin, employer and even where they can live. Arbitrary rules, inspections and other requirements make the system virtually unworkable for all but the most committed of employers, with the result that American companies are prevented from finding the talent they want.

Soviet bureaucrats thought they knew everything about the labor market, including the number of workers, their skill level and even where they should live. Their efforts failed, and so has our immigration system."

"Our immigration regulations are not just arbitrary, complex and expensive, but are based on an entirely false premise that there is a fixed pool of jobs over which people must compete. Jobs are constantly being created and destroyed in a healthy economy. And immigrants create many of them."

WTO Correctly Calls the U.S. to Task for Lying about Dolphins | K. William Watson | Cato Institute: Commentary

WTO Correctly Calls the U.S. to Task for Lying about Dolphins | K. William Watson | Cato Institute: Commentary: Tuna caught in a part of the Pacific Ocean near Mexico must meet strict requirements before it can be labeled “dolphin safe.”

"tuna caught elsewhere, like the Western Central Pacific where U.S. fishing fleets operate, may be labeled dolphin safe without any certification that dolphins were not harmed."

Baby Budget Hawks of the GOP | Michael D. Tanner | Cato Institute: Commentary

Baby Budget Hawks of the GOP | Michael D. Tanner | Cato Institute: Commentary: "the latest Club for Growth scorecard suggests that, on the whole, Republicans in this congress have actually been less fiscally responsible than those in past congresses. For 2011, the average Republican received a weighted score of 69.5 out of 100. That’s far short of the 86.3 average score in 2010, and it hardly suggests a tea-party-led wave of austerity."

"On an annualized basis, Republicans in the House proposed spending increases of $5.3 billion and cuts of $135 billion. Thus, if every one of their proposals had passed, total federal spending would have been reduced by $130.2 billion, which is 3.6 percent of this year’s projected spending. That would still have left us with a budget deficit this year of $1.17 trillion.

That’s an improvement over last year, when Republicans proposed a net spending reduction of only $45 billion. So it’s a baby step in the right direction — but far from what we need to keep us from falling off the debt-and-deficit cliff."

"Republicans in the House vote to reauthorize the Export-Import Bank, an example of corporate welfare if there ever was one, and abandon the sequester for cuts in military spending. Senate Republicans also agreed on a highway bill that hikes the deficit in the long run."

Politicians and Team Owners Snooker Sports Fans and Taxpayers | Ilya Shapiro and Nick Mosvick | Cato Institute: Commentary

Politicians and Team Owners Snooker Sports Fans and Taxpayers | Ilya Shapiro and Nick Mosvick | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Dennis Coates and Brad Humphreys performed an exhaustive study of sports franchises in 37 cities between 1969 and 1996 and found no measurable impact on per-capita income. The only statistically significant effects were negative ones because revenue gains were overshadowed by opportunity costs that politicians inevitably ignore.

An older study looked at 12 stadium areas between 1958 and 1987 and found that professional sports don't drive economic growth. A shorter-term study looked at job growth in 46 cities from 1990 to 1994 and found that cities with major league teams grew more slowly."

"the majority of attending fans come from within a 20-mile radius, such that money they spend would otherwise have gone to another form of local entertainment or recreation. In that light, publicly subsidized stadiums are at best zero-sum endeavors — a shift of resources called the "substitution effect." "

"55% of the gains from subsidies to pro sports teams go to players and 45% to owners"

Charting Fun with Krugman - Robert P. Murphy - Mises Daily

Charting Fun with Krugman - Robert P. Murphy - Mises Daily: "Using Krugman's own source, we find that the establishment of the Fed generated (a) the two worst panics in US history and (b) a string of panics that were on average more than twice as bad as the average panic from the pre-Fed era."

Afghanistan's Corruption Breeds Failure | Malou Innocent and Danny Markus | Cato Institute: Commentary

Afghanistan's Corruption Breeds Failure | Malou Innocent and Danny Markus | Cato Institute: Commentary: "In this case, the U.S. appears to be inadvertently fueling the very warlordism and corruption that we are pressing President Karzai to curtail."

How Soon They Forget | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary

How Soon They Forget | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary: "the House voted 330-93 not only to reauthorize the Export-Import Bank, but to increase its funding to $140 billion. The Ex-Im Bank is used to subsidize U.S. exports, and most of the benefit goes to a couple of large companies such as Boeing Co. and General Electric Co. Yes, it is good that Boeing exports its planes to other countries, but you, the taxpayer, should not be on the hook to finance these exports. There is plenty of private money available."

Proposed Reforms Won't Fix Alabama's Immigration Law | Alex Nowrasteh | Cato Institute: Commentary

Proposed Reforms Won't Fix Alabama's Immigration Law | Alex Nowrasteh | Cato Institute: Commentary: "[trying to correct] their identity information in government databases, [takes] an average of 104 days to fulfill (as of 2009). If the worker is unsuccessful in contesting the government's decision in a short amount of time, he must be fired.

E-Verify is largely ineffective at weeding unauthorized workers out of the labor force — missing them more than half of the time"

"Around one percent of legal American workers are initially denied employment by E-Verify and many of them have to spend many months sorting out the problems — all because the government has forced them to ask permission to work."

Questions Not Yet Asked about Mitt Romney | Nat Hentoff | Cato Institute: Commentary

Questions Not Yet Asked about Mitt Romney | Nat Hentoff | Cato Institute: Commentary: " Obama often imposes his will outside the Constitution. But Romney has yet to even mention — let alone rebuke the president for — any of those unconstitutional breaches."

15 Most Ludicrous Jobs the Government Counts as ‘Green’ - Independent Journal Review

15 Most Ludicrous Jobs the Government Counts as ‘Green’ - Independent Journal Review: "
Floor Sweeper at a solar panel factory
Driver of a hybrid public transportation bus
College professor teaching environmental studies classes
Any school bus driver
Anyone who puts gas in a school bus
Employee at a bicycle shop
A clerk at a bicycle repair shop
Antique dealer
Salvation Army employee
Employee of a store that sells rare manuscripts
Employee of a consignment shop
A full-time teenage employee at a used record shop
Train car manufacturers
Garbage men
Ladies and gentlemen: your number one most incredible green job is…[Drum roll please]: Oil Lobbyist"

I have a green job! I help reduce resource utilization.

JPMorgan Losses Do Not Make the Case for Regulation | Mark A. Calabria | Cato Institute: Commentary

JPMorgan Losses Do Not Make the Case for Regulation | Mark A. Calabria | Cato Institute: Commentary: "In September 2003, when warned of problems at Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, then-House Financial Services Chair Barney Frank stated, "I want to roll the dice a little bit more in this situation." Well, Chairman Frank did indeed "roll the dice," and now the American taxpayer is almost $200 billion poorer.

JPMorgan rolled the dice, betting that the U.S. economy would improve — essentially a bet on Obama's economic agenda. That bet went south. JPMorgan lost $2 billion, one hundredth of the losses so far on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

But the losses at JPMorgan were borne not by the American taxpayer, but by JPMorgan. The losses also appear to have been offset by gains so that in the last quarter JPMorgan still turned a profit."

"The losses at JPMorgan have also resulted in the quick dismissal of the responsible employees. Show me the list of regulators who lost their jobs, despite the massive regulatory failures that occurred before and during the crisis. In fact, some of the most incompetent, such as the previous president of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, actually got promotions."

"What the recent JPMorgan losses actually prove is that a major investment bank can take billions of losses, and the financial system continues to function even without an injection of taxpayer dollars."

"What we need is not a system free of errors, but one that is robust enough to withstand them. And the truth is that the more small errors we have, the fewer big errors we will have."

Killers of Banks and Jobs | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary

Killers of Banks and Jobs | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary: "JPMorgan Chase, revealed that the bank had made a $2 billion-plus trading mistake. The bank has more than $2 trillion in assets and made a profit of about $20 billion last year. So it lost one-tenth of 1 percent of its assets and an amount equal to about 10 percent of its income for last year."

"Sen. Carl Levin immediately issued a press release calling for more bank regulation."

"about 20 percent, or $100 billion, of Medicare spending is fraudulent. Other estimates of Medicare fraud, including those of the U.S. government, range between $20 billion and $100 billion."

Why is Levin worried about a $2 billion loss that only affects JPMorgan Chase shareholders when there is $100 billion in Medicare fraud?

Iran's nuclear program: 4 things you probably didn't know - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad never said that Israel should be "wiped off the map." - CSMonitor.com

Iran's nuclear program: 4 things you probably didn't know - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad never said that Israel should be "wiped off the map." - CSMonitor.com: "Ahmadinejad "never... uttered the words 'map,' 'wipe out,' or even 'Israel'" in his statement.  Rather, he argued, the translation should have been that "this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time."  (Both The Washington Post and The Atlantic came up with similarly variant translations.)

This is a key difference, Mr. Norouzi argued, because Ahmadinejad used the "vanish from the page of time" idiom elsewhere in his speech: when describing the governments of the Shah of Iran, the Soviet Union, and Saddam Hussein.  While war and revolution were involved in the three regimes' collapse, none of them, Norouzi argued, were "wiped off the map."  Rather, they underwent regime change.  This suggests in turn, he said, that Ahmadinejad was calling for regime change in Israel, not nuclear genocide.  Juan Cole, another critic of the speech's translation, compared Ahmadinejad's statement to Reagan-era calls for the end of the Soviet Union."

"on Aug. 9, 2005, [the country's supreme leader and foremost religious figure, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] issued a fatwa against the production and use of nuclear weapons, it was not simply a sermon – it carried political weight."

"in 2000 that Iran ranked second only to the US in gasoline consumption. But despite Iran's huge oil production, it lacks the facilities to refine it into gasoline, forcing it to import a barrel of oil for every eight it exports. According to Majd, some Iranians blame their lack of refining infrastructure on Western sanctions."

"Both US and Israeli intelligence agree that Iran is not pursuing a nuclear weapons program."

GOP measure protects lawmakers' office budgets | Fox News

GOP measure protects lawmakers' office budgets | Fox News: "Several GOP tea party freshmen had sought to cut office budgets by 11 percent, but House leaders shut down the effort"

Orlando man given George Zimmerman's old cellphone number bombarded with death threats | Fox News

Orlando man given George Zimmerman's old cellphone number bombarded with death threats | Fox News: "he got about 70 threatening calls between May 7, when he bought the phone, and May 16"

It is sad that people would do that!

Eduardo Saverin, Not the U.S. Government, Is Entitled to the Wealth He Earned | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary

Eduardo Saverin, Not the U.S. Government, Is Entitled to the Wealth He Earned | Doug Bandow | Cato Institute: Commentary: "the U.S. is the only country which taxes worldwide compensation. Other nations limit their claim to a share of money earned within their borders. America’s corporate tax rate also is the world’s highest."

Romney: US not meeting commitment to fight poverty | Fox News

Romney: US not meeting commitment to fight poverty | Fox News: "Mitt Romney says the government has "a moral commitment" to help every American help themselves."

Does he want a "nanny state"?

Dollar loses reserve status to yen & euro - NYPOST.com

Dollar loses reserve status to yen & euro - NYPOST.com: "The dollar's share of new cash in the central banks was down to 37 percent -- compared with two-thirds a decade ago.

Currently, dollars account for about 62 percent of the currency reserve at central banks -- the lowest on record, said the International Monetary Fund."

"They grumble that they've loaned the US record amounts to cover its mounting debt, but are getting paid back by a currency that's worth 10 percent less in the past three months alone. In a decade, it's down nearly one-third."

In Mass., individual mandate sparks little outcry | Fox News

In Mass., individual mandate sparks little outcry | Fox News: "Massachusetts collected about $77 million in penalties from residents as a result the requirement from 2007-2009. While that may seem like a lot of money, the penalties have touched just a tiny fraction of the state's population of more than 6.5 million.

In 2007, about 67,000 people were required to pay a penalty. That declined to 53,000 in 2008 and 48,000 in 2009."

"In 2012, those making more than three times the poverty level — $32,676 for an individual — pay the highest penalty of $105 per month, or $1,260 per year."

"The intense focus on the federal mandate may be disproportionate to the number of people who could end up paying a penalty. "

Of course the rule of law and the government taking more rights doesn't affect the suggested focus. :-p

NM court upholds gay discrimination ruling | Fox News

NM court upholds gay discrimination ruling | Fox News: "The New Mexico Court of Appeals has upheld a ruling that a professional photographer who refused to take pictures of a gay couple's commitment ceremony violated state anti-discrimination laws."

Time for US to Normalize Ties with Pyongyang | Ted Galen Carpenter | Cato Institute: Commentary

Time for US to Normalize Ties with Pyongyang | Ted Galen Carpenter | Cato Institute: Commentary: "North Korean leaders undoubtedly fear that Washington might use its vast military power to intimidate Pyongyang or even engage in forcible regime change, as it did with Saddam Hussein. To reduce tensions, the Obama administration should offer to sign a non-aggression pact with North Korea. US leaders should also propose a peace treaty formally ending the armed hostilities on the Korean Peninsula."

"The notion that Pyongyang would abandon all nuclear ambitions was overly optimistic from the outset. Yet that has been a key premise of the Six-Party Talks. Given that North Korea probably has processed enough plutonium over the past decade to build several nuclear weapons, and has an active uranium-enrichment program, such a maximalist goal is now completely detached from reality.

Washington should instead focus on getting North Korea to stop short of actually deploying an arsenal. That status of "one screwdriver turn away" from being a full-fledged nuclear-weapons power is hardly ideal, but it's probably the best US leaders can expect from North Korea — even in exchange for a new, normal relationship between the two countries."

Why Speculators? - Percy L. Greaves, Jr. - Mises Daily

Why Speculators? - Percy L. Greaves, Jr. - Mises Daily: "The prices of the New Orleans Cotton Exchange were long a valuable guide for farmers and manufacturers alike. For farmers, they indicated how much land should be planted in cotton and how much in other crops. Through the growing season, future prices indicated how much time, care, and expense should be spent in tending crops. When future prices were high, no expense was spared to bring every possible ounce to market. When future prices were low, farmers were warned not to waste too much time and expense cultivating and picking that last possible ounce.

For manufacturers and other cotton buyers, the Cotton Exchange quotations provided a base for estimating or determining their future raw-material costs. This in turn helped them calculate the prices on which they bid for future business. On orders accepted for delivery over long periods of time, they could always make sure of their raw-material costs by immediately buying contracts for delivery of cotton on the dates they would need it."

"Men act as speculators when they have only partial knowledge and understanding of the results their actions are likely to produce. The more speculators know and understand, the better they can predict the future results of their actions. But they never can be certain of the actual results.

Most speculations involve people and how they will react to given situations. Since we can never know with certainty the future reactions of others, every action which involves others is a speculative action. Thus, all voluntary actions, including market actions, are speculative."

"Frequently, the speculator is the first to foresee a future scarcity. When he does, he buys while prices are still low. His buying bids up prices, and consumption is thus more quickly adjusted to future conditions than if no one had foreseen the approaching scarcity. A larger quantity is then stored for future use and serves to reduce the hardships when the shortage becomes evident to all.

Since a price rise tends to encourage increased production, the sooner prices rise, the sooner new and additional production will be started and become available. So a successful speculator reduces both the time and the intensity of shortages as well as the hardships which always accompany shortages.

Likewise, speculators are often the first to foresee an increase in future supplies. When they do, they hasten to sell contracts for future delivery. This in turn drives down future prices earlier than would otherwise be the case. This tends to discourage new production that could only be sold at a loss. It also gives manufacturers a better idea of what future prices will actually be. So, here again the speculator tends to smooth out production and consumption to the benefit of all concerned."

"When governments set prices, quotas, acreage limits, or other hampering restrictions on the honorable activities of men, they countermand the checks and balances that the free market places on supply and demand. The result is always surpluses and shortages: the former, where producers' rewards are set too high; the latter, where they are set too low. Where there are surpluses of some things, there will always be shortages of others. For the men and materials subsidized to produce surpluses have been lured from producing those things which free-market conditions would indicate that consumers prefer."

Police laud 'hero' in Seattle shootings | Fox News

Police laud 'hero' in Seattle shootings | Fox News: ""My brother died in the World Trade Center," the man later told police, who provided an account of the interview. After his brother's death, he said, he resolved that if something like this ever happened, "I would never hide under a table.""