Archive for James Bovard
Freedom Is Not the Issue? It Just Ain’t So!
James Bovard is the author of Attention Deficit Democracy, Terrorism and Tyranny, Lost Rights, and other books.
The Friends of Leviathan are once again encouraging people to forget about freedom. In a May op-ed piece in the New York Times, columnist David Brooks announced, “The central political debate of the 20th century was over the role [...]
Torture and Liberty
Contributing editor James Bovard is the author of Attention Deficit Democracy, Terrorism and Tyranny, Lost Rights, and other books.
Is torture compatible with liberty?
Unfortunately, this is no longer a hypothetical question. Many Americans who claim to support individual freedom also favor permitting the government to torture suspected terrorists or other purported enemies of the United States.
This [...]
“Deliberative Democracy” Dementia
James Bovard (jim@jimbovard.com) is the author of Attention Deficit Democracy Palgrave, 2006), Terrorism and Tyranny (Palgrave, 2006), and Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Rights (St. Martin’s, 1994).
A specter is haunting America ’s politicians and professors—the spect(er of illegitimacy. The political-intellectual elite fear that millions of Americans will conclude that the current democracy is a [...]
Democracy Versus Liberty
If a foreign power took over the United States and dictated that American citizens surrender 40 percent of their income, required them to submit to tens of thousands of different commands (many of which were effectively kept secret from them), prohibited many of them from using their land, and denied many the chance to find [...]
1Aug2006 | James Bovard | 0 comments | ContinuedUncle Sams Flood Machine
When NASAs Pathfinder spacecraft landed on Mars in 1997 and sent back pictures showing that the planet was once flooded, comic Alan Ray quipped: “Of course, Mars lacks the one factor that makes high waters on Earth so much more devastating. Mars has no FEMA.”
1Jan2006 | James Bovard | 0 comments | ContinuedFederal Surveillance: The Threat to Americans’ Security
Contributing editor James Bovard is the author of Terrorism & Tyranny: Trampling Freedom, Justice, and Peace to Rid the World of Evil (Palgrave Macmillan, September 2003).
Since the terrorist attacks on 9/11 the Bush administration has launched many new surveillance programs in the name of homeland security. When critics raised questions about the potential abuses of [...]
New Laws Will Protect Americans from Snipers? It Just Aint So!
The handcuffs had barely been slapped on the two Maryland sniper suspects—John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo—before the so-called liberals began invoking their crimes as a pretext to undermine the rights of all Americans. New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, writing on October 31, 2002, invoked federal crime statistics indicating that “the number of [...]
1Feb2003 | James Bovard | 0 comments | ContinuedDictatorship of Lawyers
James Bovard is the author of Feeling Your Pain: The Explosion and Abuse of Government Power in the Clinton-Gore Years (St. Martin’s Press).
Law is no longer an impediment to legalized robbery. In area after area, lawyers have achieved court rulings that subvert due process and the rule of law. Unfortunately, while this trend has been [...]
Farm Credit Fraud
James Bovard is the author of Feeling Your Pain: The Explosion and Abuse of Government Power in the Clinton-Gore Years (St. Martin’s Press, September 2000).
The federal government has been busy foisting new billions in loans onto uncreditworthy farmers. The lending binge is accelerating and paving the way for another massive loan collapse and [...]
Property and Liberty
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press).
Property is “the guardian of all other rights,” as Arthur Lee of Virginia wrote in 1775.[1] The Supreme Court declared in 1897: “In a free government almost all other rights would [...]
The Right of Resistance
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press).
Many politicians talk as if citizens were obliged both to revere and obey their government. But there are few things more dangerous than swallowing the notion that government is entitled to [...]
Government as Slave Owner
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State & the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press, 1999).
The Declaration of Independence proclaimed that “all men . . . are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.” This assertion captured the idealism and the principles of this nation’s Founding [...]
Political Accounting
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press, 1999).
Why does the federal government, according to its own auditors, squander tens of billions of tax dollars year after year? Attempts to understand the actions of politicians and bureaucrats on [...]
Paranoia About Paranoia in American Politics
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press, 1999).
Since the 1960s modern “liberals” have often sought to stigmatize those who distrust government as paranoid. This “diagnosis” was first popularized by Columbia University professor Richard Hofstadter (1916–1970). His widely [...]
Storm Trooping to Equality
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State & the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press).
Politicians have long enjoyed promising to deliver equality to the American people. In a January speech, President Clinton announced that he is seeking a budget increase to hire more federal agents [...]
Money: The Great Gold Robbery
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press, 1999).
The New Deal established much of the moral framework of contemporary political life. Though some of the programs and policies of that era have been terminated, the moral heritage of [...]
Bogus Freedom
James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s, 1999), from which this article is adapted.
“Freedom from want” is one of the most frequently invoked notions of freedom in our time. However, it is a bogus freedom that politicians and [...]
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The End of Prosperity: How Higher Taxes Will Doom the Economy–If We Let it Happen
By Arthur B. Laffer, Stephen Moore, and Peter J. Tanous
