Ideas and Consequences
Wanted: A Healthy Dose of Humility
An awful lot of people in this world are really puffed up about themselves. One of the character traits I wish were much more widely practiced these days is good old-fashioned humility. T. S. Eliot said, “Humility is the most difficult of all virtues to achieve; nothing dies harder than the desire to think well [...]
30Nov2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 5 comments | ContinuedMissing Samuel Tilden
If you’re under 50 you probably don’t remember when telephone “numbers” weren’t all numbers. From the 1920s until the mid-1960s most phone “numbers” began with two letters corresponding to certain digits on a common telephone dial. KL7-1234, for example, was read as “Klondike 7-1234.” My family’s number was TI3-8597. The letters were meant to honor [...]
26Oct2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 0 comments | ContinuedDusting Off a Man and His Classic
In 1870 the sultan of Turkey gave a book by a Scotsman to his entire entourage of top-ranking officials. The Khedive of Egypt had the same work inscribed and painted on the wall of the Royal harem. Two years later the Meiji dynasty ordered the book to be issued throughout Tokyo’s school system. Eventually every prefecture [...]
21Sep2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 1 comment | ContinuedWhat’s Wrong with Government Funding of the Arts
People who oppose Soviet-style collective farms, government subsidies to agriculture, or public ownership of grocery stores because they want the provision of food to be a private matter in the marketplace are generally not dismissed as uncivilized or uncaring. Hardly anyone would claim that one who holds such views is opposed to breakfast, lunch, and [...]
24Aug2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 7 comments | ContinuedLiberty and the Power of Ideas
A belief that I stress again and again is that we are at war—not a physical, shooting war, but nonetheless a war that is fully capable of becoming just as destructive and just as costly. The battle for the preservation and advancement of liberty is a battle not against personalities but against opposing ideas. The [...]
25May2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 9 comments | ContinuedCompetition and Monopoly: A Refresher
“Gym Now Stresses Cooperation, Not Competition,” blared a headline in the New York Times a decade ago. The story was about an elementary school where “confrontational” games, team sports, and elimination rounds were changed or scrapped so that differences between students’ athletic abilities would be minimized. Perhaps this is fine for grade-school gym class, but [...]
21Apr2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 2 comments | ContinuedThe Gasoline Demagogues Will Be Back
Here we go again. In late February gasoline prices across America were surpassing $3 a gallon. Forecasters are advising us to expect $4 by summer, maybe higher. So be prepared for something else with it all: the broken-record rhetoric of anti-market types about “gouging.” It’ll be coming from a lot of the same people who [...]
23Mar2011 | Lawrence W. Reed | 13 comments | ContinuedFEE Is Expanding to Atlanta
From its founding in 1946 until 2010, the Foundation for Economic Education had one office: its headquarters near the Hudson River in Irvington, New York, less than one hour from New York City. Now, I am proud to announce, it has a second home in the heart of the South. In early May 2010, FEE [...]
22Dec2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 9 comments | ContinuedScotland: Seven Centuries since William Wallace
I am an American of Scottish extraction, and few things stir my blood more than the colorful history of my ancestral homeland. Through the centuries, rugged Scots stand tall among those heroes who gave every ounce of their lives for such noble ideals as liberty, independence, and self-reliance. Mel Gibson’s epic film Braveheart, released in [...]
24Nov2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 7 comments | ContinuedWilfrid Laurier: A Canadian Statesman
Owing to where most Americans trace their ancestry from, we tend to know more European history than the history of our immediate neighbors to the north and south, Canada and Mexico. We can name famous entrepreneurs and political leaders from across the sea but rarely one from right next door. Last May in a casual [...]
22Oct2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 4 comments | ContinuedConfessions of a Secret Marxist
After 33 years of writing articles and columns about capitalism and freedom for The Freeman, I’ve decided to confess. I’m a Marxist, and have been from a very early age. I’m not the kind of Marxist that you normally think of when that term is used. I have nothing in common with Karl. I am [...]
22Sep2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 15 comments | ContinuedFree Markets Blossom in Vietnam
Americans think of the Vietnam War as the first armed conflict in our history that we lost. Tanks and troops from the communist North captured the South’s capital of Saigon on April 30, 1975, renamed it Ho Chi Minh City, and ended decades of war. Who can forget the scenes of the last frenzied evacuation [...]
7Jul2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 0 comments | ContinuedGood Economists, Bad Economists, and Walmart
Good economists are seldom popular with the political class. This is not unique to democratic systems; dictators like good economists even less. Why? As a rule, politics doesn’t educate. It obfuscates, pontificates, and prevaricates. It often seeks to advance the interests of the few at the expense of the many. It is a playground for [...]
29Jun2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 13 comments | ContinuedThe 1932 Bait-and-Switch
Harry Truman once said, “The only thing new in the world is the history you don’t know.” That observation applies especially well to what tens of millions of Americans have been taught about Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the man under whom Truman served as vice president for about a month. Recent scholarship (including a highly acclaimed [...]
20May2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 7 comments | ContinuedHow We’ll Know When We’ve Won
“Are we winning?” That’s a query I hear almost every time I speak to an audience about liberty and the battle of ideas. Everyone wants to know if we should be upbeat or distraught about the course of events, as if the verdict should determine whether or not we continue the fight. Too many friends [...]
19Apr2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 1 comment | ContinuedNew Hope for Africa’s Most Populous Nation
When riots surrounding the Miss World beauty pageant in Nigeria claimed more than 200 lives last November, a horrified world thought it was observing religious fanaticism run wild. Widespread reports blamed the bloodshed on an article in a local newspaper, in which the author stated that if the prophet Mohammed were around today he might [...]
19Apr2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 2 comments | ContinuedAnti-Force Is the Common Denominator
Allow me to alter something the great humorist Will Rogers said: “I’m not a member of any organized group. I’m a libertarian.” I wince a bit as I say that, though. Let me explain. Labels such as “libertarian” aren’t always illuminating. Sometimes they serve as expedient substitutes for thought—as in, “Oh, he’s one of those!” [...]
24Mar2010 | Lawrence W. Reed | 14 comments | Continued-
The Latest
Contraception: Insuring the Uninsurable
Update below. Controversy rages over the Obama administration’s mandate that all employers – including... Read More
The Snow Plowers’ Petition
The following might have happened in a small college town in upstate New York… In a cold and snowy... Read More
Super Bowl versus Education?
In the spirit of Super Bowl weekend I’d like to deconstruct a Facebook status update that a friend... Read More
Capitalism, Corporatism, and the Freed Market
When a front-running presidential contender tells the country that thanks to Barack Obama, “[w]e are... Read More
Creating Jobs versus Creating Value
Picking on New York Times columnist Paul Krugman is one of the largest participation sports on the Internet.... Read More
