A Crisis of Political Economy

The current state and the current banking sector require each other. They are so reciprocally intertwined that each is an extension of the other.

Remember this the next time somebody tells you, as New York Times columnist Bob Herbert did, that “free market madmen” caused the current financial crisis that is threatening to undermine the global economy. There is no free market. There is no “laissez-faire capitalism.” The government has been deeply involved in setting the parameters for market relations for eons; in fact, genuine “laissez-faire capitalism” has never existed. Yes, trade may have been less regulated in the nineteenth century, but not even the so-called Gilded Age featured “unfettered” markets.

Bailing Out Statism

The key to understanding the saga of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—the recently nationalized twin government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) that dominate home financing—is this:
They were set up—intentionally—to distort the housing and mortgage markets. Government planners were not content to let voluntary exchange and spontaneous market forces configure those industries unmolested. So—holding the taxpayers hostage—they intervened.
Make no [...]

Historical Reputations

In an election year it is useful to try to remove oneself from the hubbub of daily campaign news and advertisements and to imagine how the candidates will be viewed by historians. This is not a simple exercise, and the attempt will reveal a number of widespread attitudes that affect our view of both past [...]

Interpreting the State of the World

Why are optimists about the state of the world disproportionately represented by classical liberals, libertarians, and free- market conservatives, while pessimists about the state of the world are disproportionately represented by statists?
Why do left-leaning media such as the New York Times and CNN devote so much ink and airtime alleging that middle-class Americans have made little [...]

John Dewey and the Decline of American Education

by Henry T. Edmondson, III Reviewed by Terry Stoops

Global Warming and the Layman

Global warming is a divisive issue. People are either believers or skeptics, with each side viewing the other with apprehension. I’ve sided firmly with the skeptics, but lately I have had a nagging concern. Like most people, I am not an atmospheric scientist. I have no firsthand way to evaluate a scientifically based argument for [...]

The Peace Principle

The key principle of liberalism is peace. Some would say peaceful cooperation is the key. But in a free society one is also free peacefully not to cooperate. 
Many would say the core principle of liberalism is freedom, and since the word liberalism is derived from the Latin liber, which means free, that is a reasonable [...]

Book Reviews – October 2006

• Reviving the Invisible Hand: The
  Case for Classical Liberalism in the Twenty-First Century
  by Deepak Lal Reviewed by Richard M. Ebeling
  
• Laws of Fear
  by Cass Sunstein Reviewed by Donald J. Boudreaux
  
• Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an
  Empire’s
  Slaves
  by Adam Hochschild Reviewed by Becky Akers
  
• Why Men Earn More
  by Warren Farrell Reviewed by George C. Leef