Partisan Free Politics

I recently came across a post at Freespace, a relatively new blog by my friend and former Positive Liberty blogger, Timothy Sandefur.  Sandefur asserts that his observation in The Myth of “Harmony” is not original, but is “one that needs to be made frequent and with fervor.”  Since I’ve found The Myth of “Harmony” to be founded on faulty ground, I felt its necessary to respond with equal fervor.    Sandefur begins by citing a Café Hayek posting from 2 years ago by George Mason University Economics Chair Donald Boudreaux.  Boudreaux had recently visited Sea World where he was inspired by a video at the manatee exhibit to “do [his] ...

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On this day 6 years ago, Al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked 4 passenger airplanes and slammed them to the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the heroes of Flight 93 sacrificed themselves by preventing their plane from striking DC. On that day, terrorism was the biggest threat. It was literally chaos as people wondered if their loved ones were still alive and others fearful if their city was next. To some, reality didn't set in as they couldn't believe that within an hour on a clear Tuesday day, the world was suddenly changed. Nobody knew what else would happen in the coming days.  Episodes such as  the anthrax scare and the would-be shoebomber on flight close to Christmas 2001 made people wonder if ...

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The big topic in the campaign is health insurance. Various different presidential candidates have offered their stance on this issue. Some want market forces, others want full coverage. In some states, there are plans for universal health insurance in California and in Massachusetts, taxes is the stick to force companies to give their workers health insurance. Well, John Edwards recently told of his vision of health care and its a little frightening. Here is the story link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070902/ap_on_el_pr/edwards_2 Under his plan, he will require all Americans to have a yearly doctor visit. Now preventive care has its good qualities. But having it forced is a different issue. Now for a short media plug, it sounds all nice and dandy, but there is a reason why ...

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Last night, 8 GOP candidates squared off in yet another televised debate from the University of New Hampshire. I can't fault any of you for not watching, as usual it ended up looking more like 8 parallel press conferences than a true debate. But for about 3 minutes, however, a real debate managed to break out in what was without a doubt the most interesting moments of the program. [youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=u9sA5FQfE1E[/youtube] As I watched live, I couldn't believe my eyes: this is what real democracy is supposed to look like. Wouldn't it be grand if we could see every candidate up there engaged in a real honest discussion with each other? Maybe we could actually understand the differences between ...

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One of my good friends, Pete Eyre, from the DC area has an interesting story to tell, that I'm sure some of our readers in the area will be interested in.  Despite the District's draconian gun control laws, the State of Virginia has done a slightly better job of maintaining the liberty that helped to produce such patriots as Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry and George Wythe.   As Pete recently discovered, Virginia allows for the open carry of firearms, which of course inspired my freedom-loving friend to go for a test walk.  It didn't take long for Pete to discover the truth of his words from his first post on the subject: "a right not exercised will soon be ceded to the State."  In short, while ...

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part 2 - Democrats This one is going to be rough. Democrats flock to health care like or [Insert your own awful cliché here] white on rice. Unlike their Republican counterparts, every Democrat seems to be taking the problems of our uninsured very seriously. So seriously in fact that every single one of them has “The Solution” – thank goodness, cause I thought this was a complex problem… To be fair to the candidates, I am not going to get their plans 100% right – I did not read everything on all of their policies. Instead, I focused on watching and analyzing their message ...

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The post-Colbert Bump is working its magic yet again. The mainstream press (and even some of the blogosphere) has been having a virtual Huckabee love-fest, from the this article in the NYTimes, to this one in the Washington Post. The story goes that this Southern Baptist preacher is sincere, affable, plays the guitar, likes the Rolling Stones, and yes, is pretty funny. Plus he's for environmental regulation, believes in cleaning up the prison system, and takes other stereotypcially "liberal" positions (although he is pro-life). Basically, from all the media hype he appears to be the dark horse favorite; an evangelical who can win "the base" but not alienate moderate voters. I must admit, I too am loving Huckabee, ...

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