Hysteria over the Islamic State is now focused on the refugees seeking to escape the violence in Syria and Iraq. Predictably, the Republican-controlled House yesterday voted to increase background checks on potential refugees, a demand for omniscience that would amount to exclusion. The bill faces trouble in the Senate, however, and President Obama, who wants…
The Intercept is a website dedicated to investigative journalism. It is best known for having Glenn Greenwald as one of its editors. Its long term goal is to provide “fearless journalism” that sheds much-needed light on privacy invasions. But even knowing all of that, some of its headlines still manage to take you by surprise: Massive…
The criminal trial of former Oklahoma City police officer Daniel Holtzclaw has entered its third week. Dozens of witnesses have already taken the stand, including many of Holtzclaw’s 13 alleged sexual assault survivors and their families. As the trial progresses, one thing has become clear: Holtzclaw’s defense team is not interested in proving, based on…
It has been a century since “the man who never died” was put to death. Joe Hill, whose songs inspired labor organizing and introduced the phrase “pie in the sky,” went before a firing squad on November 19, 1915. The case putting him at the scene of a grocery store shootout was tenuous at best. But as Franklin Rosemont observes,…
For a long time, anarchists and libertarians have mockingly characterized the stereotypical liberal goo-goo response to any vision of a stateless society as “But what about the rooaaads?” But now a couple of libertarians — at least that’s what they call themselves — have made that phrase their own. In response to the seemingly self-evident…
When I heard noted filmmaker Quentin Tarantino had participated in a rally devoted to opposing police brutality, I thought that was cool. When I heard that the police unions were encouraging people to boycott his upcoming movie, The Hateful Eight, I thought that was funny. But when I heard that the Fraternal Order of Police,…
The state often imposes enormous regulatory hurdles like licensing fees and time-consuming and expensive classes on people trying to carve out a basic living. And it’s all done by the state for our supposed safety. But this is time and money that Achan Agit, a hair-braider from Iowa, simply didn’t have. Her case is particularly…
An article published on October 29th by the Washington Post discusses Bernie Sanders’s “revolutionary” plan to change the banking system and Postal Service in one fell swoop. The author mentions that “from 1911 until 1967, the Postal Service also served as a bank,” where customers could deposit money into a savings account. Sanders, recognizing that low income…
The CIA’s torture program is back in the headlines this week, as three former detainees have filed suit against the two psychologists who created and administered the CIA’s Bush-era torture program. According to the ACLU (who are pushing for Attorney General Loretta Lynch to appoint a special prosecutor in the matter), Drs. James Mitchell and…
Multiple news outlets have circulated a viral Facebook post, dated October 27th, from author Steven Hildreth, Jr. regarding a positive interaction with the Tucson Police Department. Hildreth describes being pulled over for a broken headlight. He informs the officers he has a concealed carry permit, and is currently armed. He cooperates showing them his weapon, and his…
We are told there is a pipeline in the United States that travels from our school system to our criminal justice system. Correct as the data corroborating the pipeline’s existence may be, it is a flawed way of conceptualizing the issue. There is no pipeline out of schools and into prisons, because schools and prisons…
Back in 2004, rapper P. Diddy started an organization called Citizen Change and launched a campaign called Vote or Die. Diddy and the campaign were subsequently mocked in some circles, notably the popular TV show South Park. Since 2006, Citizen Change has been inactive, but in a recent interview at a Revolt music conference, Diddy…
If you’re black, you may have trouble getting on to a jury. The way in which jurors are chosen in the United States is intended to ensure an unbiased jury; and part of that process is the right of “peremptory challenge,” by which the prosecution and the defense are each allowed to reject a certain…
Did you know President Obama’s “core legacy” is free trade — and the centerpiece of this alleged “free trade” policy is the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)? Neither did I. But that’s what Shikha Dalmia says, writing at the leading right-wing libertarian periodical Reason (“Why Is Hillary Throwing Obama’s Core Legacy on Free Trade Under the Bus?”…
Playboy’s announcement (“Playboy is Doing What?!?,” Playboy.com, October 13) that it will be ending the nude magazine pictorials that have been its foundation for six decades might seem the result of the instability of free markets. The Foundation for Economic Education’s Sarah Skwire (“The Creative Destruction of Nudity in Playboy Magazine,” The Freeman, October 14) calls the…
Usually, it’s upsetting to see a person’s livelihood attacked and destroyed by government bureaucrats. In the case of Thomas Chipperfield, it’s not so bad. Chipperfield is one in a long line of family members extending back many generations who’s made his living in the circus. The Chipperfield family takes their show on the road across…
Charter schools, for the libertarian establishment, are what passes for “free market reform” in public education. They’re regularly pushed by mainstream libertarian think tanks, and at Reason they’re topped only by Uber, right-to-work laws and defined-contribution pensions on the list of libertarian shibboleths. But besides not being very effective they’re not very libertarian either (in…
Jerry Taylor of the Niskanen Center dropped a truth bomb on the beltway in his recent piece for Fox News about the decline of Rand Paul. Taylor notes that the alleged growth of the libertarian movement in the wake of the Ron Paul campaign was largely illusory. The alienated populists and conspiracy theorists that filled…
A common negative stereotype of the conventional “pot-smoking Republican” variety of libertarian is their condescending dismissal of anyone who disagrees with them as “not understanding economics.” Such people are so fond of firing off this rhetorical weapon that they often use it in situations where it’s far more applicable to themselves. Reason‘s recent commentary on…
Many consider Portland, Oregon to be a liberal, hipster paradise where anything organic is not far from reach and everyone loves each other. So naturally, Portland’s largest school, Portland State University (PSU), a setting where students roam free in an urban location, must fit the description. But recent events that have unfolded in the past…
