March 16 marks an important date for those who cherish peace and harmony between human beings: Open Borders Day. The website openborders.info, founded by Vipul Naik, is in its third year of existence (it began March 16, 2012). It aims at opening up the conversation around immigration and freedom of movement across political borders. Its…

Imagine the following scenario: You’re driving along one fine evening, pretty thoroughly drunk, and ram your car through police tape and into a barricade.  Suppose further that the barricade you’ve smashed into is in front of the White House. For good measure, let’s add that the police tape you broke was marking off an active crime scene…

With marijuana legalization efforts finding success in scattered parts of the United States, Rhode Island stands as a potential trailblazer. A new attempt at legalization put forth by its state legislature looms as a modest victory in 2015 for proponents of liberty and sane drug policy. Modest, because unfortunately the state would still maintain a…

On March 10th a jury in Los Angeles ordered songwriters Pharrell Williams and Robin Thicke to pay $7.3 million to the family of Marvin Gaye. The jury found that Williams and Thicke’s hit song, “Blurred Lines”, infringed on the copyright of Gaye’s 1977 song “Got to Give It Up.” While Thicke and Williams have previously…

I normally associate terms like “treason” and “sedition” with right-wing know-nothings like the American Legion. So it’s eye-rollingly painful, in cases like the letter to Iran from Tom Cotton and 47 other Republican senators, to hear self-described progressives seize on those terms. By way of background, the Congressional GOP recently invited ultra-hawkish and ultra-racist Israeli…

Sao Paulo is one of the great cities of the world. Located in southeastern Brazil, this sprawling metropolis is the most populous city in the country — second in all of the Americas. The state of Sao Paulo is the wealthiest in Brazil and uses its power to influence the nation’s trade, commerce, finance and foreign relations….

As expected, reaction to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Washington DC Congressional address broke pretty much  along party lines, both in Israel and the United States.  Those already susceptible to Netanyahu’s war fever heard a compelling, irrefutable case against any nuclear deal with Iran.  Those familiar with Netanyahu’s “boy who cried wolf” routine weren’t persuaded. In Israel, Netanyahu’s expected election numbers…

In a backstage interview at Real Time with Bill Maher, science educator and entertainer Bill Nye expressed a change of mind on genetically engineered food. Formerly concerned about the environmental impacts of transgenic species Nye now says: “I went to Monsanto and I spent a lot of time with the scientists there, and I have…

Cody Wilson, a founder of Defense Distributed, is a name too often connected with the failures of corporate and government bureaucracy. For those not in the know Defense Distributed is a Texas non-profit that defends the so-called constitutional right to bear arms.  But once again this supposed “guarantee” will be abridged by another corporation. This…

In a February 22 interview, Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore discussed his reasons for nixing issuance of same-sex marriage licenses by probate judges in the state. “You’re taking any definition of a family away,” said Moore. He also expressed fear that bisexuals might “marry two persons, one of the same sex and one of the opposite…

A riot broke out on February 20 at Willacy Correctional Facility, a Texas prison for “illegal immigrants.” 2,000 inmates demonstrated against their subjection to neglect and overwork. The situation quickly escalated as inmates armed themselves with blunt instruments, swarming the yard and dismantling and setting fire to the structures they’d been shackled to for too long. As the…

In his ongoing quest to remain relevant, Rudy Giuliani recently accused president Barack Obama of not loving America. In the ensuing outrage, Giuliani quickly backpedaled, clarifying that he doesn’t doubt Obama’s love of country, but instead believes Obama’s policies are wrongheaded, representative of someone who doesn’t know what’s in America’s best interests, as set forth in the Rudy…

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden continues to loom large in the world’s daily news. Revelations from the trove of data he disclosed to journalists roll out on a near-weekly basis, followed by denials and excuses from politicians and bureaucrats he exposes as responsible for rights violations around the world. Citizenfour, a documentary covering his heroic actions on behalf…

On February 20, US Representatives Jared Polis (D-CO) and Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) introduced two new bills for federal marijuana legalization. The US government’s practice of imprisoning, fining, harassing and stigmatizing marijuana users is tragic and has damaged many lives. Ending prohibition is a welcome change, but these bills have severe problems. If passed, they would turn marijuana…

If it seems like only months ago that America’s warmongers were claiming there would be no need for US boots on the ground in the fight against the Islamic State (IS), that’s because it was. When the politicians initially decided to promote IS to the position of threat du jour, they promised that threat could be eliminated without sacrifice of American…

The US Congress approved construction of the Keystone XL pipeline’s fourth phase on February 11, with the bill scheduled to land on president Barack Obama’s desk for a likely veto sometime after the “President’s Day” recess. Near-unanimous support for Keystone from self-proclaimed “conservatives” and “libertarians” is disappointing but unsurprising. This government land grab is just…

Of all the complex environmental problems the world faces today, the elephant in the room is climate change. If current predictions are correct, our posterity faces famine and drought, land loss, natural disasters, political instability and (if the hippies at the Pentagon are correct) increased warfare as resources are strained. So, how do we address the…

Watching Fox News’s recent coverage of the Islamic State’s Twitter-hack left me shaking my head in disbelief, as usual. The latest act alleged to have been carried out by IS is the group’s takeover of several Twitter accounts belonging to the wives of US military servicemen. Among the threatening tweets issued by IS through the hacked…

“Whenever the legislature attempts to regulate the differences between masters and their workmen,” Adam Smith noted in The Wealth of Nations, “its counsellors are always the masters.” US president Barack Obama reaffirms this insight with his intervention in the dispute between shipping industry employers and longshore workers on the west coast. That intervention comes at the behest of…

“Hardline House GOP conservatives aren’t worried about a looming Department of Homeland Security shutdown,” reports Cristina Marcos at The Hill. They’d rather let DHS’s funding lapse than give up a provision in its new appropriation reversing president Barack Obama’s recent executive orders on immigration. Is it just me, or does this sound more like the promise of ice…