Blogs

The director of Of By For, a dcomentary about American politics, reveals he does not understand the nature of the State in this ReasonTV video.

This c4ssvideos video is a reading of an intriguing Kevin Carson article.

Oscar Pistorius is on trial for murder in South Africa, and reports of it indicate that "justice" in those parts may be even more bizarre than in these United States.

A "plus" first, though: one witness, a former girl friend, recalled that Oscar was once stopped for speeding (MacLarens "speed" soon after one changes from second to third gear) and the cop saw a gun lying on the seat. Did he pull his own, shout "freeze!!" and call for  backup? No. He contemptuously emptied the magazine on to the floor and then drove off. Oscar put the bullets back in place and shot one into the air and they both laughed. Seems cops there aren't so uptight.

But the big minus is that there is no jury. Oscar is accused of deliberately shooting his (subsequent) girl friend, and judgment will be handed down by a female, feminist judge. One. The sort that any US defense lawyer would do his utmost to exclude from a jury.

Pistorius has been without feet since soon after he was born, but has persevered to win big in the paralympics, using special, springy prosthetics; he's the "blade runner." I saw a cruel comment that in this courtroom he "doesn't have a leg to stand on." Unhappily, it may be so - regardless of actual guilt or innocence.

Libertarian economist Bryan Caplan debates a law professor on immigration in this Learn Liberty video.

Variety bemoans that "Hollywood Continues to Flee California at Alarming Rate." Of course, it isn't just the movie industry where business is leaving for greener, or at least less kleptocratic, pastures. But Hollywood has always been the one industry best able to dramatize and publicise its own perception of the world, and while producers and film investors aren't being hurt by California's fiscal insanity (because they can, and do, film their productions elsewhere), the Little People -- meaning the Hollywood working class, the thousands of people behind the scenes doing everything from building sets to creating CGI -- are increasingly unemployed, as film-making happens in other states or other countries. 
 
The same is true for almost every major industry in California, and indeed throughout America. Freedom and prosperity go together, and the United States is rapidly losing ground in both. Not often said is that compassion is ALSO tied to freedom; rarely does one find a compassionate police state. In all, not a positive situation for those of us living in the former Land of the Free.

This ReasonTV video reports on CBD extract, a major non-pschoactive cannabis plant component.

LRC and PressTV report today that in response to the rude and boorish things Loose-Cannon Kerry and his boss have been saying recently about Russia, Kremlin economic aide Sergei Glazyev said that US sanctions would cause Russia to “...find a way not just to reduce our dependency on the United States to zero but to emerge from those sanctions with great benefits for ourselves,” adding that Russia could stop using dollars for international transactions (my italics.)
 
“An attempt to announce sanctions would end in a crash for the financial system of the United States, which would cause the end of the domination of the United States in the global financial system.”
 
I heard several years ago that the use of the US Dollar as the world's currency for international transactions was a primary reason why this country has prospered rather well since 1944. This is the first time I've seen it admitted openly by a government spokesman.
 
So now we know: global demand for dollars is high (so boosting our living standards) not just because our exports are in demand, but because dollars are needed when some country buys a shipload of grain from Russia. Print money, get rich. What a racket.

Mark Thornton responds to former DEA administrator Peter Bensinger's claim that the legalization of marijuana is a disaster in this misesmedia video.

This ReasonTV video is a hilarious sendup of Obamacare.

Dr. Salerno dismantles the Council of Economic Advisers's latest report touting the "success" of the 2009 stimulus in this misesmedia video.