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Ari Armstrong's 2014 Posts

Following are consolidated blog posts I wrote in 2014, republished here on August 18, 2025. All contents copyright © by Ari Armstrong. I may not in every case still agree with my older positions. Paragraphs that begin "Comment" are notes by readers, unless marked otherwise. Because so many of the hyperlinks have since become "dead," I removed almost all of the hyperlinks and (usually) put the original url in parenthesis. Due to minor editing and formatting changes the material here may not exactly match how it originally appeared.

Major themes include smoking bans, health policy, Ayn Rand and Objectivism, approval voting, libertarianism, immigration, copyright, W. Earl Allen, Ferguson, antitrust, Venezuela, Islamic State, the anti-abortion personhood movement, and more.

Smoking Bans: Private vs. Government Property

February 27, 2014

Recently a reporter contacted me regarding smoking bans. She did not use my comments in her story, so I'm pleased to make them available here:

I am opposed to smoking bans on private property in general, at every level of government.

When government restricts smoking on private property, including in restaurants and the like (even if "open to the public"), government violates people's rights to control their property and associate freely with others. Restaurants and other establishments have a moral right to allow smoking in their establishments or to ban it—and their potential customers have a moral right to decide whether to seek to do business at any given establishment. If you don't want the smoke, don't go. There's no such thing as a "right" to use another's property against that person's consent. That said, given historical trends of reduced smoking, absent a ban many establishments would have voluntarily banned smoking long ago. (I personally hate smoking and would go out of my way to find smoke-free establishments.)

To give you an indication of how smoking bans violate civil liberties, consider that some bans prevent people from smoking on stage, in the course of presenting a work of art, and hence violate rights of free speech and expression. Moreover, the First Amendment recognizes "the right of the people peaceably to assemble"—but smokers are often denied this right.

Smoking bans regarding government property are more complex. Government may legitimately ban smoking in government buildings and tight public spaces, such as court houses. Government has no good reason to ban smoking in open outdoor spaces controlled by the government, such as sidewalks. As to what government property ought to be converted to private property, that is a broader subject for another day.

Regarding campuses, the fundamental problem is that many campuses are government controlled. Private colleges—like all private establishments—have a moral right to allow, restrict, or ban smoking, at their discretion. Regarding government-controlled campuses, often there is no clear way to protect everyone's rights—quite simply because government controlling a college campus inherently violates people's rights, primarily by forcibly seizing people's wealth. When government does control a college campus, the best the government in control can do is seek to draw up rules that balance different people's interests while not horribly trampling the Bill of Rights. To my mind, colleges can reasonably ban smoking inside, but not outside. If a college wants the ability to ban smoking everywhere, it should first stop violating people's rights, stop collecting people's money seized by force, and become a private institution.

The Problems with Prescription Drug Monitoring

March 13, 2014

Yesterday the Greeley Tribune published my article, "(http://www.greeleytribune.com/news/opinion/10580808-113/drug-prescription-pain-government) Prescription Drug Monitoring Punishes the Responsible for the Sake of the Irresponsible," written for the (http://www.i2i.org) Independence Institute. That article begins:

Prescription drug abuse is a serious problem, sometimes a fatal one. But the answer is not for the government to monitor and harass people who suffer from devastating pain—and make it harder for them to manage their pain—in a misguided attempt to save drug abusers from themselves. Unfortunately, that is precisely the effect of (http://www.leg.state.co.us/clics/clics2014a/csl.nsf/fsbillcont3/B40C81F74784059D87257C300005EC23?open&file=1283_01.pdf) House Bill 1283, sponsored by Rep. Beth McCann of Denver.

Here I thought I'd take the opportunity to offer more details about the program and my research of it.

Health Information Designs

One interesting fact about the Colorado database that tracks (some) prescription drug use is that it is operated by a limited-liability corporation, Health Information Designs (HID).

Colorado's Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA) (http://cdn.colorado.gov/cs/Satellite/DORA-Reg/CBON/DORA/1251631994088) links users directly to HID for information about the Electronic Prescription Drug Monitoring Program (PDMP). Interestingly (or perhaps disturbingly), HID originally went into business (http://www.hidinc.com/about-hid.html) producing "data mining software" for prescription drugs.

So let us clarify what's going on here. The Colorado government encourages doctors and pharmacies to enter patients' personal medical information into a central database, run by a for-profit corporation, and this information is available to a wide range of medical professionals—whether or not patients wish their records to be so distributed—and to law enforcement agents who obtain a warrant to see the records.

One thing McCann wants to do is force all prescribing doctors and pharmacies to register with the database. McCann's bill would not force prescribing doctors and pharmacies to actually use the register, but does anyone seriously doubt that's the Drug Enforcement Administration's eventual aim? The goal here is for Big Brother to be able to monitor every individual's use of prescription drugs, every doctor's prescriptions, and every pharmacy's drug sales. And, of course, the government wants to subject violators of the (ambiguous) prescription laws to penalties, including the penalty of getting locked in a metal cage.

The Funding for the PDMP

Tellingly, the Colorado PDMP, launched in 2005, got its primary funding from the U.S. Department of Justice—of which the DEA is an agency.

The legislator's fiscal note for 2005 House Bill 1130 (http://www.leg.state.co.us/clics2005a/csl.nsf/fsbillcont3/DEAC7E254C04D4AF87256F39005CF81E?Open&file=HB1130_r1.pdf) states the following:

The bill is assessed at having a conditional fiscal impact of $547,156 . . . in its first year of implementation and $271,484 . . . in its second year of implementation. . . . During the current fiscal year, the Department of Regulatory Agencies has received a $50,000 U.S. Department of Justice grant in support of the Harold Rogers Prescription Drug Monitoring Program. . . . Additionally, the federal government will make a $350,000 grant available to implement the program once statutorily authorized.

I do not have complete funding details about the program. However, it is apparent that the program is driven primarily by federal law enforcement.

News Sources

I relied on several news reports in conducting my research. 9News (http://kdvr.com/2014/03/06/revamp-of-colorados-pain-pill-monitoring-systems-moves-ahead/) published a story about McCann's current bill. Eli Stokol's pathetic excuse for journalism on this matter essentially uncritically relates McCann's talking points, without bothering to raise a single critical question. Hopefully in the future Stokol will take his role as a journalist more seriously and set a higher bar for himself than legislative lapdog.

Over at the Denver Post, I found Felisa Cardona's 2011 (http://www.denverpost.com/ci_18118563) story about the legislature's renewal of the PDMP that year as well as Michael Booth's 2012 (http://www.denverpost.com/ci_21788638/drug-registry-often-ignored-despite-growing-painkiller-abuse) story about DEA complains of low registry use.

Drug Substitution

As I point out in my op-ed, drug abusers who have a harder time getting one type of drug often switch to another type. My claim is supported by a (http://www.denverpost.com/nationworld/ci_25295203/fight-against-prescription-drug-abuse-leads-rise-heroin) recent news story from the Washington Post (republished by the Denver Post).

[T]he U.S. government's decade-long crackdown on abuse of prescription drugs has run an unsettling risk: that arresting doctors and shuttering "pill mills" would inadvertently fuel a new epidemic of heroin use. . . . [A]t the same time that some pain medications have become less available on the street and pricier, many users have switched to cheaper heroin, since prescription pills and heroin are in the same class of drugs and provide a comparable euphoric high.

It should go without saying—but, in today's political climate not even the most obvious facts may go without saying—that substituting street heroin addictions and deaths for prescription drug addictions and deaths is no great victory.

Drug Thefts

I cut the following line from my op-ed due to space restraints, but it's an interesting detail: "In testifying in favor of McCann's bill, Robert Valuck from the University of Colorado offered the example of a woman who robbed a pharmacy at gunpoint—but the expanded registry would promote rather than deter thefts of prescription drugs." Valuck's claim is included in 9News's video, not in Stokol's written account.

The Magnitude of Prescription Drug Deaths

In my op-ed, I claim that McCann apparently overstated the magnitude of deaths related to prescription drugs. Specifically, she (http://kdvr.com/2014/03/06/revamp-of-colorados-pain-pill-monitoring-systems-moves-ahead/) said, ""More people actually die from prescription drug overdose than from traffic accidents."

I have an email out to McCann asking for her sources, so perhaps she'll send me something I have not yet considered. However, based on the sources I've been able to find so far, McCann's claim seems not to have support.

This past October, an outfit called Trust for America's Health published a report, "(http://healthyamericans.org/assets/files/TFAH2013RxDrugAbuseRptFINAL.pdf) Prescription Drug Abuse: Strategies to Stop the Epidemic." (Likening a volitional behavior—drug abuse—to an infectious disease is epistemologically and morally offensive, but I'll leave that topic for another day.)

That report does not state that prescription drugs are responsible for more deaths than are traffic accidents. Instead, the report claims that "[p]rescription painkillers are responsible for more than 16,000 deaths" per year. The number of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_motor_vehicle_deaths_in_U.S._by_year) motor vehicle deaths exceed 30,000 each year.

Regarding traffic fatalities, the report makes a different claim: "Drug poisoning deaths—the majority of which are related to prescription drugs—surpassed traffic-related crashes as the leading cause of injury death in the United States in 2009."

My guess is that McCann misstated this report's (or a derivative report's) findings.

(I also saw that Dr. Joseph Mercola makes a (http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/10/11/suicide-and-poisoning-rate-increased.aspx) broad statement about prescription drug deaths surpassing auto deaths, but, if you trace back his links, you find that the statistic pertains only to Ohio. I have not traced the claim beyond a 2011 New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/20/us/20drugs.html) story.)

The best statistics I've found about the problem of prescription drug abuse are provided by the Centers for Disease Control, which (http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6043a4.htm) report, "In 2008, drug overdoses in the United States caused 36,450 deaths. OPR [opioid pain relievers] were involved in 14,800 deaths (73.8%) of the 20,044 prescription drug overdose deaths." (In many cases a death involves the mixing of various types of drugs.)

Of course, as the CDC also (http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/NVDRS_Data_Brief-a.pdf) report, most people who intentionally kill themselves by overdosing on drugs use prescription drugs for the purpose. But the monitoring program will not pick up one-time drug purchases among suicidal people, nor will it prevent suicidal people from substituting one method of suicide for another.

Conclusions

I have known people who have died from terminal cancer. I know people now dealing with the agonizing pain caused by late-stage cancer and other diseases. The simple fact is that more people with serious injuries and diseases will suffer more pain because of the government's crackdown on prescription drugs—all to save irresponsible drug abusers from their own poor choices. That policy is morally wrong.

Interviews from the Independence Institute's Founders' Night Banquet

March 16, 2014

I attended the Independence Institute's 2014 Founders' night banquet March 6 and filmed some interviews. Here they are:

https://youtu.be/xrkMJS3VE54

The Real Story of Caprock Academy

March 26, 2014

A student at Caprock Academy of Grand Junction, Colorado, shaved her head to show solidarity with a friend fighting cancer. On that part of the story, everyone agrees.

Then, as the story goes in many popular accounts, the school callously kicked the student out of school, relenting only after media exposure and nationwide outrage forced it to. That part of the story is false.

Those interested in the real story—and that seems to be very few people indeed—may read on. Part of the real story is how irresponsible reporting fed a despicable witch hunt.

True, part of the real story is how a young charter school wrote an ill-planned dress and hair code and then substantially botched a public-relations crisis.

Let us begin with Caprock's rules. Caprock has an extensive and rigorous (http://caprockacademy.org/caprock-essentials/dress-code/girls-grade-school-dress-code/) dress code. It states, for example, "Clothing should not be excessively tight, or body hugging." Although the school doesn't require official uniforms, it does require uniform dress, specifying even the color and type of clothing that may be worn at school. The section on hair reads:

Ladies' Hair: Should be neatly combed or styled. No shaved heads. Hair accessories must be red, white, navy, black or brown. Neat barrettes, headbands and "scrunchies" are permissible. Hair should not be arranged or colored so as to draw undue attention to the student. Hair must be natural looking and conservative in its color. Radical changes in hair color during the school year are unacceptable.

Personally I think this is overly demanding; if a girl wants to die her hair bright orange, I have no problem with that. But it's not my school, and, within reason and within Constitutional limits (it is a government-funded school, after all), I think Caprock should be able to formulate its own policies.

The intent behind the "no shaved heads" rule seems to be to prevent shocking or gang-like behavior. Surely I do do not need to point out that head shaving is also part of the ritualistic practices of some very nasty sorts of people (hence the term "skin heads").

But the rule does not adequately take into account the fact that people can shave their heads for perfectly reasonable reasons—as to undergo cancer treatment or to support a friend with cancer.

The rule book does take this into account to a degree. The rules (of which I have a copy) explicitly mention the concern with gangs—and they also explicitly allow for "medical or religious" exemptions:

Apparel advertising tobacco, alcohol, illegal substances, and/or offensive slogans are not acceptable attire at school- sponsored activities. Clothes making statements with sexual innuendoes are not allowed. The wearing of clothing, jewelry, or a style of grooming that is identified with membership in a gang will not be tolerated in school or at any school-sponsored activity. Apparel that interferes with or endangers self or others while participating in school or school sponsored-activities is not allowed. Dress will not be worn that causes or is likely to cause disruption of the educational process. The final decision as to the safety or unsuitability of the clothing, hair or jewelry will be left up to the Deans of Students. Anyone who cannot follow the dress code for medical or religious reasons should contact the Headmaster.

As has been correctly reported, the school issued a waiver to the student in question on precisely these grounds. The problem is that the rule's default position is to allow no shaved heads; the default position should be that a "religious or medical" condition is presumed in cases of shaved heads (I mean, it's not like there's a racist "skin head" problem among young Grand Junction girls). The school should change its rules to explicitly allow for religious and medical exceptions, sans waiver. [March 27 Update: After more consideration, I think the school should add the following line to its rules: "Exceptions to this dress code may be made for bonafide religious, medical, or humanitarian reasons, as evaluated by the headmaster, acting headmaster, or school administrators."]

It might come as a surprise to many reading about the story to learn that the mother of the student in question is quite supportive of Caprock—although she sensibly argues the school should tweak its rules. Yesterday that woman, Jamie Renfro, posted the following on Facebook:

I would just like to say, from the bottom of our hearts...thank you! We never expected any of the support that we have received regarding Kamryn and Delaney. We are pleased with the decision that our school made to let Kamryn back in school today. She got up, got ready, and held her head high as she walked into her classroom this morning. To say her dad and I are proud, is a total understatement. Nate and I are so humbled from the outpouring of love and support from family, friends, and strangers. Our goal was just to get the shaved head policy at Kamryn's school revised, and let her back in the classroom. That goal is on it's way to being reached, with a meeting by the board being held this evening, as well as an invitation for Kamryn to return to school today. At no point during this ordeal was Kamryn's school not supportive of her decision, nor show compassion...they just made a decision to enforce their dress code, which we were asking to be changed. They responded to all of our requests, and have treated us with nothing but respect the whole time. Now that we have seen just how much 2 little girls can change the world and touch so many hearts, we are asking for all of this attention to embrace awareness of childhood cancer. There are so many blessings that have come to light for our family the past couple of days, and we would like to use this as a platform, along with our best of friends...Delaney and Wendy, to remind everyone that Delaney is still in the fight of her life, and needs as much love, support and prayers as she can get. Thank you! Love, prayers, and hugs from the Renfro's

Contrary to various media reports, at no point did Caprock try to deny the student a waiver. [January 27 Update: On Sunday, March 23, Jamie Renfro claimed that "the school" forbade her daughter to return to school until she grew her hair out. It is unclear to me whom Renfro contacted or what those parties discussed. On Monday the school's administrators announced the exemption hearing; it is unclear to me when precisely they reached the decision to hold a hearing. See the notes below.] Indeed, as Renfro points out, the school was consistently supportive of the student. What the school did do is follow its stated policies and pursue a waiver.

Following is the statement that Caprock sent out March 24:

It has come to our attention that reports have been circulating concerning a Caprock Academy student who has shaved her head to show solidarity with a friend who is fighting cancer. Caprock Academy does have a detailed dress code policy, which was created to promote safety, uniformity, and a non-distracting environment for the school's students. Under this policy, shaved heads are not permitted. Exceptions, however, are sometimes made under exigent and extraordinary circumstances. While we cannot discuss the specifics of this situation, the Caprock Academy Board of Directors is calling a special meeting March 25, 2014, at 6:00 PM. The Board is expected to discuss this matter in executive session (discussions concerning individual students are conducted in executive session). We expect the Board will vote regarding a waiver of the policy following that executive session.

Catherine M. Norton Breman,

President and Chair of

Caprock Academy, Board of Directors

Although inanrtful, Breman's remarks distinctly point to the waiver process already underway.

Unfortunately, various "journalists" quoted Breman out of context.

For example, a New York Daily News story from yesterday (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/colo-child-kicked-school-shaving-head-sympathy-cancer-pal-article-1.1734045) quoted included only this much: "In a statement released Monday, administrators said 'shaved heads are not permitted.'" Okay, but the statement also discusses the exception waiver. Such "creative editing" is simply bad journalism. (The News's opening paragraph also wrongly implies that the school relented only in response to national outrage.)

Likewise, a story in USA Today (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/03/25/shaved-head-cancer-violates-school-dress-code/6862189/) quotes only part of Breman's remarks, ignoring the part about the exception process already underway.

There is a lesson here for consumers of media: Do not assume that the story told by newspaper is the complete (or even an accurate) story, even if it appears in one of the most prestigious papers in the world. It is said that "half the truth is a great lie," and the reporters for the New York Daily News and USA Today (among others) told only half the truth.

Thankfully, the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel has been basically responsible in its reporting; see a (http://www.gjsentinel.com/news/articles/girl-suspended-in-headshaving-act-of-support/) first and (http://www.gjsentinel.com/news/articles/vote-bald-is-beautiful) second article there.

It is worth relating Caprock's second statement, released yesterday:

Compassion and selfless acts of courage are to be commended and encouraged—in children and in adults -and we apologize that our policies and following our process for exceptions to those policies has, in any way, suggested that supporting any one's but particularly a child's, brave fight against cancer is anything less than an extraordinary cause worthy of our highest regard.

The Caprock Academy Board of Directors held a special meeting tonight to discuss a waiver to the dress code policy per the parents' request. The Caprock Academy Board of Directors voted to approve the waiver to the dress code policy.

Although Caprock needs to tweak its policies, nothing the school did justifies the seething rage directed at the school by swarms of social media personalities. Some people literally called the school to threaten its teachers and the teachers' children. Such behavior is reprehensible. Shame on the people conducting themselves in such a way, and shame on the "journalists" who are irresponsibly fanning the flames of this witch hunt.

To summarize, Caprock acted within the constraints of its written policies to expeditiously grant an exception to the girl who shaved her head for a good cause. This incident illustrates the need for Caprock to tweak its policies so that, in religious or medical cases, a waiver is not required. That is obvious.

Unlike almost all of the critics of Caprock, I actually know something about the school. Someone I know teaches there, and my nephew goes there. I have been to his basketball games at the school. I have seen his hand-written letters and heard his reviews of his classroom exercises that assure me he is getting a good-quality education.

Caprock certainly deserves criticism over its ill-thought-out rules, and it should fix its rules as quickly as possible. Caprock also deserves praise for acting quickly to grant an exception to its big-hearted student and for offering an exceptional-quality education to its students. As always, a sense of context goes a long way.

5:22 pm Update: As the Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_25418689/girls-shaved-head-draws-national-furor-at-grand) notes, the girl with cancer at the base of this story, Delaney Clements, is receiving care at Children's Hospital. That facility has treated a number of children whom I personally know, and it is excellent. Please (http://www.childrenscolorado.org/donate-volunteer) donate now.

An Open Reply to a Pharmacist Regarding Prescription Drug Monitoring

April 2, 2014

Last month I wrote an (http://www.greeleytribune.com/news/opinion/10580808-113/drug-prescription-pain-government) op-ed and a follow-up (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/03/the-problems-with-prescription-drug-monitoring/) blog post critical of a proposal to expand Colorado's prescription drug monitoring program. I pointed out (among other things) that the program was promoted and financed largely by federal law enforcement; that law enforcement agents can access the information in the database (by warrant) for purposes of pursuing criminal investigations; that the program does little to curb drug abuse, in part because drug abusers easily can switch to different drugs, and in part because some drug abusers steal their drugs (or, I'll add here, buy them on the black market); and that the proposal seeks to force doctors (and other prescribers) to register with the database.

My main point was that it is not the government's proper role to save drug addicts from their own dangerous behavior—particularly given the government's actions in this area inevitably make it harder for some people to obtain the drugs they desperately need to manage their excruciating pain.

On March 31, someone who identified himself only as "John" replied to my web page:

Ari, hello. My name is John and I am a retail pharmacist. I rely heavily on our prescription monitoring program here in Nevada. As pharmacists, we use it to make sure people are not filling multiple controlled substance prescriptions at different pharmacies, using multiple doctors for controlled substances, and that they are not misusing or abusing controlled substances. This tool has prevented abuse and diversion in our state and is a very useful tool. Also, to stress an important point, a good pharmacist understands true pain (cancer) and always strives to take compassionate care of the patient.

Following is my open reply:

Dear John,

As a pharmacist, you are undoubtedly a smart fellow; you must realize, therefore, that you have not actually responded to any of the observations or arguments I make in my op-ed and related post.

I have no doubt that the monitoring programs set up by the governments of various states prevent some drug addicts from obtaining certain drugs from certain sources. (Whether it substantially prevents drug addicts from abusing drugs, on the other hand, is extremely doubtful.) My primary philosophical objection is that it is not the government's proper role to address or prevent the problem of drug abuse; rather, it is to protect people's rights, including the rights of consenting adults to contract freely. Although a full defense of that position lies outside the scope of this short letter, I will note here that there are other—and much better—ways to help drug addicts with their problems.

I will also note here that my criticisms of government-run drug prescription drug monitoring programs (run largely at the behest of federal law enforcement agents) do not constitute reasons to prohibit doctors and pharmacists from independently sharing certain information about potentially dangerous situations. And of course nothing in my position implies that reckless doctors should be free from civil and even (if circumstances warrant) criminal liability.

As a pharmacist, your ability to "take compassionate care of the patient" is inherently limited. After all, you are not legally authorized to diagnose any disease or to write drug prescriptions. Thus, there is no case in which you can actually expand the delivery of pain medications to the patients who desperately need them. Your actions can have one and only one effect in this regard: to block or delay such delivery.

Of course, your actions might also have the effect of subjecting the doctors and other medical professionals, who are legally authorized to write drug prescriptions, to the actions of federal and state law enforcement agents. Those agents, in turn, have the power in some cases to arrest doctors and to help other government agents prosecute doctors or strip them of their ability to practice medicine.

As a pharmacist, John, you are not in any danger of having your power stripped to write drug prescriptions (as you have no such power) or of being prosecuted for writing drug prescriptions (as you do not write any). You are, however, quite capable of assisting federal and state drug enforcement agents create a climate of fear and intimidation among those who do write drug prescriptions, such that, on balance, those who prescribe drugs tend to err on the side of legal precaution and not help people coping with excruciating pain obtain the drugs they desperately need. Such a result is possible—and I think likely—even assuming (as I'm sure is the case) that most uses of the monitoring program do not involve law enforcement. And the more the program is expanded, the more substantial will be its effects in this regard.

In using the monitoring program, you act primarily on guesswork and speculation. Consider the activities that you regard as inherently suspicious: people "filling multiple controlled substance prescriptions at different pharmacies" and "using multiple doctors for controlled substances."

Again, I do not doubt that such behavior describes some drug addicts. But I also do not doubt that such behavior also describes some people coping with excruciating pain due to cancer or other serious diseases.

Consider that cancer patients and others coping with serious illnesses typically see multiple doctors in multiple locations to manage their diseases. They also typically use different types of pain medications concurrently to cope with their diseases. Moreover, cancer patients often end up leaving their jobs, moving to a different location, and switching their insurance companies—developments that can result in them seeing more doctors in more locations. Add to this the fact that people suffering from a variety of diseases often require supplemental surgeries—surgeries that initially cause enormous pain and that involve yet more medical facilities. For all these reasons, people coping with such diseases very often get multiple drug prescriptions, written by multiple doctors, filled at multiple pharmacies—the very behaviors that you claim to "make sure" to treat as suspicious.

As a pharmacist, John, you typically lack access to the pertinent information about such patients, and when you lack such information you cannot possibly "take compassionate care" of them. With respect to such patients, your actions can have one and only one result: to make it harder for them to obtain the pain medications they so desperately need.

I will thus repeat here what I wrote at the outset: "the answer is not for the government to monitor and harass people who suffer from devastating pain—and make it harder for them to manage their pain—in a misguided attempt to save drug abusers from themselves."

Sincerely, Ari Armstrong

The "Common Core" Subtraction Technique Caleb Bonham Criticizes is Actually Useful

May 16, 2014

I'm a fan of Caleb Bonham's work. However, in his recent (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ldyl_uYrojs) video on Common Core, he gets a little off-track. The subject is a technique for subtracting one number from another. Bonham claims the technique in question was imposed by a Common Core curriculum and that it is overly complicated. In fact, the technique is very old and very useful. The fact that a Common Core program happens to use it is no cause to damn it.

As Bonham explains, the traditional solution to the problem, thirty-two minus twelve, is to first subtract "two minus two" in the "ones" column, then subtract "three minus one" in the "tens" column, for the correct answer of twenty.

The approach used by Common Core, by contrast, asks a student to see the following:

32 - 12 = ?

12 + 3 = 15

15 + 5 = 20

20 + 10 = 30

30 + 2 = 32

The sum of the 3, 5, 10, and 2 is 20.

Bonham thinks this approach is overly complicated, and, in some situations, he's right. But the approach indicated is, in fact, how I often do subtraction problems in my head (except that in this case I'd jump straight from twelve to twenty, and so get eight plus ten plus two), and it's a perfectly legitimate approach. It is also an approach that helps students reach a conceptual-level understanding of addition and subtraction, rather than merely learn rules of subtraction by rote.

Of course, in this case, because we're dealing with two, two-digit numbers that end in the same digit, adults and more-advanced students can easily see that the difference between the numbers is some increment of ten (in this case twenty). But what to do in other cases?

To illustrate the advantage of the approach given, consider the problem thirty-one minus twelve. In this case, the rule-based approach requires that a student "borrow" from the three. It's much easier to solve the problem in your head by saying, "eight plus ten plus one equals nineteen."

Or consider the problem seventy-three minus twenty-eight. A good way to do this problem in your head is to think, "To go from twenty-eight to thirty I need to add two; to go from thirty to seventy I need to add forty; to go from seventy to seventy-three I need to add three. The total is forty-five." There are other good ways to find the answer, of course, but, for me, the way I described is the easiest way to do it in your head.

The broader lesson here is that, just because something is associated with Common Core, doesn't mean its bad.

Update: I've also written about a (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/05/common-cores-nonsensical-math-problems-undermine-students-confidence/) vague, nonsensical problem from a Common Core-approved test.

Where Is Dave Brat's Paper on Ayn Rand?

June 13, 2014

Recently I wrote a blog post for TOS Blog about (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/06/dave-brat-ayn-rand-rights-government/) Dave Brat's views (specifically, I compared and contrasted his views and those of Ayn Rand).

In that post, I quote from a summary of a 2010 paper coauthored by Brat about Rand. That four-page summary is available through (http://www.seinforms.org) Southwest Informs, under "2010 Proceedings," "Papers Listed by Track." (The summary was not available there until June 11, when I contacted the organization and its representatives made it available.) Unfortunately, I have not been able to locate the full paper.

Lynn Stuart Parramore also (http://www.salon.com/2014/06/12/ayn_randian_wingnut_goes_to_washington_the_scary_economic_thinking_of_dave_brat_partner/) went looking for the paper:

We tried to find that paper, which was "presented and published in the proceedings of Southeast Informs, Myrtle Beach, SC, October 6, 2010," but that publishing venue evidently doesn't quite make the cut for Google scholar and JSTOR, so we can only guess at its contents.

But Parramore's remarks are imprecise. Whereas Brat's college page (http://faculty.rmc.edu/dbrat/research.html) claims the 2010 paper was "published in the proceedings of Southeast Informs," the paper was not actually made publicly available. When I asked Ali Nazemi of Southeast Informs if the organization has the full paper, he replied (in a June 11 email), "That [the summary] is all we have. The authors may have the full paper and may have tried to get it published in a journal."

I have contacted Brat via email, both through his campaign and his college email address, but as of yet I have had no reply. Obviously I'm interested in reading the paper, and when and if I get my hands on it I'll write about its contents.

Would Gessler Have Won the GOP Primary with Approval Voting?

June 25, 2014

On Tuesday Colorado Republicans selected Bob Beauprez to run for governor—again. Queue "both ways Bob," queue the "(http://www.9news.com/story/news/politics/2014/03/05/beauprez-clarifies-stance-on-personhood/6098181/) war on women." (I doubt the Democrats will make much of Beauprez's 2007 support for an (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jason-salzman/free-market-writer-still_b_5474776.html) insurance mandate, or his 2000 support for (http://www.freecolorado.com/1999/09/squishgop.html) anti-gun laws.) I predict that he will lose—again (this time to John Hickenlooper, the incumbent). (This is no courageous prediction; I don't think any of the candidates would have been able to beat Hickenlooper, despite his (http://www.denverpost.com/carroll/ci_26004653/carroll-gov-john-hickenloopers-very-bad-day) mishandling of the gun issue. I could be wrong, of course; general antipathy toward Democrats this time around could swing the governor's race.)

What's interesting about the primary vote is that four strong candidates split the vote relatively evenly. With 98 percent of the votes reported, the Denver Post (http://data.denverpost.com/election/results/governor/2014/primary/r/governor/) offers the following results:

In other words, fewer than a third of Colorado Republican primary voters, or a little over 111,000 people (in a state with a (http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/08000.html) population of around 5.3 million people), cast a vote for Beauprez—hardly a popular uprising.

Consider what might have happened under (http://ariarmstrong.com/2011/01/atwood-pitches-approval-voting/) approval voting. The basics of approval voting are straightforward: Each voter gets to vote for as many candidates as he or she "approves" of. The candidate with the most votes wins. For example, if I had voted in this primary under approval voting, I would have cast a vote for both Gessler and Tancredo (despite my deep disagreements with the latter).

Although it's quite possible that Beauprez would have won under approval voting as well, I think there's a good chance Gessler would have won.

Here's my reasoning. Beauprez is the milquetoast, establishment candidate, and I think a lot of people voted for him just because he's tall and grandfatherly, he has congressional experience, and he's not as ornery as Gessler (a quality of Gessler's I find appealing) or as weighed down by baggage as Tancredo. (Kopp was never a leading candidate, despite his incessant YouTube ads.) I think that, under approval voting, many people who voted for Beauprez also would have voted for Gessler. I think that many people who voted for Tancredo also would have voted for Kopp, and vice versa, but that many people who voted for those candidates also would have voted for Gessler as their second choice.  And I think that a disproportionate number of people who voted for Gessler would have voted for a single candidate. In this scenario, Gessler may well have pulled ahead.

Of course, there's no way to know for sure. The only thing we can know for sure at this point is that fewer than a third of Republican voters cast a vote for the Republican nominee for governor, and that doesn't give me much confidence that the outcome accurately reflects voters' preferences.

Those who have a different guess as to what the outcome would have been under approval voting are welcome to explain their reasoning in the comments.

Incidentally, (http://dunafonforgovernor.com) Mike Dunafon is also running for governor, as an independent (and I may well vote for him), and there's also a Libertarian in the race. Although Hick might get more than half of the total votes, he may well win with Beauprez and Dunafon (and the Libertarian) combined earning more than half the votes. If that happens, I will take the opportunity to write yet another post about the benefits of approval voting.

These African Cocoa Bean Producers Had No Idea What the Beans Were Used For

July 30, 2014

A remarkable (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEN4hcZutO0) video from VPRO Metropolis shows what happens when a reporter brings a chocolate bar to cocoa bean farmers from the Ivory Coast—it is the first time the farmers learn what their produce is used to make (hat tip to (http://twistedsifter.com/videos/cocoa-farmers-taste-chocolate-for-first-time/) Twisted Sifter). Some of the men thought the beans were used to make wine. One of the farmers says of chocolate bars (apparently in perfect seriousness), "This is why white people are so healthy." One thing the video demonstrates is how people, interacting through global markets, can cooperate to mutual benefit without even knowing how they're benefitting their trading partners. Of course, it also shows how communication technologies can help people, including chocolate lovers, become more educated about the world around them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEN4hcZutO0

Obama Threatens to Punish Companies over Legal Tax Avoidance

July 30, 2014

Again following in the footsteps of FDR, Barack Obama is threatening to take political action against U.S. companies that justifiably seek to legally reduce their onerous U.S. tax burdens. Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/07/28/us-usa-tax-shay-idUSKBN0FX07W20140728) reports, "Obama could bypass congressional gridlock and restrict foreign tax-domiciled U.S companies from using inter-company loans and interest deductions to cut their U.S. tax bills." At issue are so-called "inversions." What are those, you ask? Investopedia (http://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/corporateinversion.asp) states, "Re-incorporating a company overseas in order to reduce the tax burden on income earned abroad. Corporate inversion as a strategy is used by companies that receive a significant portion of their income from foreign sources, since that income is taxed both abroad and in the country of incorporation. Companies undertaking this strategy are likely to select a country that has lower tax rates and less stringent corporate governance requirements." Alternately, the U.S. government could stop chasing companies oversees with (http://taxfoundation.org/blog/another-study-confirms-us-has-one-highest-effective-corporate-tax-rates-world) insanely burdensome corporate taxation.

Why Sam Harris Sides with Israel over Hamas

July 30, 2014

In a remarkable (http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/why-dont-i-criticize-israel) article and podcast, Sam Harris explains why he sides with Israel over Hamas. Among other things, Harris notes, "The charter of Hamas is explicitly genocidal." He further points out that, while Hamas intentionally tries to kill Israelis and Palestinians alike, Israel tries to minimize civilian casualties and, if it could, the nation's residents would be more than happy to live in peace. Although not everything Harris writes makes sense—most prominently, he inappropriately blames Israel for civilian casualties that are necessitated by Hamas's violence—overall his article is excellent.

Why Some Libertarians Hate America and Israel More than They Hate Hamas

July 30, 2014

Yaron Brook of the Ayn Rand Institute (http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2014/07/29/hamas-a-litmus-test-for-libertarians/) offers a great analysis of why some libertarians hate America and Israel more than they hate Hamas and other totalitarian gangs:

I think that the libertarians who tend to be anti-Israel . . . tend to be anarchists. They tend to have a deep rooted hatred of government. And it's interesting [because] they tend to hate free governments more than they hate totalitarian governments. They tend to focus their hatred much more on the American government [and] on the Israeli government than they do on Hamas. . . .

Thanks to Walter Hudson for (http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2014/07/29/hamas-a-litmus-test-for-libertarians/) transcribing some of Brook's remarks from the (http://www.peikoff.com/2014/07/28/to-yb-why-are-so-many-libertarians-anti-israel/) original audio.

Paul Ryan and the American Enterprise Institute Endorse the Welfare State

July 30, 2014

With his new anti-poverty plan, Paul Ryan explicitly endorses the welfare state (which he calls a "safety net"), (http://www.aei-ideas.org/2014/07/the-ryan-pro-work-anti-poverty-plan-thomas-aquinas-1-ayn-rand-0/) notes James Pethokoukis for the American Enterprise Institute—and so does Pethokoukis. Don Watkins of the Ayn Rand Institute (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/07/28/paul-ryans-new-antipoverty-plan-would-be-a-modest-improvement-but-we-can-do-better) replies that a coercive welfare state is immoral, although a voluntarily funded "safety net" is not. Pethokoukis (http://www.aei-ideas.org/2014/07/ayn-rand-vs-paul-ryan/) replies that he and AEI emphatically support the welfare state, although a modified one, and think it's not going away.

CO Supreme Court Puts Boulder Gay Marriages on Hold

July 30, 2014

Boulder County, which has issued a couple hundred marriage licenses to gay couples this summer, must stop issuing such licenses at least for now, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled. Related legal action is pending. The Associated Press has the (http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/top-colorado-court-halts-gay-marriages-boulder-24764016) report; hat tip to (http://www.completecolorado.com) Complete Colorado.

Amazon Explains Rationale for Cheaper Ebooks

July 30, 2014

Amazon recently explained its rationale for wanting ebook prices set at $9.99 or less, as Jillian D'Onfro (http://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-hachette-ebook-pricing-2014-7) writes for Business Insider: "The company says it's found that e-books priced at $9.99 sell 1.74 [times] more copies than when they're priced at $14.99." (Hat tip to (http://www.philosophyinaction.com) Diana Hsieh.) Unfortunately, Amazon also beats up publisher Hachette over the government's antitrust persecution of that company and others. For why the government's antitrust action against publishers was immoral, see my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2013/08/the-governments-obscene-assault-on-apple/) post for The Objective Standard.

The Consequences of Power Shortages in Developing Nations

July 30, 2014

Here in America, anti-fracking activists wouldn't dream of going home and finding their lights didn't work, their cars didn't run, their refrigerators didn't cool. But in many parts of the world energy shortages are a routine part of life—and they can be impoverishing and even deadly. Kenneth P. Green (http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/kenneth-p-green/energy-poverty_b_5628465.html) quotes one observer: "Lack of power means so many things. It means women giving birth in the dark, children who either cannot study at night or don't go to school, and business that cannot function."

Fans of Harry Potter More Likely to Overcome Bigotry

July 30, 2014

"Kids who identify with the hero of J.K. Rowling's popular fantasy novels hold more open-minded attitudes toward immigrants and gays," (http://www.psmag.com/navigation/books-and-culture/harry-potter-battle-bigotry-87002/) reports Pacific Standard (hat tip to (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/265578/speedreads-study-finds-kids-who-read-harry-potter-books-become-more-tolerant-of-minority-groups) The Week). This is hardly surprising, given the strong anti-bigotry themes of the books. Incidentally, I discuss the various themes of the Potter novels in depth in my book, Values of Harry Potter—which would make a spectacular gift for the young reader in your life.

U.S., EU Impose Energy Sanctions on Russia in Response to Ukraine Involvement

July 30, 2014

In response to "a stark escalation by Russia in the insurgency in eastern Ukraine," U.S. and European governments imposed new sanctions on Russia "to curtail Russia's access to Western technology as it seeks to tap new Arctic, deep sea and shale oil reserves," the (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/30/world/europe/european-sanctions-russia.html) New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/30/world/europe/european-sanctions-russia.html) reports (hat tip to (http://theweek.com) The Week). No doubt the sanctions will hurt Russia—and they will also hurt American and European developers and consumers of energy. Of course, if the rest of Europe would get on board with the fracking revolution, other nations wouldn't be so dependent on Russian energy; see David Biederman's (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/05/european-fracking-bans-fuel-russias-ambition-conquest/) report for The Objective Standard.

In China, Muslim Terrorists Clash with Communist Police

July 30, 2014

Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-07-29/dozens-of-xinjiang-attackers-shot-dead-by-police-xinhua-says.html) describes bomb and knife attacks and police retaliations that "left dozens of people dead in China's turbulent Xinjiang region, marking a new escalation of violence with the ethnic Uighur minority." And who are the Uighur? The BBC is (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-22278037) glad you asked: "The Uighurs are Muslims. . . . In the early part of the 20th Century, the Uighurs briefly declared independence. The region was brought under the complete control of communist China in 1949." Hat tip to (http://theweek.com) The Week.

Coloradans Rally to "Stop the EPA Power Grab"

July 30, 2014

Agents of the Environmental Protection Agency are in Denver to promote the agency's restrictions on carbon-emitting power generation. Yesterday hundreds of Coloradans rallied to "stop the EPA power grab"; the Denver Post has the (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26238611/denver-protests-over-proposed-epa-power-plant-rules) story. However, Eli Stokols (http://kdvr.com/2014/07/29/environmentalists-flood-epa-hearing-on-carbon-rules-in-denver/) reports for Fox31 the hearings were "dominated by the environmentalists." Dustin Zvonek of Americans for Prosperity make some (http://americansforprosperity.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/AFP-CO-EPA-Document-.pdf) pro-energy remarks at the hearings.

A More Efficient Welfare State Still Violates Rights: On Paul Ryan's Plan

July 30, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/paul-ryans-anti-poverty-program-america-needs-vein/) article on Paul Ryan's anti-poverty proposal. Here's the summary: "If Ryan's plan reduces welfare dependency and gives taxpayers better results for their dollars, it might represent a marginal improvement over current policy. But it is still riddled with political and moral problems." See also (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/07/paul-ryan-and-the-american-enterprise-institute-endorse-the-welfare-state/) yesterday's post on the subject.

Right to Bear Arms Protected in Nation's Capital

July 30, 2014

What, you mean the U.S. Constitution still means something in the nation's capital? Sometimes, yes. As Dave Kopel (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/07/28/licensed-handgun-carry-now-legal-in-district-of-columbia-palmer-v-dc/) reports, "the United States District Court for the District of Columbia ruled unconstitutional the District's absolute prohibition on the carrying of handguns outside the home for lawful self-defense."

Colorado Gun Sales Normalize as Practice Shooting Increases

July 30, 2014

"Gun purchases in Colorado have fallen by more than a third this year, after an unprecedented surge of buying last year," (http://www.cpr.org/news/story/colorado-gun-sales-stabilize-after-panic-fueled-spike) reports Ben Markus for Colorado Public Radio. Meanwhile, "Colorado Springs-area shooting centers gaining in popularity," (http://gazette.com/colorado-springs-area-shooting-centers-gaining-in-popularity/article/1534391) reports the Gazette. In related news, the new Colorado universal background-registration law has generated only a small fraction of the private-sale checks that Democrats predicted, (http://www.denverpost.com/News/Local/ci_26219796/Analysis:-Colorado-gun-law-based-on-flawed-estimate) reports the Denver Post (via the Associated Press).

So Now ObamaCare Is a "Tax" But Not One to Raise Revenues

July 30, 2014

You may recall the Supreme Court ruled ObamaCare constitutional on the basis that it's a tax—see Dave Kopel's (http://ariarmstrong.com/2012/07/kopel-on-obamacare-scotus-ruling/) discussion of that ruling. But now the D.C Circuit Court has ruled that, although ObamaCare is a tax for purposes of its Constitutionality, it is not a revenue-generating tax for purposes of the Origination Clause. Article I, Section 7 of the Constitution states, "All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives"; ObamaCare originated in the Senate. So not only is ObamaCare a "Seinfeld tax on nothing," as Kopel says, it's a tax that's not really a tax. The courts in these matters are completely failing to uphold the letter and spirit of the Constitution. See Heritage's (http://dailysignal.com/2014/07/30/wasnt-tax-tax-court-upholds-obamacare-individual-mandate/) report, Timothy Sandefur's (http://blog.pacificlegal.org/2014/d-c-circuit-rules-obamacare-tax-isnt-bill-raising-revenue/) blog post on the recent ruling (Sandefur pursued the case), and Sandefur's (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoYmChQc4iA) video about the same.

Wage Controls Still Violate People's Rights, Kristen Bell's Mary Poppins Routine Notwithstanding

July 30, 2014

Kristen Bell is a great actor and singer but a terrible economist and political scientist. In my Objective Standard blog post I (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/kristen-bells-spoonful-coercion/) take her to task for advocating a higher minimum wage.

Welcome to Rational Beacon

July 30, 2014

Rational Beacon is an aggregator of news and views of interest especially to people who advocate reason and individual rights. Rational Beacon was founded by Ari Armstrong, and the site and its trademarks, including "Rational Beacon," are owned by Ari Armstrong. Unless otherwise marked, all posts are written and copyrighted by Ari Armstrong. Although there are currently no plans to turn Rational Beacon into anything more than an aggregation service, it's possible the future may hold more in store.

September 7, 2014 Update: On August 19, I discontinued posting to Rational Beacon; see the (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/wrapping-up-rational-beacon/) explanatory post. Today I imported all the posts to AriArmstrong.com, and eventually I'll delete the contents at RationalBeacon.com. -Ari

The Way Bloomberg's "Everytown" Gun Ad Should Have Ended

July 31, 2014

The victim disarmament group Everytown for Gun Safety recently published a video showing a man breaking into his ex-wife's house, seizing their son, and shooting the woman. The point of the ad is that, if the man hadn't had a gun, he wouldn't have been able to shoot his ex-wife. However, If the man hadn't had a gun, he still would have been able to break in, kidnap the couple's son, and harm or murder his ex-wife with a knife, bar, or other weapon. Moreover, disarmament laws would not have stopped him from getting a gun illegally. What likely would have helped, as Dan Cannon (http://gunssavelives.net/blog/video-youtuber-fixes-everytown-domestic-abuse-ad-with-a-little-taste-of-defensive-gun-usage/) points out, is if the woman had had a gun and the training to use it effectively: "Who was the woman on the phone with? The police. The police have guns. She was begging someone with a gun to come and save her, most likely by shooting the suspect (her ex). If she had a gun, she could have been that good guy with a gun." On YouTube, CoyoteTrails edited the ad to show what should have happened:

August 1 Update: "The (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoDjNHgeHek) video is no longer available due to copyright claim by Everytown for Gun Safety." I guess the organization found the edited video too effective a rebuttal. Anyway, the edited video showed a man breaking into his ex-wife's house, the woman opening her gun safe and retrieving her handgun, the woman warning the man, and the woman firing her gut at the man—the end.

Colorado DMV Expects to Issue Thousands of Drivers Licenses to Illegal Immigrants

July 31, 2014

"Colorado is one of eight states that enacted laws in 2013 allowing undocumented immigrants to apply for [drivers] licenses," Jennifer Oldham (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-07-31/colorado-overwhelmed-by-immigrant-license-requests.html) reports for Bloomberg, and the "DMV expects to process 9,551 applicants through September." Hat tip to (https://twitter.com/MelissaTweets/status/494899145044656128) Melissa Clouthier. I'm on record as supporting (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/myths-facts-rights-respecting-immigration-policy/) open immigration for rights-respecting people who pass through appropriate check points; I have no developed opinion regarding the state programs in question. The obvious concern is that states may be issuing official government licenses to people whom the federal government has not cleared as posing no threat to others.

"Sierra Leone Bans Public Meetings" over Ebola Outbreak

July 31, 2014

Sierra Leone's president declared a state of emergency in his west African country, banning all public meetings and mobilizing troops to quarantine the homes of Ebola victims, as the World Health Organization reports that the death toll from the latest outbreak of the virus has jumped to 729," USA Today (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/07/31/ebola-sierra-leone-emergency-meetings/13407731/) reports. But how dangerous is the disease even for those in the most-affected areas? (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/11000309/The-deadliest-Ebola-outbreak-in-history.html) According to the Telegraph, the recent outbreak has led to "1200 suspected cases so far across Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone." Sierra Leone has a population of some (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sierra_Leone) six million people (Colorado has around (http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/08000.html) 5.3 million, by comparison). No doubt if hundreds of people died of a viral infection in Colorado, people would be freaking out. The outbreak leads to two important questions: What should governments do about this and other outbreaks, and what should individuals do? Prudence counsels that families keep on hand at least a short-term store of emergency supplies (including water and food), just in case. Meanwhile, those who want to learn more about the ebola virus may see (http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs103/en/) WHO's fact sheet.

IRS's Lois Lerner Targeted Conservative "Crazies"

July 31, 2014

Shocking, but not surprising: "The House Ways and Means Committee [yesterday] released emails from Lois Lerner, former head of the Internal Revenue Service's tax-exempt organizations division, in which she uses a vulgar anatomical expletive to refer to conservatives and says 'it's our own crazies that will take us down,'" Heritage (http://dailysignal.com/2014/07/30/irs-emails-lois-lerner-calls-conservatives-crazies-worse/) reports. You can read the (http://waysandmeans.house.gov/uploadedfiles/lerner_email_a.pdf) emails in question, dated 2012, via the Ways and Means committee. Lerner criticized, among others, people claiming "we've bankrupted ourselves" and "we'll never be able to pay off our debt and are going down the tubes." Memo to Lerner: It is out-of-control government bureaucrats and the politicians who enable them who threaten to take us down.

Court Ruling Preserves Lone Mississippi Abortion Clinic

July 31, 2014

As Diana Hsieh and I discuss in "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2011-winter/abortion-rights/) The Assault on Abortion Rights Undermines All Our Liberties," conservatives in various states have sought to regulate abortion clinics out of existence, thereby borrowing a political tactic the left commonly uses in other contexts. The Onion satirizes such laws: "(http://www.theonion.com/articles/new-antiabortion-legislation-requires-doctors-to-s,36514/) New Anti-Abortion Legislation Requires Doctors To Scale 18-Foot Wall Surrounding Clinic." Partly as a consequence of such laws, Mississippi has only a single abortion clinic—Jackson Women's Health Organization—which nearly shut down when its doctor was  unable to obtain admitting privileges to a local hospital, as state law requires, as Emily Le Coz (http://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2014/07/29/court-rules-in-favor-of-miss-abortion-clinic/13322317/) reports for the Clarion-Ledger. But, as Le Coz reports, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently upheld a preliminary injunction against the law in question, (perhaps) "essentially dooming the state law that had threatened to close" the clinic.

Rand Paul Seeks to Lesson Damage of Drug War

July 31, 2014

Rand Paul seems serious about reducing the harm of the war on drugs. Consider these recent headlines from StopTheDrugWar.org: "(http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2014/jul/24/rand_paul_files_medical_marijuan) Rand Paul Files Medical Marijuana Amendment," "(http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2014/jul/25/rand_paul_files_asset_forfeiture) Rand Paul Files Asset Forfeiture Reform Bill," and "(http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2014/jul/29/rand_paul_files_crack_sentencing) Rand Paul Files Crack Sentencing Reform Bill." Good for him.

On Blogging and the Information Explosion

July 31, 2014

What's the point of creating Rational Beacon as another aggregator of news and views? In times past, the problem for readers was the paucity of information; today it is the hyperabundance of information. A chart illustrating "(http://anotherdamnblog.com/index.php/the-explosion-of-digital-data/) The Explosion of Digital Data" fundamentally altered my thinking about producing and consuming information in the digital age; see also "(http://www.sciencemag.org/content/332/6025/60) The World's Technological Capacity to Store, Communicate, and Compute Information." In a world of hyperabundant information, writers can help readers by essentializing and condensing information and by filtering information. My hope is that Rational Beacon will effectively serve those functions for select readers. In brief, I spend a lot of time reading news and opinions so that you can spend a short amount of time doing so.

"Billionaire's Club" Funds Bogus "Anti-Fossil Energy Message"

July 31, 2014

According to the Minority Staff of the United States Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, a "close knit network of likeminded funders, environmental activists, and government bureaucrats . . . specialize in manufacturing phony 'grassroots' movements and in promoting bogus propaganda disguised as science and news to spread an anti-fossil energy message to the unknowing public." See the Complete Colorado (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/07/30/senate-report-highlights-colorado-nexus-of-environmental-efforts-billionaire-funds/) report for details, or see the Senate report itself, titled, "(http://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=8af3d005-1337-4bc3-bcd6-be947c523439) How a Club of Billionaires and Their Foundations Control the Environmental Movement and Obama's EPA."

Reisman on Piketty's Program for Economic Stagnation and Decline

July 31, 2014

Economist George Reisman recently published a twenty-thousand word (http://georgereismansblog.blogspot.com/2014/07/pikettys-capital-wrong_28.html) reply to Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century. Reisman writes, "Over the course of several generations, the US government has taxed away trillions upon trillions of dollars that otherwise would have been saved and invested and thereby added to the capital of the American economy. . . . The government's massive assault on the supply of capital has begun to transform the American economic system from one of continuous economic progress and generally rising living standards into one of stagnation and outright decline." Of course, Piketty's program to "help" the less well-off consists of expanding government's assault on capital. If after reading Reisman's lengthy essay you find yourself hungry for more, you can find Reisman's double-column, thousand-page book, (http://www.capitalism.net) Capitalism, for free online.

Colorado Senator King Faces Felony Charges over Time Cards

July 31, 2014

Until recently, Colorado state senator Steve King was running for Mesa County sheriff as his legislative term winds down. But, amid accusations that he falsified time cards while contracting with the sheriff's office, he dropped out of the race; a vacancy committee (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26196712/mesa-county-republicans-choose-new-candidate-replace-steve) found a replacement. Now, as Nancy Lofholm (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26246364/state-sen-steve-king-charged-three-felonies) reports for the Denver Post, King has been charged with "three felonies and two misdemeanors for allegedly falsifying time cards, theft and failing to report income as required of state legislators." As a Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/Opinion/ci_26132765/Sen-Steve-Kings-timecard-trouble) editorial pointed out, King seems not only to have billed over sixty hours per week at one point, but he seems to have asked for mileage and reimbursement on days off. Maybe there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for the apparent discrepancies, or maybe King played fast and loose with his paperwork. At any rate, at least Mesa County will hire a new sheriff who is not to my knowledge operating under a legal cloud.

Congress Sues Over "Lawlessness of this President"

July 31, 2014

"The House on Wednesday approved a highly contentious lawsuit against President Obama over his alleged abuse of executive power," Fox (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/07/30/house-approves-lawsuit-against-obama-over-alleged-abuse-executive-power/) reports. Colorado Congressman Doug Lamborn said, ""The people's representatives will not turn a blind eye to the lawlessness of this president. We will do whatever it takes to hold him and future occupants of the Oval Office accountable." It's unclear to me whether the move is purely political, or if the suit might actually go somewhere legally.

Zen Magnets Stands Up to Abusive Government Agency

August 1, 2014

Shihan Qu, owner of Denver-based Zen Magnets, is a modern-day hero of liberty. The Consumer Product Safety Commission has waged a relentless campaign to put sellers of super-magnet educational products out of business, but Qu is fighting back. He (http://reason.com/blog/2014/07/31/cpsc-still-trying-to-crush-buckyballs-la) told Brian Doherty of Reason magazine:

[CPSC needs] . . . to be reminded of the standard of liberty in this country. . . .

CPSC is arguing that warnings don't work, which has incredibly vast policy implications. . . . Warnings are a sort of agreement a customer accepts upon use of a product. And by assuming that people cannot follow . . . instructions to keep magnets away from children and mouths, they are assuming the American Population is not capable of deciding for themselves. They are taking your right to consent, and fleecing your freedom to do as you will.

We're the last line of defense, and if Zen Magnets doesn't stand up, the CPSC gains a remarkable amount of power from consumers. . . .

The government has already shut down Buckyballs, another (former) seller of the magnets, and now it is forcing a recall; see the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/business/after-two-year-fight-consumer-agency-orders-recall-of-buckyballs.html) report. See also my previous posts on the subject for the Objective Standard:

Government Doesn't Need to Regulate Edible Marijuana Potency

August 1, 2014

As the Associated Press (http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/apnewsbreak-colorado-tightening-edible-pot-rules-24799157) reports, "Colorado regulators have drafted an emergency rule"—expected to take effect in November—requiring sellers of edible marijuana to sell products with clearly marked "''servings' of 10 milligrams of THC." I agree it's a very good idea for sellers to let their customers know the levels of THC they're ingesting. But the goal hardly requires government regulations. Most consumers want to know doses, creating a market for sellers to provide the doses. Sellers who misrepresent the dosages of their products may be sued. So government should be involved only at the judicial level, not the regulatory level. The regulations will inevitably have harmful consequences for some consumers. As the AP reports, "stronger-dosed edibles are holdovers from the medical pot marketplace, where sellers say consumers who have built up strong tolerances won't buy anything that has a dosage less than 100 milligrams of THC." Cancer patients shouldn't have to eat ten brownies to get the dosages they need. People have a moral right to seek higher-dosage "servings" if they want, and sellers have a moral right to offer them (but not to fraudulently or negligently mislabel them).

When Will DAs Start Prosecuting Abusive Cops?

August 1, 2014

In many respects, America has two sets of de facto laws: one set for regular people, another for police officers. Police officers routinely and seriously violate people's rights—as by invading their homes without good reason, killing their pets, and assaulting them—and at most, rarely, they get fired from their jobs. Of course most cops are very good people and good at their jobs, but obviously not all of them are. If regular people acted violently the way some police officers act, they'd quickly face criminal prosecution. Not only do police officers hardly ever face criminal prosecution for their crimes, they hardly ever face any penalty of consequence. The Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/editorials/ci_26253604/denver-sheriffs-deputy-received-slap-wrist-assaulting-inmate) discusses a recent example. In court, a Denver sheriff's deputy slammed an inmate "face-first into a metal window frame"—possibly a criminal act as defined by law. If you or I did that to someone, we'd be sitting behind bars. The deputy got a thirty-day suspension. When will district attorneys get serious about their jobs and prosecute abusive cops for the crimes they commit?

A Suit? How about Repeal ObamaCare?

August 1, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my blog post, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/congress-rather-sue/) What Congress Should Do Rather than Sue." I write, "Congress has the power to repeal ObamaCare and to begin rolling back government controls of health care. For example, Congress could not only repeal the rights-violating mandates that force individuals to purchase insurance and employers to provide it; Congress could also put an end to the use of the tax code to punish people for purchasing insurance directly." In his post on the subject, Erick Erickson (http://www.redstate.com/2014/07/07/the-house-gop-should-man-up-instead-of-resorting-to-political-theater-in-the-courts/) offers a great quote by Madison explaining how and why Congress controls the purse; it begins, "The House of Representatives cannot only refuse, but they alone can propose, the supplies requisite for the support of government."

On Climate, Ice Cream, and Gender Slurs

August 1, 2014

Writing for the Washington Times, Jennifer Harper (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/31/exercise-journalism-climate-change-tempest-and-one/) describes the recent exchange between writer Valerie Richardson and CNN correspondent Bill Weir. Here's the sequence:

Of course Weir is correct about the difference between climate and weather—a given day can be unusually hot or cold regardless of overall climate trends. Unfortunately for Weir, there is some evidence that the (http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2014/04/30/twenty-years-of-winter-cooling-defy-global-warming-claims/) climate has actually cooled in recent years.

The climate debate aside, how come Weir can get away with using a slur referring to a penis? If a right-winger had called a left-winger the "c-word," he'd have been crucified.

Morning Headlines 8/1/14

August 1, 2014

"(http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/08/01/gaza-crisis-humanitarian-cease-fire-underway/) Gaza cease-fire unravels"—that didn't take long.

"(http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/07/31/wisconsin-union-law-scott-walker/13398983/) Wisconsin [Supreme Court] backs Walker, controversial union law"—good news for fiscal conservatives.

"(http://michellemalkin.com/2014/07/31/the-environmental-corruption-agency/) The EPA is a toxic waste dump for lawlessness and disdain for the Constitution," says Mark Levin, as quoted by Michelle Malkin. Did the EPA seek to influence the 2012 presidential election?

(http://thecoloradoobserver.com/2014/08/the-colorado-observer-ceases-publication/) The Colorado Observer Ceases Publication

Help Support "No on 67" Policy Paper against "Personhood"

August 1, 2014

As those who follow my work know, I've written extensively against the so-called "personhood" proposals that seek to grant full legal rights to embryos and fetuses from the moment of conception. Diana Hsien and I coauthored a (http://www.seculargovernment.us/a67.shtml) 2010 paper on the subject; we wrote a broader (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2011-winter/abortion-rights/) article for The Objective Standard; and I wrote a (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2013/10/colorado-personhood-measure-would-outlaw-all-abortions-and-more/) follow-up article for TOS's blog. Now Hsieh is raising funds for her and me to update the 2010 paper in order to discuss the 2014 Colorado "personhood" ballot measure, officially Amendment 67. To read about the effort and to contribute funds to it, see the (http://www.seculargovernment.us/a67.shtml) page at the Coalition for Secular Government.

Immigration Restrictions Arose with Progressive Social Engineering

August 1, 2014

Cato's Alex Nowrasteh penned a new article for National Review, "(http://www.nationalreview.com/article/384150/conservative-case-immigration-reform-alex-nowrasteh) The Conservative Case for Immigration Reform." He offers a brief account of immigration laws in America:

The first naturalization law, passed in 1790, did not put any restrictions on immigration. It wasn't until 1882 that Congress, in its first major legislative restriction, passed a blanket ban on Chinese immigrants. Over the next 40 years, Congress passed laws banning immigration of the Japanese and illiterates, and it imposed low quotas on immigration from European countries whose members were supposedly "unassimilable"—all at the insistence of nationalists, labor unions, progressives, and eugenicists. . . .

During the 1950s, the Bracero guest-worker visa program channeled migrants into a legal and regulated market, shrinking the illegal-immigrant population by 90 percent. . . .

The immigration restrictions of the late 19th and early 20th centuries were a vast social-engineering experiment that departed from America's traditional open immigration policy. In contrast, allowing immigration to mostly be guided by the market would be a rejection of the social-engineering impulse that arose out of the Progressive era.

Although I have not personally researched the history of America's immigration laws, Nowrasteh's account seems reliable. One modern guest-worker proposal is the "(http://redcardsolution.com) Red Card Solution," promoted by Helen Krieble. Recently I've written a four-part series on immigration for The Objective Standard: see parts (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/rational-morality-requires-amnesty-rights-respecting-illegal-immigrants/) one, (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/rights-respecting-immigration-policy-muslims/) two, (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/mass-illegal-immigration-central-american-children-u-s-created-crisis/) three, and (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/myths-facts-rights-respecting-immigration-policy/) four.

Udall Calls for Resignation of CIA Director Brennan

August 1, 2014

Today Colorado Senator Mark Udall "demanded the resignation of CIA Director John Brennan in response to a new watchdog report that concluded that CIA officers improperly accessed computer files and records used by the Senate Intelligence Committee," the Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26253081/udall-calls-resignation-cia-director-senate-spying-scandal) reports (hat tip to (http://www.completecolorado.com) Complete Colorado). See also CNN's (http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/31/politics/cia-spying-senate-apologize/index.html) report. This might be the only issue on which I've agreed with Udall lately, but it's an important one. A federal agency spying on Congress? Outrageous. My main remaining question is why the agents in question are not now sitting in a prison cell, or at least awaiting their criminal trial.

Under Government Force CA Health Premiums Increase "Only" 4.2 Percent

August 1, 2014

"California officials said the more than 1.2 million consumers in the state-run Obamacare insurance exchange can expect modest price increases of 4.2% on average next year," (http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-obamacare-2015-rates-20140801-story.html) reports the Los Angeles Times. Of course, the fact that government can "negotiate" with insurers using brute force may have something to do with the lower-than-average increases. But starving insurance companies of premiums won't keep the costs of health care from going up; it will only cause insurance companies to offer worse coverage or worse service. And if government artificially forces down the costs of health care, that will cause doctors to offer worse care or less service. Government can control prices (to some extent), but it can't escape the inevitable economic consequences. If we want better services and lower prices, we must demand a free market in medicine.

The Rise of Nationalism and Anti-Semitism in Europe

August 2, 2014

Some recent headlines sound hauntingly familiar. As the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/hungarys-illiberal-turn-1406829873) reports, Hungary's prime minister Viktor Orban has explicitly endorsed "an illiberal new state based on national foundations." That doesn't sound new to me. The Journal reports that Orban "went on to cite Russia, Turkey and China as successful models to emulate." Meanwhile, "an explicitly neo-Nazi party" called Jobbik has been formed there, the Journal reports. Elsewhere, as the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/02/world/europe/anger-in-europe-over-the-israeli-gaza-conflict-reverberates-as-anti-semitism.html) reports, German Chancellor Angela Merkel fears "a new anti-Semitism being strutted on the street"; the newspaper also published a photograph of protesters in Paris who had painted a Nazi swastika on a wall. A German university professor quoted by the paper sees "a startling indifference in the German public to the current display of anti-Semitism." These trends are ominous.

Welfare State Violates Rights, AEI's Claims Notwithstanding

August 2, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my critique of the American Enterprise Institute's position on the welfare state (at least as expressed by its president and two of its writers): "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/aei-writer-invokes-implicit-contract-fantasies-excuse-government-coercion/) AEI Writer Invokes 'Implicit Contract' and other Fantasies to Excuse Government Coercion." Whereas representatives of AEI claim the welfare state is beneficial and moral, I point out it "relies on coercive, rights-violating confiscations of wealth."

U.S. Bureaucrats Watch TV and Porn at Taxpayer Expense

August 2, 2014

An employee of the Federal Communications Commission watched a day's worth of porn every week "out of boredom," (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/265698/speedreads-government-employees-say-theyre-only-watching-porn-at-work-because-theyre-bored) reports Bonnie Kristian for the Week. Meanwhile, "paralegals at the U.S. Patent and Trademark office were paid salaries as high as $80,000 per year, with $3,500 annual bonuses, while spending their days watching TV and doing the dishes at home, with the full knowledge of their supervisors," Kristian reports. See the reports by the (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/31/feds-accept-bordom-lack-of-work-as-excuses-for-sur/) Washington Times and the (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2014/07/31/federal-paralegals-had-no-work-so-they-surfed-the-internet/) Washington Post for details. Meanwhile, Watchdog Wire (http://watchdogwire.com/colorado/2014/08/01/patent-and-trademark-office-satellite/) dings Colorado Senators Mark Udall and Michael Bennet for requesting new field offices for the patent office, a move that apparently would allow even more bureaucrats can screw off at taxpayers' expense. (Hat tip to (http://www.completecolorado.com) Complete Colorado.) So long as the FCC exists, it's probably better that their bureaucrats are wasting time rather than harassing Americans. Offhand I can think of no legitimate reason for the FCC to exist. But doesn't the patent office have important work to do, protecting people's intellectual property?

North Korea Detains Americans

August 2, 2014

"Over the past 18 months, 'North Korea detained several U.S. citizens who were part of organized tours," (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/2-americans-detained-north-korea-seek-us-help) reports the Associated Press, based on U.S. travel warnings (hat tip to the (http://theweek.com) Week). Why anyone from the civilized world would go to North Korea as a tourist is beyond me.

Is Homeland Security Enforcing Emissions Standards?

August 2, 2014

The story is so bizarre I have a hard time believing it's true: A North Carolina couple reports the Department of Homeland Security seized their imported, $60,000 Land Rover because it might not have complied with emissions standards for imported cars, as Steve Ohnesorge (http://www.wbtv.com/story/26075071/woman-has-questions-after-agents-seize-land-rovers) reports for WBTV (hat tip to (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/01/federal-agents-storm-couples-property-seize-60000-car-violating-emissions-standards/) Heritage). According to the report, some sellers of import cars doctor the VIN numbers to make them appear older; emissions standards vary by the car's age. Is the story true? If it is, why is Homeland Security enforcing emissions standards? Come to think of it, why do we even have emissions standards? Regardless, wasn't there a more graceful way for the government to handle the alleged problem? Sheesh!

Why People in America Almost Certainly Won't Get Ebola

August 2, 2014

The Ebola outbreak in Africa certainly is frightening, and it's a horrible tragedy for those affected. However, people in America are at very low risk of contracting the disease, according to doctors quoted by Lenny Bernstein in his Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/08/01/why-youre-not-going-to-get-ebola-in-the-u-s/) story. The difference is basically that Americans have better health practices and better health care—one of the many benefits of living in a wealthier nation. For example, Bernstein notes, some people in Africa "bury their own dead family members or friends" who have Ebola. Amesh Adalja of the Infectious Disease Society of America points out that Americans are more likely (although still very unlikely) to contract other infectious diseases, such as Lassa fever and bird flu, Bernstein reports. (Hat tip to Paul Hsieh.)

Uganda Court Tosses Anti-Gay Law

August 2, 2014

"Uganda's constitutional court on Friday overturned an anti-homosexuality law that punished gay sex with long prison sentences," Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/01/uganda-homosexuals-idUSL6N0Q731V20140801) reports (hat tip to the (http://theweek.com) Week). Obviously that's an improvement—but the fact the law was passed in the first place offers a reminder of how oppressive many of the governments in the world are.

See Guardians of the Galaxy

August 3, 2014

How could a movie featuring a talking raccoon, a walking tree, a green lady, a overly-literal hulk, and a guy named "Starlord" be any good? The latest Marvel outing makes such a film work with Guardians of the Galaxy by blending silly humor with heartfelt drama and plenty of action, featuring great actors, and hiring a great effects crew. Sure, the premise is a little thin—the story revolves around a small magical rock—and the universe is sometimes mind-numbingly complex. But at its heart Guardians is a buddy film, and the friendships work. The Associated Press (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/guardians-rockets-top-box-office-94m) reports the film will earn an estimated $94 million on opening weekend. Paul Dergarabedian of Rentrak told the AP, "[F]or Marvel to have four films this year [including Guardian] open with over $90 million is amazing. It's unprecedented success."

A Burrito Is a "Sandwich" so New York Can Tax It

August 3, 2014

Noah Veltman, a student of obscure government regulations, (http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/06/26/325803580/what-burritos-and-sandwiches-can-teach-us-about-innovation) tells NPR: "My new home state of New York has a special tax category for sandwiches. And because they have that, it means they then have to go and define what they think a sandwich is. So they publish this memo that explains that a sandwich includes club sandwiches and BLTs, but they also include hot dogs and they include burritos and they include gyros. And then you have to sort of say, are burritos really a sandwich?" See also NPR's follow-up (http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/07/18/332612643/episode-554-how-the-burrito-became-a-sandwich) podcast on the subject. (Hat tip to Paul Hsieh.)

Why Hamas is Morally Responsible for the Deaths in Gaza

August 3, 2014

Craig Biddle, publisher of the Objective Standard (where I'm an associate editor), published an (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/hamas-lefts-pretense-deaths-innocents-gaza/) article today succinctly pointing out that the deaths in Gaza are Hamas's fault. Biddle writes, "Hamas is morally responsible for the deaths and destruction resulting from the retaliatory force necessitated by Hamas's assaults on Israel."

The "Logic" of Gun-Free Zones

August 3, 2014

Two funny stories have floated around social media for years. (I suspect both were made up.) According to the first, a woman complains about daylight savings time because the extra hour of sunlight cooks her grass. According to the second, someone complains that "wildlife crossing" signs are badly placed, because the wildlife crossings in those locations create hazards for drivers. The error is the same in both cases: A person wrongly thinks a description of something changes the underlying reality of what's going on. It occurred to me that people who advocate so-called "gun-free zones" commit a similar error, in that they imagine that decreeing an area "gun free" will somehow stop criminals from using guns in those areas.

Russia Begins Registration and Censorship of Bloggers

August 3, 2014

Any Russian blogger who attracts more than 3,000 daily readers must now register with the government—no more anonymous free speech—and comply with government regulations, including bans on profanity and liability for statements the government deems incorrect, (http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/08/01/russia_bans_dissident_blogging_and_bloggers_today.html) reports Mark Joseph Stern for Slate. The mere fact that bloggers now must register with the government chills free speech, for it signals government will crack down on any speech the government doesn't like. Does anyone doubt "troublesome" bloggers will face special scrutiny by the former KGB goons who run Russia's government? See also my article at the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/05/consistent-american-christians-endorse-putins-soviet-style-censorship/) Consistent American Christians Endorse Putin's Soviet-Style Censorship."

How Not to Stop Ebola: Attack Doctors

August 4, 2014

Recently I listed some (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/01/why-people-in-america-almost-certainly-wont-get-ebola/) reasons why people in America are much less likely to contract the Ebola virus than are people in Africa. Here's another reason: Some people in Africa, thinking Ebola-related symptoms are a "curse," have thrown rocks at health care workers and "become very violent," one observer (http://theweek.com/article/index/265758/the-superstition-that-is-dramatically-escalating-the-ebola-outbreak) told the Global Post. Not physically attacking the doctors and other medical personnel trying to help you would be a good first step toward not dying from the virus.

Nicole Perlman's Marvel-ous Adventure in Writing Guardians of the Galaxy

August 4, 2014

Boulderite Nicole Perlman has exactly one credit to her name (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2270979/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1) at IMDB, but it's for co-writing Guardians of the Galaxy, a film that (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/03/see-guardians-of-the-galaxy/) made $94 million its first weekend. Not surprisingly, she how has an announced second credit, for (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3480822/fullcredits?ref_=tt_ov_wr#writers) Black Widow. Time has out a remarkable (http://time.com/3025421/marvel-movie-female-writer-nicole-perlman/) article on how Perlman broke into the "guys' club" of sci-fi script writing. Congratulations to Marvel for recognizing her talent. What caught my eye is that Perlman has also written biopic screenplays about Richard Feynman, Neil Armstrong, and the Wright brothers—I hope somebody funds those films, because I'd love to watch them.

The Insanity of Environmentalist "Human Engineering"

August 4, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my article, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/environmentalists-war-people/) The Environmentalists' War on People," about an environmentalist plan to "engineer" people to reduce their carbon footprints (also their literal footprints). As I write, "It's as though the paper's authors read the dystopian novels of the 20th century such as Brave New World and adapted them as a blueprint for their environmentalist agenda." Among the proposals are drugging or otherwise manipulating people to make them hate meat and to make fetuses smaller. The Ayn Rand Institute published an (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/08/01/when-i-think-of-genetic-engineering-crippling-humanity-doesnt-come-to-mind) article on the same subject.

A Clash of Worldviews

August 4, 2014

Rick Santorum's EchoLight Studies seeks to produce "high-quality movies for families of faith" that Santorum hopes to screen in churches, the Heritage Institute (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/03/casting-churches-movie-theaters-santorum-hopes-engage-culture/) reports. At a Heritage event, Santorum said, "We want this company to be a tool to get people into the church and make the church the center of culture again." Meanwhile, "Atheists in the US are rallying together, launching a new TV programme and providing support for those who go public with their beliefs," (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-28616115) reports the BBC.

The Problem with Gun-Owner Welfare

August 4, 2014

A media release today from Colorado House Republicans states: "House Bill 1275, which authorizes the state of Colorado to purchase property to build a multi-use shooting facility in Mesa County will go into effect. The shooting facility is projected to attract more than a 100,000 visitors annually along with world-class competitors from around the world." Insofar as the purpose of this tax-funded venture is to provide opportunities for recreational shooting, it is a form of welfare for gun owners, and therefore a violation of individual rights. People who do not shoot guns recreationally, or who do not even like guns, ought not be forced to finance the recreational shooting of those who do. Now, there is  an element of this that probably supports the state's constitutional mandate that government establish a general militia and store "public arms"—a mandate the state almost entirely ignores—so there is some aspect of the bill that comports to some extent with the proper purposes of government (i.e., to protect rights). However, any state expenditure in this area should be strictly tied to militia purposes. Otherwise, recreational shooting facilities should be tax-exempt, private enterprises with due protections from abusive litigation.

Deadly Earthquake in China; Disasters in the U.S.

August 4, 2014

An earthquake in China has killed some 400 people and injured nearly two-thousand more, as the Associated Press (http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/strong-quake-hits-sw-chinas-yunnan-province-24823707) reports. California mudslides have killed one and trapped thousands, Fox (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/04/thousands-stranded-at-least-1-killed-by-southern-california-mudslides/) reports. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people in and around Toledo can't drink the tap water; "sewage from treatment plants and fertilizer from farms streamed into the lake, triggering an algae bloom near an intake valve that sends water to Toledo," poisoning the water supply, (http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/toledos-water-crisis-not-over-yet-n171751) reports NBC. And of course the (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/07/31/sierra-leone-bans-public-meetings-over-ebola-outbreak/) Ebola crisis continues in Africa. A couple observations: The more prosperous people are, the better equipped they are to minimize the damages of natural and man-made disasters. The greater the rule of rights-respecting law, the more government tends to discourage (and the less it tends to encourage) negligent behaviors that can worsen the effects of natural disasters and cause man-made disasters.

The Tragedy of Iraq

August 4, 2014

While much of America's left (not to mention legions in (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/02/the-rise-of-nationalism-and-anti-semitism-in-europe/) Europe) are busy spreading anti-Semitic smears and demonizing Israel for Hamas's violence, Islamic totalitarians continue to expand their control of Iraq, most recently in the northern towns of Zumar and Sinjar, causing thousands to run for their lives (see the Associated Press (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/08/04/islamic-militants-seize-2-towns-in-northern-iraq-after-fierce-clashes-with/) report). Not only are many Iraqis not better off after America's involvement there; many are undoubtedly far worse off. Remember, we called the 2003 American invasion "Operation Iraqi Freedom." Well, let's just say mission not accomplished.

Eliminate Corporate Taxes, Says Pethokoukis

August 4, 2014

Although I recently (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/aei-writer-invokes-implicit-contract-fantasies-excuse-government-coercion/) criticized James Pethokoukis (and others at AEI) for endorsing a welfare state, I recognize that Pethokoukis does some good policy work that's usually supportive of freer markets. A good example is his article today in the Week, "(http://theweek.com/article/index/265755/why-corporations-shouldnt-pay-any-taxes-mdash-zero-zilch-nada) Why Corporations Shouldn't Pay Any Taxes—Zero, Zilch, Nada." Quoting Boston University economist Laurence Kotlikoff, Pethokoukis writes, "Fully eliminating the corporate income tax . . . would cause 'rapid and dramatic increases' in U.S. investment, output, and real wages." I've been (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2011/10/how-to-actually-separate-government-from-the-corporations/) making that case for years.

The Obama Administration's Contempt for Congress and the American People

August 4, 2014

The NSA spies on the American public. The CIA spies on Congress—the American public's elected officials. The IRS targets select groups for "special treatment" based on their (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/07/irss-lois-lerner-targeted-conservative-crazies/) political views. Some days, if feels like we don't even live in America anymore. In his article about the CIA for USA Today, Glenn Reynolds (http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/08/03/public-servants-masters-cia-sentors-privacy-column/13542065/) writes: "Contempt for Congress, and for separation of powers and historical understandings about the roles of the executive and legislative branches, has been a hallmark of the Obama administration." Is it still possible to turn this ship around?

Poopy Pants Welfare

August 5, 2014

Seriously, is there any good or service the left doesn't want to turn into a welfare program? The latest example comes from California, where Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez has proposed Bill 1516 to start a new welfare program to provide "$80 a month to buy diapers for children under the age of 2," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/05/diaper-duty-for-california-taxpayers/) reports. Even if you're going to have forced wealth transfers, there's no reason to make them for such specific goods and services. Or government could protect people's rights to keep and spend their wealth as they see fit. This latest proposal sounds like something my two-year-old nephew thought up; "poopy pants" tends to be his knee-jerk response to any pressing question of the day.

Coffman Introduces Insurance Regulation Bill

August 5, 2014

Colorado Congressman Mike Coffman introduced the "Guaranteed Health Coverage for Pre-Existing Conditions Act of 2014" to "prohibit the ability of an insurance company to deny coverage based on a pre-existing medical condition in the event that the Affordable Care Act (ACA), better known as Obamacare, is repealed," according to a July 31 media release from Coffman's office.

In other words, Coffman wants to make sure that government smothers insurers with rights-violating regulations, whether or not ObamaCare exists. But the (http://www.freecolorado.com/2009/09/restore-free-market-to-address-pre.html) problem regarding pre-existing conditions is almost entirely a creation of government, which pushed most people from long-term personal insurance to (typically short-term) employer-based insurance. Is there any prominent Republican, anywhere, willing to stand up and say that government should protect rather than violate the rights of patients, insurers, and doctors?

Denver Gay Bar Hit with Antidiscrimination Suit

August 5, 2014

According to the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies, Denver Wrangler, a gay bar, illegally "discriminated against a man when a bouncer denied him entry last year because he was dressed in drag," the Associated Press (http://denver.cbslocal.com/2014/08/04/colorado-gay-bar-discriminated-against-man-in-drag/) reports. "[R]egulators determined the bar illegally discriminates against effeminate men because its dress code bars high heels, wigs, 'appearance-altering makeup' and strong perfume," the AP reports.

Although it seems odd to me that a gay bar would deny entry to men dressed in drag, and although that may be cause for some people to complain or even boycott the bar, certainly the bar's owners have a moral right to determine dress and behavior codes within their own establishment, and government has no legitimate business intervening. For more on this idea, see my article for the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/06/right-bake-cake/) On the Right Not to Bake a Cake."

Dems' New Taxes and Regulations Hit Colorado Tomorrow

August 5, 2014

A (http://coloradohousegop.com/2014/08/damaging-democrat-bills-begin-to-hammer-coloradans-this-week/) media release from Colorado House Republicans reports that two of the Democrats' onerous, rights-violating laws go into effect tomorrow: "Senate Bill 029 will impose more than $13 million in fees on retail paint products to fund a new paint recycling program," while "Senate Bill 103 . . . will phase out the sale of traditional plumbing fixtures, such as [for] toilets and shower heads, and mandate only low-flow products be sold in Colorado." I'm still angry over the Democrats' idiotic Amazon tax. Is there any reason for me not to vote party-line Republican this year? It seems like every day Colorado Democrats create some new reason for me to loathe them.

The "Miracle of Manufacturing": Better Goods, Lower Prices

August 5, 2014

At AEI Mark J. Perry (http://www.aei-ideas.org/2014/08/the-good-old-days-are-today-todays-home-appliances-are-cheaper-better-and-more-energy-efficient-than-ever-before/) offers an interesting comparison between old and new window air conditioner units. In 1956, Sears sold a unit for $299.95. In 2014, it sold a better unit for $219. Based on an average manufacturing wage, "the time cost of a Sears room air conditioner has declined from 164 hours in 1956 to only 11 hours today," Perry writes. Perry writes that such advances "are part of the 'miracle of manufacturing,' which continues to deliver cheaper and better goods to American consumers year after year, which translates into a higher standard of living for all Americans, especially for lower and middle-income households." Of course manufacturing is no miracle; it is the consequence of productive and self-interested people collaborating voluntarily to earn a profit.

Death and Abuse at the Border

August 5, 2014

Bob Price wrote a disturbing (http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-Texas/2014/08/04/Rape-Death-and-Police-Pursuits-Continue-as-Illegal-Immigrants-Flood-Falfurrias) report yesterday for Brietbart.com about how forty-four people have died and numerous women have been sexually assaulted while illegally crossing America's border. I would point out that these horrific consequences are partly the result of America's rights-violating policies restricting the immigration of rights-respecting people; see my (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/07/31/immigration-restrictions-arose-with-progressive-social-engineering/) previous articles.

Judge Tosses Alabama Abortion Regulations

August 5, 2014

"A federal judge Monday morning ruled that a portion of a 2013 Alabama law requiring doctors at abortion clinics to have admitting privileges at a local hospitals posed an undue burden on women's abortion rights, and was unconstitutional," (http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/politics/southunionstreet/2014/08/04/federal-judge-rules-abortion-clinic-law-unconstitutional/13569555/) reports the Montgomery Advertiser. The courts also recently (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/07/31/court-ruling-preserves-lone-mississippi-abortion-clinic/) ruled against a similar regulation in Mississippi. For details on why such regulations are wrong, see the article by Diana Hsieh and me, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2011-winter/abortion-rights/) The Assault on Abortion Rights Undermines All Our Liberties."

The Government's Insane War on Small Magnets

August 5, 2014

To follow up on the story, "(http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/01/zen-magnets-stands-up-to-abusive-government-agency/) Zen Magnets Stands Up to Abusive Government Agency": Shihan Qu of Zen Magnets issued a (http://zenmagnets.com/we-will-fight-until-the-end/?mc_cid=c0f58d803f&mc_eid=29d065be8c) statement yesterday on why he's standing up to the abusive, rights-violating Consumer Product Safety Commission. Qu points out (among other things): "There are products that may be reasonably expected [to sometimes] cause harm, even if used responsibly. Alcohol, tobacco, trampolines, skateboards, ATVs, skis, snowboards. Things with warnings that say 'Using this is inherently dangerous.' And then there are products that are only dangerous if misused. This is the category that every other product falls under, including magnet spheres. Anything can cause harm if misused." But the CPSC is arbitrarily persecuting the makers of magnets, because it can.

Sugar Nannies Go Home

August 5, 2014

Representative Rosa DeLauro wants to tax sweetened soda for the purpose of making it unaffordable for people. See the reports by the New York Times and by (http://cnsnews.com/news/article/eric-scheiner/rep-delauro-tax-every-teaspoon-sugar) CNSNews.com. The idea is that, if people drink soda, government will punish them for it by confiscating more of their wealth. This is yet another byproduct of government-controlled medicine: When everyone pays for everyone else's health care, more people tend to support government intervention to control people's behavior. But whether people drink sugar water is none of government's legitimate business. People have a right to consume what they want and to spend their money how they want. Would-be sugar nannies should mind their own business.

Will Low-Cost College Degrees Be a Game-Changer?

August 5, 2014

The (http://uopeople.edu/) University of the People's model for low cost, online higher education could be a game-changer for high school graduates throughout the developing world, as well as for financially strapped students in wealthier nations. Students who enroll at this university don't acquire useless humanities degrees in leftist studies; they (http://uopeople.edu/groups/online-education) study one of two things, business administration or computer science.

(That said, the (http://uopeople.edu/files/Pdf/university_catalog.pdf) university "is based on the [false] belief that education at a minimum cost is a basic right for all suitable applicants"—there is no "right" to other people's resources—and I wouldn't be surprised if students have to sit through some politically charged material despite the classes' practical orientation.)

"To date, more than 2,000 students from over 140 countries have been admitted," the school (http://uopeople.edu/groups/online-education) reports. I first heard of the university today, when Ted released the (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kH-uYwt0qs) video of a talk by Shai Reshef (shown in the photo), the institution's founder.

Americans had better get real about education: Students with worthless degrees, huge student loans, and an entitlement mentality may soon face considerably stiffer competition. Over the coming decades we could witness some spectacular advances in various regions of the world, wherever people can establish governments stable enough to protect property rights and not pillage what people earn.

In related news, Michael A. LaFerrara discusses (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/lumni-rights-respecting-profit-driven-financing-college-students/) Lumni, a program that pays for students to attend traditional colleges when those students agree to repay the program a set portion of their income for a set period.

Libertarians for Welfare

August 6, 2014

As Reason (http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/04/libertarians-on-basic-income-guarantee) reports, various libertarians continue to support the welfare state. Matt Zwolinsky supports the federal government giving people cash with absolutely no strings attached, meaning they could (for example) spend the entire wad on booze, at taxpayers' expense. But what of people's rights to control their wealth and live their lives as they see fit? There are no such rights, according to such libertarians. For more on this topic, see the following articles:

University of Kansas Cuts Student Work Hours over ObamaCare

August 6, 2014

Here's the latest from the University of Kansas: Because of "potential fiscal liabilities with ACA," aka ObamaCare, the "Student Employee Eligibility Requirements and Appointment Limits will reduce the hours that undergraduate students will be able to work during the semester to 20 hours per week except during breaks and summer. Previously, undergraduates could clock up to 30 hours during the academic year," (http://kansan.com/news/2014/07/29/new-policy-reduces-total-hours-for-students-working-on-campus/) reports the University Daily Kansan. Hat tip to (http://www.campusreform.org/?ID=5813&advD=1248,352962) Campus Reform. This is just the latest illustration of ObamaCare's impacts on employers—who became involved in health insurance in the first place almost entirely because of government.

"The Harder You Work, the Luckier You Get"

August 6, 2014

Yesterday Don Watkins shared the transcript of a delightful 2012 (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/08/05/your-success-is-your-responsibility-an-interview-with-brian-tracy) interview he conducted with Brian Tracy. Following are a few of the highlights:

See (http://www.briantracy.com) Tracy's web site for more.

Maximum Wage Talk Begins

August 6, 2014

As I (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/kristen-bells-spoonful-coercion/) wrote recently for the Objective Standard, if government imposes "a minimum on what employers may pay so as to establish a 'living wage,' logically, there is nothing stopping government from also imposing a maximum wage." Now, just a few days later, Vox has come out with an article, "(http://www.vox.com/2014/8/6/5964369/maximum-wage) The Case for a Maximum Wage." The author, Matthew Yglesias, maintains a fantasy that a "super-tax" (or something like it) might "avoid seriously reducing the number of hours people work." But obviously a maximum wage—either absolute or de facto via the tax code—would discourage some of the most productive people from producing (or would encourage them to move). I'm reminded of a 2011 union rally in Denver in which some people chanted, "(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjAC2FYP0rM) Eat the rich!" Morally, a maximum wage is an outrage that violates people's moral rights to associate voluntarily and to operate their businesses and run their lives as they see fit.

To Secure the Borders, Liberalize Immigration

August 6, 2014

Michelle Malkin says, "I reject the premise of 'secure the border first' platitudes. It's secure the border. Period." But, practically, doing so is impossible without also liberalizing immigration policy.

Yesterday Malkin released an (http://michellemalkin.com/2014/08/05/murder-in-rio-grande-valley-this-is-coming-to-a-town-near-you/) article about the horrific murder of an off-duty U.S. Border Patrol agent. "The two suspects are Mexican nationals from Matamoros," in the U.S. illegally and "previously deported after committing other serious crimes," Malkin writes. Undoubtedly this disturbing case illustrates the problem of insecure borders. The question is, how can the United States government actually secure the borders?

An apt analogy is the drug war. The U.S. government outlaws various drugs, but those laws do not actually stop Americans from buying those drugs. Instead, the laws foster violent black market at home and abroad (which is a major cause of the recent influx of illegal immigrants). Could the U.S. government absolutely stop all illegal drug use? Yes, it could—but at the cost of imposing a fascist police state. Similarly, the U.S. government could totally secure the borders while maintaining rights-violating immigration restrictions, but only by imposing a fascist police state, complete with routine government raids of American businesses and homes.

If we wish to have secure borders, not live in a fascist police state, and also respect the moral rights of peaceable people to immigrate, we have only one option: Liberalize immigration policies—establishing check points for peaceable people seeking to immigrate—and redirect all the manpower and resources now spent rounding up and harassing decent people to the task of securing the borders.

On Freedom of Religion and Freedom from Religion

August 6, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my article, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/government-properly-protects-freedom-religion-freedom-religion/) Government Properly Protects Freedom of Religion and Freedom from Religion." I write, "The right to freedom from religion means that nonreligious people and people of minority religions have a moral right not to finance the propagation of religious beliefs and not to be subjected to faith-based, rights-violating laws." For my formulation of the right to freedom of religion, see the article (with which I'm very pleased).

U.S. General Murdered by Member of Afghan Security Forces

August 6, 2014

Army Major General Harold J. Greene was shot and killed yesterday in Afghanistan, "apparently . . . by a member of the security forces he was committed to training," the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-general-killed-in-afghanistan-was-key-figure-in-training-effort/2014/08/05/d25cc80a-1cc4-11e4-ae54-0cfe1f974f8a_story.html?hpid=z1) reports. (Hat tip to the (http://theweek.com) Week.) Horrid. I tend to agree with Greene's neighbor, Retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Nicholas Caramanica, who told the Post: "If we're going to fight a war, fight to win, and get out."

Udall's Half-Truths about Gardner's Birth Control Stance

August 6, 2014

Over at Townhall.com, Katie Pavlich (http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2014/08/05/why-is-mark-udall-lying-about-a-birth-control-ban-in-colorado-n1875130) writes, "In an ad released today attacking his opponent, Republican Congressman Cory Gardner, Udall claims Gardner wants to 'ban common forms of birth control.' This statement is completely false." The headline calls Udall a liar. But if Udall is a liar for telling half the truth, then so is Pavlich. So let's get to the bottom of things.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26sbLmONB2Y) Udall's ad cites Garder's "8-year crusade that would ban common forms of birth control." Did Gardner lead such a crusade? Yes, he did, insofar as the so-called "personhood" measures he actively supported would have had that effect if passed and fully implemented. Gardner even circulated a "personhood" ballot initiative, as Personhood USA (http://www.personhoodusa.com/blog/rep-cory-gardner-supports-personhood/) brags. For details about the impact of "personhood" on birth control, see the (http://www.seculargovernment.us/docs/a62.shtml#3.6) 2010 paper by Diana Hsieh and me. But, more recently, Gardner decided "he was wrong to support previous personhood efforts" because of their possible impact on birth control, (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_25395470/senate-bombshell-cory-gardner-says-cant-support-personhood) reports Lynn Bartels for the Denver Post. In June, Gardner (http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_25995739/women-should-be-able-buy-pill-without-prescription) wrote an op-ed advocating the legalization of "oral contraception for over-the-counter purchases by adults." That's a very bold and a very pro-liberty move, and not one I've seen Udall support. Of course, Gardner still supports abortion bans.

So Pavlich misrepresented Udall's claims about Gardner, but in his ad Udall did not reveal important facts about Gardner's change of heart. "Half the truth is a great lie."

Khmer Rouge and More: Breaking News for 8/7/14

August 7, 2014

Here are some of today's important news stories:

"A U.N.-backed war crimes tribunal in Cambodia sentenced the two top surviving cadres of the Khmer Rouge regime to life in jail on Thursday after finding them guilty of crimes against humanity for their roles in the 1970s 'killing fields' revolution," NBC News (http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/khmer-rouge-leaders-get-life-prison-killing-fields-crimes-n174661) reports. Under the bloody regime, "At least 1.7 million people—a fifth of Cambodia's population at the time—died of starvation, disease, overwork or execution," the Wall Street Journal (http://blogs.wsj.com/briefly/2014/08/07/5-things-on-the-khmer-rouge-verdict/) reports.

"Iraqi militants seized control Thursday of the country's largest Christian city [Qaraqoush]—reportedly telling its residents to leave, convert or die," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/07/militant-takeover-iraqs-largest-christian-city-mountaintop-siege-fuel-calls-for/) reports.

Meanwhile, "Islamist insurgents from Boko Haram killed at least 50 people as they stormed a town in northeastern Nigeria," the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/boko-haram-overruns-nigerian-town-killing-dozens-1407417206) reports.

"Growing political heat and possible customer backlash helped dissuade Walgreen from trying to trim its tax bill by reorganizing overseas as part of an acquisition," the Associated Press (http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_26289730/walgreen-turns-down-inversion-cut-tax-bill) reports.

"About half of the nation's federal criminal cases last year were filed in regions near the U.S.-Mexico border," Kristin Tate (http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-Texas/2014/08/06/DOJ-Regions-Near-Mexico-Border-Most-Crime-Ridden-in-US) reports for Breitbart.com.

"[T]he average age of industrial equipment is now almost 10.5 years old. That's the oldest it has been since 1938," John Azis (http://theweek.com/article/index/265930/americas-factories-are-crumbling-mdash-is-the-economy-next) writes for the Week.

Who Is Justin Amash?

August 7, 2014

(http://www.justinamash.com) Justin Amash, Congressman from Michigan, handily beat his primary opponent Brian Ellis. So who is Amash? You can get a feel for him by watching his (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/08/06/rep-justin-amash-delivers-one-of-the-most-scathing-unforgiving-victory-speeches-in-recent-memory-i-ran-for-office-to-stop-people-like-you/) victory speech (posted at the Blaze). Here are a few excerpts:

One extraordinary thing about Amash is that, not only does he participate in every vote, but he explains his every vote on his (https://www.facebook.com/justinamash) Facebook page.

I have two open questions about the "libertarian-minded" Amesh: First, does he support strong national defense, or does he follow Ron Paul's blame-America-first line? Second, does he want government to outlaw abortion? On this latter point, it's interesting to note that, although Amash claims to be "100 percent pro-life," Michigan Right to Life endorsed Ellis, partly on the grounds that Amash declined single out Planned Parenthood for defunding, as MLive (http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2014/06/brian_ellis_backed_by_grand_ra.html) reports.

Two things seem clear. Amash is serious about advocating economic liberty. And, whatever his possible shortcomings, he is a man to watch.

One in Six U.S. Jobs Are in Government

August 7, 2014

As Rani Molla (http://blogs.wsj.com/numbers/what-states-have-the-most-government-workers-1654/) reports for the Wall Street Journal, "Nearly 1 in 6 jobs in the U.S. are working for the government, more than any single private industry." Put another way, every government employee is supported by only five people working in the private economy. In California, nearly 2.3 million people work for government—more than the entire populations of over a (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_population) dozen states. In Colorado, the figure is 383,646. The number of government workers per 1,000 people ranges from 52 in Nevada to 114 in Wyoming.

What's the trend? The National Bureau of Economic Research (http://www.nber.org/chapters/c3252.pdf) reports, "In 1900, one out of 24 workers was on a government payroll, in 1920, one out of 15, and in 1940, one out of 11. The [1949] ratio . . . is one out of 8 or 9."

Over the last dozen decades or so, Americans fundamentally rethought their relationship with government. I suggest we should fundamentally revisit that relationship again.

August 7 Update: As Rani Molla points out in a (http://blogs.wsj.com/numbers/a-history-of-government-employment-1668/) follow-up for the Journal, "the percentage of government jobs out of all nonfarm jobs has actually dropped significantly from its peak in 1975 of 20%."

Monkie Selfie: Is Wikipedia Violating David Slater's Image Copyright?

August 7, 2014

(http://www.djsphotography.co.uk) David Slater is a UK nature photographer who earns his living in part by selling reproductions of his images. In 2011, Slater traveled to Sulawesi, Indonesia to photograph macaque monkeys. As the Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/08/06/wikipedia-monkey-selfie_n_5654707.html) explains, one of the monkeys "borrowed" Slater's camera and took some (http://www.djsphotography.co.uk/Tropical%20Forests/Sulawesi%20Macaques.htm) amazing self-portraits. It's easy to see how Slater might profit by selling reproductions of these monkey "selfies."

Quite understandably, Slater is keen to claim his copyright to the images. But Wikipedia has posted a couple of the best images, (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Macaca_nigra_self-portrait.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Macaca_nigra_self-portrait.jpg) declaring, "This file is in the public domain, because as the work of a non-human animal, it has no human author in whom copyright is vested." I don't know how the law will come down, but as a moral issue Wikipedia's claim seems clearly wrong to me. Slater put in a lot of time and money to put himself in a position to capture the image; it's hardly as though some monkey broke into his house to steal the camera.

Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebes_crested_macaque) states, "[I]n 2014 the Wikimedia Foundation rejected his copyright claim, upholding the fact that the macaque is the legal copyright owner which defaults to the public domain, as had the community on the Wikimedia Commons." Slater continues to fight for his copyright, as the Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/11015672/Wikipedia-refuses-to-delete-photo-as-monkey-owns-it.html) reports.

I am not displaying one of Slater's images, because I regard those images as Slater's property, morally even if not legally. Instead, I'm displaying an image of (https://www.flickr.com/photos/jinterwas/4223373030/) Rhesus Macaques from a zoo in Rotterdam, captured and placed into the Creative Commons by "jinterwas." Because I think that's the right thing to do.

Pat Roberts Bests Milton Wolf for Senate

August 7, 2014

Frankly I'd never heard of Senator Pat Roberts, but I had heard of his challenger, Milton Wolf, because Wolf frequently writes about health policy and related matters (see his (http://www.washingtontimes.com/staff/dr-milton-r-wolf/) op-eds for the Washington Times). So I was interested to learn that Wolf was running for U.S. Senate, because I agreed with various articles he'd written.

On Tuesday, Wolf lost the primary to Roberts, as MSNBC (http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/sen-pat-roberts-beats-tea-party-challenger-milton-wolf) reports. As Politico (http://www.politico.com/story/2014/08/kansas-senate-2014-results-pat-roberts-milton-wolf-109748.html) explains it, Roberts won through a combination of hard work, party support, and (of course) incumbency. Then there's this: "Roberts . . . trained the spotlight on an embarrassing professional scandal. . . . Wolf was discovered to have posted patient X-rays on Facebook, sometimes accompanied by morbid jokes." (I'm not sure any radiologist's campaign could survive similar scrutiny.) Still, Wolf did relatively well, earning over 40 percent of the vote.

ISIS, Tick Bites, and More News and Views for 8/8/14

August 8, 2014

Here are some of the big news stories of the day, and some interesting opinions:

Iraq: As no doubt you're aware, the U.S. military (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/08/us-military-launches-airstrikes-on-terror-targets-in-iraq/) launched airstrikes against Islamic State militants in Iraq. Overall, U.S. engagement in Iraq has been a disaster, and certainly many Iraqis are now much worse off than they would have been had the U.S. never intervened. Now, it seems, the U.S. is faced with a variety of no-win outcomes.

Tics: The Associated Press (http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_26293109/bad-bite-tick-can-make-you-allergic-red) reports, "Doctors across the nation are seeing a surge of sudden meat allergies in people bitten by a certain kind of tick."

Fracking: David Biederman (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/european-industry-stagnates-americans-prosper-fracking/) writes for the Objective Standard, "Europeans can continue to blame American frackers for producing lower-cost energy in America, or they can liberate European energy producers to do the same."

Catcalling: Buzz Feed has a good video out critical of catcalling:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUJ24mblCLY

Tiny Houses: And Reason magazine has out a fascinating video about minimalist "matchbox" houses—and government's war against such houses.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-zESacteu4

Insurance Rates Politicized under Colorado ObamaCare Regs

August 8, 2014

"In April, 2014, emails from Insurance Commissioner Marguerite Salazar to various Colorado officials discussed what to do about the high Obamacare premiums in Colorado's resort counties," as Linda Gorman (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/08/06/colorado-soaks-poorer-residents-to-solve-obamacare-political-problem/) discusses for Complete Colorado. At issue is the regulatory manipulation of rates in different regions. Gorman concludes, "In Colorado, Obamacare is such bad policy that it encourages politicians to take from the relatively poor and give to the relatively rich." When politicians give bureaucrats the power to regulate insurance premiums, is anyone surprised that regulatory process becomes political and influenced by special interests?

Beauprez, Fracking, and More Colorado News for 8/8/14

August 8, 2014

Here are some of today's important news items in Colorado:

Governor's Race: Bob Beauprez, the Republican candidate for governor in Colorado, has released his "(http://www.bobbeauprez.com/part1) Stronger Colorado Plan," which, at first glance, seems like a decent proposal to trim regulatory burdens and increase transparency (among other things). I still have a lot of reservations about Beauprez, but he may yet end up on top of my "lesser of evils" list.

Fracking: "A Larimer County judge overturned Fort Collins' five-year moratorium on hydraulic fracturing Thursday," Ryan Maye Handy (http://www.coloradoan.com/story/news/local/2014/08/07/judge-overturns-fort-collins-fracking-moratorium/13743031/) reports for the Coloradoan. That's good news. (As an aside, I think the appropriate term is "Coloradan"; no "o.")

CU Boulder: The philosophy department at the University of Colorado, Boulder, has been accused—fairly or unfairly—of tolerating sexual harassment. The latest development, as (http://www.dailycamera.com/cu-news/ci_26294506/cu-firing-professor-david-barnett) reported by the Daily Camera, is that the university is trying to fire a tenured professor for writing a report critical of the university's handling of sexual assault allegations. I don't have enough information to make any clear judgments about the case.

Sports: And the Broncos beat the Seahawks last night in the first pre-season game—at least a small taste of victory after the horrible Superbowl loss.

Obama's Reversals on Executive Power and Insurance Mandates

August 8, 2014

Perhaps someone has listed or will list all of Barack Obama's many reversals between his campaigns and his presidency. Here I want to focus on two such reversals.

On executive power, Obama said, "I want everybody to understand: I taught constitutional law for ten years. I take the Constitution very seriously. The biggest problems we're facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch, and not go through Congress at all." As Obama now openly brags, his main strategy as president is to find ways to avoid going through Congress.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ShovG383ac

On insurance mandates, Obama opposed Hilary Clinton's proposal to force people to buy insurance. He said, "Understand that when Senator Clinton says a mandate, it's not a mandate on government to provide health insurance, it's a mandate on individuals to purchase it. . . . Now, Massachusetts has a mandate right now. They have exempted 20 percent of the uninsured, because they've concluded that that 20 percent can't afford it. In some cases there are people who are paying fines, and still can't afford it, so now they're worse off than they were. They don't have health insurance, and they're paying a fine. And in order for you to force people to get health insurance, you've got to have a very harsh, stiff penalty." Of course, the individual mandate became a centerpiece of ObamaCare.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FHzqY_9IPI

Check Out Rational Beacon

August 8, 2014

"Rational Beacon was founded by Ari Armstrong on July 29, 2014, to publishing mini-posts on the news and views of the day and to advocate reason and individual rights." Check it out! [November 10, 2014 Update: That content has since been integrated into AriArmstrong.com.]

New Wikimedia Commons Images of Colorado Political Figures

August 9, 2014

As a regular user of Creative Commons images from Wikipedia and Flickr, I make an effort to share my own images in the Commons. When going through some prints recently, I found some nice images from the Independence Institute's 2002 banquet (see my (http://www.freecolorado.com/2002/12/ii02.html) write-up). I scanned and uploaded images into Wikimedia Commons of Dinesh D'Souza, Hank Brown, Bill Owens, Mike Rosen, Douglas Bruce, Jared Polis, and Mike Coffman. Of the images I've shared in the Commons, the one I'm proudest of is a 2005 photo of Christopher Hitchens, in my opinion the finest photograph of Hitchens available in the Commons.

Obama on Bombing Islamic State

August 9, 2014

Today the White House released Barack Obama's short address on bombing militants of Islamic State in Iraq and on dropping humanitarian supplies to their victims. My initial reaction is that Obama's foreign policy is intentionally pragmatic, without any basic guiding principles. Sometimes he'll act in America's defensive interests, sometimes he'll act for other reasons—but only in piecemeal fashion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_czB1K1ogk

The Neo-Luddites

August 10, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my article, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/new-technologies-old-fallacies/) New Technologies, Same Old Fallacies," a reaction to Jeff Elder's article for the Wall Street Journal, "(http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/08/06/tech-experts-see-good-and-bad-sides-of-robots/) Tech Experts See Good and Bad Sides of Robots." I write (among other things), "Elder predicts that new technologies, including advanced robotics and self-driving cars, will soon be commonplace. Undoubtedly these technologies will make some jobs obsolete, but they will also give rise to many new career opportunities."

Oh, You Mean Marijuana Doesn't Improve People's Driving?

August 10, 2014

Cully Stimson (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/08/traffic-fatalities-marijuana-positive-drivers-rise-colorado/) writes for the Heritage Institute: " Colorado traffic fatalities have gone down since 2007, but they went up in 2012. More to the point, Colorado traffic fatalities between 2007 and 2012 involving operators testing positive for marijuana use increased 100 percent over that period—from 39 in 2007 up to 78 in 2012." He helpfully adds, "Of course, we have no idea what actually caused those fatalities." Often people who test positive for marijuana consumed it long enough ago that they're no longer under the drug's influence. And often people who test positive for marijuana also test positive for alcohol and other substances. I'd also like to know whether police are simply reporting marijuana levels more diligently—something that would hardly be surprising given the heated politics surrounding the issue. But even if it is the case that marijuana consumption is a causal factor in more traffic wrecks, that doesn't mean marijuana should be banned or more heavily regulated—any more than the fact that alcohol consumption is a causal factor in many traffic wrecks means that alcohol should be banned or more heavily regulated. The principle is that government ought not violate the rights of people who use something responsibly (whether guns or drugs or magnets or whatever) because a minority use that thing irresponsibly.

The "Lower Expectations" of Common Core Math

August 10, 2014

Berkeley mathematics professor Marina Ratner (http://online.wsj.com/articles/marina-ratner-making-math-education-even-worse-1407283282) writes for the Wall Street Journal that California's Common Core standards "were vastly inferior to the old California standards in rigor, depth and the scope of topics. Many topics—for instance, calculus and pre-calculus, about half of algebra II and parts of geometry—were taken out and many were moved to higher grades. As a result, the Common Core standards were several years behind the old standards, especially in higher grades." Ratner goes through several examples of absurd problems and approaches that are part of the Common Core approach. Hat tips to (http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/08/06/Berkeley-Math-Professor-Ratner-Common-Core-Will-Move-U-S-Closer-To-Bottom-In-International-Ranking/) Breitbart.com and (https://twitter.com/warnerthuston/status/497163904707874816) Warner Todd Huston. See also my article for the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/05/common-cores-nonsensical-math-problems-undermine-students-confidence/) Common Core's Nonsensical Math Problems Undermine Students' Confidence."

Boulder County Puts "Little Liz" Out of Work

August 10, 2014

Boulder County bureaucrat Carrie Haverfield thinks there's an "ick factor" to carnival goers having their photos taken with "Little Liz," "a 29-inch-tall woman from Haiti," so the county shut down the sideshow, the Longmont Times-Call (http://www.timescall.com/fair/ci_26302798/boulder-county-fair-closes-down-worlds-smallest-woman) reports (hat tip to Complete Colorado). As fair coordinator Laura Boldt told the paper, the move puts Liz "out of work and unable to pay any medical or living expenses for those three days." Apparently Boulder hates little people and wants them to be poor. But why is this even a political issue? "The county owns the fairgrounds," the Times-Call notes. How about we get government out of the entertainment business? (Although obviously Boulder bureaucrats would make excellent clowns.)

Satanic Event in Government Building Draws "Hate Speech" Charge

August 10, 2014

Satanists are renting out the Oklahoma City Center Music Hall for a September 21 "black mass," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/08/satanists-plan-to-stage-black-mass-in-oklahoma-city-sparks-outrage/) reports (hat tip to (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/08/08/not-all-speech-is-protected-if-it-is-hate-speech-and-it-is-intended-to-ridicule-another-religion/) Eugene Volokh). Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City told Fox, "Not all speech is protected if there is hate speech and it is intended to ridicule another religion. I don't believe it is a free speech matter." But wait a minute. . . isn't Coakley's speech hateful toward Satanism? Obviously, if free speech means anything, it means people have a right to criticize ideas, including religious ones, that they believe deserve ridicule. The real problem here is that the government owns an event center and thereby forces taxpayers to subsidize speech with which they disagree—that is a violation of the right to free speech.

Ebola "Uncontained and Out of Control in West Africa"

August 10, 2014

Ken Issacs of Samaritan's Purse has some (http://www.samaritanspurse.org/article/ebola-crisis-in-west-africa/) grim news about the Ebola outbreak in western Africa. Isaacs says "this present outbreak is going to surpass" the number of fatalities and known cases of the past three decades. " He continues, "The disease is uncontained and it is out of control in West Africa. The international response to the disease has been a failure." Isaacs further claims that the World Health Organization's estimates of some 1,700 cases and some 930 deaths represent only around a quarter to a half of the real numbers.

How the U.S. Government Accidentally Armed Islamic State

August 10, 2014

This news from Kurdish Irbil is absolutely sickening: "In a bitter irony, the extremists used American armored vehicles and weapons they had seized from the hapless Iraqi military to defeat Kurdish fighters who were blocked from acquiring just such equipment, U.S. and Kurdish officials said," the Associated Press (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/09/kurdish-fighters-routed-by-better-armed-extremists-may-get-us-weapons-after/) reports. Hat tip to (http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2014/08/arm-the-kurds.php) Power Line. I don't have any well-developed opinions yet about the latest developments in Iraq—other than that this sort of mess is what happens when the U.S. engages in haphazard, unprincipled foreign policy—but offhand arming the Kurds strikes me as a reasonable possibility.

Was Stanford Prison Experiment Flawed?

August 10, 2014

In 1971, Philip Zimbardo conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment, during which students were divided into "guards" and "inmates," and the guards soon began to treat the inmates horribly. But (http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2014/07/what-textbooks-dont-tell-you-one-of.html) according to BPS Research Digest (hat tip to (http://www.williamrinehart.com/2014/famous-pyschological-experiment-has-serious-flaws/) William Rinehart):

New details to emerge show that Zimbardo played a key role in encouraging his "guards" to behave in tyrannical fashion. Critics have pointed out that only one third of guards behaved sadistically (this argues against the overwhelming power of the situation). Question marks have also been raised about the self-selection of particular personality types into the study. Moreover, in 2002, the social psychologists Steve Reicher and Alex Haslam conducted the BBC Prison Study to test the conventional interpretation of the SPE. The researchers deliberately avoided directing their participants as Zimbardo had his, and this time it was the prisoners who initially formed a strong group identity and overthrew the guards.

But even if all the criticisms of the Stanford Prison Experiment are true, it's still the case that "one third of guards behaved sadistically" at Zimbardo "encouragement." That still says something very important about the human capacity to mistreat other people.

Egypt Dissolves Muslim Brotherhood

August 10, 2014

"Egypt's administrative court on Saturday dissolved the political party of the banned Muslim Brotherhood and ordered its assets liquidated, the state news agency reported," the Associated Press (http://online.wsj.com/articles/egypt-court-dissolves-muslim-brotherhood-party-1407585929) re-reported yesterday." News Sandwich (http://newssandwich.net/2014/08/09/because-you-need-it-a-foreign-policy-news-sandwich/) opines, "Despite our government's attempt to put the Muslim Brotherhood in power in Egypt, the better people in that country continue to marginalize their 'Freedom and Justice Party.'" Hat tip to (https://twitter.com/AmyPeikoff/status/498335788128423936) Amy Peikoff.

O'Keefe Sneaks Across U.S.—Mexican Border Dressed as Bin Laden

August 11, 2014

Sensationalist media personality James O'Keefe snuck across the U.S.—Mexican border—while dressed as Osama bin Laden—to illustrate how insecure the borders really are. See reports by the (http://dailycaller.com/2014/08/11/new-video-james-okeefe-crosses-the-border-as-osama-bin-laden/) Daily Caller and the (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2721991/The-border-fence-joke-Filmmaker-crosses-US-Mexico-dressed-Osama-bin-Laden-Border-Patrol-says-once.html) Daily Mail. Of course, if the United States would stop fostering a black market in drugs and stop violating the rights of peaceable people to immigrate, the job of securing the border would be radically easier, as I've (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/06/to-secure-the-borders-liberalize-immigration/) argued.

Gaylord and the Sickening Politicization of Development

August 11, 2014

Aurora's efforts to facilitate the development of the Gaylord Rockies hotel illustrate the far-reaching influence of city politics on commercial development. The Colorado Springs Gazette (http://gazette.com/gazette-investigation-raises-new-questions-about-multimillion-dollar-aurora-tax-giveaway/article/1535340) reports, "The city of Aurora invented an incentive tool called an enhanced taxing area to levy higher admissions and lodging taxes, imposed a general improvement district with a 40-mill property tax levy, and declared agricultural land blighted to use urban renewal tax incentives." In many cases development is now a matter of regional governments muscling landowners through threats of arbitrary "blight" designations and taxing different business owners at radically different rates to "manage" development.

Hickenlooper: Bloomberg "One of the Greatest Mayors" in History

August 11, 2014

Is it any wonder that Colorado Democrats are taking marching orders from Michael Bloomberg? Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper write a "fawning letter" to Bloomberg and called him "one of the greatest mayors, not just in New York, but in the history of the United States." See Todd Shepherd's (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/08/10/hickenlooper-wrote-long-fawning-letter-to-former-nyc-mayor-michael-bloomberg/) report for Complete Colorado for details. Bloomberg is one of the nation's most prominent nannyists who advocates gun bans, restrictions on soda, and more. Of course, Bloomberg's replacement, Bill de Blasio, is a far greater enemy of liberty.

Colorado Activist W. Earl Allen Dies in Plane Crash

August 11, 2014

W. Earl Allen, long active in Colorado libertarian and free market organizations, died August 9 in a plane crash. See my brief (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/w-earl-allen-died-doing-what-he-loved/) write-up about Earl and the Denver Post's (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26311858/two-dead-steamboat-air-crash-identified) report about the crash. Just a few months ago I gave Earl some old flying videos that I'd collected. I've known Earl for many years, and I'm deeply saddened by his passing. The photo shown is of Earl at a (http://ariarmstrong.com/2009/03/beer-smash-photos/) 2009 event I organized to protest legal restrictions of beer sales.

Wait… You Mean I Shouldn't Always Trust What I Read Online?

August 11, 2014

Here are a couple recent reminders of why you really shouldn't trust everything you read On The Line.

1. Michael Hale, who runs a dumb-joke Twitter feed called dogboner, saw Neil deGrasse Tyson on a New York subway, took a photo of him, and Tweeted a dumb-joke Tweet (http://gawker.com/how-i-became-thousands-of-nerds-worst-enemy-by-tweeting-1618323233) calling Tyson "Some guy using his laptop on the train like a Dumbass nerd." If only I were that funny I too could have nearly forty-thousand Twitter followers. But a lot of people didn't get this humor and assumed Hale was playing it straight. Hale (https://twitter.com/dogboner/status/494578076790292481) responded, "Bahaha I somehow fooled a bunch of people into thinking I'm an idiot just by acting really stupid." Unless he didn't really fool them, and they were all just carrying on the joke, in which case I'm the one now fooled. (Unless I'm just pretending to be fooled.) In any event, someone wasn't grokking what was going on.

2. Michelle Fields, a media personality, thought one of her former Pepperdine professors called her a "full retard" on Twitter. But it's unclear who posted the Tweet in question; see the Twitchy (http://twitchy.com/2014/08/10/tweeter-claiming-to-be-prof-russell-burgos-says-michelle-fields-got-him-mixed-up-with-someone-else/) notes.

Anyway, if you're not immediately skeptical of nearly everything you read on the Internet until you confirm the story, you're not doing it right. Or you're just playing games and reading joke sites, like a dumbass nerd.

All Police Actions Should Be Video Recorded

August 11, 2014

The New York Police Department's Chief of Departments reminded city police "that they can't legally take action to stop someone from filming them, unless that person is interfering with police operations," (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nypd-cops-told-memo-filmed-article-1.1898379) reports the New York Daily News (hat tip to Paul Hsieh). I'm of the opinion that all public police actions should be video recorded by the police as well as by any public spectator who wishes to turn on a camera. It's safer for the cops (except for the corrupt ones), and it's safer for the public.

See My Grandfather Spray DDT without Protective Gear

August 11, 2014

My grandfather Theo Eversol was a peach farmer in Palisade, Colorado. When I saw him spray his orchards in the 1970s and 1980s with pesticides, he wore protective gear. But back in the 1950s he didn't wear protective gear, at least judging from a ca. (http://www.palisadecorotary.org/sunrise/peaches/) 1953 film about the Palisade peach industry that's archived online by the Palisade Sunrise Rotary. The film shows my grandfather spraying DDT out of a hose on the back of a tractor, wearing nothing but regular clothing. The images shown are captured from that film.

Today no one doubts that spraying DDT without protective gear is not a great idea health-wise. But, given mosquitos are the world's most deadly creature, (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/10/snails-are-a-thousand-times-more-deadly-than-sharks/) killing some 725,000 people each year, I can't help but think that widespread bans of DDT (previously used to kill mosquitos, among other things) has killed untold millions of human beings over the years.

The peach film is remarkable for many other reasons besides its depiction of pesticide control. A lot of things have changed since then, but in many ways the industry is similar to the way it was back then.

Snails Are a Thousand Times More Deadly than Sharks

August 11, 2014

Conrad Hacket of the Pew Research Center published an (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/498622330302521345) informative graphic on Twitter about the relative deadliness of various animals (hat tip to Michael Shermer). Following is his list of beasties with the number of people they kill every year:

The Weather Channel has out a (http://www.weather.com/health/15-deadliest-animals-world-20140507) lengthier list (again shown with annual number of human victims):

So why do people obsess about sharks, and why have so many horror/suspense films been made about sharks? Where's the "Shells" or "Trunks" film? The lesson here is that people's fears often have little to do with objective risks.

W. Earl Allen Died Doing What He Loved

August 11, 2014

W. Earl Allen, long a libertarian activist in Colorado, died August 9 in a plane crash. The Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26311858/two-dead-steamboat-air-crash-identified) reports, "A Broomfield flight instructor and his student died Saturday when the small plane they were flying crashed near Steamboat Springs. Routt County Coroner Rob Ryg identified the two as William Earl Allen, 62, and a flying student, Terry Lynn Stewart, 60, of Houston." This is devastating news to the many people who knew and loved Earl.

Of those aspects of his life with which I was familiar, three of Earl's loves stand out: His love of liberty, his love of flying, and his love of public speaking. I knew him from his political activism. In answering a (http://ariarmstrong.com/2012/03/ideas-of-the-tea-party-survey/) survey a couple years ago, Earl said he read Milton Friedman's Free to Choose when he was a college teacher, and he owns "three copies of Atlas Shrugged, one of which is falling apart at the seams due to overuse."

Earl promoted a free-market in health care while at a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-weXKMmrmo) 2010 rally (see the 2:55 mark in the video). In 2009, he joined me and other activists to (http://ariarmstrong.com/2009/03/beer-smash-photos/) protest legal restrictions on beer sales. Following is a photograph from that event; Earl is at left, with Amanda Muell, Justin Longo, Dave Williams, and me.

Regarding his flying, Earl was featured in a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsxKXkCN3v4) 2011 student video about his career as a flight instructor.

Earl's death is a great loss to his family, his friends, and his fellow advocates of liberty.

August 13 Update: I just received an email from Earl's wife with the following notice: "William Earl (Earl) Allen was born on March 18, 1952 in Provo, Utah and passed away on August 9, 2014 in Routt County, CO at the age of 62. He is survived by his wife Maralyn Mencarini; his mother Donna Sharp (Norman); siblings Edward (Madalyn), Eric (Ying), Esther (Nathaniel), and Evan (Rachel); eight nieces and nephews; and six great-nieces and nephews. . . . As an expression of sympathy, memorial contributions may be made at https://secure.eaa.org/development/index.html to the EAA Young Eagles Program."

Watkins on How to Repeal ObamaCare

August 12, 2014

In his recent (http://politix.topix.com/story/13537-is-obamacare-here-to-stay) op-ed for Politix, Don Watkins paints potentially grim future for those wanting to repeal ObamaCare. He compares its history with that of Social Security, in which opposition from the right started with superficial objections and soon withered away almost entirely, such that now almost all Republicans openly endorse Social Security.

But repealing ObamaCare is not hopeless, Watkins writes, if those fighting for its repeal follow three main strategies: First, defend "the free market against those who would blame it for problems" caused by government. Second, distinguish "between an individual's voluntary decision to support people and causes he cares about" from the moral premise "that a person's need entitles him to support by others." Third, "offer an inspiring moral alternative" of free markets and voluntary interactions between patients, doctors, and insurers.

Incidentally, the pdf of Watkins's new book, Rooseveltcare: How Social Security is Sabotaging the Land of Self-Reliance, is (http://ari.aynrand.org/~/media/pdf/rooseveltcare.ashx) available for free online.

Fast Buses Beat Rail

August 12, 2014

In a new (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/08/12/why-rapid-buses-are-preferable-to-rail-transit/) op-ed for Complete Colorado, Randal O'Toole argues that governments that run transportation systems should build rapid-bus lines rather than rail lines. Rail is expensive, and rail lines serve only particular routes. He concludes, "Transit agencies that want to build-light rail are wasting their taxpayers' money. Cities that haven't yet built light-rail should plan rapid-buses instead. Cities that have light rail should expand their systems with rapid buses and plan to replace the rail lines when they wear out with more efficient buses." Someday I hope to write an in-depth essay about the history and theory of government-run transportation systems and their free-market alternative.

Yaron Brook Visits the NSA

August 12, 2014

Recently Yaron Brook, head of the Ayn Rand Institute, visited the offices of the National Security Agency, as he (http://www.blogtalkradio.com/amypeikoff/2014/08/09/dont-let-it-go-unheard-discussion-with-yaron-brook) relates to Amy Peikoff during a "Don't Let It Go Unheard" podcast of hers. The NSA invited Brook and a small group of other academics to talk with NSA officials. Those officials "tried to convince us that they're following the law," Brook said. He said "the law's the problem, . . . and the executive branch is the problem, and American foreign policy is the problem"; the NSA domestic spy programs are a consequence of those deeper problems. Listen to the podcast for his complete account and for his comments on various other contemporary issues.

Out of Africa, but When?

August 12, 2014

Writing for IO9, Annalee Newitz (http://io9.com/more-evidence-undermines-the-out-of-africa-theory-of-1619420466) summarizes a recent discussion at New Scientist about when people first migrated out of Africa. Catherine Brahic (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22329813.000-human-exodus-may-have-reached-china-100000-years-ago.html) writes:

A closer look at the genetics also suggests there was an earlier migration. Recently, Katerina Harvati of the University of Tubingen in Germany and her colleagues tested the classic "out of Africa at 60,000 years ago" story against the earlier-exodus idea. They plugged the genomes of indigenous populations from south-east Asia into a migration model. They found that the genetic data was best explained by an early exodus that left Africa around 130,000 years ago, taking a coastal route along the Arabian peninsula, India and into Australia, followed by a later wave along the classic route.

We're all Africans ultimately; the question is how far back did our various ancestors leave Africa?

End Asset Forfeiture Abuse

August 12, 2014

The Institute for Justice just published a video critical of abusive asset forfeiture. "Civil forfeiture is a little-known legal device that allows law enforcement officials to take your property, sell it and pocket the proceeds—even if you have done nothing wrong," IJ notes. Thankfully, we substantially (http://www.freecolorado.com/2002/04/1404april25.html) reformed asset forfeiture in Colorado in 2002—although now police officers sometimes evade the state law by collaborating with federal agencies (a topic worthy of further research).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6MT_YLO5yg

Two Conflicting Accounts of the Ferguson, Missouri Shooting

August 12, 2014

Many people in Ferguson, Missouri are protesting the police shooting death of "unarmed black teenager" (meaning 18-year-old adult) Michael Brown. What should matter in this case are primarily the facts surrounding the shooting. Unfortunately, two very different accounts of those facts have been presented.

Here is what happened, according to police, as (http://online.wsj.com/articles/missouri-teenager-killed-by-police-after-fight-1407698036) reported by the Wall Street Journal:

Authorities said the shooting occurred around noon Saturday, when a Ferguson police officer encountered two men in the street. When the officer tried to exit his vehicle, Chief Belmar said one of the two pushed the officer back into the cruiser. The suspect allegedly assaulted the officer in the car and the two struggled over his gun. At least one shot was fired inside the vehicle. A few moments later, Chief Belmar said, the officer allegedly fired multiple shots outside the vehicle that killed the suspect, about 35 feet from the cruiser.

If that account is accurate, and if Brown is the "suspect" in question, then arguably Brown attempted to murder a police officer. But that would not justify the officer shooting Brown at a distance, assuming Brown was running away.

But now consider the accounts of Brown's associate and another witness, as (http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-michael-brown-ferguson-missouri-shooting-20140811-story.html) reported by the Los Angeles Times:

Dorin Johnson, a friend of Brown's, told Fox 2 that he and Brown were walking in the street when the police car pulled up. The officer said to "get the eff onto the sidewalk," he recounted. Johnson said the officer reached out of the car window and grabbed Brown around the neck.

Another witness, Piaget Crenshaw, said she saw police chase Brown. "He ran for his life," she said. "They shot him and he fell. He put his arms up to let them know that he was compliant and he was unarmed, and they shot him twice more and he fell to the ground and died."

Whether the officer shot Brown as Brown was running away is independent of whether Brown assaulted the police officer and reached for his gun. If Brown assaulted the officer, then Brown was in the wrong. If the officer shot Brown while Brown was running away, then the officer was in the wrong. So, yes, it's possible, depending on the facts, that both parties were in the moral and legal wrong. It's also possible Brown was entirely innocent. It's also possible that we'll never know exactly what happened, because the case will devolve to conflicting eye-witness accounts.

A couple of related points: First, as I've argued, (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/10/all-police-actions-should-be-video-recorded/) police should video record everything they do. If we had a clear video of what happened, we'd almost certainly be able to firmly nail down the relevant facts. Second, the fact that some of the protesters are using the incident as an excuse to loot and vandalize local shops is reprehensible. Even if Brown was unjustly killed, that hardly excuses protesters in victimizing others.

How Doctors Can Improve Care, Lower Costs, and Earn More

August 12, 2014

In a recent (http://conciergemedicineradio.com/06/) interview with Concierge Medicine Radio, family physician Brian Forrest of Apex, North Carolina discusses his concierge practice (hat tip to (http://conciergemedicineradio.com/06/) Paul Hsieh). CMR summarizes the topics covered:

For more on this innovative approach to health care, see my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2013-fall/dr-josh-umbehr-on-concierge-medicine-revolution/) interview with Dr. Josh Umbehr for the Objective Standard, or see a set of (https://newsle.com/BrianForrest) collected articles about Forrest. For regular updates about health care and health policy, see the Hsieh's blog at (http://blog.westandfirm.org/index.html) Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

To Make Much of Time

August 12, 2014

I never knew until this evening that Robert Herrick (1591—1674) wrote the poem, "(http://www.bartleby.com/101/248.html) To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time." Here is the first and last verse:

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,

Old Time is still a-flying:

And this same flower that smiles to-day

To-morrow will be dying. . . .

Then be not coy, but use your time,

And while ye may, go marry:

For having lost but once your prime,

You may for ever tarry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veYR3ZC9wMQ

Good Grief: Now Free Tampons Are "A Human Right"?

August 12, 2014

Recent I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/05/poopy-pants-welfare/) asked, "Seriously, is there any good or service the left doesn't want to turn into a welfare program?" Apparently the answer is no. In an (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/11/free-tampons-cost-feminine-hygiene-products) op-ed for the Guardian, Jessica Valenti suggests that free tampons are a human right. She concludes, "Why aren't tampons free?" (Hat tip to the (http://washingtonexaminer.com/should-tampons-be-free/article/2551894) Washington Examiner.)

To answer Valenti's question, tampons aren't free because they don't fall from the sky from the Great Vagina God; someone has to produce them, and that costs money. If a tampon is "free" for one person, that means someone else is paying for it. And if government provides "free" tampons, that means government is forcing someone else to pay for them. Where is the feminist ideal of consent when it comes to forcing others to pay for your stuff?

But much of what Valenti writes makes a lot of sense. She's right that access to menstrual hygiene products is extremely important, and she's right that such products should not be subject to sales tax. (Of course, I hold that nothing should be subject to sales tax.)

I want to conclude by switching gears to address a related issue. I didn't realize it at first, but the very heavy menstruation cycles my wife used to have were not normal. They made her weak and anemic. In fact, as we eventually learned, they were caused by uterine fibroids, non-cancerous growths in the uterus. My wife's life changed radically for the better when she got fibroid embolization, a procedure performed by Dr. Brooke Spencer of RIA Endovascular. (My wife has given me permission to discuss her case, in the hopes of altering others to the availability of the procedure.) Ladies, if you have debilitating menstruation cycles, I suggest that you consider getting checked for fibroids—and that, if you have them, you explore the option of embolization. (Disclaimer: I'm not a doctor or medical professional, and this post does not constitute medical advice.) For details read my (http://ariarmstrong.com/2013/08/my-wifes-experiences-with-uterine-fibroid-embolization/) report about my wife's procedure.

William Coley's Immune-Provoking Cancer Treatments

August 13, 2014

William Coley, a doctor in the late 1800s and early 1900s, noticed that some people who got infections beat their cancer. As I understand his work, he theorized that an infection boosts the body's immune system, which then also (sometimes) fights off cancer. Coley developed some bacterial vaccines and gave them to patients, not to vaccinate against a particular illness, but to basically trick the immune system into going into high gear.

Today Coley is not well-respected by other cancer researchers, and his vaccines are illegal in the United States. But Monica Hughes thinks Coley vaccines are a very good ways to treat some cancers, and her husband has taken them (in conjunction with other treatments) to treat a brain tumor. Apparently the treatments have met with at least some success. I'm not sure what to think of Coley's work, but I do find it interesting, regardless of whether ultimately there's anything substantive to it.

In June, Hughes (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdrNYh50wow) presented her views at a Liberty On the Rocks event in Broomfield. Please observe the disclaimer posted with the video: "The speaker is not a medical doctor or health care practitioner. The ideas in this video are not intended as a substitute for the advice of a trained health professional. All matters regarding your health require medical supervision. Consult your physician and/or health care professional before adopting any nutritional, exercise, or medical protocol, as well as about any condition that may require diagnosis or medical attention. In addition, statements regarding certain products and services represent the views of the speaker alone and do not constitute a recommendation or endorsement or any product or service."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdrNYh50wow

Was Robin Williams the Last Comedian with the Courage and Freedom to Make Fun of Islam?

August 13, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my article, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/jihad-robin-williams-speaks-volumes/) The Jihad against Robin Williams Speaks Volumes." I link to one of Williams's (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osvvTOzzQBE) comedic routines in which he makes fun of jihad. (I'm not sure of the date of the performance.) Unsurprisingly, some Muslims responded with rage, praying for Williams's eternal torture at the hands of Allah.

Milwaukee's Pro-Gun Sheriff Beats Bloomberg-Backed Opponent

August 13, 2014

"Yesterday incumbent Sheriff David Clarke, of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, won the Democratic primary, 52-48%," David Kopel (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/08/13/pro-gun-milwaukee-sheriff-defeats-challenge-from-bloomberg/) reports for the Washington Post. "Mayor of Everywhere" Michael Bloomberg poured $150,000 dollars into the campaign to unseat Clarke. Why? Because Bloomberg hates guns and wants a disarmed populace, and (as Kopel reports) "Sheriff Clarke has urged Milwaukee citizens to arm themselves for lawful self-defense."

Will Islamic State Get a Boost in Syria?

August 13, 2014

The Syrian civil war is so complex that I resorted to reading (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Civil_War) Wikipedia to try to get a handle on it. The upshot is that the government of brutal tyrant Bashar al-Assad is battling against the Free Syrian Army as well as against explicitly Islamist groups, including Islamic Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS)—the same broad organization now terrorizing Iraqis.

A problem for al-Assad, as well as for the West, is that, to the degree al-Assad's regime weakens the Free Syrian Army, it strengthens Islamist rebels. The Wall Street Journal makes this point in an (http://online.wsj.com/articles/syrian-forces-advance-on-aleppo-rebels-fear-another-siege-1407860811) article by Maria Abi-Habib. The regime is currently attacking rebel forces in Aleppo. "The fall of Aleppo, Syria's largest city and economic hub before the fighting, could also bolster the ranks of Islamic State militants who continue to make gains across the country, as defeated members of the Western-backed Free Syrian Army switch to their side," Abi-Habib writes.

And what we know about Islamic State (ISIS) is that its members are brutal, murderous totalitarian Muslims who explicitly want to destroy America and create a global Islamic state. So how is this all going to end?

Fears of Rioting Drive Missouri Gun Sales

August 13, 2014

This is hardly surprising: "Gun sales are up across St. Louis since the shooting of Michael Brown and subsequent nights of violence," as CBS Saint Louis (http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2014/08/12/gun-sales-up-across-area/) reports (hat tip to (https://twitter.com/DRUDGE_REPORT/status/499378756088131585) Drudge Report). This mirrors (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRc_FlmW2Jc) what happened during the Los Angeles riots. Hopefully those intent on harming innocent third parties and their property will knock it off.

Ferguson Unrest Raises Concerns about Militarized Police

August 14, 2014

No sensible person questions the need for a strong police presence in Ferguson, Missouri, given that rioters there have vandalized and looted businesses and even (http://abcnews.go.com/US/violence-ferguson-police-fire-smoke-bombs-tear-gas/story?id=24973522) thrown Molotov cocktails. But police action there has clearly gotten out of control.

Saying that Ferguson looked like a "a little bit more like a war zone" than a normal city, Missouri governor Jay Nixon "announced Thursday that the Missouri Highway Patrol will take control of security in Ferguson," USA Today (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/08/14/ferguson-missouri-police-clashes-shooting-anonymous/14046707/) reports. A video provided by USA Today shows Ferguson police intentionally assaulting members of the media.

A broader issue is the militarization of police in America, including in Ferguson. In an (http://theweek.com/article/index/266337/the-fiasco-in-ferguson-shows-why-you-dont-give-military-equipment-to-cops) article for the Week, Ryan Cooper argues that "it is beyond reckless to let a bunch of local cops get their hands on a high-grade military arsenal"; he plausibly argues "the military itself would never behave so crudely" as the Ferguson police have behaved with their hi-tech gear. Bonnie Kristian (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/266402/speedreads-the-pentagon-supplied-ferguson-police-with-military-apparatus-being-used-against-civilians) reports for the Week that the Pentagon provided the Ferguson police with two tactical vehicles.

Concern about the militarization of police has been growing for years; for example, see (http://www.theagitator.com) Radley Balko's Rise of the Warrior Cop. Less than a month before the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson (which provoked the protests and riots), A. J. Delgado wrote an article for National Review titled, "(http://www.nationalreview.com/article/383312/its-time-conservatives-stop-defending-police-j-delgado) It's Time for Conservatives to Stop Defending Police"; and John Stossel wrote an article for Fox titled, "(http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2014/07/23/conservatives-libertarians-and-liberals-should-all-worry-about-militarization/) Conservatives, Libertarians and Liberals Should All Worry about the Militarization of Police."

Let's not forget the innocent people victimized by the violent rioters in Ferguson—and the need for the police to appropriately intervene to try to stop that violence. Riot conditions undoubtedly justify a different and more robust police response than is warranted in normal circumstances. That said, I worry that, by becoming militarized, some of America's police officers tend to forget that they are civilians whose proper job is to protect the peace and to protect people's rights.

11:06 pm Update: Captain Ronald Johnson of the Missouri State Highway Patrol appears to be doing a decent job of restoring order. Paul Hampel and Koran Addo (http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/mcculloch-blasts-nixon-for-replacing-st-louis-county-police-control/article_0806541b-ed48-5d06-9267-323531ad6cf1.html) write for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, "Johnson marched in shirtsleeves—a stark contrast with the para-military uniforms that have become the symbol of the Ferguson police presence during nearly a week of unrest." Hat tip to the (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/266442/speedreads-new-state-police-commander-is-bringing-calm-to-ferguson-missouri) Week.

Amazon Is Wrong to Sanction Antitrust Action against Hachette

August 14, 2014

In an August 9 (http://www.readersunited.com) email to participants of Kindle Direct Publishing, Amazon argued that publishers should price their ebooks at $9.99 or less and that the publisher Hachette is wrong to try to price them higher. Amazon sanctioned the antitrust action against Hachette and other publishers regarding ebook pricing, claiming:

Hachette has already been caught illegally colluding with its competitors to raise e-book prices. . . . Colluding with its competitors to raise prices wasn't only illegal, it was also highly disrespectful to Hachette's readers.

Amazon may be right or wrong about the economics of ebook pricing, but it's definitely wrong about the moral propriety of antitrust action. Book publishers and all other businesses have a moral right to contract and otherwise associate voluntarily with suppliers, other businesses, and customers. Anyone who feels "disrespected" by a business's actions is properly free to stop associating with that business and seek to do business elsewhere. When, under antitrust laws, government sues, fines, or otherwise punishes companies for doing what those companies have a moral right to do, government becomes the violator of rights. (See also my article for the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2013/08/the-governments-obscene-assault-on-apple/) The Government's Obscene Assault on Apple."

Amazon's sanction of antitrust action is immoral and especially self-destructive given Amazon's own susceptibility to antitrust actions. In 2008, Amazon was itself hit with an (http://antitrust.booklocker.com/booklocker-files-class-action-lawsuit-against-amazon) antitrust suit: BookLocker.com "filed a class action lawsuit against Amazon.com in response to Amazon's . . . attempts to force [sic] all publishers using Print on Demand (POD) technology to pay Amazon to print their books." (Amazon (http://antitrust.booklocker.com/amazon-backs-down-settles-antitrust-lawsuit-by-booklocker) settled the suit in 2010.) And recently "German book publishers . . . filed a complaint with the country's antitrust authority against Amazon, accusing it of violating competition laws and asking the government to investigate," the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/25/business/international/amazon-accused-in-Germany-of-antitrust-violation.html) reports.

What of Amazon's economic case for lower-priced ebooks? The company states:

[E]-books are highly price elastic. This means that when the price goes down, customers buy much more. We've quantified the price elasticity of e-books from repeated measurements across many titles. For every copy an e-book would sell at $14.99, it would sell 1.74 copies if priced at $9.99. So, for example, if customers would buy 100,000 copies of a particular e-book at $14.99, then customers would buy 174,000 copies of that same e-book at $9.99.

No doubt this is true for many ebooks, but it is not necessarily true of all ebooks. Some books are highly specialized, and its readers tend to buy them regardless of the asking price (within a wide range). In those cases, a publishing company might do better by charging more per copy. In other cases, a publisher might do better to charge far less than $9.99 per copy.

If Amazon does not wish to carry ebooks priced higher than $9.99, then Amazon has a moral right not to do so—but not to initiate physical force (or sanction government force) against publishers to make them lower their prices. And if publishers wish to price their ebooks at a higher price, they have a moral right to do so—but not to force Amazon to carry them. And the sole proper role of government in this area is protect people's rights to do business, when they choose to do so, by mutual consent.

Ecoterrorists Call for Murder of Food Scientists and Their Supporters

August 14, 2014

As Amanda Maxham (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/08/13/policy-digest-environmental-issues) writes for the Ayn Rand Institute, some anti-GMO activists have called for the murder of scientists who conduct, and of writers who support, genetic engineering of plants. Maxham also discusses environmentalists who advocate population control. In a 2012 interview with me for the Objective Standard, Robert Zubrin aptly (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2012-fall/robert-zubrin/) characterizes such environmentalist attitudes as a "scourge of antihumanism." And recently I discussed an environmentalist plan to (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/environmentalists-war-people/) engineer humans as a way to reduce their "carbon footprints." So, for environmentalists, apparently it's not okay to engineer food for human benefit, but it is okay to engineer human beings for the sake of the "environment."

Accusations Fly about 2009 Ferguson Police Abuse

August 15, 2014

Michael Daly tells a (http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/15/the-day-ferguson-cops-were-caught-in-a-bloody-lie.html) horrifying story for the Daily Beast. According to Daley, police officers in Ferguson, Missouri, arrested Henry Davis on September 20, 2009, on an outstanding warrant. The first problem is that the police arrested the wrong man; they got the wrong "Henry Davis." Then, for no justifiable reason, the police beat Davis, at one point kicking him in the head as he lay defenseless on the ground. He was so badly injured they took him to the hospital. And then the police charged Davis with "property damage" for—get this—getting his blood on their uniforms. Could this story possibly be true? If it is, why are the officers involved not now sitting in prison? Hopefully this case will become the subject of a more detailed investigation, if not by prosecutors then at least by journalists.

Related:

That's Captain China to You

August 15, 2014

A Chinese film reviewer for Douban.com (http://movie.douban.com/review/6622349/) wrote of Captain America: The Winter Soldier that the hero's enemy "is the very country he loves and protects. To love one's country isn't the same as loving one's government: This is the main draw of Captain America." This translation comes by way of Warner Brown's (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/04/11/captain_america_captain_china) article for Foreign Policy (via (http://progressive-economy.org/2014/08/13/chinese-box-office-for-captain-america-the-winter-soldier-115-6-million/) Edward Gresser via (http://www.aei-ideas.org/2014/08/how-captain-america-conquered-china-and-why-it-matters/) James Pethokoukis). (I checked the original in Google Translate, which produced a bit of a jumble, but the translations seem to roughly square.) Of course, Captain America's enemy in the film is not the "country he loves"; it is instead a corrupt group controlling the country's government. By defeating that group, Captain America saves his country. Hopefully that message is appealing to Americans and Chinese alike.

Rand Paul, Libertarians Decry Militarized Police

August 15, 2014

Writing for Time, Rand Paul (http://time.com/3111474/rand-paul-ferguson-police/) writes, "there should be a difference between a police response and a military response." He continues, "There is a systemic problem with today's law enforcement. Not surprisingly, big government has been at the heart of the problem. Washington has incentivized the militarization of local police precincts by using federal dollars to help municipal governments build what are essentially small armies. . . ." Paul cites the related work of (http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military/paramilitary-police-force-ferguson) Glenn Reynolds and (http://www.cato.org/blog/police-militarization-ferguson-nationwide) Walter Olsen.

Meanwhile, David Kopel (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/08/14/libertarian-criticism-of-police-militarization/) points out for the Washington Post that he and other libertarian-minded scholars have been raising the alarm about militarized police for years. He cites several of his own articles on the matter.

Related:

Require Police to Wear Cameras

August 15, 2014

I think Derek Thompson ((http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/08/americas-weaponized-police-force-could-benefit-from-one-more-weapon-cameras/376063/) writing for the Atlantic) has this exactly right: "Although military technology has arguably given law enforcement an unreasonable amount of power, there is another piece of technology that could help restrain the militarization of America's police in the future: a camera." Thompson discusses the case of Rialto, California, which outfitted officers with cameras in 2012. The results? Complaints against officers fell by 88 percent and "'use of force' fell by 59 percent," he reports.

Given the great benefits of this technology and its relative low costs, why would any police force not do this? This shouldn't even be optional; for whenever an officer is in contact with the public, state legislatures should require that all officers in their states always wear cameras, and Congress should require the same of all federal law enforcement officers. As I've said, such a policy would protect the public, and it would also protect good cops against false accusations.

Discovery of Parasitic Plant Control Mechanism May Lead to Better Containment

August 15, 2014

A (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-08/vt-pmu080114.php) media release from Virginia Tech reveals a groundbreaking discovery about parasitic plants: They exchange RNA (mRNA, or "messenger" RNA) with their hosts to "communicate," probably to control the way the host plant behaves. The release quotes Julie Scholes of the University of Sheffield: "Parasitic plants such as witchweed and broomrape are serious problems for legumes and other crops that help feed some of the poorest regions in Africa and elsewhere." The new work could lead to better ways for humans to control parasitic plants. Biologist Jim Westwood states, "The beauty of this discovery is that this mRNA could be the Achilles hill for parasites."

Is Michael Brown a Robbery Suspect?

August 15, 2014

This certainly adds important context to the police shooting of Michael Brown, whose death sparked protests and riots in Ferguson, Missouri: Brown "fit the description of a suspect in a strong-arm robbery that happened minutes" before Brown was shot, Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/15/ferguson-police-say-michael-brown-fit-description-strong-arm-robbery-suspect/) reports. That certainly explains why the police were on alert and searching for a suspect matching the description of the robbery suspect. And if Brown was indeed the robbery suspect, he probably was tense with the police officer who confronted him. Again, the police's story, if I understand it correctly, is that Brown attacked the officer and attempted to take his gun. Now as ever, people should refrain from rushing to unwarranted conclusions; there's still a great deal we don't know about this case.

August 20 Update: This August 15 (http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/15/us/missouri-teen-shooting/) story from CNN is relevant: "The Ferguson police officer who shot Michael Brown didn't stop him because he was suspected in a convenience-store robbery, but because he was 'walking down the middle of the street blocking traffic,' the city's police chief [Thomas Jackson] said." Does that mean the officer in question hadn't even heard about the robbery, or that he'd heard about it and stopped Brown because he was in traffic? At any rate, Brown's robbery may well explain his state of mind, and certainly him "walking down the middle of the street" is dangerous behavior for which a police response is appropriate.

Suddenly Libertarianism Is Hip

August 15, 2014

I used to be a libertarian and active in the Libertarian Party. Now I'm not a libertarian. I advocate free markets and individual rights—but I don't think those values are the essence of libertarianism. Instead, libertarianism is the belief that political liberty can be advocated with no moral foundation or (what amounts to the same thing) any moral foundation. In practice, libertarianism usually devolves to hostility toward government as such (although sometimes it devolves to Rawlsian welfare statism or some other form). In my view, Craig Biddle offers the single best critique of libertarianism in his "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2013-winter/libertarianism-vs-radical-capitalism/) Libertarianism vs. Radical Capitalism." I've also written on the (http://ariarmstrong.com/2011/05/why-im-not-a-libertarian/) subject.

And yet public interest in and discussion of libertarianism is a notable and potentially positive development. Here's a run-down of some of that discussion.

(http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/10/magazine/has-the-libertarian-moment-finally-arrived.html) Has the 'Libertarian Moment' Finally Arrived?

New York Times, Robert Draper, August 7

"[T]oday, for perhaps the first time, the libertarian movement appears to have genuine political momentum on its side. An estimated 54 percent of Americans now favor extending marriage rights to gay couples. Decriminalizing marijuana has become a mainstream position, [as has] the drive to reduce sentences for minor drug offenders. . . . The appetite for foreign intervention is at low ebb, with calls by Republicans to rein in federal profligacy now increasingly extending to the once-sacrosanct military budget. And deep concern over government surveillance looms as one of the few bipartisan sentiments in Washington. . . ."

(http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/08/america-is-not-turning-libertarian.html) No, America Is Not Turning Libertarian

New York, Jonathan Chait, August 7

". . . The crucial difference lies in economics, where libertarians veer sharply right and young voters veer sharply left. This can be seen in specific instances, like health care, where young voters are far more likely than older ones to support an expanded government role. Like most Americans, they strongly support the maintenance of specific programs, such as Social Security. Unlike most Americans, they actually favor bigger government in the abstract. . . ."

(http://thefederalist.com/2014/08/08/the-libertarian-moment-has-definitely-not-arrived/) The 'Libertarian Moment' Has Definitely Not Arrived

Federalist, David Harsanyi, August 8

". . . A libertarian—according to the (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/libertarian) dictionary, at least—is a person who 'upholds the principles of individual liberty especially of thought and action.' And there is simply no evidence that Americans are any more inclined to support policy that furthers individual freedom or shrinks government. . . ."

(http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/11/opinion/paul-krugman-the-libertarian-fantasy.html) Phosphorus and Freedom

New York Times, Paul Krugman, August 10

". . . Is libertarian economics at all realistic? The answer is no. . . . Smart libertarians have always realized that there are problems free markets alone can't solve—but their alternatives to government tend to be implausible. . . ."

(http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/08/the-illusion-of-a-libertarian-moment/375844/) Why the 'Libertarian Moment' Isn't Really Happening

Atlantic, David Frum, August 11

". . . Young voters are not libertarian, nor even trending libertarian. Neither, for that matter, are older voters. The "libertarian moment" is not an event in American culture. It's a phase in internal Republican Party factionalism. Libertarianism is not pushing Republicans forward to a more electable future. It's pushing them sideways to the extremist margins. . . ."

(http://theweek.com/article/index/266278/yes-the-libertarian-moment-has-arrived) Yes, the Libertarian Moment has Arrived

Week, Damon Linker, August 13

". . . America clearly is becoming more libertarian—it's just that the transformation is happening in morality and culture, not in economic, tax, and regulatory policy. . . ."

(http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/08/an-opening-for-libertarians-to-be-a-significant-force-in-us-politics/375972/) Libertarians Can Be a Significant Force for Good in U.S. Politics

Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf, August 14

". . . Important libertarian victories are happening right now. Consider drug prohibition, which is being challenged in multiple states, as are draconian sentencing rules. Like gay marriage, criminal-justice reform seems poised to sweep the nation within a generation. . . ."

(http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-28779376) Is Ferguson the Start of a 'Libertarian Moment'

BBC, Anthony Zurcher, August 14

". . . . Perhaps the libertarian moment has arrived after all, borne in the ashes and smoke of Missouri riots."

Pipe Guy and the Internationalization of Culture

August 15, 2014

(http://www.statisticbrain.com/social-networking-statistics/) According to Statistic Brain, 490 million people use YouTube every month, and they spend a collective 2.9 billion hours watching YouTube videos. That works out to around six hours of video watching per active person per month, on average. I think it's safe to say that most of those hours are spent on entertainment.

Of the many remarkable things about YouTube is the way it lets people share their artistic talents with a worldwide audience in a way never before possible. No doubt you've heard of Psy, but have you heard of Lim Chang Jung—in my view a far better artist? His (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLPLgJqeZJw) music video has over seven million views despite not being English friendly. A self-made comedian makes hilarious videos through his MediocreFilms; his "(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA1J-raGinQ) Cell Phone Crashing at the Airport" has over eleven million views since December. The latest video I've enjoyed is a musical performance by "(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0gED3rn2Tc) Pipe Guy," an Australian who plays cleverly arranged PVC pipes. His video, only a few days old, has over a million views.

And to think: I am one of the last human beings ever to be born in the pre-Internet age.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0gED3rn2Tc

"Convert or Be Killed"

August 16, 2014

Only the willfully blind can continue ignore the nature of the widespread Islamic totalitarian movement. Members of Islamic State (aka ISIS) recently slaughtered scores of Yazidi men in northern Iraq and "kidnapped 'dozens' of women and children," (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/08/16/isis-massacres-dozens-yazidi-in-northern-iraq-town-say-iraqi-officials/) Fox News reports. For now we can only imagine what will happen to these women and children. Islamic State has murdered "at least 500" Yazidis, Fox reports. Why did Muslims butcher these men? A (http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/08/15/uk-iraq-security-yazidis-killings-idUKKBN0GF1XZ20140815) Reuters report (mentioned by Fox) quotes senior Kurdish official Hoshiyar Zebari: "We believe it's because of their creed: convert or be killed." This was cold-blooded mass murder in the name of Allah.

Perry Indicted for Being Governor

August 16, 2014

What's going on in Texas? Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/16/texas-gov-perry-indicted-for-coercion-for-veto-threat/) reports that Governor Rick Perry was indicted after he "threatened to veto $7.5 million over two years for the public integrity unit, which is run by Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg's office. The governor wanted Lehmberg, a Democrat, to resign after she was arrested and pleaded guilty to drunken driving in April 2013. When she refused, Perry vetoed the money." So, in other words, Perry, the governor, whose job entails signing and vetoing legislation, vetoed legislation funding a "public integrity unit" run by a drunk driver. I have very little idea what this "public integrity unit" does, but might it be a reasonable guess that the best person to run it isn't someone who admitted to drunk driving? It seems to me that Perry has been indicted for acting on his authority as governor. (I only wish we Coloradans could indict John Hickenlooper for not using his veto power nearly often enough.) This indictment seems totally bizarre to me. But this is only my initial reaction; perhaps I'm missing some nuance of the case and, on further evaluation of the evidence, I'll reach a different conclusion—but I can't imagine why I might. For reference, here's the (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/08/15/indictment-against-texas-gov-rick-perry/) indictment and the (brief) (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/08/15/statement-from-texas-gov-rick-perry-defense-attorney/) response of Perry's attorney. The New York Times also has a (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/16/us/gov-rick-perry-of-texas-is-indicted-over-veto-of-funds-for-das-office.html) report.

Adama on Militarized Police

August 17, 2014

Adama from Scyfy's Battlestar Galactica (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Battlestar_Galactica_(2003)) says, "There's a reason you separate military and the police. One fights the enemies of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people." As John Edwin Mason (https://twitter.com/johnedwinmason/status/499915777768951808/photo/1) writes, "God bless the screenwriter who wrote these lines." Hat tip to Paul Hsieh.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv9S93yTgGc

Ferguson Rioters "Wanted to Injure Police"

August 17, 2014

Antonio French, part of the peaceful protests in Ferguson, Missouri, tweeted early this morning, "I can tell you firsthand that some of the people that remained tonight were armed. Were ready for a fight. And wanted to injure police." Politicus USA has (http://www.politicususa.com/2014/08/17/situation-ferguson-growing-calmer-missouri-governor-enacts-midnight-curfew.html) reproduced that tweet and others; hat tip to (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/17/police-try-to-disperse-protesters-defying-ferguson-curfew/) Fox News. Fox reports that one of the rioters fired a gun at police but didn't injure anyone. Fox and others also report that one rioter was shot during the night and that that person is in critical condition, but no report I've seen clarifies who was shot or who did the shooting.

What is clear here is that the violent rioters in Ferguson—as distinguished from the peaceful protesters—are smashing and looting stores, intentionally trying to hurt police, and in general proving to the world that a forceful police response there is warranted. They are foolishly and self-destructively taking attention off of whether the shooting of Michael Brown was justified, and putting attention onto the criminal fringe of Ferguson. The rioters' behavior is shameful, to say the least.

The "Unbelievably Ridiculous" Indictment of Rick Perry

August 17, 2014

Recently I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/15/perry-indicted-for-being-governor/) wrote, "It seems to me that Perry has been indicted for acting on his authority as governor." The alleged problem is that Perry vetoed legislation funding a bureaucracy—something fully within his legitimate powers as governor. I have seen nothing to alter my view that the indictment of Perry is absurd, unjust, and politically malicious.  Jonathan Chait has a (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/08/rick-perry-indictment-is-unbelievably-ridiculous.html) similar view: "The theory behind the indictment is flexible enough that almost any kind of political conflict could be defined as a 'misuse' of power or 'coercion' of one's opponents. To describe the indictment as 'frivolous' gives it far more credence than it deserves." The headline calls the indictment "unbelievably ridiculous." Hopefully Texas courts will toss this monstrosity promptly.

Perry Indictment "Irresponsible and Nakedly Political"

August 18, 2014

Scott Lemieux, (http://theweek.com/article/index/266547/rick-perry-is-a-terrible-governor-but-his-indictment-is-a-politically-motivated-farce) writing for the Week, reaching a similar conclusion to the indictment of Texas governor Rick Perry that I and others have reached: "The basis for the indictment is exceptionally weak, and reflects a disturbing trend towards criminalizing garden-variety political actions. . . . The indictment . . . is irresponsible and nakedly political." Lemieux observes the obvious fact that part of a governor's legitimate powers is to veto legislation.

Related:

Michael Brown Shot in the Front, Not the Back

August 18, 2014

Michael Brown was shot in the front, not the back, as a New York Times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/18/us/michael-brown-autopsy-shows-he-was-shot-at-least-6-times.html) reports (hat tip to (http://dailycaller.com/2014/08/17/none-in-the-back-brown-autopsy-shows-he-was-shot-in-the-front-of-the-body/) Daily Caller). The report is based on an autopsy performed by "Dr. Michael M. Baden, the former chief medical examiner for the City of New York, who flew to Missouri on Sunday at the family's request to conduct the separate autopsy," the Times reports. Brown appears to have been shot six times, and possibly more, with two shots entering his head and four entering his arm, according to the report. This would seem to corroborate the (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/18/does-eye-witness-suggest-michael-brown-charged-police/) eye witness account that Brown first ran from police, then came "back towards" the officer who shot him.

10:52 pm Update: Lawyers for Michael Brown's family have a very different interpretation of the data than that Brown charged the officer. "Lawyers for the family of Michael Brown said a noted former medical examiner's autopsy backs claims the 18-year-old was trying to surrender when he was killed," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/18/lawyers-for-michael-brown-family-say-private-autopsy-backs-witness-accounts/) reports. At any rate, the autopsy rules out the possibility that a police officer shot Brown in the back as he ran away. The autopsy indicates that Brown was facing the officer. Now the open question is whether Brown was seeking to surrender or acting aggressively toward police. As I've repeatedly noted, if the officer in question had been wearing a camera, its video almost certainly would have provided definitive evidence one way or the other. As it is, we may never move beyond "he said she said" claims.

Does Eye Witness Suggest Michael Brown Charged Police?

August 18, 2014

As Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/18/youtube-video-captures-purported-witness-backing-police-version-in-ferguson/) reports, one self-purported eye witness to the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, seems to claim that Brown charged a police officer immediately before that officer shot him. The unnamed person in question can be heard in the background of a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdL9dqkyjhM) graphic video captured of Brown laying in the street soon after he was shot. The person holding the camera claims that the police chased after Brown and shot him again as he lay on the ground; however, the person holding the camera also explicitly says he was not an eye witness to the shooting, and that he's repeating what he had heard others say. However, another person, who can be heard in the background, claims that he was an eye witness to the shooting, and that person claims that Brown and the officer were "over the truck," "then he [Brown] ran, police got out and ran after him." Then, "The next thing I know, he comes back towards them. The police had his guns drawn." The relevant portion of the video can be seen starting at around the 6:30 minute mark (warning: graphic content). Of course, this is still not a confirmed account; there are many potential reasons why this interpretation of events may not be accurate or complete. However, to my mind this audio provides a good reason to think that Brown may well have charged police—in which case the police shooting of him, which took place soon after a local robbery in which Brown may have participated, may have been justified. (Obviously his death is tragic regardless of the details.)

As I've (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/15/require-police-to-wear-cameras/) noted before, if the officer in question had been wearing a camera, we would now know definitively what happened that day. I believe that every federal, state, and local law enforcement officer should, while on duty in a public setting, wear and use an active video camera.

In related news, "Missouri governor orders National Guard to Ferguson after latest night of clashes," Fox (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/18/private-autopsy-on-michael-brown-reveals-that-was-shot-six-times-report-says/) reports. Even if the shooting of Brown was not justified, that would hardly justify rioters smashing and looting stores and attempting to injure police, as some of have done.

Finally, Johnathan Gentry, a minister local to Ferguson, shared a YouTube video in which he condemns those perpetrating violence. Fox shows (http://video.foxnews.com/v/3731606825001/ministers-explosive-rant-on-violence-in-ferguson-goes-viral/) part of the video (with which I do not entirely agree) and interviews Gentry.

10:59 pm Update: See my (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/18/michael-brown-shot-in-the-front-not-the-back/) updates elsewhere regarding claims that Brown was surrendering, not acting aggressively toward the police.

Related:

Newspaper Ad Revenue Dropped from $66 to $24 Billion

August 18, 2014

In 2013 dollars, American newspaper ad revenue grew from around $20 billion in 1950 to $65.8 billion in 2000—then dropped to $23.6 billion as of last year (including digital and "other" ad revenue). This is from (http://www.aei-ideas.org/2014/04/creative-destruction-2013-newspaper-ad-revenue-continued-its-precipitous-free-fall-and-its-probably-not-over-yet/) Mark J. Perry of AEI, hat tip to (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/501136390449414144) Conrad Hackett. Perry writes, "The dramatic decline in newspaper ad revenues since 2000 has to be one of the most significant and profound Schumpeterian gales of creative destruction in the last decade, maybe in a generation." Of course, this doesn't account for all the ad revenue generated by America's independent bloggers and publishers, who have to some extent displaced the work once done by newspapers. Still, it is a breathtaking change.

Was Michael Brown High on Marijuana, and Did It Matter?

August 19, 2014

Citing an anonymous "person familiar with the [St. Louis] county's investigation," the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2014/08/18/county-investigation-michael-brown-was-shot-from-the-front-had-marijuana-in-his-system/) reports Michael Brown "had marijuana in his system when he was shot and killed by a police officer on Aug. 9 in Ferguson," Missouri.

Leftist David Sirota persuasively (http://www.ibtimes.com/mike-brown-autopsy-results-marijuana-found-ferguson-teens-body-does-pot-increase-violent-1661692) argues for the International Business Times that there's no good reason to think marijuana contributes to violent behavior overall.

More concerning to me is that Brown apparently robbed a market just ten minutes before he was shot. Maybe consuming marijuana doesn't make a person aggressively agitated, but robbing a store and assaulting its employees (as Brown apparently did) almost certainly does. And flashing gang signs is also probably associated with aggressive violence. The (http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2014/0817/Ferguson-shooting-What-s-known-now-about-Michael-Brown-video) Christian Science Monitor points to a report by (http://patdollard.com/2014/08/meet-the-real-michael-brown-violent-gun-toting-gangbanger/) Pat Dollard with images showing Brown apparently flashing gang signs. (That doesn't mean he was active in a gang, of course.)

As far as I can tell, there simply is not sufficient evidence (and there may never be sufficient evidence) to determine whether the officer who shot Brown was justified in doing so. What is clear is that Brown was no angel. Of course, the police have a responsibility to protect the rights of everyone, not just angels.

Related:

Global Poverty Has Dropped Radically

August 20, 2014

As Michael Shermer (https://twitter.com/michaelshermer/status/499988503262789632/photo/1) tweeted a few days ago, global poverty has declined sharply from 1820. The graphic Shermer shares, created by Max Roser for (http://ourworldindata.org/) OurWorldInData.org, reports that 94 percent of the world's people lived in poverty in 1820, whereas 21 percent did in 2010. That's remarkable progress by any standard—although of course there's still a ways to go. Shermer notes that this advance was accomplished "not by making [the] rich poorer, but making [the] poor richer." Specifically, it was accomplished by producers working in relative freedom. See also Shermer's article, "(http://www.michaelshermer.com/2014/07/the-myth-of-income-inequality/) The Myth of Income Inequality."

Denver's "Affordable Housing" Mandates Made Housing More Expensive

August 20, 2014

As Randal O'Toole writes for (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2013/08/17/the-unsurprising-failure-of-denvers-affordable-housing-ordinance/) Complete Colorado, Denver's so-called "affordable housing" ordinance has made housing in Denver less affordable for most people. As O'Toole explains, when the city forces developers to sell some of their residential units for below the cost of production, developers have to make up the funds by charging others more. And people who buy the "affordable" units are saddled with absurd restrictions, so they're not really such a good deal. I suspect that the ordinance also results in a net loss of development, as it's less attractive to do business in a city whose politicians and bureaucrats are openly hostile to your efforts to earn a profit.

Salzman: Both Beauprez and Gardner Supported Federal "Personhood"

August 20, 2014

As Jason Salzman (http://bigmedia.org/2014/06/30/why-do-beauprez-and-gardner-support-personhood-at-the-federal-but-not-the-state-level/) points out at Bigmedia.org, both Bob Beauprez (Colorado Republican candidate for governor) and Cory Gardner (Republican candidate for U.S. Senate) endorsed federal "personhood" bills to give just-fertilized zygotes full legal rights. "Beauprez supported federal personhood legislation in 2005," Salzman notes, and Gardner is a current sponsor of "personhood" legislation.

Salzman concludes: "The question left hanging is, why would Beauprez (and Gardner) support personhood at the federal level but oppose it in Colorado when the results here would be the same?"

The obvious answer is that both candidates reasonably believe that endorsing Amendment 67—this year's "personhood" ballot measure in Colorado—would be political suicide. From a strategic standpoint, probably the worst thing to happen to Republican candidates this year in Colorado is to have run with "personhood" on the ballot. The measure will certainly bring more left-leaning women to the polls, and it will remind all voters that "personhood" is very much a live issue with many Republican candidates.

For more on why I oppose so-called "personhood" laws, see the papers Diana Hsieh and I co-authored for the (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2011-winter/abortion-rights/) Objective Standard and for the (http://www.seculargovernment.us/docs/a62.shtml) Coalition for Secular Government.

Odoi on African Sex Trafficking of Children

August 20, 2014

Fox Odoi, a member of Uganda's parliament, (http://dailycaller.com/2014/08/19/ugandas-anti-gay-law-masks-the-real-scandal-a-growing-western-child-sex-trade-in-africa/?advD=1248,352962) writes for the Daily Caller: "[T]here is a serious child sex tourist problem affecting Africa, and that many of the abusers come from the West. The Asian child sex trade has been well documented, but the African trade has grown to the point where government and NGO estimates suggest there are as many as 18,000 child sex workers in Uganda alone."

Even worse, writes Odoi, rather than seek to address the problem, some African politicians and activists have instead scapegoated and persecuted homosexuals.

How African governments might put an end to the heinous crime of child sex trafficking is an open question—but hopefully one they will answer soon.

On Evidence and Agendas in Ferguson

August 20, 2014

I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the passion with which some people rush alternately to condemn or to vindicate the police officer who shot Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Might I suggest that we try instead to go where the evidence leads?

Part of the problem is that many of the "facts" reported about the case (and this is typical in any high-profile incident) turn out to be totally false or at least suspect. To take just one recent example, Gateway Pundit (http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2014/08/breaking-report-po-darren-wilson-suffered-orbital-blowout-fracture-to-eye-socket-during-encounter-with-mike-brown/) claims the officer in question suffered an "orbital blowout fracture to the eye socket." But Charles Johnson (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/43751_Jim_Hofts_Unsourced_Claim_That_Officer_Darren_Wilson_Had_an_Orbital_Blowout_Fracture_of_the_Eye_Socket) offers pretty good reasons to doubt that account; he embeds CNN video from an eye witness that (apparently) shows the officer immediately after the shooting, and he is not obviously injured. If he had an eye injury resulting from a scuffle with Brown, it wasn't such a "blowout" that it was obvious at a distance on camera. So did Brown injure the officer? I don't know.

A report from yesterday's New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/20/us/shooting-accounts-differ-as-holder-schedules-visit.html) indicates many of the problems with trying to accurately piece together what happened. "[W]itnesses have given investigators sharply conflicting accounts of the killing," the Times summarizes. Consider some of the problems:

"Some" people claim that Brown and the officer struggled, with the officer in his vehicle and Brown reaching through the window. Apparently at that point the officer's gun went off. Was that because the officer was reaching for it and misfired? Was that because Brown reached for it and fired it? Was that because the officer was attempting to shoot Brown at that time and missed? I don't know.

"Many" witnesses say, "Mr. Brown ran away, the officer got out of his car and began firing toward Mr. Brown, and then Mr. Brown stopped, turned around and faced the officer." If those witnesses are correct, then the officer shot at Brown, but did not strike him or only grazed him, while Brown's back was turned to the officer. If that account is correct, then the question becomes: Was the officer justified in shooting at Brown as he fled?

Most people would assume that an officer may not shoot a fleeing suspect. But, according to (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleeing_felon_rule) Wikipedia, Supreme Court Justice Byron White declared that sometimes the use of potentially deadly force against a fleeing suspect may be appropriate or at least legal: "Where the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a threat of serious physical harm, either to the officer or to others, it is not constitutionally unreasonable to prevent escape by using deadly force." (Missouri may have statutes or precedents regarding this matter; it would be worth someone checking.)

If Brown attempted to murder the police officer by grabbing for the officer's gun with the intent of then shooting the officer, then that officer might reasonably have concluded that Brown posed a "threat of serious physical harm, either to the officer or to others." On the other hand, if Brown didn't actually assault the officer, then for the officer to shoot Brown as he fled would have been immoral and illegal. The key question, then, is, did Brown assault the officer, and, if so, in what manner? I do not know the answer to that question.

Another possibility is that the witnesses in question are wrong, and that the officer did not shoot at Brown as he fled, but only after Brown turned around. Perhaps forensics experts can definitively nail down that point at least—but perhaps not.

Next, reports the Times, "Some witnesses say that Mr. Brown, 18, moved toward Officer [Darren] Wilson, possibly in a threatening manner, when the officer shot him dead. But others say that Mr. Brown was not moving and may even have had his hands up when he was killed." That's a pretty radical difference in interpretation of events by eye witnesses. So was Brown trying to attack the officer, or was he trying to surrender? I don't know.

Unless you were there and you saw what happened with your own eyes, if you claim that, based on existing evidence, you know definitely what happened on the day of Brown's death, I have to question your motives.

Of Course Communists Are Promoting Violence in Ferguson

August 20, 2014

As Charles Johnson (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/43749_One_of_the_Outside_Groups_Inciting_Violence_in_Ferguson-_The_Revolutionary_Communist_Party) reports for Little Green Footballs, members of the Revolutionary Communist Party have been in Ferguson promoting "violent revolution." Johnson cites Antonio French, who reports a "white guy" from Chicago "was trying to incite a riot."

In related News Michalle Malkin persuasively (http://michellemalkin.com/2014/08/20/the-ferguson-feeding-frenzy/) argues that some members of the media in Ferguson seem to have forgotten that their job is to report the news, not create it.

The Faith-Based Barbarism of Islamic State

August 20, 2014

Members of Islamic State beheaded American journalist James Foley, as Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/20/beheading-video-prompts-calls-for-us-to-escalate-campaign-against-isis/) reports. In related news, members of Islamic State recently invaded Kocho in northern Iraq, slaughtered 80 men for not converting to Islam, and kidnapped "all the women and girls," Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/19/us-iraq-security-yazidis-survivor-idUSKBN0GJ1A620140819) reports. After years of the United States "spreading democracy" and welfare programs throughout the Middle East, these are the fruits.

Police Video Should Be Mandatory and Public

August 20, 2014

I have (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/15/require-police-to-wear-cameras/) called for all law enforcement officers at all levels to wear video cameras any time they interact with the public. But such a requirement is not adequate, as Radley Balko (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2014/08/19/police-cameras-are-important-but-theyre-useless-without-proper-policies-to-ensure-theyre-used-properly/) points out in a Washington Post article (hat tip to (https://twitter.com/PaulHsieh/status/502135250894352384) Paul Hsieh). Balko notes that, in San Diego, police have withheld recordings from the media and the public at large—which mostly defeats the purpose of having the cameras in the first place. He offers other similarly disturbing examples.

Legislators should require that law enforcement agents wear video cameras whenever they interact with the public, provide stiff penalties for officers who turn off their cameras or "lose" footage, and require that the footage be made publicly available on request (probably with some exceptions to protect the privacy of people recorded). Although I haven't seen a detailed plan spelling out all the specifics, no doubt such a plan is feasible.

If the police knew their interactions with the public were being recorded, officers would be far more likely to behave responsibly. And if an officer ended up in a violent confrontation with someone, a recording very often would provide clear evidence about what happened. The only losers under such a system are violent criminals and corrupt cops. The winners are innocent people and good cops. So why would we not do this?

What Happened to the Presumption of Innocence in Ferguson?

August 20, 2014

I have often called for the prosecution of police officers who violate people's rights. But I also believe in the presumption of innocence. It seems that Missouri Governor Jay Nixon does not. In a recent statement (cited by (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/08/20/missouri-gov-calls-for-vigorous-prosecution-ferguson-shooting-case/) Fox News), Nixon says, "A police officer shot and killed Michael Brown in broad daylight. . . . A vigorous prosecution must now be pursued. The democratically elected St. Louis prosecutor and the attorney general of the United States each have a job to do." (Fox2 has the (http://fox2now.com/2014/08/19/gov-nixon-has-another-message-for-missouri-about-the-situation-in-ferguson/) complete video.) But if it's the prosecutor's job to decide whether the evidence warrants prosecution, then why is Nixon telling the prosecutor how to do his job?

I have no idea whether the police shooting of Brown was justified. And I doubt anyone else does, either—except the officer in question. If the police officer in question had been wearing a video camera—I've also frequently endorsed putting cameras on all officers active with the public—we would almost certainly have good evidence one way or the other. But the limited evidence I've seen could support very different interpretations of what happened. Nixon's observation that the officer shot Brown "in broad daylight" is ridiculous; daylight doesn't make someone less aggressive—if Brown was indeed acting aggressively.

We already know that the officer in question (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/18/michael-brown-shot-in-the-front-not-the-back/) shot Brown in the front, not the back—as was frequently claimed at the outset. We also know that Brown had almost certainly just finished robbing a local store and assaulting its employee—something that demonstrates that Brown was a violent man at least sometimes. Was he charging the officer at the time of the shooting or trying to surrender? I don't know, and anyone who claims to know I regard with suspicion.

The presumption of innocence means the officer is presumed not to have acted criminally, unless the evidence convincingly shows otherwise. The fact that a bunch of people are angry (and that some of those people are smashing and looting stores and assaulting the police) is not a reason to upend a cornerstone of American justice.

Did you say prosecution, governor, or persecution?

Related:

Three Sci-Fi Reviews: Edge, Martian, and Trek

August 21, 2014

The Fall 2014 issue of the Objective Standard features my reviews of the following works:

(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2014-fall/edge-tomorrow/) Edge of Tomorrow, directed by Doug Liman, starring Tom Cruise.

(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2014-fall/martian-andy-weir/) The Martian, a novel by Andy Weir (soon to be a film).

(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2014-fall/star-trek-first-contact/) Star Trek: First Contact, directed by Jonathan Frakes, still my favorite Trek film.

I loved all three of these works. Check out my reviews (the second two of which are partly behind a paywall, so feel free to subscribe to the journal).

Fed Action, School Indoctrination, Hamas, and More Headlines for 8/21/14

August 21, 2014

Some of today's stories:

The Fed: Some members of the Federal Reserve board want to raise interest rates, Don Lee (http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fed-minutes-july2014-mtg-20140820-story.html) reports for the Los Angeles Times. This is another reminder of how much control a handful of bureaucrats have of America's economy.

Indoctrination: "Officials at Brantley Elementary School in Selma, Ala. placed a sixth-grade teacher on paid administrative leave on Wednesday after he directed his students to reenact the police shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown," as Eric Owens (http://dailycaller.com/2014/08/21/teacher-on-leave-after-instructing-sixth-graders-to-perform-michael-brown-death-skit/) reviews for the Daily Caller. Obviously, the teacher did not actually know the relevant facts of the shooting, because those facts have not been established.

Hamas: "Israel kills three top Hamas commanders" in a bombing attack in Gaza, the BBC (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28876821) reports. Good for Israel.

Islamic State: "Attorney General Eric Holder said Thursday that his Justice Department is opening a criminal investigation into the brutal execution by Islamic State militants of American journalist James Foley," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/21/holder-says-criminal-investigation-launched-into-american-journalists-execution/) reports. A criminal investigation? This may properly be a job for soldiers, but it's not one for prosecutors.

Pronunciation: Why are "Kansas" and "Arkansas" pronounced so differently? As Arikia Okrent explains for the Week, it has to do with the Native American tribes after which the states were named.

Taxes: Cigarette taxes are giving organized crime a new revenue stream, Mike Flynn (http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/08/20/Higher-Cigarette-Taxes-Boon-to-Organized-Crime) reports for Breitbart.com.

Student Arrested for Writing about Killing a Dinosaur with a Gun

August 21, 2014

Here is today's not-an-Onion story: "A 16-year-old Summerville High School student says he was arrested Tuesday morning and suspended after writing about killing a dinosaur using a gun," WCSC (http://www.live5news.com/story/26319685/cops-summerville-high-school-student-arrested-after-writing-threatening-message-on-assignment) reports (hat tip to the (http://dailycaller.com/2014/08/21/high-school-kid-arrested-for-writing-about-shooting-a-dinosaur/) Daily Caller). As Abby Ohlheiser (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2014/08/20/teen-says-he-was-suspended-and-detained-for-joking-about-killing-a-pet-dinosaur/) reports for the Washington Post, police claim the student became "irate" when they questioned him and searched his belongings. But getting angry at such an absurd abuse of police power is entirely warranted. Who should be suspended in this case isn't the student, but the administrators and police officers responsible for the boy's unjust persecution.

Sowell on the Ferguson "Bullet Counters"

August 21, 2014

Thomas Sowell opens his (http://www.creators.com/conservative/thomas-sowell/the-media-and-the-mob.html) recent article about the police shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, by pointing out that most of us "were not there, and do not know what happened when Michael Brown was shot." Sowell then accuses governor Jay Nixon of "poisoning the jury pool" by calling for a "vigorous prosecution" prior to a discovery of the facts. I've made similar points in my articles about (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/20/on-evidence-and-agendas-in-ferguson/) conflicting eye witness accounts and about the (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/20/what-happened-to-the-presumption-of-innocence-in-ferguson/) governor's remarks.

Then Sowell addresses the claim that the mere fact that the officer in question shot Brown multiple times is proof that he did something wrong. It is not. Of course, if Brown was trying to surrender at the time the shots were fired, then the officer was wrong to fire even a single shot. But if Brown was charging the officer—accounts vary on this point—then the officer may well have been justified in firing multiple shots. Sowell writes, "Since the only justifiable reason for shooting in the first place is self-protection, when should you stop shooting? Obviously when there is no more danger. But there is no magic number of shots that will tell you when you are out of danger."

People who get their firearms training from the movies or from television may mistakenly believe that a single bullet magically stops an attacker, perhaps even knocking him across the room. In the real world, attackers sometimes keep coming even after taking multiple rounds. Many factors are relevant, including the size of the attacker, his mental state, the placement of the shots, and the type of gun and ammunition involved.

I am not saying I know whether Brown was charging the officer. I do not. I am merely saying, as Sowell points out, that the mere fact that the officer shot Brown multiple times is not, by itself, reason to condemn the officer.

Related:

When May an Officer Use Potentially Deadly Force to Apprehend a Suspect in Missouri?

August 21, 2014

As I recently (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/20/on-evidence-and-agendas-in-ferguson/) noted, some witnesses claim the officer who shot Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, first fired at him as he was running away. Whether he did so has not, to my mind, been firmly established one way or the other.

As I observed, it is not the case that a police officer can never fire a gun at a fleeing suspect. I quoted Supreme Court Justice Byron White: "Where the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a threat of serious physical harm, either to the officer or to others, it is not constitutionally unreasonable to prevent escape by using deadly force." I wondered whether Missouri law or precedents say more on the matter. Someone on Twitter (https://twitter.com/SwordofDamocles/status/502225787169169408) pointed out that the case Mattis v. Schnarr indeed (http://openjurist.org/547/f2d/1007) addresses the matter.

In that 1976 case, the US. Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit, ruled:

. . . Missouri statutes . . . permit law enforcement officers to use deadly force to effect the arrest of a person who has committed a felony if the person has been notified that he or she is under arrest and if the force used is restricted to that reasonably necessary to effect the arrest. We hold the statutes unconstitutional as applied to arrests in which an officer uses deadly force against a fleeing felon who has not used deadly force in the commission of the felony and whom the officer does not reasonably believe will use deadly force against the officer or others if not immediately apprehended.

The principle is that a police officer may use potentially deadly force against a fleeing suspect, only if the suspect is likely to endanger the lives of the officer or of others. (It would be helpful to look at current Missouri statutes on the matter.)

If the officer in Ferguson did shoot at Brown as he fled (again, I'm not sure he did), did the officer reasonably believe that Brown posed such a threat? That depends entirely on the nature of the confrontation between the officer and Brown that immediately preceded the shooting. And the facts regarding that confrontation are, as far as I can tell, entirely unclear. Still, it's useful to at least look at the legal and moral parameters for justifiable uses of force, to see if they possibly apply.

Violating Human Rights in the Name of Anti-Discrimination Laws

August 21, 2014

According to a report from the (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/19/government-farmers-host-sex-wedding-pay-13000-fine/) Heritage Foundation, on August 8 the New York State Division of Human Rights "fined Cynthia and Robert Gifford $13,000 for acting on their belief that marriage is the union of a man and woman and thus declining to rent out their family farm for a same-sex wedding celebration." What about the human rights of property ownership and freedom of association? Those are to be trampled in the name of pretend "rights" to force others to provide you with goods and services.

Is it immoral to refuse service to a couple because they're gay? Yes. Should it be illegal to do so? No. The fact that so few people today can see the difference between morality and law is an indicator of how far our nation has fallen from the Founding principle of individual rights.

See also my article for the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/06/right-bake-cake/) On the Right Not to Bake a Cake."

Sullum Destroys Drug Warriors' Case against Legal Marijuana in Colorado

August 21, 2014

In a new op-ed for Complete Colorado (via (http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/15/drug-warriors-try-but-fail-to-show-that) Reason), Jacob Sullum (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/08/20/flawed-report-reflects-drug-warriors-desperation-to-discredit-colorados-re-legalization-of-marijuana/) critiques a new (http://www.rmhidta.org/html/August%202014%20Legalization%20of%20MJ%20in%20Colorado%20the%20Impact.pdf) report from the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area purporting to show the harms of legal marijuana in Colorado. This tax-financed report is deceptive on a number of points. The report claims, among other things, that "traffic fatalities involving operators testing positive for marijuana have increased 100 percent from 2007 to 2012″ and that the "percent of all hospitalizations that were marijuana related increased 91 percent from 2008 to 2013." But in both cases, Sullum points out, there's no indication that the traffic fatalities or the hospitalizations were caused by marijuana. Moreover, I would add, part of the difference may simply be that police and hospitals are checking for marijuana more rigorously, and therefore finding it more often.

Of course, the statists at the Heritage Foundation (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/20/7-harmful-side-effects-pot-legalization-caused-colorado/) seized on the drug warriors' report to decry legal marijuana.

But let's not lose sight of the big picture: One of the benefits of legal marijuana is that, to a substantial degree, police officers are no longer harassing people, arresting them, and locking them in metal cages for doing something they have a moral right to do do.

Fort Collins Passes Bag Tax (that's Not Really a Tax)

August 21, 2014

The city government of Fort Collins, Colorado, just passed a five-cent tax on disposable shopping bags, set to be implemented on April 1, 2015. Only, legally, they can't call it a tax, or they'd have to get voter approval, so it's a "fee." See the (http://www.coloradoan.com/story/news/2014/08/20/council-passes-amended-bag-fee/14324677/) Coloradoan for details

For a second I thought maybe talk about "consent" might mean that shoppers could decide whether they wanted to pay the fee, but of course that's not what "consent" means in this context. According to a (http://www.coloradoan.com/story/news/local/2014/08/20/breaking-fort-collins-new-bag-fee/14348451/) Q&A by the Coloradoan, the language means merely that the store has to tell you it's charging you for a bag. You are free not to "consent" to the fee—in which case you don't get the bag.

The most onerous part of the ordinance might not even be the fee; it might be the records requirements for merchants. According to the Coloradoan:

Retailers will be asked to record the bag fee charge and the number of disposable bags provided on customers' receipts. They should maintain such books, accounts, invoices and documents necessary to verify the implementation of the charge, the ordinance says. The retailer should keep and preserve those records for three years and make them available during any inspection or audit by the city.

In other words, retailers are supposed to track every bag that leaves in the hands of a customer. I suspect that that burden alone will cause smaller retailers to stop offering bags altogether.

For more on why the bag fee is a terrible idea, see my June 20 (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/06/20/ft-collins-should-bag-its-bad-bag-fee-idea/) op-ed for Complete Colorado. (Note that, as amended, the ordinance lets retailers keep the proceeds of the bag "sales.")

Denver Deputy Punches Out Inmate, DA Declines to Prosecute

August 23, 2014

A Denver sheriff's deputy was caught on video walking up to an apparently non-aggressive inmate and violently punching the man to the ground. The inmate had said something to the officer (I know not what), and stood up when the officer walked over to him. As far as I can tell, the officer punched out the guy because he was irritated with him. If you or I acted that way, we'd almost certainly see the inside of a jail, and we'd almost certainly be prosecuted for assault. But not the cops! "DA investigators determined that an unjustified use of force could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt," Noelle Phillips (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26386621/no-charges-against-denver-deputy-thomas-ford-seen) reports for the Denver Post. But why not put the matter to a jury? Watch the video and decide for yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQOYFTgHGLw

Aurora Theater Shooting "Foreseeable," Federal Judge Rules

August 24, 2014

U.S. District Court Judge R. Brooke Jackson declined to toss lawsuits against Cinemark regarding the 2012 mass murder at the Century Aurora 16 theater on the grounds that such an attack was "foreseeable," John Ingold (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26346801/federal-judge-rules-aurora-theater-shooting-was-foreseeable) reports for the Denver Post. Jackson wrote, "Although theaters had theretofore been spared a mass shooting incident, the patrons of a movie theater are, perhaps even more than students in a school or shoppers in a mall, 'sitting ducks.'"

I tend to agree with Lenore Skenazy's (http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/22/aurora-theater-should-have-predicted-mas) views on the matter, as expressed for Reason:

The judge seems to be saying that because we do not live in a perfect world, free of all violence, all businesses open to the public should be constantly on guard against psychopathic killers. . . . [T]he ruling . . . endorses what I call 'worst-first thinking'—dreaming up the worst case scenario first ('What if someone comes in and shoots up our book club?') and proceeding as if it's likely to happen. Worst-first thinking promotes constant panic. The word for that isn't prudence. It's paranoia.

That said, (http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2012/07/no-guns-policy-at-cinemark-theaters.html) Cinemark's no-guns policy did render the movie patrons "sitting ducks" and almost certainly made the theater more enticing for the psychopath against whom the no-guns policy obviously did nothing.

Biddle, Borders Debate Moral Foundations of Liberty

August 24, 2014

As those who have followed my work over the years realize, I was once active in the Libertarian Party and the broader libertarian movement, but I no longer regard myself as a libertarian. (See for example, my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2012/02/problem-of-gary-johnsons-libertarian-affiliation/) 2012 essay for the Objective Standard on the subject.) The basic problem with libertarianism is that it regards objective morality as inessential (or even worthless) for establishing liberty. To my mind, Craig Biddle has written the (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2013-winter/libertarianism-vs-radical-capitalism/) authoritative critique of libertarianism. But I remain friends with many libertarians and seek them out as allies for certain specific reforms.

Recently Biddle and Max Borders of the Foundation for Economic Education debated the moral foundations of liberty. Biddle argued that objective moral foundations are possible and necessary for establishing genuine liberty; Borders argued that morality is subjective.

Here's one of Biddle's key lines: "[I]f you want to defend your freedom to act on your judgment, you need to be able to defend the idea that it is moral for you to act on your judgment—that you have a moral right to act on your judgment, to keep and use the product of your effort, and to live your life as you see fit."

And here are a couple of Borders's key lines: "There ain't no such thing [as rights]. Rights don't grow on trees. They are socially constructed reality just like if I pulled out a dollar bill—which I can't because I already spent it in the drink machine. I can hold up that dollar, and if I give it to you, we all agree in some sense that this dollar has value—intersubjectively we can agree to that. . . . I think that societies that value freedom and make it primary, make it primary through intersubjective agreement."

It's an interesting debate, and the entire (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2014-fall/moral-diversity-asset-liability-liberty/) transcript is offered at no charge.

Do Colorado Police Really Need 1,160 M-16s and 8 Mine-Resistant Vehicles?

August 24, 2014

Kudos to Chris Vanderveen and Denver's 9News team for reporting this (http://www.9news.com/story/news/local/investigations/2014/08/22/program-brings-mraps-and-m-16s-to-colorado/14458045/) important story: "Colorado's law enforcement agencies have acquired a vast arsenal of military-grade weapons, vehicles and equipment since 1999 under a Department of Defense program. . . ." Among other things, Colorado police have acquired "1,160 M-16's and eight mine resistant vehicles." Do we seriously expect the police to keep the peace when they're outfitted for war?

Related:

How Shipping Regs Hamper International Free Trade

August 24, 2014

Recently an acquaintance of mine described to me his job. From what I can tell, his job is to help people fill out bureaucratic paperwork for shipping goods to and from Canada (and I think other nations). I was shocked by this: Don't we have free trade with Canada?

Practically speaking, we don't have free trade with any other nation; we have heavily regulated trade. Recently a friend of mine, Robert Anthony Peters, came to Denver to attend a freight conference; he helps run a shipping company in Arizona. He (https://www.facebook.com/robertanthonypeters/posts/10152327947646342) posted some remarks to Facebook about what he learned (republished here with permission; note that I have not independently verified his claims):

Main take away from the Freight Workshop: the US federal government has an even longer reach than most people realize. Export law verges on insanity. Its reach is further geographically and temporally than most would think. Did you know that if you send an email through your company server that is based in another country, it falls under export law? Did you know that if you sent an email to a foreign national in the US, it falls under export law? Did you know that if you shipped something outside the US, you are liable for its end use? That means, if you sent shoes to someone in Poland and for whatever reason, they were transmitted to Iran, you can be held liable for that. On top of this, every freight shipment that leaves the US must be intricately documented for every item for both US census purposes and foreign customs (yes, foreign governments are by and large even worse!) For example, you would have to record something like, adult male t shirt cotton polyester blend made in Mexico valued at $10. Imagine moving your house to another country and doing this for EVERY item! Of course, some may share my feelings that this is none of anyone's business what you and another party may exchange. But there is a far greater, far more global issue at play.

Every regulation serves to reduce the amount of exchange that occurs. All compliance comes at a cost of time and money. The amount of paperwork that is generated and the number of people that are used in the process to identify, process, assess, and clear is myriad. All of this serves to create more difficulty and greater expense and will reduce the amount of trade that goes on. Even for Keynesians, there are implications, as less money will circulate. If free market economics is right about anything at all, it is that trade and exchange make all parties better off. We need more exchange, not less. That is why these regulations and the tariffs that accompany them are making us all poorer then we could be, yet another man-made tragedy from which the world suffers.

Venezuela Shocker: Price Controls Cause Shortages

August 24, 2014

You mean that government cannot arbitrarily lower the prices on food and household items without disrupting the supply of those items? Who would have thought it? No one except every real economist who's ever lived. But since when have socialists been concerned with such things as economic realities?

Not only has Venezuela imposed price controls, it now seeks to "cure" shortages by cracking down on shoppers. "Venezuela's food shortage is so bad the country is mandating that people scan their fingerprints at grocery stores in order to keep people from buying too much of a single item," Fox News (http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2014/08/22/venezuela-wants-to-fingerprint-grocery-shoppers-to-control-how-much-food-by/) reports.

The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2013/sep/26/venezuela-food-shortages-rich-country-cia) offers some background: "In 2008, when there was another serious wave of food scarcity, most people blamed shop owners for hoarding food as a mechanism to exert pressure on the government's price controls, a measure that former president Hugo Chávez adopted as part of his self-styled socialist revolution." (Nicolás Maduro is the current president.) Of course, price controls spawned a black market where common items go for exorbitant prices.

Today's left continues to pretend that they can strip away people's economic liberties without harming their civil liberties. The fact that Venezuela now wants to fingerprint grocery shoppers to counter the "hoarding" caused by price controls is merely the latest reminder that economic liberties are civil liberties.

Islamic State's "Apocalyptic, End-of-Days Strategic Vision"

August 24, 2014

The Islamic militants active with Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria and Iraq believe they are doing God's work on Earth. General Martin Dempsey, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently said of the group: "This is an organization that has an apocalyptic, end-of-days strategic vision and which will eventually have to be defeated. . . . ISIS will only truly be defeated when it's rejected by the 20 million disenfranchised Sunni that happen to reside between Damascus and Baghdad." This is as (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/pentagon-islamic-state-militants-regroup-25075180) reported by the Associated Press.

The open question (to my mind) is to what degree Islamic State and its (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/24/how-saudi-arabia-backs-islamic-state-terror/) state sponsors pose a threat to the United States and to Americans. I have no confidence that America's current leaders will sensibly answer that question or that, if they do answer it, they will act appropriately. They might look to John Lewis for guidance; see his articles at the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2006-winter/no-substitute-for-victory-the-defeat-of-islamic-totalitarianism/) 'No Substitute for Victory': The Defeat of Islamic Totalitarianism," and "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/winter-2007/american-victory-over-japan-1945/) 'Gifts from Heaven': The Meaning of the American Victory over Japan, 1945."

How Saudi Arabia Backs Islamic State Terror

August 24, 2014

Ed Husain is an "adjunct senior fellow" with the Council on Foreign Relations. In a recent (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/opinion/isis-atrocities-started-with-saudi-support-for-salafi-hate.html) op-ed for the New York Times, he explains how Saudi Arabia actively supports Islamic State and other Islamic terrorist organizations: "Al Qaeda, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, Boko Haram, the Shabab and others are all violent Sunni Salafi groupings. For five decades, Saudi Arabia has been the official sponsor of Sunni Salafism across the globe." Husain, himself a Muslim, believes the "rigid interpretation of Shariah" practiced by these violent Muslims is "un-Islamic." Of course, they would claim that Husain's moderation is "un-Islamic." Regardless, hopefully Husain's brand of partly Westernized Islam will win out over more barbaric variants.

Violence-Minded Cops on Patrol in Missouri

August 24, 2014

According to the (http://dailycaller.com/2014/08/22/st-louis-area-cop-thinks-protesters-should-be-put-down-like-rabid-dogs/) Daily Caller, a police officer in Missouri, Matthew Pappert, allegedly stated on Facebook that the protesters in Ferguson "should have been put down like a rabid dog the first night" and that he wished for a "Muslim with a backpack" to blow up the assembled "thugs and white trash" (referring to KKK members). Hat tip to the (http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/st-louis-county-officer-suspended-over-video-glendale-officer-suspended/article_44544bee-b353-5f86-aeb2-d13238a9fdc2.html) St. Louis Post Dispatch via the Week.

And, a couple years ago, reports the Dispatch, St. Louis County police officer Dan Page said, "I personally believe in Jesus Christ as my lord savior, but I'm also a killer. I've killed a lot. And if I need to, I'll kill a whole bunch more. If you don't want to get killed, don't show up in front of me, it's that simple. I have no problem with it. . . . I'm into diversity. I kill everybody, I don't care." I do get the sense that there's some additional context to Page's remarks, but I didn't want to watch the (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XA_yW7Z5OM) full hour-long video of Page to run down the details. I watched the first few minutes, and that was enough to convince me that, at a minimum, Page holds some very bizarre views.

Here's a thought: How about not employ police officers who sound like sociopaths?

Related:

Staten Islanders Protest Eric Garner's Death by Police

August 24, 2014

Thousands of people marched in Staten Island yesterday to protest the police-caused death of Eric Garner on July 17, as the New York Daily News (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/chokehold-death-demonstrators-leave-harlem-bus-staten-island-article-1.1914257) reports. What was Garner's "crime" for which police killed him? It was allegedly "peddling single, untaxed cigarettes near a Staten Island park," the News reports. The man who (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1ka4oKu1jo) filmed his death claims that the police confronted Garner for breaking up a fight. That video does show Garner resisting arrest, but not aggressively so; he merely told the police he was tired of them harassing him for no good reason, then he said "don't touch me" when they began to invade his personal space. Police officers placed Garner in an extended choke hold, causing him to complain he couldn't breath, and pushed his body into the ground.

Pause to let the facts of this case sink in. Garner was killed by police for allegedly selling untaxed cigarettes. No, the officers in question didn't mean to kill him; they "merely" executed an extremely dangerous assault on Garner that happened to result in his death. In other words, Garner's killing was not premeditated murder, but I cannot see how, morally, it was anything short of manslaughter. Morally, you don't get to kill people indiscriminately or violently assault them for petty reasons, just because you're wearing a badge. The simple fact is that if anyone other than a police officer had done to Garner what the officers did to him, the assailant already would have been prosecuted for manslaughter—and rightly so. So why do police officers not have to follow the same laws against violating people's rights the rest of us follow?

Of course, it would help immensely if legislators would stop authorizing police to use potentially deadly force against people who are violating no one's rights.

"Staten Island District Attorney Daniel Donovan announced this week that a grand jury will begin considering criminal charges next month," the News reports.

China Flexes Its Power in Latin America, Asia

August 24, 2014

Consider some recent news stories involving China:

Last month, Chinese president Xi Jinping visited left-leaning Brazil and various other Latin American nations, as Agence France-Presse (AFP) (http://news.yahoo.com/china-leader-signs-brazil-deals-latin-america-trip-212656159.html) reports. Xi went to Brazil to ink trade agreements and to attend "a summit of the BRICS group of emerging powers—Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa—and South American presidents," AFP reports. Xi ended his Latin American tour "with a symbolic visit to the barracks from which Fidel Castro launched the first armed assault of his communist revolution in 1953," AFP (http://news.yahoo.com/chinas-xi-venezuela-seeking-trade-oil-deals-111011539.html) reports elsewhere; Xi said, "China and Cuba, as fellow socialist countries, are closely linked by the same visions, ideals and goals."

What is the standard Chinese view of the tour? We can get a hint from a (http://www.scmp.com/comment/article/1567006/chinasties-latin-americacounter-us-rebalance-policy) story from the South China Morning Post: "Xi Jinping's intense nine-day tour of Latin America last month yielded significant gains for Beijing's strategy in the region and in the broader strategic arena vis-à-vis the United States. Moving beyond purely economic interactions, Beijing is content that Xi's trip has reinforced political relationships that will ultimately temper American influence in the region and help counter the US rebalance policy."

Meanwhile, David Axe (http://theweek.com/article/index/264770/why-china-thinks-it-could-defeat-the-us-in-battle) claims for the the Week: "For the first time since China's rapid ascent as a regional military power, officers in Beijing believe the Chinese army could invade Taiwan or attack a disputed island while also deterring intervention by U.S. Pacific Command."

Elsewhere, the Week offers (http://theweek.com/article/index/266652/speedreads-north-korea-reportedly-moves-tanks-to-chinese-border-over-betrayal-fears) some evidence indicating that China's relationship with North Korea may be "fraying"—so that at least may be some good news.

At home, as Cass Sunstein reported a few months ago (see my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/06/sunstein-sees-opportunity-chinas-indoctrination-efforts/) article for the Objective Standard), "recent curricular reforms in China, explicitly designed to transform students' political views, have mostly worked"; the reforms were explicitly intended (in the words of a Chinese official) to "form in students a correct worldview, a correct view on life, and a correct value system." Obviously, "correct" in this context means pro-socialist.

And all of this comes at a time when Barack Obama is deliberately weakening America's standing in the world. Mission accomplished.

Rowling Said to Pen Potter-Universe Film Trilogy

August 24, 2014

According to (http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Harry-Potter-Spinoff-Fantastic-Beasts-May-Have-Finally-Found-Its-Director-66881.html) Cinemablend, J. K. Rowling herself is adapting her Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them for a trilogy of films, the first of which is set to arrive in 2016. "The story is expected to pick up some seventy years before Harry Potter set foot in Hogwarts, and would follow fictional Fantastic Beasts author Newt Scamander during his exploration of the subject," Cinemablend reports.

I confess that after the inflation of the Hobbit films to a ridiculous total length, I'm worried about the adaptation of even scrawnier source material for a trilogy. But, given Rowling's direct involvement with the project, perhaps she'll come up with a rich enough story line to actually merit the extensive film treatment. (I'll see them regardless; I'm just wondering how much I'll enjoy them.)

Incidentally, this would be a great time to more fully master the Potter universe by reading my lit-crit book, Values of Harry Potter. You can read more about it at (http://www.valuesofharrypotter.com) ValuesOfHarryPotter.com.

"There Is a War on the Black Male"—By Black Males

August 24, 2014

Spike Lee believes "there is a war on the black male" in America, as the Spectator (http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/9293782/not-black-and-white/) reports. He is absolutely correct, but he has not to my knowledge pointed his finger at the primary culprit: other black males who are part of the gang culture.

As I (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2013/01/startling-homicide-statistics-among-blacks-and-the-cause/) pointed out last year for the Objective Standard, about half of all homicides in the United States involve black victims. And it simply is not the case that usually the problem is whites killing blacks; as the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304830704577496501048197464) reported a couple years ago, "Bureau of Justice Statistics data show that from 1976 to 2005, white victims were killed by white defendants 86% of the time and black victims were killed by blacks 94% of the time."

So, yes, march against police brutality—and demand changes to prevent such abuse (such as by requiring officers to wear and use (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/20/police-video-should-be-mandatory-and-public/) video cameras). Yes, demand changes in America's drug laws that enrich violent gangs and imprison low-level drug offenders. Yes, demand the (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/04/whats-worse-donald-sterlings-racism/) repeal of economic regulations that especially harm minorities. But let's not lose sight of the very real problems of America's gang-fueled subculture. Where are the marches to address that?

How You Can Help Rational Beacon

August 25, 2014

September 7, 2014 Update: I discontinued posting to RationalBeacon.com on August 29 and converted all the files from that site to AriArmstrong.com today.—Ari

Rational Beacon launched July 29 to offer brief commentary on the news and views of the day. Since then, I've published 180 posts—on average more than six per day—covering such topics as Islamic State, the Ferguson shooting, Ayn Rand, environmentalism, economics, and criminal justice.

That's a great start, but it's only a start. You can help Rational Beacon expand its reach in several ways:

Thank you for your support toward creating a world of reason and individual rights.

Ari Armstrong

The "Civilized" Jihadists

August 25, 2014

So-called "jihadi-tourists" have traveled from European nations to help Islamic State pursue its brutal totalitarian agenda. "At least 320 Germans and more than 2,000 other Europeans are thought to have made the trip" to Turkey and then to Syria or Iraq to join the Islamic cause, Matthew Schofield (http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/06/27/231781_with-isis-surging-in-iraq-europe.html?rh=1) reported for McClatchy a couple months ago. Many of these people are children of immigrants from Muslim countries who "end up finding a sense of community online and in the radical splinters of Islam set up to prey upon the lost," Schofield writes. Michael Brendan Dougherty recently (http://theweek.com/article/index/266528/how-the-west-produces-jihadi-tourists) picked up Schofield's story for the Week.

And Madeline Grant and Damien Sharkov (http://www.newsweek.com/twice-many-british-muslims-fighting-isis-armed-forces-265865) report for Newsweek: "Khalid Mahmood, the MP for Perry Barr in Birmingham, estimates that at least 1,500 young British Muslims have been recruited by extremists fighting in Iraq and Syria in the last three years."

One thing this illustrates is that jihadists are not made because they live in impoverished regions; they are made because of the ideology they embrace.

Can Muslims Defeat Islamic Jihad?

August 25, 2014

Muslims commit atrocities against women, against gays, against "infidels" in many regions around the world. Yes, violent Muslims are the minority. But how many more Muslims openly endorse such violence or tolerate it by failing to condemn it? That, to my mind, is an open question. Consider some recent articles on the subject.

Mehdi Hasan (http://www.newrepublic.com/article/119182/jihadists-buy-islam-dummies-amazon) writes for the New Republic that violent jihadists tend to be youths who are largely ignorant of their own religion. Hasan claims that "religious fervour isn't what motivates most" jihadists; rather, Hasan points to such factors as "moral outrage" (about what?) and "peer pressure" as motivators. True, as Hasan points out, many serious Muslims do not practice and to not advocate violent jihad. But does Hasan doubt that many serious Muslims do advocate violent jihad and (especially in Saudi Arabia and Iran) actively finance it?

Patrick Goodenough (http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/patrick-goodenough/isil-isis-now-qsis-top-sunni-cleric-says-stop-calling-terrorists) reports for CNSNews.com that a Cairo-based Suni leader, Shawki Ibrahim Allam, has actively condemned Islamic State and called "for people to post messages or video clips opposing ISIS terrorism." And, Goodenough reports, Saudi grand mufti Abdulaziz al-Sheikh said that "extremist and militant ideas and terrorism which spread decay on earth, destroying human civilization, are not in any way part of Islam, but are enemy number one of Islam." I don't know anything else about those two figures, but on their face such statements appear to be a move in the right direction, and hopefully one other Muslims will follow.

In Arizona, M. Zuhdi Jasser has been berated by his fellow Muslims for daring to criticize Hamas. He (http://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/2014/08/23/muslim-intimidation-eid-sermon/14445117/) writes for AZCentral, "I had criticized the radicals of Hamas on national television for their supremacist Islamist doctrine hatched from the Muslim Brotherhood that daily and viciously oppresses the people of Gaza." Jasser discusses the widespread Muslim "silence on the terror tactics of Hamas [that] speaks volumes to terror apologia." Jasser's own perspective is encouraging, but the opposition he apparently faces is frightening.

Oh, You Mean Ayn Rand Wasn't a Rawlsian?

August 25, 2014

As John McCaskey (http://www.johnmccaskey.com/joomla/index.php/blog/71-new-libertarians) reviews, various libertarians today are explicitly egalitarian in the vein of John Rawls. One such libertarian is John Tomasi, who claims that even "avowedly egoistic defenses of libertarianism [such as Ayn Rand advocated] recognize the moral imperative that material benefits of social cooperation reach the least well-off class." This is as quoted by Don Watkins in his (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/08/25/ayn-rand-for-social-justice) article today for the Ayn Rand Institute.

Watkins offers a pretty good summary of why Rand was not Rawlsian, even implicitly, even a little. (As an aside, she was not a libertarian, either, and did not consider herself to be one.) He writes:

Rand would say we shouldn't evaluate institutions by how they affect any group. It's wrong, she thinks, to approach political questions by thinking in collectivist terms like "the rich," "the poor," or "society." The question is not which social system benefits which groups, but which social system is geared toward the life of an individual human being.

Of course, when government protects each individual's rights to think and act by his own judgment, the outcome is a prosperous society that can benefit everyone—including the least-wealthy people living in it. It should come as no surprise that what's good for individuals is good for individuals considered as a group.

Ayn Rand, Coffee, and the Honor System

August 25, 2014

The Objective Standard just published my article, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/contra-time-writers-claim-ayn-rand-advocate-mooching-coffee-anything-else/) Contra Time Writer's Claim, Ayn Rand Did Not Advocate Mooching Coffee (or Anything Else)." Basically, Bijan Stephen claims that Rand endorses mooching any time there's an "honor system" for payments. But his claims about Rand are ridiculous—and directly contradicted by countless, explicit comments by Rand. This "smear Rand" phenomenon is interesting, at least: Which other public intellectual born over a century ago is as routinely subjected to regular smears today?

Fossil Fuels Help the Poor, Bill Gates Recognizes

August 25, 2014

People living in the world's poorest regions "desperately need cheap sources of energy now to fuel the economic growth that lifts families out of poverty. They can't afford today's expensive clean energy solutions, and we can't expect them wait for the technology to get cheaper," Bill Gates said recently. Alex Epstein discusses Gates's remarks and their context in a recent (http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexepstein/2014/08/22/solar-executive-tries-to-intimidate-bill-gates-into-opposing-fossil-fuels/) article for Forbes. Epstein discusses the issue at length and summarizes his own view: "Life has gotten much better in poor countries with massively increased fossil fuel use."

Gates also believes that "we" (by which I suppose he means government) should invest in research to "make fossil fuels cleaner and make clean energy cheaper than any fossil fuel." I oppose government forcibly seizing wealth for the purpose, but obviously private R&D can be great. Gates himself is funding research into (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/25/business/energy-environment/atomic-goal-800-years-of-power-from-waste.html) nuclear energy.

Good for Microsoft for Limiting Tax Liabilities

August 25, 2014

Leftist David Sirota (http://www.ibtimes.com/microsoft-admits-keeping-92-billion-offshore-avoid-paying-29-billion-us-taxes-1665938) writes for the International Business Times, "Microsoft Corp. is currently sitting on almost $29.6 billion it would owe in U.S. taxes if it repatriated the $92.9 billion of earnings it is keeping offshore, according to disclosures in the company's most recent annual filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission." For Sirota, this is an accusation. For anyone who recognizes the rights of producers to keep and use their earnings as they see fit, this is great news. Microsoft earned that money, and its owners are morally right to legally limit the amount of wealth government pillages from the company.

Why Many Americans Don't Work

August 25, 2014

As Stephen Moore (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/23/why-is-it-so-hard-for-employers-to-fill-these-jobs/) points out in an article for the Heritage Foundation, "at least one million jobs . . . go begging" for employees, even as the unemployment rate remains high. Why? Undoubtedly it has much to do with the fact that the high-paying jobs in question, in manufacturing, trucking, and energy, are hard work.

Of course, the fact that the federal government pays people not to work is also a big factor, as Moore explains:

Too many Americans have come to view blue collar jobs or skilled artisan jobs as beneath them. Contributing to this attitude is the wide availability of unemployment insurance, food stamps, mortgage bailout funds and other welfare. Taking these taxpayer handouts is somehow seen as normal and a first, not a last resort.

Moore laments the widespread loss of the "old-fashioned work ethic." But there are many signs of hope in this regard, in Dirty Jobs, in North Dakota, in the factories and offices across America where millions of people go to work every day.

Jihad News Roundup for 8/25/14

August 25, 2014

Here are some of the recent stories about jihadist Islam:

Islamic State: General Martin Dempsey, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently "insisted the Islamic State terror group is a regional threat and said he would not recommend U.S. airstrikes in Syria until he determines that they have become a direct threat to the U.S.," Fox New (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/25/joint-chiefs-chairman-says-isis-not-direct-threat-to-west-wont-recommend-syria/) reports. Undoubtedly Islamic State (ISIS) has threatened to attack the United States and would carry out such attacks if it could. I don't know enough about the organization to assess its threat level to America; it obviously poses some threat.

American Jihad: In America, Ali Muhammad Brown murdered four people this year for explicitly jihadist reasons. As Michelle Malkin (http://michellemalkin.com/2014/08/22/the-jihadi-serial-killer-no-ones-talking-about-plus-read-the-charging-documents/) reports. Brown was arrested a decade ago as a suspect in a "terror-financing ring," Malkin reports.

Journalist Released: "Al Qaeda-linked militants" in Syria released American journalist Peter Theo Curtis after holding him captive for two years, the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/u-s-journalist-peter-theo-curtis-released-after-being-held-in-syria-1408907962) reports.

Syria: "Islamic State fighters captured a major military air base [Tabqa airfield] in northeastern Syria on Sunday," the Associated Press (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/jihadis-take-over-at-least-part-of-syrian-air-base/2014/08/24/7c63d912-2b8c-11e4-be9e-60cc44c01e7f_story.html?hpid=z9) reports.

Libya: "Libya's Islamist militias [Dawn of Libya] said Sunday they have consolidated their hold on Tripoli and its international airport," the Associated Press (http://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2014/08/24/libyas-islamist-militias-claim-control-of-capital) reports. (Hat tip for this link and the last to the Week.)

France's Economic and Political Troubles

August 25, 2014

You have to feel a bit sorry for France's president François Hollande—how does a socialist refrain from tanking his country's economy? In 2012, Hollande (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/08/business/global/frances-les-riches-vow-to-leave-if-75-tax-rate-is-passed.html) threatened to punish the rich with 75 percent marginal tax rates—causing many of the nation's most productive people to leave or consider leaving.

Apparently Hollande thought it better not to decimate France's economy, so earlier this year he made a "pro-business shift" (as the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/hollande-vows-no-change-as-french-economy-stagnates-1408550151) puts it), complete with "tax and spending-cut plans" (the details of which I know not).

But France's socialists are unhappy, as the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/frances-francois-hollande-asks-prime-minister-to-form-new-government-1408954134) reports today. They wanted Hollande to tax businesses more, raise government spending, and tax consumers less (directly). In response, Hollande has "dissolved his government" and plans to announce a new cabinet, the Journal reports.

Observe that statists view the economy as their plaything, on which they can experiment at will. But a large economy—the sum total of countless private relationships and transactions—is not like a Lego set that can be taken apart and reassembled by bureaucratic whim. In the real world, people need time to plan their lives, and they are unable to plan to the degree that politicians loot their revenues or threaten to do so or hamper their ability to associate voluntarily with others.

How Beer Regs Throttle the Brewery Industry

August 26, 2014

Here in Colorado, many craft brewers have sided with liquor stores to keep it illegal for grocery stores to sell anything other than 3.2 beer (except for one store in a chain). Not only is this stance by brewers morally wrong, because such regulations violate people's rights, but it is incredibly short-sighted and self-destructive. (See my previous (http://ariarmstrong.com/2011/06/free-colorados-beer-and-liquor-markets/) article.) Craft brewers would be far better off if they'd rally to repeal all onerous regulations of the beer industry, rather than undercut their moral authority to do so by selectively endorsing protectionist laws.

As Michelle Minton (http://cei.org/content/could-prohibition-still-be-slowing-craft-beer-boom) writes for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the very existence of craft breweries is due to lifting regulations against it:

[H]ome-brewing was still illegal until 1978 when then President Jimmy Carter signed legislation to legalize brewing in the home for personal or family use. In that year, the number of breweries was at its lowest point after the repeal of Prohibition. But in the 1980s, after states began to legalize brewpubs, the number of brewers began to rise.

But the beer and liquor industry is still very tightly and crazily regulated, particularly in its distribution systems, as Minton notes. She explains that the "mandatory three-tiered distribution system . . . requires brewers to sell their beer to wholesalers and prohibits from selling directly to consumers with a few exceptions."

People should be able to brew what they want and sell it how they want, and consumers should be able to buy what they want from willing sellers. It's called liberty.

Another Day, Another Koch Hit Piece

August 26, 2014

As I've written, (http://ariarmstrong.com/2011/02/confessions-of-a-former-koch-fellow/) I was once a Koch Fellow, and I'm proud of that. I spent Charles Koch's money (among other things) researching the sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine (you can find (http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost/doc/408241128.html) details about my related Washington Post op-ed).

But leftists hate the Kochs, or at least love to pretend they hate them. They make a convenient demon: They're wealthy—automatically a sin for today's nihilistic egalitarians—and they work in the energy industry—a sin for today's nihilistic environmentalists.

The latest in an endless stream of hit pieces against the Kochs comes from Chris Young, (http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2014/08/koch_funded_edvantage_the_billionaire_brothers_are_bringing_libertarian.html) writing for Slate. Young's basic complaint seems to be that, because of the Kochs, it might be the case that a tiny few American students might very occasionally be exposed to ideas other than leftist ones in tax-funded schools.

Hat tip to Jeffrey Tucker (with whom I have many disagreements), who (https://twitter.com/jeffreyatucker/status/504277115148451841) tweets about the article, "Happy day! I make an appearance a Slate hit piece. How long I've waited for this day! Patience pays off." Congratulations, Jeff.

Incidentally, Charles Koch (http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303978304579475860515021286) published a self-defense earlier this year in the Wall Street Journal titled, "I'm Fighting to Restore a Free Society."

Zubrin Aims to Turn Waste Gas into Profits

August 26, 2014

Robert Zubrin—whom I've (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2012-fall/robert-zubrin/) interviewed for the Objective Standard—runs Pioneer Energy out of Lakewood, Colorado. The Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/News/ci_26403269/Lakewood-company-working-to-capture-flared-natural-gas-at-oil-well-sites) describes the "Mobile Alkane Gas Separator" Zubrin's company is developing: "The unit captures the waste byproduct of drilling" and turns it into salable natural gas. Zubrin told the Post: "This is a significant step forward and a significant resource for America." Soon "the first MAGS unit will be sent to North Dakota for full field operations," the Post reports.

I really hope this pans out, not only so that Zubrin and his crew earn spectacular amounts of wealth, but so that I and millions of other people around the world can have access to the energy he hopes to provide.

Norwegian Muslims Condemn Islamic State

August 26, 2014

Yesterday I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/25/can-muslims-defeat-islamic-jihad/) wrote, "Yes, violent Muslims are the minority. But how many more Muslims openly endorse such violence or tolerate it by failing to condemn it?" I considered a few examples of Muslims condemning Islamic violence. Consider the latest example, as (http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/norwegian-muslims-rally-islamic-militants-25116601) reported by the Associated Press.

The extremely disturbing news is that around fifty people from Norway left the country to fight for Islamic State, the AP reports, and a "small radical group in Norway has expressed support for Islamic State militants."

The good news is that "Norway's prime minister and other politicians have joined Muslim leaders and thousands of other people for a demonstration in Oslo against radical Islamists," the AP reports. And, Mehtab Afshar, head of the Islamic Council in Norway, said of Islamic State, "They stand for terrorism . . . and we condemn that in the strongest terms."

Let's hope other Muslims similarly condemn Islamic violence, and let's hope they do it consistently.

Reynolds on Militarized Police

August 26, 2014

Glenn Harlan Reynolds (http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/08/25/police-militarization-accountability-review-military-equipment-swat-column/14576871/) writes for USA Today: "[B]lurring the lines between civilian policing and military action is dangerous, because soldiers and police have fundamentally different roles. . . . The people [police] are policing aren't enemy combatants, but their fellow citizens—and, even more significantly, their employers. A combat-like mindset on the part of police turns fellow-citizens into enemies, with predictable results." Reynolds also endorses three specific reforms: Abolish police unions, require that officers wear video cameras, and let people sue cops more easily for abuse.

I've endorsed requiring officers active with the public to (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/20/police-video-should-be-mandatory-and-public/) wear and use video cameras. I've also advocated district attorneys (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/01/when-will-das-start-prosecuting-abusive-cops/) prosecuting officers for crimes they commit. Reynolds's other two ideas sound potentially good, too, but I think they're secondary.

I'd like to publicly thank Reynolds as well as (http://www.theagitator.com) Radley Balko and (http://www.davekopel.com) Dave Kopel for drawing attention to the important issue of militarized police and the resulting abusive practices.

U.S. Scolds Egypt, UAE for Striking Islamic Militants in Libya

August 26, 2014

The New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/26/world/africa/egypt-and-united-arab-emirates-said-to-have-secretly-carried-out-libya-airstrikes.html) reports a Libyan story with some bizarre twists. The Islamic militant group Dawn of Libya recently seized control of the international airport in Tripoli (as I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/25/jihad-news-roundup-for-82514/) mentioned yesterday). Now we learn that Egypt and the United Arab Emirates had "secretly launched airstrikes" against the militants. In what sense were the strikes "secret"? The two Middle Eastern nations had declined to notify "Washington, leaving the Obama administration on the sidelines." (Hasn't Obama largely put himself on the sidelines, anyway?) The two nations "had also successfully destroyed an Islamist camp near the eastern Libyan city of Derna," the Times reports. In any case, "United States diplomats were fuming about the airstrikes," the Times reports; apparently they thought the strikes would undermine United Nations efforts to "broker a peaceful resolution" (because we know how successful the U.N. is at accomplishing such things). I don't know enough about the context of the strikes or the broader conflict to know whether to cheer the strikes or condemn them; however, offhand, it seems plausible to me that Americans should take the attitude that the more third-party bombs are dropped on Islamic militants, the better.

The Klingenschmitt Conundrum: Why Colorado Republicans Keep Losing Big Races

August 26, 2014

Now, not only do top Colorado Republican candidates Bob Beauprez (governor) and Cory Gardner (U.S. Senate) have to contend with a so-called (http://rationalbeacon.com/2014/08/20/salzman-both-beauprez-and-gardner-supported-federal-personhood/) "personhood" measure on the ballot, they have to share the stage with Gordon Klingenschmitt, (http://www.gordonforcolorado.com) Republican candidate for House District 15.

Klingenschmitt recently made the following remarks, as Fox31 (http://kdvr.com/2014/08/25/gop-chair-klingenschmitt-comments-on-polis-isis-dont-reflect-republicans-as-a-whole/) reports: "The open persecution of Christians is underway. Democrats like Polis want to bankrupt Christians who refuse to worship and endorse his sodomy. Next he'll join ISIS in beheading Christians, but not just in Syria, right here in America."

I disagree with Polis's position on laws forcing business owners to act against their judgment; for some of my reasons, see my recent (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/07/hobby-lobby-ruling-government-protect-rights-everyone/) blog post for the Objective Standard. But Klingenschmitt is not here expressing reasoned disagreement: He is expressing bigoted hatred. Some of Polis's proposals are relatively bad in the context of American politics (and some of them are relatively good), but comparing him to the butchers of Islamic State is just evil. (Colorado Republican chair Ryan Call denounced the comments, as Fox31 reports.)

In an (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onBpjGHFGxc) "apology" video—in which Klingenschmitt bizarrely mixes his version of the "ice bucket challenge"—Klingenschmitt says he was using hyperbole to "exaggerate to make a point." He accused Democrats of lacking a sense of humor. How ridiculous. He has made a point, alright, although not the one he intended to make.

Consider a couple other off-the-wall remarks this Republican candidate has uttered:

• "(http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/navy-chaplain-klingenschmitt-performed-gay-exorcism-rape-victim) I looked into [a woman's] eyes as she began to weep and I said 'you foul spirit of lesbianism, this woman has renounced you, come out of her in Jesus' name' and she began to wrestle with that and suddenly her eyes began to bug out. . . ."

• "(http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/klingenschmitt-fcc-letting-demonic-spirits-molest-and-visually-rape-your-children) The Bible defines spiritual discernment, and the ability to see invisible angels or demons, or the Holy Spirit, influencing human morality. . . . Julius Genachowski, the outgoing FCC chairman . . . has not enforced decency standards. . . . There's perhaps a demonic spirit of tyranny or immorality inside of him. . . ."

In Colorado's primary election, (http://data.denverpost.com/election/results/state-house/2014/primary/) 3,472 of Klingenschmitt's fellow Republicans voted for him over his opponent to put him up to replace (https://www.facebook.com/WallerforColorado/) Mark Waller, a Republican who ran for Attorney General (until getting (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/04/28/rep-mark-waller-citing-party-unity-withdraws-attorney-general-race/108551/) trounced in the primary).

Yes, these Colorado Republicans offered a bigoted exorcist as a candidate for the Colorado legislature—and then Republicans wonder why metro, women, and nonsectarian voters routinely hand big elections to the Democrats, despite the Dems' many problems.

Related:

Burger King, Eh?

August 26, 2014

As Daniel Ikenson (http://www.cato.org/blog/when-hamburger-becomes-doughnut-other-lessons-about-tax-inversions-globalization) writes for the Cato Institute, "Burger King plans to purchase Canadian doughnut icon Tim Hortons and move company headquarters north of the border, where corporate tax rates are as much as 15 percentage points lower than in the United States." See also the Washington Post's (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/08/25/burger-king-is-mulling-a-move-to-canada-for-breakfast-and-lower-taxes/) write-up.

When will the idiotic, economically illiterate, self-destructive members of Congress stop driving American companies oversees with their punishingly high corporate tax rates? In the mean time, I say, Good for you, Burger King.

See also my recent post about (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/25/good-for-microsoft-for-limiting-tax-liabilities/) Microsoft's efforts to reduce its tax liabilities.

News Roundup for 8/28/2014

August 28, 2014

Here are some of the important recent news stories and opinions:

Ice Bucket Challenge: The fact that the ALS Association funds embryonic stem cell research is a good thing, I (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/ice-bucket-challenge-supports-embryonic-stem-cell-research-thats-good-thing/) argue in today's post for the Objective Standard.

Teen Sex: Sex among responsible, older teens who use contraceptives is a good thing, not something to condemn, contrary to the rantings of Colorado pastor Bob Enyart. See my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/contra-colorado-pastor-sex-among-older-teens-can-moral-healthy/) post for the Objective Standard.

War on Patients: The DEA is tightening up regulations on Vicodin and similar medications, (http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2014/aug/21/dea_tightens_rules_popular_pain) reports StopTheDrugWar.org. See also my recent (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/government-patients-feel-pain-best/) article for the Objective Standard about marijuana and opioid restrictions.

Ukraine: "Ukraine accused Russia of launching a new military incursion across its eastern border on Wednesday," Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/27/us-ukraine-crisis-idUSKBN0GQ0RF20140827) reports.

Islamic State: The brutal totalitarians of Islamic State continue to hold American journalist Steven Sotloff captive, (http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2014/0827/A-mother-s-plea-to-Islamic-State-Please-release-my-child-video) reports the Christian Science Monitor, and the man's mother has publicly pleaded for his release. (Hat tip for this story and the last to the Week.)

More Islamic State: Islamic State is a "hugely successful movement with an apocalyptic, nihilistic philosophy," (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/28/11-reasons-isis-might-dangerous-al-qaeda/) writes Steven Bucci for the Heritage Foundation. He offers eleven reasons to fear Islamic State and hope for its annihilation.

Even More Islamic State: In Mosul, in northern Iraq, members of Islamic State publicly stoned to death a man accused of adultery—and broadcast the murder on "large digital monitors they erected in the city center," (http://online.wsj.com/articles/in-islamist-ruled-mosul-resentment-of-militants-grows-1409174892) reports the Wall Street Journal. Is anyone still confused about the nature of Islamic totalitarianism?

Fracking: A Boulder District Court judge threw out "Lafayette's voter-approved fracking ban," (http://www.dailycamera.com/lafayette-news/ci_26417569/judge-tosses-out-lafayette-fracking-ban) reports the Daily Camera. (Lafayette is a city within Boulder County.)

News Roundup for 8/27/14

August 28, 2014

Here are some of today's important stories and opinions:

Drug War: According to the Journal for the American Medical Association, states with legal medical marijuana have fewer deaths due to opioid use. I wrote an article for the Objective Standard about that and the broader issue of drug prohibitions and regulations; see "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/government-patients-feel-pain-best/) Government to Patients: 'We Feel Pain Is Best for You.'"

Gas Taxes: Starting in January, Californians will pay even higher gasoline taxes, (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/27/california-hidden-gas-tax/) reports Fox News, because of a pointless effort to restrict carbon dioxide emissions in a relatively small region.

Islamic State: "The Islamic State wants more than $6 million to free an American woman the Muslim extremists kidnapped a year ago while she did humanitarian work in Syria," USA Today (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/08/26/us-woman-hostage-islamic-state/14625139/) reports. How about U.S. special forces rescue the woman, then unload $6 million worth of artillery on these barbaric bastards instead?

More Islamic State: A Westpoint study says Islamic State has been growing and organizing for several years, (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/08/27/west-point-report-describes-islamic-state-threat-as-crisis-4-years-in-making/) reports Fox News.

Al Qaeda: Al Qaeda Islamists want to hit "casinos in Las Vegas, oil tankers and military colleges" in America, Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/08/27/al-qaeda-magazine-urges-terrorists-to-hit-vegas-military-academies-and-stores/) reports.

Common Core: Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal has sued the Obama administration over Common Core education standards, "accusing [the administration] of illegally manipulating federal grant money and regulations to force states to adopt the Common Core education standards," the Associated Press (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/08/27/bobby-jindal-sues-obama-administration-common-core/14677085/) reports. But it's unclear to me how Common Core is any worse, Constitutionally, than W. Bush's No Child Left Behind Act.

Coal: Frank Wolak claims, "[E]xpanding western U.S. port capacity to allow a significant increase in exports of Powder River Basin coal to Asia will likely lead to reduced global greenhouse gas emissions," PERC (http://perc.org/blog/qa-frank-wolak-us-coal-exports-and-climate-change) reports. The idea is that exporting coal to China would cause Americans to burn more natural gas to generate electricity, thereby on net reducing global carbon dioxide emissions. (Whether reducing global carbon dioxide emissions is a worthwhile goal is a separate question, of course.)

Socialized Medicine: "Paramedics will give patients whose heart has stopped a dummy drug as part of an 'ethically questionable' study into whether adrenalin works in resuscitation or not," the Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/11028692/Heart-patients-to-be-given-placebo-by-paramedics-in-controversial-trial.html) reported earlier this month. Paul Hsieh (http://www.forbes.com/sites/paulhsieh/2014/08/27/uk-to-experiment-on-cardiac-arrest-patients-without-their-consent/) writes about this for Forbes.

Climate Treaty: Guy Benson (http://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2014/08/27/obama-administration-n1883901) claims for Townhall.com that Obama may try to commit the "United States to an anti-climate change international treaty without even attempting to seek formal approval from the Senate."

Ministry of Truth: "The National Science Foundation has embarked on a little-known project to create an online database of 'political smears, astroturfing, misinformation, and other social pollution,' reports Elizabeth Harrington of The Washington Free Beacon," (http://theweek.com/article/index/267097/the-government-is-getting-into-the-fact-checking-business-be-very-very-afraid) re-reports Edward Morrissey for the Week. See Harrington's (http://freebeacon.com/issues/feds-creating-database-to-track-hate-speech-on-twitter/) original piece. But we don't need a Ministry of Truth. American bureaucrats seem to forget that works such as 1984 and Brave New World were not intended as templates for government. Aside from speech directly relevant to government action, government bureaucrats have no legitimate business deciding which private speech is accurate and which is not.

Gaza: How many (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/27/us-mideast-gaza-idUSKBN0GM11320140827) "ceasefires" is this now?

Christie Corruption? Despite his hard-leftist views, David Sirota might actually be onto something regarding Chris Christie's cozy relationship with Wall Street. "There is a curiously overlooked story from David Sirota that examines the mutually profitable kinship between Gov. Chris Christie and Wall Street hedge funds," opens an (http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/08/christie_ships_pension_funds_to_wall_street_pals_and_therein_lies_a_story_editorial.html) editorial from the New Jersey Star-Ledger.

Wrapping Up Rational Beacon

August 29, 2014

[September 7, 2014 Update: Today I moved all the files from RationalBeacon.com to my homepage, AriArmstrong.com. See the (http://ariarmstrong.com/category/publications/rational-beacon/) "Rational Beacon" category for the contents imported from RationalBeacon.com.—Ari]

Although I'm glad I tried running Rational Beacon, it has been more time consuming and less successful than I'd anticipated, so I'm shutting it down. At first I was upset about this move, but then I thought about it in Edison's terms: I didn't fail at blogging, I merely discovered one additional way for me not to blog.

I plan to import all of Rational Beacon's contents to my personal page at (http://ariarmstrong.com) AriArmstrong.com, where I plan to continue blogging. I also plan to consolidate all my previously published works there, except for my material with the (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/author/aarmstrong/) Objective Standard and with (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/category/ari-armstrong/) Complete Colorado. (In the future I may write material for other publications and not reproduce it on my own page.) Although I'm shutting down RationalBeacon.com, I'm retaining the url into the indefinite future, in case I want to resurrect the site in a different form (something for which I have no plans at present).

A few people may be interested in a fuller account of my reasons for shutting down the site.

Originally, my idea for Rational Beacon was that, as I read the news and views of the day, I would quickly blog about the items that interested me, something I didn't think would take much additional time. After all, I was essentially aggregating news for myself already, so, I thought, why not simply convert that work to a blog? Not only would that process help me keep in better touch with the news of the day, I thought, it might prove useful to others looking for a filtered news source.

Obviously part of my inspiration for aggregating news was InstaPundit, only I wanted to omit many of the types of stories covered there and to include many stories and opinion pieces not covered there. No one else aggregates stories the way I'd like to see it done, so I end up subjecting myself to the data equivalent of a fire hose each day, mostly via my Twitter feed. That seems to be unavoidable at this point. Very little of the total material published on a daily basis significantly interests me, but I have to sift through a substantial amount of that material to find the few items that do interest me.

Unfortunately, in blogging for Rational Beacon, I soon found myself spending much more time than I'd anticipated writing about certain stories. I thought I'd spend less than an hour, or perhaps up to a couple of hours, writing for Rational Beacon every day; instead, I found myself spending several hours blogging on most days. Especially given that no one is paying me to do it, I just can't justify spending that much time on it.

Soon after starting the site, I shifted my focus. At first, I thought I'd post two or three dozen very-short posts. But I quickly began writing fewer (often a handful or a dozen), longer posts. Many of my posts are essentially (short) op-eds.

I've tentatively decided that I do want to continue aggregating news, although in much briefer form. (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/27/news-roundup-for-82714/) Yesterday and (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/08/28/news-roundup-for-8282014/) today I published "roundups" of links, and that's the way I'll probably continue to aggregate material at my home page. If I want to say something more substantial about some event, issue, or editorial, I'll write a dedicated article about it, either for my own page or for another publication (at this point, usually for the Objective Standard).

I never imagined Rational Beacon would be an Internet sensation, but I thought it would be more successful than it has been. After nearly a month of steady effort, the Facebook page has only 91 likes, and the Twitter page has only 75 followers. That's just not enough of a following to justify the effort. (I have received some very positive feedback from several people, which I appreciate. I also appreciate the numerous "Rational Bacon" jokes.)

Part of my reasoning for starting Rational Beacon was that I thought a publication name separate from my name might go over better. Apparently I was wrong. So I'm just going to consolidate my offerings on my personal blog and through my personal (https://www.facebook.com/AriArmstrongWriter) Facebook and (https://twitter.com/ariarmstrong) Twitter feeds. Associating my content with my name is fine, I think; that's what Michelle Malkin and various others do (although Malkin has something like 300 times the Twitter followers that I have).

Of course, part of my problem, in terms of number of readers, is that I advocate some view or other to alienate nearly everyone. I'm not a conservative, or a leftist "liberal," or a libertarian, or a "moderate"—and in many instances I loudly declare my disagreements with those groups. But I'd rather reach a few active-minded individuals than many cheerleaders.

Over the coming years I plan to write not only op-ed-style articles, as I've been doing for many years, but weightier articles on a range of subjects. (I hope my efforts toward that end will help broaden audience.) To reach my main goals in writing, I need to be a lot more careful about how I spend my time. As painful as shutting down Rational Beacon is, the main purpose in doing so is to help free up some of my time so that I can work more on other projects. Stay tuned.

PM News Roundup for 8/29/14

August 29, 2014

Here are even more important news stories and opinion articles published today or within the past few days:

Krugman: Recently Paul Krugman claimed that the risks of drugs and the phosphorus contamination of Lake Erie show that markets must be regulated. In my latest post for the Objective Standard I (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/08/paul-krugman-master-straw-man-fallacy/) explain why he's wrong.

Islamic State: A hard drive recovered from Islamic State militants in Syria reveals plans to develop biological weapons for the purpose of causing "huge" numbers of casualties, Harald Doornbos and Jenan Moussa (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/08/28/found_the_islamic_state_terror_laptop_of_doom_bubonic_plague_weapons_of_mass_destruction_exclusive) report for Foreign Policy.

Ukraine: "U.S. should send military equipment to help Ukraine," (http://www.denverpost.com/editorials/ci_26427095/u-s-send-military-equipment-help-ukraine) opines the Denver Post. Although Russia's invasion of Ukraine obviously is disturbing, the U.S. arming Ukraine seems like a dangerous game to me, and not one obviously tied to U.S. interests. (However, I don't have a well-developed opinion on the matter.)

EPA: Documents seem to indicate that the Environmental Protection Agency is seeking expanded control over Colorado's water, Joshua Sharf (http://watchdogwire.com/colorado/2014/08/27/co-secret-epa-water-maps-released/) reports for WatchdogWire.

Grocery Bags: California may "ban single-use plastic grocery bags," the San Jose Mercury News (http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_26425177) reports.

Monkey Business: U.S. copyright officials have deemed a monkey "selfie" belongs not to the photographer whose camera the monkey used, but to the "public," as David Kravets (http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/08/monkeys-selfie-cannot-be-copyrighted-us-regulators-say/ Old: http://rationalbeacon.com/2014/08/07/monkie-selfie-is-wikipedia-violating-david-slaters-image-copyright/) reports for ARS Technica. For why I think that decision is wrong, see my (http://rationalbeacon.com/2014/08/07/monkie-selfie-is-wikipedia-violating-david-slaters-image-copyright/) previous post on the matter. Hat tip to Paul Hsieh.

Gun Restrictions: New York now has the most people of any state with a membership in the National Rifle Association, Genevieve Wood (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/29/new-yorks-new-gun-control-law-working-hint-great/) reports for Heritage's Daily Signal. The law largely responsible for driving NRA membership there, the so-called "SAFE Act," involves (among other things) magazine restrictions and a gun registry; see (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NY_SAFE_Act) Wikipedia for details.

News Roundup for 8/29/14

August 29, 2014

Here are some recent important stories and opinions:

Police Abuse: In an (http://m.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/08/the-problem-is-im-black/379357/) article for the Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf describes an instance of police apparently unnecessarily harassing and arresting a black man in St. Paul, Minnesota. Hat tip to (http://www.dianahsieh.com/) Diana Hsieh.

Corporate Taxes: Matt Levine (http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-08-25/burger-king-may-move-to-canada-for-the-donuts) explains corporate taxes for Bloomberg View: "U.S. companies pay the IRS a tax rate of 35 percent on income they earn abroad, but they can credit the amount of foreign tax they pay against that liability." By contrast, companies that relocated elsewhere do not have to pay the 35 percent rate on all their income, only their U.S. income. Hat tip to (http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-08-26/burger-king-and-the-whopper-about-taxes) Megan McArdle via (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/08/28/policy-digest-welfare-state-edition) Don Watkins.

Endangered Property Rights: (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/29/government-controlling-private-property-save-frog-species-seen-50-years/) Writing for Heritage's Daily Signal, Scott Blakeman describes the curious (and maddening) case of the federal government effectively nationalizing private property for the sake of a the dusky gopher frog—despite the fact that the "frog hasn't been seen on the land in question for over 50 years."

Obama on Terror: Regarding Islamic State in Syria, Barack Obama says, "We don't have a strategy yet," as the Week (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/267289/speedreads-obama-we-dont-have-a-strategy-yet-on-battling-isis-in-syria) reports. That gets my nomination for understatement of the year, and unfortunately it applies to practically everything Obama does.

Child Abuse in England: According to a (http://www.rotherham.gov.uk/downloads/file/1407/independent_inquiry_cse_in_rotherham) report cited by (http://tonywoodlief.com/2014/08/27/the-turned-back/) Sand in the Gears, "over 1,400 children in the borough of Rotherham were systematically brutalized over the past decade"; apparently the problem largely involves immigrants.

Islamic Jihad: In Syria, Islamic State and al Qaeda are fighting each other, Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/08/28/fighting-in-syria-spawns-separate-civil-war-in-global-jihadist-movement/) reports. Is it too much to hope that they kill each other off?

ObamaCare: "A reporter for the Independence Institute, a libertarian think tank, asked for a court order Thursday that compels the state Division of Insurance to justify its refusal to release emails discussing the one-year renewal of health insurance policies not in compliance with the Affordable Care Act," Jeffrey A. Roberts (http://coloradofoic.org/reporter-legal-action-emails-aca-decision/) reports for the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition.

Chelsea: "Chelsea Clinton is quitting her job as a reporter," the AP (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/nbc-news-says-chelsea-clinton-quits-reporter) reports. In other news, I'm quitting my job as the Queen of England.

Volcanoes: Volcanoes in Iceland and Papua New Guinea are "causing havoc," NPR (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/08/29/344227337/volcanoes-in-iceland-papua-new-guinea-keep-residents-on-edge) reports.

News Roundup for 9/1/14

September 2, 2014

Here are some of the important stories from the past few days:

Islamic State: "Hundreds of Yazidi women abducted by ISIS have either been sold or handed out to members of the Sunni extremist group," CNN (http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/30/world/meast/isis-iraq-syria/index.html) reports. The article describes other atrocities by these Islamic savages, as well.

Immigrant Crime: In an (http://www.forbes.com/sites/rogerscruton/2014/08/30/why-did-british-police-ignore-pakistani-gangs-raping-rotherham-children-political-correctness/) article for Forbes, Robert Scruton picked up the story of men in Rotherham—apparently mostly or entirely immigrants from Pakistan—allegedly have badly abused some 1,400 girls.

Hong Kong: The people of Hong Kong want more political autonomy than China is willing to grant, according to a (http://news.yahoo.com/china-slams-door-shut-full-hong-kong-democracy-090319614--business.html;_ylt=AwrBJSCyKQNUUTYA0ZDQtDMD) report from Reuters.

China: Here's more evidence that China is moving more toward a harder Communist line. "China universities vow ideology clampdown on staff, students," (http://news.yahoo.com/china-universities-vow-ideology-clampdown-staff-students-132939456.html) reports AFP.

Bionic Eye: Okay, it might not be up to Lee Majors's standards, but it's still awesome. A new device promises to bring sight to certain people who have lost vision, the Atlantic (http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/08/a-bionic-eye-that-restores-sight/378628/) reports. The producer of the device, the Argus II, offers (http://2-sight.event-com.com/ee/how-does-argus-ii-produce-sight) more information.

Denver Post: Apparently some leftie groups are (ridiculously) accusing Chuck Plunkett of the Denver Post of bias because, in 2010, he delivered some remarks to Liberty on the Rocks. (I recorded his talk with permission and posted it to YouTube.) Read Plunkett's (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/08/31/liberty-movement-advice/112015/) explanation, and (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjIi6ti4Q_Q) see the video.

Islam, Mars, and More: News Roundup for 9/4/14

September 4, 2014

Here are some of the important stories and opinions from the past few days:

Muslims against Women: Brutal men in northern England—predominantly Muslim immigrants from Pakistan—(allegedly) sexually abused some 1,400 girls—but that's just the tip of the iceberg, as Raymond Ibrihim (http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/raymond-ibrahim/muslims-sexually-enslaving-children-a-global-phenomenon/) writes for Front Page. Muslims have also raped and otherwise brutalized women in Australia and Nigeria, not to mention the Middle East, Ibrihim points out. Of course, only some Muslims abuse women, and Muslims are hardly alone in doing so. But, as Ibrihim argues, the sexual abuse of "infidel" women is built into Islamic theology, at least as some Muslims interpret it. See also Rich Lowry's (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/386920/real-rape-culture-rich-lowry) article on the subject for National Review.

Iran: The United States is actively working with Iran against Islamic State, Mohsen Milani (http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/141937/mohsen-milani/this-is-what-detente-looks-like) writes for Foreign Affairs (hat tip to (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/09/03/policy-digest-foreign-policy-edition) Elan Journo). But both Iran and Islamic State are enemies of America.

Indian Jihad: "Al-Qaeda commander Ayman al-Zawahari released a videotape Thursday announcing plans for a new wing of the terrorist group dedicated to waging jihad in the Indian subcontinent," John Bacon (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/09/04/al-qaeda-india/15057321/) reports for USA Today.

Mars: Robert Zubrin recently gave a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKQSijn9FBs) talk at NASA about sending humans to Mars. He said (among many other things): "I think that this task of opening space, opening the universe to humanity, is the most important thing going on at the world at this time. This time will be remembered, because this is when we first set sail for other worlds."

Cronyists Target Tesla: "The Georgia Automobile Dealers Association filed a complaint Friday with that state's Department of Revenue charging that the automaker is illegally selling cars," CNN (http://money.cnn.com/2014/09/02/news/companies/tesla-georgia/) reports (hat tip to the (http://consumerist.com/2014/09/03/georgia-car-dealers-ask-the-state-to-shut-down-tesla-store-because-it-sold-too-many-cars/) Consumerist). Tesla allegedly sold 173, when it's "supposed" to sell only 150. How about Tesla gets to sell its cars to whomever wishes to buy them?

Smearing Rand: The left hates Ayn Rand because she's a capitalist; religious conservatives hate Rand because she's an atheist. Members of both camps routinely smear Rand rather than address her actual ideas. The latest round of smears comes from (of all places) PJTV; here's the (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVBjnxAc9r4) video. PJ also published a (http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2014/09/04/you-probably-dont-understand-ayn-rand-enough-to-critique-her/) reply by Walter Hudson; I may have more to say about this later.

Campaign Censorship: "The Center for Competitive Politics today filed two lawsuits on behalf of a Colorado think tank [the Independence Institute] saying that similar state and federal campaign finance disclosure laws are unconstitutional under the First Amendment," the Center (http://www.campaignfreedom.org/2014/09/02/lawsuit-challenges-mccain-feingold-disclosure-law/) reports.

Regulations: A Florida man complained to his city government about a boy "illegally" running a lemonade stand. Then the government went after the man for illegally running a business out of his home. Read Katherine Mangu-Ward's (http://reason.com/blog/2014/09/02/guy-who-tried-to-shut-down-kids-lemonade) report for Reason. God forbid that government actually, you know, protect people's rights rather than violate them.

News Roundup for 9/5/14

September 5, 2014

Here are some of the important stories from today and recent days.

Al-Shaabab: "The Pentagon has confirmed that a U.S. airstrike conducted earlier this week killed the leader of the al-Shaabab terrorist group in Somalia," (http://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2014/09/05/us_airstrike_kills_al-shabaab_terror_leader_107418.html) reports Real Clear Defense.

Cookbook Medicine? Dr. Karen Sibert fears, "The surge of uncritical belief in 'evidence-based medicine' has led to rigid algorithms—cookbook recipes, really—for patient care." See Paul Hsieh's (http://blog.westandfirm.org/2014/09/sibert-replies-to-jauhar.html) report for Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Debating Government: David Harsanyi (http://thefederalist.com/2014/09/04/actually-the-greatest-threat-to-our-liberty-is-federal-government-run-amok/) asks which is the greater threat to liberty: local governments or the federal government? My answer is, "It depends."

Campaign Speech: With the help of the Center for Competitive Politics, Colorado's Independence Institute is challenging federal and state campaign disclosure laws, rightly saying such laws violate the right to freedom of speech. See my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/speech-isnt-free-government-requires-speakers-register-report/) write-up for the Objective Standard.

Unions: "US Department of Labor data document[s] that the SEIU spent at least $38 million on the Fight for 15/Fast Food Forward campaign in 2013," (http://www.workercenterwatch.com/seius-38-million-dollar-ponzi-scheme/) reports Worker Center Watch (hat tip to (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/05/big-labor-spending-big-bucks-on-co-ordinated-fast-food-protests/) Fox News).

Brazil: The president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, is a "former Marxist guerrilla," the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/marina-silva-creates-competition-for-dilma-rousseff-in-brazils-presidential-election-1409884205) reports—but she may get beat by Socialist Party candidate Marina Silva. Is it any wonder the country is a basket case?

Benghazi: "A U.S. security team in Benghazi was held back from immediately responding to the attack on the American diplomatic mission on orders of the top CIA officer there," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/05/top-cia-official-in-benghazi-delayed-response-to-terrorist-attack-us-security/) reports.

Snowden: Supposedly some of the information released by Edward Snowden has helped Islamic State "evade U.S. intelligence," the Washington Times (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/4/islamic-state-using-edward-snowden-leaks-to-evade-/) reports. Two quick notes: If we had a real foreign policy, such "intelligence" would be mostly irrelevant. And, if the U.S. government were not busily violating the rights of American citizens, Snowden would not have felt compelled to release the information.

Common Core: Colorado Republican candidate for governor Bob "Beauprez says that if he is elected governor, he will ensure that Colorado opts out of Common Core and PARCC" (Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Career), (http://watchdogwire.com/colorado/2014/09/04/bob-beauprez-local-education/) reports Watch Dog Wire.

Abortion: "Congressional candidate George Leing, a Republican taking on U.S. Rep. Jared Polis [of Boulder], has denounced the [anti-abortion] 'personhood amendment' on the November ballot," Lynn Bartels (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/09/03/george-leing-personhood-jared-polis/112122/) reports for the Denver Post.

Global Warming: Matt Ridley (http://online.wsj.com/articles/matt-ridley-whatever-happened-to-global-warming-1409872855) writes for the Wall Street Journal, "Global warming has stopped since shortly before this century began." Ridley notes that warming researchers have pointed to some forty different possible causes for the "hiatus" in warming.

More Global Warming: A (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212096314000163) paper in Climate Risk Management (one widely misrepresented in the popular media), relying on various assumptions about what causes climate change, finds that, except for greenhouse gas emissions, "there is less than a one in one hundred thousand chance of observing an unbroken sequence of 304 months (our analysis extends to June 2010) with mean surface temperature exceeding the 20th century average." That's a much punier finding than many have reported. (For what it's worth, Anthony Watts (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/09/03/laughable-new-paper-claims-99-999-certainty-global-warming-over-past-25-years-is-man-made/) calls the paper "laughable.")

Gay Marriage: a federal appeals court in Chicago declared the bans on same-sex marriage in Indiana and Wisconsin to be unconstitutional," the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/05/us/us-appellate-court-overturns-same-sex-marriage-bans-in-wisconsin-and-indiana.html) reports.

Now for a bit of fun:

Marketing: Ikea has (http://www.tastefullyoffensive.com/2014/09/ikea-parodies-apple-with-new-bookbook.html) announced its 2015 "BookBook." Brilliant!

Still About that Bass: Jimmy Fallon, The Roots, and Meghan Trainor (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/267596/speedreads-jimmy-fallon-meghan-trainor-and-the-roots-rock-all-about-that-bass-on-toy-instruments) perform a fun rendition of "All About That Bass."

News Roundup for 9/6/14

September 6, 2014

Here are some recent, interesting items of news and views:

IRS: "The Internal Revenue Service has lost emails from five more employees who are part of congressional probes into the treatment of conservative groups that applied for tax-exempt status," the Associated Press (http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/09/05/irs-says-it-has-lost-emails-from-5-more-employees/) reports. Well isn't that convenient for the IRS?

Islamic State Coming to America? William Forstchen believes Islamic terrorists will likely try to attack "soft targets" in America—movie theaters, schools, churches, and so on. He fears small groups of "professionally trained" killers may be able to "wipe out" an entire school within fifteen minutes. He has a new book out on the topic: Day of Wrath. See his (http://video.foxnews.com/v/3762644198001/preparing-for-an-isis-attack-inside-america/) interview with Fox News. Then think about how to (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2013/01/interview-linn-armstrong-on-self-defense-and-guns/) protect yourself.

No "Immediate Threat"? Meanwhile, Colorado Senator Mark Udall believes that Islamic State poses no "immediate threat to the homeland," (http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/09/03/Senator-Udall-We-Shouldn-t-Rush-In-ISIS-Not-An-Immediate-Threat-To-The-Homeland) reports Breitbart.com. I hope that's not wishful thinking, but it probably is.

Marijuana Welfare: Recently I asked whether there was any good or service that the left does not want to turn into a welfare program. I'm still looking. Here's the latest example: "The city of Berkeley has mandated marijuana dispensaries donate at least 2 percent of their inventory to low-income patients," UPI (http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2014/09/04/Mixed-reactions-as-Berkeley-mandates-free-medical-marijuana-for-low-income-patients/5101409849838/) reports.

Bag Welfare: Meanwhile, even as the state of California has banned retail disposable bags, at least one California county offers plastic bags for "free" to dog owners, as Steve Simpson (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/09/04/policy-digest-regulatory-state-edition-090414) points out for the Ayn Rand Institute.

Ukraine: The Ukrainians and the Russians are mostly not shooting at each other, at least for the moment, the Associated Press (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_UKRAINE?SITE=AP) reports.

Indian Poop: Many Indian children suffer from a (perhaps surprising) problem: Many people "defecate outdoors" and thereby spread disease, (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/15/world/asia/poor-sanitation-in-india-may-afflict-well-fed-children-with-malnutrition.html) reports the New York Times. (Hat tip to (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/508103051081568256) Conrad Hackett.)

Economy: Although the official unemployment rate fell to 6.1 percent, August job growth was sluggish and "the labor force participation rate fell to 62.8 percent, from 62.9 percent," the Week (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/267606/speedreads-unemployment-rate-falls-to-61-percent) reports.

Discrimination: "A husband and wife who were fined $13,000 and told they could not discriminate against same-sex couples after refusing to allow a gay wedding on their New York farm have announced that they will 'no longer host any wedding ceremonies on their property,'" the Blaze (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/08/29/after-being-fined-and-forced-to-host-gay-weddings-christian-farm-owners-make-drastic-decision-that-will-likely-hurt-their-business/) reports. It's wrong to discriminate against gay couples, but it's wrong and rights-violating for government to force the farm owners to serve people they don't want to serve.

No Ice for Rowe: I thought Mike Rowe (https://www.facebook.com/TheRealMikeRowe/photos/a.151342491542569.29994.116999698310182/848469731829838/) offered some pretty good reasons to consider not participating in the Ice Bucket Challenge.

The Myth of 10,000 Hours: Citing the work of Daniel Goleman, Maria Popova (http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/22/daniel-goleman-focus-10000-hours-myth/) points out at Brain Pickings that merely spending 10,000 hours (or any amount of time) doing something won't necessarily make you better at doing it. You also need focused practice with an aim toward improvement and good feedback on your performance.

Secular Spirituality: Frank Bruni (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/31/opinion/sunday/frank-bruni-between-godliness-and-godlessness.html) offers a pretty good summary of Sam Harris's new book, Waking Up, for the New York Times. Bruni asks, "Mightn't religion be piggybacking on the pre-existing condition of spirituality, a lexicon grafted onto it, a narrative constructed to explain states of consciousness that have nothing to do with any covenant or creed?"

Technology: Check out my Objective Standard (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/kids-react-apple-ii-look-humanity-used-intellect/) take on the video, "Kids React to Old Computers" (meaning the Apple II, which I used in school). One of kids says, "Look at how humanity has used their intellect!"

Islamic State, Romanoff, and More: News Roundup for 9/8/14

September 8, 2014

Here are some of the interesting stories and opinions of late:

Islamic State: (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/world/middleeast/destroying-isis-may-take-3-years-white-house-says.html) According to the New York Times, Barack Obama's plan against Islamic State (ISIS) likely will take three years (translation: an unknown number of years) and involve three main stages: bomb Islamic State in northern Iraq (already underway), "train, advise or equip the Iraqi military, Kurdish fighters and possibly members of Sunni tribes" (doesn't that involve American "boots on the ground"?), and then bomb Islamic State inside Syria. What could go wrong? Hat tip to (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/08/white-house-reportedly-planning-years-long-campaign-to-destroy-isis/) Fox News.

Colorado Politics: "Dems throw millions behind Clinton ally" Andrew Romanoff, Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/08/dems-throw-millions-behind-clinton-ally-in-search-house-win/) reports. My guess is that Coffman will win, although his positions on (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tag/mike-coffman-abortion/) abortion and other issues are giving Romanoff a real shot.

Indian-Themed Mascots: A Colorado legislature (Joseph Salazar) wants to cut funding to government schools that use Native American mascots without permission from a tribe, CBS Denver (http://denver.cbslocal.com/2014/09/07/legislation-would-deny-funding-to-schools-with-unauthorized-native-american-mascots/) reports (hat tip to (http://www.completecolorado.com) Complete Colorado). (Which tribe is authorized to grant permission in a given case is unclear to me.)

Getting Rand Wrong: I was surprised by the ineptness with which Bill Whittle and Andrew Klavan addressed Rand's ideas in a recent (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVBjnxAc9r4) video for PJ Media. Read my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/andrew-klavan-bill-whittle-pretend-analyze-ayn-rand/) reply, published by the Objective Standard. (No, Rand did not advocate blowing up orphanages full of children! Sheesh!)

Endangered Species Act: I describe a recent action under the Endangered Species Act in another Objective Standard article, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/endangered-species-act-sacrifices-people-frogs/) Endangered Species Act Sacrifices People to Frogs." For the facts of the case I rely on a (http://dailysignal.com/2014/08/29/government-controlling-private-property-save-frog-species-seen-50-years/) report by Scott Blakeman for the Heritage Foundation.

Benghazi: "Fox News host Greta Van Susteren said the White House pressured her to get a colleague to back down on a Benghazi story," (http://dailysignal.com/2014/09/06/greta-van-susteren-white-house-pressured-get-fox-news-back-benghazi/) reports the Daily Signal.

Terror Funding: "Three hundred U.S. nationals are suing Arab Bank, claiming it knowingly provided services to terrorists and their financiers," the Daily Signal (http://dailysignal.com/2014/09/08/arab-bank-mounts-defense-landmark-terrorist-financing-case/) reports.

Alcohol: Conrad Hacket (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/508781795207172096) tweeted an interesting chart showing the fraction of a country's population that regards drinking alcohol as moral. The United States join Germany, Australia, Britain, Canada, and Japan at the bottom of the list in terms of number of people who regard drinking as a moral problem.

Gage Skidmore on Photography, Creative Commons, and Rand Paul

September 8, 2014

Recently I had the opportunity to interview Gage Skidmore, a semi-professional photographer from Arizona.—Ari Armstrong

Armstrong: According to your (https://www.facebook.com/gageskidmore/) Facebook bio, you started out as a photographer in 2009, when you documented Rand Paul's Senate run. Your work has also appeared in numerous publications, including Forbes, Wired, and Reason. Do you work as a full-time photographer now, or is that a part-time occupation? Do you mean to make photography your long-term career? What is the scope of your photographic work presently?

Skidmore: I started doing political photography with Paul when I was sixteen years old. I had been involved in the liberty movement since the end of 2007 when his father ran for the 2008 presidency, but I didn't get involved with his campaign as a photographer until 2011 when he ran for President again.

I've never seen photography as a job; I have always seen it as a hobby, something that I do on the side for personal enjoyment or just to make a little money. Recently I've done some freelance work for various candidates for office in Arizona, where I live now, and for other organizations like the Western Center for Journalism, as well as Reason magazine, which ran a cover image of mine of Gary Johnson for its 2012 election issue.

I really am not sure where my photography will take me, but I'm always looking to continue my photography adventure as long as I find it to be something that is worthwhile to share with people, and is still fun for me as well.

Armstrong: Every time I need an image of a libertarian or conservative politician or intellectual, I find that the best image is almost always one of yours. Then I discovered that you've also photographed celebrities such as Tom Cruise at ComicCon. What prompted you to start releasing so many of your (https://www.flickr.com/photos/gageskidmore/sets/) photographs through Flickr under the Creative Commons license?

Skidmore: The scope of my work involves for the most part two things that I enjoy the most—politics and pop culture conventions.

I originally bought my first professional camera for the purpose of going to the San Diego ComicCon in 2009, because I wanted to take somewhat professional photos for the purpose of releasing them under the Creative Commons license, and also because I wanted to see my photos used to illustrate celebrities on Wikipedia on pages where photos didn't exist.

I've always enjoyed seeing my work used in a positive way, and especially enjoy when I'm actually credited for taking the photo. And as far as Flickr goes, I think that is just the most mainstream photography website at the moment, besides Facebook (which isn't known for its photo quality). But I would really hope for Flickr to make some changes to its business model that would allow its content creators to gain the ability to make money by selling prints, or something of that nature, in the same way that YouTube rewards its content creators for providing content there.

Armstrong: I've released a few CC images (my best is of (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Christopher_Hitchens,_ATF_Party_2005.JPG) Christopher Hitchens), but nowhere near as many as you've released. I find the CC community interesting; I feel grateful, as a blogger, that I have access to so many great images, and I feel a sense of responsibility to contribute my own CC images when I can. What are your thoughts on the Creative Commons?

Skidmore: I can understand people's reasoning about wanting to tightly control their content, especially if that is how they make their living, primarily by selling photos. I've never gotten that serious about it, to the point where I need to sell a photo to eat the next day. I'm not pursuing photography as a college student, either, so I basically see the Creative Commons as a way to release my photos for public consumption, and have them used in the most wide ranging way possible. I have gotten some criticism for this, but I think with the expansion of literally everyone having a cell phone camera, and the fact that someone can easily go to the store and buy a semi-professional camera, the world of photography is constantly changing. These changes will likely have a detrimental effect on the professional photography business as a whole. Depending on one's perspective, this may be a good thing, or it may be a bad thing, but I tend not to consume myself with that type of stuff.

Armstrong: Which shot or shots of yours do you find particularly interesting, or which have a fun backstory?

Skidmore: I had a hard time thinking about a good photo back story, but I thought about when I first started doing political photography and documenting some of the early campaign events with Rand Paul. One of the first events I went to was a Tea Party event in Hawesville, Kentucky. I can vividly remember arriving at the event, and standing out in the cold November or December climate in front of this towering court house. Back then, the Tea Party was really at its peak, but standing among the crowd was Dr. Paul himself, then just a small town ophthalmologist. There was no other media, no other person taking any photos, at least semi-professionally, and hardly anyone even bothered to introduce themselves to Rand except every now and then between speakers at the event. This was actually also the first time I got to shake Rand's hand, and his campaign handler at the time introduced us to each other.

Since then, I've had the pleasure of witnessing a true grassroots movement of liberty-minded individuals who have come to embrace this one time small town doctor as one of the serious contenders for President of the United States. I am so glad to have been able to participate in some way when he first came on the scene, and am especially grateful for the kindness he has shown to me over the years, especially in the beginning when I was just some teenage fan following him around and taking photos.

Armstrong: If someone wanted to hire you to photograph an event, would you be open to that? If so, what's the best way to reach you, and what sort of processes and costs should a client expect?

Skidmore: If someone would like to hire me for an event, I absolutely would be open to doing so, and the best way to reach me is through email, which I've made publicly available on pretty much all my personal websites. I like to make things as easy as possible for potential clients, so they name a price, and I'll usually accept it, as long as it's within reason.

News Roundup for 9/9/14

September 9, 2014

Here are some of the interesting news stories and opinions of recent days.

Iran's War on Women: In Iran, "36 universities have announced that 77 BA and BSc courses in the coming academic year will be 'single gender' and effectively exclusive to men," the Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9487761/Anger-as-Iran-bans-women-from-universities.html) reports. I'm not among those who think the left's claims of a Republican "war on women" is complete bunk; however, I rarely hear leftist who much such claims talk about the actual and severe Islamic war on women.

Udall vs. Gardner: During a recent debate, U.S. Senate candidate Cory Gardner demonstrated how hard it is to rebut Democratic attacks regarding reproductive rights, when Republicans in fact seek to ban abortion. Watch the video (http://coloradopols.com/diary/62321/video-cory-gardners-epic-abortion-pivot-fail) clip.

Inflation: In 2013, it cost the U.S. government 1.8 cents to make every penny and 9.4 cents to make every nickel, the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/03/10/taxpayers-lost-105-million-on-pennies-and-nickels-last-year/) reported in March.

Islamic State: "The State Department is launching a tough and graphic propaganda counteroffensive against the Islamic State," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/09/state-department-enters-propaganda-war-with-isis/) reports. Apparently this is a "send a graphic designer to a gun fight" model of foreign policy.

News Roundup for 9/10/14

September 10, 2014

Following are some of the important news and opinions from recent days.

Syria: So Obama's (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/10/obama-reportedly-willing-to-authorize-airstrikes-against-isis-in-syria/) plan in Syria, apparently, is to arm certain of the rebels, and to bomb those rebels involved with Islamic State. In other words, the U.S. will simultaneously attack and defend the Assad regime. What could go wrong?

Egalitarianism: Yesterday USA Today published Glenn (http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/09/09/middle-class-mobility-oligarchs-wealth-distribution-column/15249645/) Reynolds's op-ed on income inequality, which he regards as a genuine problem. In my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/glenn-reynolds-problem-income-inequality/) reply for the Objective Standard, I argue that, although Reynolds confuses the relevant issues, he is right to point to the problem of rights-violating government policies.

Progressivism: Recent Don Watkins of the Ayn Rand Institute (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/09/09/the-debt-dialogues-episode-26-george-will-on-progressivism) interviewed George Will about "progressivism" in the United States. It's a great 25-minute introduction. I side with Watkins over Will regarding the appropriateness of challenging the welfare state as such; Will thinks it's an unalterable fact of life.

Eco Cars: "Colorado has so far spent $8 million in taxpayer money on nearly 240 compressed natural gas vehicles, with dozens of them stationed in places where there is no compressed natural gas filling stations, Watchdog.org has learned." Read the (http://watchdog.org/167308/natural-gas-vehicles/) report.

Cory vs. Cory: U.S. Senate candidate Cory Gardner made a smart play by advocating over-the-counter birth control pills. But, as incumbent Mark Udall shot back, Gardner's proposal rings a little hollow, given Gardner has sponsored federal legislation that could outlaw hormonal birth control. Read Lynn Bartels's (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/09/02/cory-gardner-birth-control-senate/112040/) report for the Denver Post.

Apple Watch: This (http://www.apple.com/watch/) looks impressive to me, although the haters are already out in force. (Yes, I'm listening to my new free U2 album, courtesy of iTunes.)

Islamic State: News Roundup for 9/11/14

September 11, 2014

Here are some of the important stories and opinions of recent days.

9/11: Take moment of silence for the victims of the jihadist-perpetrated murders committed on 9/11.

State Sponsors of Jihad: In his (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/jihad-america-end/) article for the Objective Standard, Craig Biddle makes the case that the primary sponsors of jihadist terror are Iran and Saudi Arabia. One thing he points out is that Iran's constitution dictates a course of global jihad. That is, the nation is founded on a doctrine of religious totalitarianism.

Obama's Delusions: The White House released Obama's fifteen-minute (http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2014/09/10/tune-president-obama-addresses-nation-isil-threat) speech on Islamic State from yesterday. As I point out in my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/obama-islamic-state-pretend-islam-islam/) response for the Objective Standard, Obama's "strategy" rests on pretending that Islamic jihadists are not motivated by their religion.

Austrian Jihadists: The Independent Journal Review has a (http://www.ijreview.com/2014/09/176684-two-teenage-girls-left-homes-austria-see-look-like-now-isis-fighters/) story about two girls from Austria who joined up with Islamic State. Hopefully they'll get what they deserve.

Kurdish Anti-Jihadists: Meanwhile, "Thousands of Kurdish women are volunteering to battle against ISIS, others in Syria," the Week (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/267935/speedreads-thousands-of-kurdish-women-are-volunteering-to-battle-against-isis-others-in-syria) reports.

In other news:

Neal Stephenson: Nature has an (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v513/n7517/full/513170a.html) interview with Stephenson about his fiction, science, and the path to a technologically innovative future.

Foreign Policy: News Roundup for 9/12/14

September 12, 2014

Here are some of the important stories and opinions from recent days.

Harris on Islamic State: Whatever his errors (and they are many), Sam Harris is right in (http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/sleepwalking-toward-armageddon) pointing out that, contra Obama, Islamic jihadists are motivated by their religion. See also my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/obama-islamic-state-pretend-islam-islam/) article for the Objective Standard on the subject. And see Harris's mostly-good essay, "(http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/why-dont-i-criticize-israel) Why I Don't Criticize Israel."

Lessons of 9/11: In a new thirteen-minute video, Elan Journo of the Ayn Rand Institute sets some of the (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/09/11/thirteen-years-since-911-what-have-we-learned) important context for the 9/11 attacks and Islamic State, and he explains a proper foreign policy to deal with those problems. Regarding the nature and actions of Iran and Saudi Arabia, see Craig Biddle's "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/jihad-america-end/) The Jihad against America and How to End It."

About Those Syrian Rebels: Obama has expressed very different views of the Syrian rebels who aren't in Islamic State—the people he now wants to arm. Obama also overstates the "broadness" of his "coalition." See Krauthammer's (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-krauthammer-obamas-uncertain-trumpet-again/2014/09/11/a955a5ac-39ee-11e4-bdfb-de4104544a37_story.html) op-ed for the Washington Post.

Islamic State Cash: Islamic State takes in some $32 million per day in oil money, the Daily Signal (http://dailysignal.com/2014/09/11/the-scary-amount-of-oil-money-isis-makes-every-day/) reports.

In other news:

Missouri Abortion Restrictions: "Missouri Enacts 72-Hour Wait for Abortion," the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/12/us/72-hour-wait-for-abortion-is-enacted-in-missouri.html) reports. This again shows that religious conservatives do not oppose economic controls by government per se; they just want their kind of controls.

Police State: "The U.S. government threatened to fine Yahoo $250,000 a day in 2008 if it failed to comply with a broad demand to hand over user communications" to the NSA, the Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/us-threatened-massive-fine-to-force-yahoo-to-release-data/2014/09/11/38a7f69e-39e8-11e4-9c9f-ebb47272e40e_story.html?hpid=z1) reports. (Hat tip for this story and the last to the Week.)

Denver Post for Sale: (http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_26520380/denver-post-other-digital-first-media-newspapers-sale) Read all about it.

Young Readers: Who said social media would kill reading? "Study finds that people under 30 are reading more than their elders," (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/268016/speedreads-study-finds-that-people-under-30-are-reading-more-than-their-elders) reports the Week.

Swimming Dinos: Don't tell Syfy, or we'll get "(http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/268004/speedreads-enormous-spinosaurus-was-likely-the-first-dinosaur-to-swim--97-million-years-ago) Spinosaurusnado."

News Roundup for 9/13/14

September 13, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions from recent days.

Atlas Shrugged: Read my take on the latest Atlas Shrugged film, in my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/atlas-shrugged-iii-john-galt-bad-good/) article for the Objective Standard (I give the film a C-minus).

Child Abuse: Minnesota Vikings football player Adrian Peterson is accused of beating his four-year-old son with a branch, causing cutting and bruising, ESPN (http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/11514522/adrian-peterson-minnesota-vikings-indicted-child-case) reports. Such child abuse should be condemned, obviously. It is worth noting that such violence used to be common throughout the world, and it remains common throughout much of the world.

School Propaganda: A government school teacher in Washington, D.C., asked her students to complete an assignment comparing George W. Bush to Adolph Hitler, UPI (http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2014/09/11/DC-sixth-grade-teacher-has-students-list-similarities-between-George-W-Bush-and-Hitler/6501410439526/) reports.

Western Jihadists: Ellie Hall has a (http://www.buzzfeed.com/ellievhall/inside-the-online-world-of-the-women-of-isis#3kug1nt) report for BuzzFeed about European women who moved to the Middle East to join up with Islamic State.

More on Western Jihadists: Shikha Dalmia (http://theweek.com/article/index/267958/stop-freaking-out-over-the-wests-jihadi-tourists) argues for the Week, "[I]f all that ISIS and its ilk can dredge up are a handful of malcontents, despite all the sophisticated communication tools at its disposal, Western liberalism must be in pretty good shape."

Bad Medicine: For some shocking examples of flaws and bias in the "medical literature," see Dr. Paul Hsieh's (http://blog.westandfirm.org/2014/09/why-much-of-medical-literature-is-wrong.html) post for Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Venezuelan Squatters: PRI has an interesting (http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-09-12/caracas-finally-ending-worlds-tallest-squat) report about a 45-story skyscraper taken over by squatters in downtown Caracas. Now the government wants the squatters to leave and go live in government housing.

Scottish Independence: A vote for independence may spell trouble for the region's business climate; see the International Business Times (http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/tv/rbs-lloyds-relocate-if-scots-vote-independence-12205) report.

Udall: The notion that the White House somehow fears Senator Mark Udall is "hilariously wrong"; see the Colorado Peak Politics (http://coloradopeakpolitics.com/2014/09/11/hilariously-wrong-cnn-panelists-mock-mark-udall/) report.

Read My Lips: Computerized lip reading could be a marvelous advance for communications, and it could be a dreadful tool for the surveillance state. See the MIT Technology Review (http://www.technologyreview.com/view/530641/the-challenges-and-threats-of-automated-lip-reading/) report.

Islam: Bill Maher makes some good points about the violent nature of Islam in his (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/09/10/maher_vs_charlie_rose_to_claim_islam_is_like_other_religions_is_naive_and_plain_wrong.html) interview with Charlie Rose.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Some Muslim students feel "disrespected" when Ayaan Hirsi Ali speaks on their campuses, (http://www.truthrevolt.org/news/yale-students-disrespected-ayaan-hirsi-ali-speaking-campus) reports Ben Shapiro. But I suspect that gays, infidels, and women also feel "disrespected" when they are brutalized or murdered by Islamic regimes or Islamic jihadists.

Boko Haram: Nigerian forces have "killed scores of Islamic" jihadists in Boko Haram, the Associated Press (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AF_NIGERIA_VIOLENCE) reports. That's a good start.

Infantile Adults: Vincent Carroll writes an (http://www.denverpost.com/carroll/ci_26523563/our-second-class-adults) important op-ed about the efforts, both left and right, to impose government controls on young adults on the grounds that they aren't mature enough to handle freedom.

China Concrete: "China used more cement in the last three years than the U.S. used in the entire 20th century"; see Bill Gates's (http://www.gatesnotes.com/Books/Making-the-Modern-World) report (hat tip to (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/510656610583068672) Conrad Hackett).

Two Jews Walk into a Bar: While 42 percent of Jews report that "having a sense of humor" is "essential to being Jewish," only 19 percent say "following Jewish law" is. See Conrad Hackett's (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/510632464222400512) tweet.

News Roundup for 9/14/14

September 14, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions of recent days.

Another Beheading by Islamic State: Jihadists beheaded British aid worker David Haines, Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/09/14/isis-video-claims-to-show-beheading-british-hostage-david-haines/) reports. If Islamic State wanted to strengthen British resolve to fight the organization, it seems to have succeeded.

Cameron on Islamic State: British prime minister David Cameron pretends that the jihadists in Islamic State are "not Muslims," NPR (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/09/14/348416487/isis-are-not-muslims-they-are-monsters-cameron-says) reports. Rather, he says they're "monsters." But obviously, they are both. See also my articles for the Objective Standard, "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/obama-islamic-state-pretend-islam-islam/) Obama on Islamic State: Pretend Islam Is Not Islam," and "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/sam-harris-yes-islamic-jihadists-motivated-religion/) Sam Harris: Yes, Islamic Jihadists Are Motivated by Religion."

The Real Islamic State: The leader of Islamic State is a man named Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. So who is he? The Week (http://theweek.com/article/index/267920) offers some important details: He is an "Islamic scholar" with a "degree in history and a doctorate in sharia law." He preached "Salafism, a hard-line form of Sunni Islam." Yes, let's keep pretending that members of Islamic State are not motivated by their religion. Oh, and, as the Week reports, the U.S. once held this man in captivity but let him go to appease the Iraqi government.

Genital Mutilation: Some 3.6 million girls are subjected to genital mutilation each year, the Economist (http://www.economist.com/news/international/21608769-too-many-girls-lives-are-still-being-destroyed-progress-too-slow) reported in July (hat tip to (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/510996372053426176) Conrad Hackett). The problem is most prevalent in central and northern Africa and in parts of the Middle East. Also: "Child marriage, another custom that destroys girls' lives, is also common in Africa, and in parts of Asia too." Horrid.

Sexual Exploitation: Forced sex is a $100 billion per year activity, Conrad Hackett (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/511117161310343168) reports. How about governments stop violating people's rights long enough to actually do something about this horrific problem?

North Korea: This is a strange story: According to a North Korean court, American Matthew Miller entered the country illegally in order to "experience prison life so that he could investigate the human rights situation," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/09/14/north-korea-claims-it-has-put-american-detainee-on-trial/) reports. The North Korean "government" is happy to oblige; it sentenced the man to six years hard labor. Whether this story is as it appears, or whether the man had some other reason for entering the country, we should ask the broader question: Why does the brutally oppressive North Korean regime even exist?

Colorado Beer: The burgeoning Colorado craft beer industry is supporting a growing hops agricultural industry, the Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_26525248/colorado-hop-growers-reap-record-harvest-supply-local) reports.

GOP Devolution: "Republican belief in human evolution dropped from 54% to 43% in 4 years," (https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/510991325982777344) reports Conrad Hacket. The poll results are from 2009 and 2013. See the (http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/01/03/republican-views-on-evolution-tracking-how-its-changed/) Pew report from early this year. Does this mean the GOP is changing, or that the GOP is dying? Probably more of the latter.

Courts Shift Dem: "For the first time in more than a decade, [federal appeals court] judges appointed by Democratic presidents considerably outnumber judges appointed by Republican presidents," the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/us/politics/building-legacy-obama-reshapes-appellate-bench.html) reports.

News Roundup for 9/15/14

September 15, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions of recent days.

Boko Haram: In April, Islamic jihadists with Boko Haram kidnapped nearly 300 girls in northeastern Nigeria. Since then, 57 girls have escaped, and "not one has escaped or been rescued since then," the Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/14/nigeria-girls-kidnapped-5-months_n_5791622.html) reports. Horrific.

"Moderate" Jihadists? Some people fear many of the so-called "moderate" rebels the United States intends to arm are actually "hard-line Islamists"; see Doug Mataconis's (http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/president-obamas-misplaced-trust-in-the-moderate-syrian-rebels/) report. That fear seems warranted.

Prostitution? Police reportedly detained Django Unchained actor Daniele Watts because they thought she was a prostitute, CNN (http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/14/showbiz/django-unchained-actress-detained/) reports. She was with her (white) boyfriend. Oopsie. This illustrates how bad laws allow people to use the police to harass others (the police were responding to a complaint).

Economics: As Coyote Blog (http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2014/09/prices-paul-krugman-and-consistency.html) points out, some of the same people who believe a carbon tax is a good idea because it will reduce the consumption of carbon fuels, also believe that an increase in the minimum wage will not reduce the employment of unskilled workers. In other words, some people invoke the principles of economics selectively, when it's convenient for them.

Political Philosophy: John McCaskey (http://www.johnmccaskey.com/joomla/index.php/blog/76-evil-deeds) defends this thesis: "[D]o not try justifying a rights-violating law with a cost-benefit analysis. If a law violates someone's rights, it is wrong, no matter how large the benefit to innocent third parties."

New Blood Filter: A new device now in testing cleans septic blood of pathogens and toxins, Medical Xpress (http://medicalxpress.com/news/2014-09-blood-cleansing-biospleen-device-sepsis-therapy.html) reports. See the report for details about how the device works. Hat tip to Paul Hsieh.

Scotland: I was just thinking to myself this morning, "I wish someone would present a good discussion about the vote for independence in Scotland." George Will (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/387872/sovereign-scotland-george-will) rides to the rescue. I still have little idea of what independence would mean legally and economically, though. Meanwhile, John Oliver makes the case against independence, the Week (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/268119/speedreads-john-oliver-channels-british-romantic-comedies-to-plead-for-scotland-to-stay) reports.

Ebola: The struggle to contain the Ebola virus outbreak is not going well, as this Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/14/ebola-decades-humanitarian-work-never-seen-such-suffering) report from Liberia indicates. Meanwhile, "Obama Plans Major Ebola Offensive" (with U.S. tax dollars), the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/obama-plans-major-ebola-offensive-1410738096) reports.

Animal "Rights": The Oregon Supreme Court seems to be moving in the direction of recognizing "rights" of animals; see the Examiner (http://www.examiner.com/article/oregon-supreme-court-takes-step-granting-personhood-to-animals) report. (Warning: The Examiner employs extremely annoying pop-up ads and the like.)

Suspended Animation: "Doctors have begun human trials of suspended animation to buy more time for critically injured patients," the Economist reports, (http://blog.westandfirm.org/2014/09/suspended-animation-update.html) via Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Sweden: "Sweden's Social Democrats were poised to return to power after a left-leaning bloc defeated the center-right government in a parliamentary election Sunday that also saw strong gains by an anti-immigration party," the Associated Press (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/power-shift-expected-swedish-election-0) reports.

Diet: Dr. P. Murali Doraiswamy (http://blogs.wsj.com/experts/2014/09/15/my-problem-with-the-paleo-diet/) thinks the paleo diet probably doesn't improve health relative to other types of diets.

News Roundup for 9/16/14

September 16, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions from recent days.

Hillary the Faker: At a recent political event Hillary "Clinton gamely posed, pretending to grill a steak that had been pre-cooked for her," reports the Economist, as quoted by (http://www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/387969/hillary-clinton-world-champion-pretend-griller-jim-geraghty) National Review. That's the main problem with Hillary, and the main reason why I think she'll never be president: It seems like everything is staged with her.

Import-Export Bank: As Steve Simpson (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/09/15/policy-digest-regulatory-state-edition) reviews for the Ayn Rand Institute, the House reauthorized the Import-Export bank for another six months. Simpson argues that politicians do such things to gain control over others: "When government holds the power to dole out benefits, like taxpayer-guaranteed loans from the Ex-Im Bank, and burdens, like Dodd-Frank and zillions of other business regulations, the only way to function is to plead for special status before the modern-day equivalent of the King's court."

City Socialism: My home city of Westminster, Colorado, will decide next month whether to enter into "an exclusive agreement with Oliver McMillan to redevelop" the (now demolished) Westminster Mall, the Denver Post (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26540262/plans-westminster-mall-add-growing-list-development-projects) reports. But why is city government even involved with such a thing? The article doesn't say, but certainly the city's restrictive zoning has something to do with it. If you don't play by the city's rules, you don't build. As I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2009/05/westminster-declares-mall-blighted/) wrote in 2005, the city declared the property blighted. I also suspect the city will come up with a package of tax discounts for the development. If you want to find free enterprise, don't look in cities like Westminster.

Military for Ebola: "U.S. Military to Send 3,000 to Battle Ebola Virus," the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/u-s-military-to-send-3-000-to-battle-ebola-virus-1410840310) reports. I understand the Ebola outbreak is horrific, but this simply is not an appropriate use of the military.

Discounts for Churchgoers: The owner of a pizza shop in Arkansas offers discounts to churchgoers. A local group threatened to bring legal action. But the owner has a moral right to run his business as he sees fit, (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/moral-right-provide-discounts-exclusively-churchgoers/) argues Natale Ogle for the Objective Standard.

China Economy: China is currently in the midst of a "sharp real-estate downturn" and "flagging factory output," the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/articles/chinas-economic-slump-complicates-beijings-restructuring-plans-1410799858?mod=e2tw) reports. Wait a minute: You mean government "stimulus" doesn't work?

American Tech Economy: This news was surprising to me: Hal Salzman (http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2014/09/15/stem-graduates-cant-find-jobs) claims for US News that the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) workforce suffers from "ample supply, stagnant wages and, by industry accounts, thousands of applicants for any advertised job."

Militarized... Schools? "Los Angeles Unified School District police officials are considering whether they need the armored vehicle and grenade launchers they received from the U.S. military," CBS Los Angeles (http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2014/09/15/armored-tank-grenade-launchers-at-disposal-of-lausd-police-force/) reports (hat tip to Drudge). Huh, tough question.

CO Anti-Abortion Measure: If you had any questions about whether a Colorado ballot measure this year is about bestowing full legal rights—"personhood"—to zygotes, just ask its sponsors. (It is.) See Jason Salzman's (http://bigmedia.org/2013/08/15/no-doubt-its-personhood-again-in-a-different-package/) report.

Taliban: From Kabul, Afghanistan: "A Taliban attacker detonated his car bomb next to an international military convoy on Tuesday, killing three members of the NATO-led force and wounding nearly 20 troops and civilians," the Associated Press (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_AFGHANISTAN?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-09-16-02-02-51) reports.

Declaration of War: An (http://theweek.com/article/index/268059/if-obama-wants-to-keep-bombing-isis-he-must-get-congress-permission) article from the Week makes a good point: If Obama wants to go to war with Islamic State, why doesn't he seek Congressional approval, as the Constitution demands?

Boko Haram: "Boko Haram Declares Its Own Caliphate in Nigeria," NBC (http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/missing-nigeria-schoolgirls/while-world-watches-isis-boko-haram-declares-its-own-caliphate-n202556) reports.

Beauprez Leads, OODA Loop, and More: News Roundup for 9/17/14

September 17, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions from recent days.

Beauprez Leads: My previous prediction of Bob Beauprez's political demise seems to have been wrong. Beauprez, Republican candidate for governor of Colorado, now leads incumbent John Hickenlooper by ten points—at least if you believe the latest Quinnipiac University Poll. See the Denver Post's (http://www.denverpost.com/election2014/ci_26550565/poll-big-shift-beauprez-posts-10-point-lead) report (hat tip to (http://www.completecolorado.com) Complete Colorado). This may be a bad year for Democrats.

Boots on the Ground? Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Geneneral Martin Dempsey said "that almost half of Iraq's army is incapable of working against the Islamic State militant group, while the other half needs to be rebuilt with the help of U.S. advisers and military equipment," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/17/top-general-says-half-iraqi-army-incapable-working-with-us-against-isis/) reports. He is also "open to U.S. ground troops fighting ISIS," the Week (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/268266/speedreads-top-us-general-open-to-us-ground-troops-fighting-isis-if-necessary) reports.

Another American Jihadist: "A Rochester, New York, man has been indicted on charges of trying to provide material support to the Islamic State militant group and attempting to murder U.S. soldiers," Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/17/us-usa-crime-islamicstate-idUSKBN0HC01320140917) reports.

Islamist Turkey? "Erdogan's new Turkey requires all students to study the Qur'an," Jihad Watch (http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/09/erdogans-new-turkey-to-requires-all-students-to-study-the-quran) reports.

Space Ferries: NASA awarded "$6.6 billion worth of contracts to two different companies [Boeing and SpaceX] that will transport astronauts to and from the International Space Station," the Week (http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/268269/speedreads-nasa-will-pay-both-boeing-and-spacex-to-shuttle-astronauts-to-space) reports.

Skeptic Blog: Michael Shermer's Skeptic has a new blog out called (http://www.skeptic.com/insight/) Insight.

Zubrin vs. Climate Alarmists: Bob Zubrin, the iconoclastic scientists who advocates sending humans to Mars and who now works in the (http://pioneerenergy.co) energy industry, has out three new articles arguing that CO2 emissions are good and that environmentalism is bad. See Zubrin's "(http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/295098/carbon-emissions-are-good-robert-zubrin) Carbon Emissions Are Good," "(http://pjmedia.com/blog/the-new-holocaust-deniers/) The New Holocaust Deniers," and "(http://www.nationalreview.com/energy-week/350395/debating-phil-cafaro-robert-zubrin) Debating Phil Cafaro."

Paranoia about Kids: As Reason (http://reason.com/blog/2014/09/15/child-services-to-mom-who-did-nothing-wr) relates, Child Protective Services of Texas harassed a woman and her son because the son was playing outdoors near his home. One of these idiot bureaucrats told the woman, "You just don't let them play outside." Sheesh.

Concrete: Concrete is a vastly underappreciated part of modern life, I point out in my recent Objective Standard (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/concrete-foundation-modern-life/) article.

Unhappy Doctors: "Only 6 percent of doctors are happy with their jobs," (http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=5083) reports John Goodman for the Independent Institute. What, you mean turning doctors into stooges for bureaucrats doesn't promote job satisfaction?

Poverty: Robert Rector argues, "(http://dailysignal.com/2014/09/16/war-poverty-colossal-flop/) The War on Poverty Has Been a Colossal Flop." He writes, "Over 100 million people, about one third of the U.S. population, received aid from at least one welfare program at an average cost of $9,000 per recipient in 2013. If converted into cash, current means-tested spending is five times the amount needed to eliminate all poverty in the U.S."

John Boyd: My dad uses Boyd's OODA Loop—Observe, Orient, Decide, Act—in his self-defense training. Now the Art of Manliness has an (http://www.artofmanliness.com/2014/09/15/ooda-loop/) article out about it. If you can wade through the enormous amount of nonsense philosophy in the article, you can pick up some good tips about preparing for and engaging in conflicts. From the article: "[W]hen it comes to winning a competition or conflict, our actions need to be surprising, ambiguous, and varying; speeding up and slowing down your actions quickly and irregularly can create confusion."

Global Jihad and More: News Roundup for 9/18/14

September 18, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions from recent days.

Australia Jihad: "Australian counterterrorism forces detained 15 people Thursday in a series of suburban raids after receiving intelligence that the Islamic State movement was planning public beheadings in two Australian cities to demonstrate its reach," (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/09/18/australia-terror-raid-prompted-by-isis-plans-for-public-killing-pm-says/) Fox New reports.

Colorado Jihad: In her latest (http://michellemalkin.com/2014/09/17/the-spread-of-rocky-mountain-jihad/) op-ed, Michelle Malkin discusses a couple women from Colorado who joined Islamic terrorist groups, and several more jihadists with Colorado ties. Frightening.

British Jihad: Stacey Dooley (http://qpolitical.com/her-town-was-invaded-by-muslim-extremists-watch-what-happens-when-she-confronts-them/) filmed a group of Muslims parading down the streets of a British town (Luton), calling for the implementation of sharia law and hoping for British police officers to burn in hell for their counter-terrorism efforts.

In other news:

Climate March: Alex Epstein responds to the upcoming "climate march" in his Forbes article, "(http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexepstein/2014/09/17/six-reasons-why-the-united-nations-should-not-intervene-on-fossil-fuel-use-a-response-to-the-misguided-peoples-climate-march/) Six Reasons Why the United Nations Should Not Intervene on Fossil Fuel Use (A Response to the Misguided People's Climate March)." He summarizes, "Proposed bans on fossil fuel use would make billions live shorter, less prosperously, and with worse environments."

Abolish the ATF? "Republican Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner has introduced legislation to eliminate the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives" and "dissolve the duties of ATF to the FBI and DEA," TownHall.com (http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2014/09/17/legislation-introduced-to-get-rid-of-atf-n1893092) reports. Sounds like a great idea to me.

Nuclear Scotland: (http://dailysignal.com/2014/09/16/5-reasons-americans-should-be-nervous-about-scottish-independence/) According to Nile Gardiner of the Heritage Foundation, "The UK's entire nuclear deterrent is based in Scotland, and all Britain's nuclear bases and warheads will have to be moved out of the country" if Scotland votes for independence.

YouTube Millionaire: Business Insider reports, "(http://www.businessinsider.com/who-is-evantubehd-2014-9) This 8-Year-Old [Evan] Makes $1.3 Million A Year By Posting YouTube Videos." He has help from his dad.

Scotland, Ebola, and More: News Roundup for 9/19/14

September 19, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions from recent days.

Scotland Stays: "Voters in Scotland have rejected independence, but leaders of Britain's three largest parties have promised Scots more autonomy than they have won so far," the Associated Press (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/uk-to-make-changes-after-scotland-vote-keeps-union/2014/09/19/8ff76632-3fdd-11e4-a430-b82a3e67b762_story.html) reports. I don't have a good sense of what "autonomy" means in this context, but here's a clue: Scotland may gain "the power to raise taxes if necessary to protect the National Health Service in Scotland."

Ebola: Here's an indication of one reason the Ebola crisis is spinning out of control: "At least eight Ebola aid workers and journalists were reportedly murdered and dumped in a latrine in a remote village in Guinea in a frightening example of the growing distrust locals have of foreigners coming to help stem the mushrooming health crisis," Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/09/19/at-least-8-ebola-aid-workers-reportedly-killed-in-cold-blood-by-villagers-in/) reports.

Voter Fraud? If you try to ensure that voters aren't voting fraudulently, obviously you're a racist, or at least so (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/19/voter-registration-fraud-probe-looms-over-tight-georgia-senate-race/) charge the critics of Georgia's Republican Secretary of State Brian Kemp.

Fossil Fuels: Read the (https://www.dropbox.com/s/a5aqhv0z4kzqgyb/MCFF%20Preview.pdf) first chapter of Alex Epstein's book, The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels.

Apple Security: Apple says it's not "technically feasible" for the company to hand over their clients' personal data to law enforcement, which has some police-state advocates in a tussle. Read the (http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2014/09/18/expert-apple-is-making-life-more-difficult-for-cops/) Fox News report.

Citizens United in CO: Read my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/citizens-united-anonymous-speech-rights-violating-disclosure-laws/) Objective Standard essay about Citizens United's fight for free speech (specifically, anonymous speech) in Colorado.

Iranian Fascism: In Iran, a "group of six young Iranians . . . were arrested in May for dancing to Pharrell Williams' hit song 'Happy.'" "[A]n Iranian court sentenced five of them to 6 months in prison and 91 lashes each, while another was sentenced to one year in prison and 91 lashes. . . . The sentences, however, are "'suspended' for three years, which means the six will remain free unless they are found guilty of a similar offense"; see the (http://mashable.com/2014/09/17/iran-happy-dancers-prison-lashes/) Mashable write-up.

Al Qaeda in Syria: "A group of Al Qaeda fighters in Syria [the Khorasan Group] is emerging as a rival terror threat to the Islamic State," (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/18/intel-chief-al-qaeda-cell-in-syria-poses-threat/) Fox News reports. So wait a minute. . . which rebels are we supposed to be arming, again?

Multiculturalism: (http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/articles/14/MulticulturalismIsAFailure.htm) As Walter Williams reports, several European leaders are coming to grips with the fact that multiculturalism is a failure. "The bottom line is that much of the Muslim world is at war with Western civilization," Williams writes.

Ginseng Raid, Another Salon Attack on Rand, Illegal Horse Transport, and More: News Roundup for 9/20/14

September 20, 2014

Here are some of the important and interesting news stories and opinions from recent days.

Ginseng Raid: Based on a (http://www.wvva.com/story/26563681/2014/09/18/police-seize-190-pounds-of-illegally-harvested-ginseng) report by the Associated Press, this story seems bizarre: "West Virginia natural resources police say they have made 11 arrests and seized 190 pounds of dry ginseng that was illegally harvested." Articles by the West Virginia (http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20140917/GZ01/140919317) Gazette-Mail and by the (http://www.wvdnr.gov/2014news/14news181.shtm) West Virginia Division of Natural Resources offer additional details, yet still leave many questions unanswered. A few details: Ginseng dealers must be licensed, the harvesting season is tightly regulated, and "digging ginseng on public lands . . . is prohibited." But does the raid in question pertain to ginseng harvested on public lands? On private property without permission? (I may have more details later.)

Salon Attacks Rand (Again): CJ Werleman of Salon claims that Ayn Rand's view of free markets is a "fantasy," a "constructed supernatural myth." But the only fantasies at hand are Werleman's own statements about free markets and about Rand's views; see my (http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/09/contra-salon-capitalism-ayn-rand-said-never-existed/) article for the Objective Standard.

Illegal Horse Transport: To transport horses across state lines, you may need "health papers, CDL license and USDOT number among a list of other requirements," (http://instrideedition.com/2014/09/are-you-legal-transporting-horses-across-state-lines/) In Stride Edition reports. Apparently the laws are being enforced more stringently these days. But why do such laws even exist? (Hat tip to Diana Hsieh.)

Islamic State Violence: (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-krauthammer-the-islamic-states-jihadi-logic/2014/09/18/9b76154a-3f64-11e4-9587-5dafd96295f0_story.html) Charles Krauthammer proposes that Islamic State posted videos of beheadings to "provoke America into entering the Mesopotamian war . . . [b]ecause they're sure we will lose. Not immediately and not militarily. They know we always win the battles but they are convinced that, as war drags on, we lose heart and go home."

Tech Revolution: "Imagine, if you will, sitting down to your morning coffee [and] turning on your home computer to read the day's newspaper." Check out this awesome (http://www.neatorama.com/2014/09/16/1981-News-Report-on-the-Internet-is-Now-Hilarious/) 1981 news report.

Asset Forfeiture: John Yoder and Brad Cates, each a former director of the Justice Department's Asset Forfeiture Office, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/abolish-the-civil-asset-forfeiture-program-we-helped-create/2014/09/18/72f089ac-3d02-11e4-b0ea-8141703bbf6f_story.html) write for the Washington Post: "As two people who were heavily involved in the creation of the asset forfeiture initiative at the Justice Department in the 1980s, we find it particularly painful to watch as the heavy hand of government goes amok. The program began with good intentions but now, having failed in both purpose and execution, it should be abolished." Good for them.

Medicare Fraud: "Dr. Farid Fata . . . was charged with intentionally misdiagnosing healthy people with cancer and pumping dying patients with chemo to make money. . . . [He

was charged with running a $35-million Medicare fraud scheme that involved billing the government for medically unnecessary oncology and hematology treatments," (http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/oakland/2014/09/16/oakland-county-cancer-doctor-fighting-keep-feds-email/15716679/) reports the Detroit Free Press. Hat tip to Paul Hsieh.

Methane Emission: "Lawmakers and natural gas supporters worry that outcries from environmentalists, led by the influential Natural Resources Defense Council, could led to a regulatory crackdown on methane, a potent greenhouse gas, this fall," the (http://dailycaller.com/2014/09/18/get-ready-for-obama-epas-push-to-regulate-methane-emissions/) Daily Caller reports.

Surveillance State: "Despite Apple's Privacy Pledge, Cops Can Still Pull Data Off a Locked iPhone," (http://www.wired.com/2014/09/apple-iphone-security/) Wired reports (hat tip to Paul Hsieh).

Demon News: (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/43854_Ridiculous_Breitbart_News_Post_of_the_Day-_Demons_Are_Real!) Little Green Footballs has some fun with Breitbart.com, which ran the bizarre headline, "Exorcists Warn of Danger from Oklahoma City Black Mass."

Die at 75? Speaking of Breitbart.com, the site also features the headline, "(http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/09/18/Obamacare-creator-die-75) ObamaCare Creator: Die at 75!" The article is by Ben Shapiro. The person in question, Ezekiel J. Emanuel, (http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/09/why-i-hope-to-die-at-75/379329/) does write for the Atlantic (as Shapiro acknowledges), "I am not saying that those who want to live as long as possible are unethical or wrong."

Beauprez on Abortion: As (http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2014/09/19/anti-choice-gubernatorial-candidate-dismisses-importance-abortion-debate/) Jason Salzman reports, Colorado candidate for governor Bob Beauprez has gone from supporting "personhood" for zygotes to (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/09/18/beauprez-stakes-position-abortion-personhood/112953/) telling the Denver Post, "Nobody's taking that [the right to get an abortion] away—that's a false argument. That's the law of the land. Some like me are personally pro-life, but I'm not going to deny what the law provides you."

Climate Change: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XttTYgDhic0) Climatologist Judith Curry claims that "evidence reported by the IPCC AR5 weakens the case for human factors dominating climate change in the 20th and early 21st centuries." She discusses the "weak linkages between anthropogenic climate change and extreme weather, and the importance of natural climate variability." Hat tip to (http://ari.aynrand.org/blog/2014/09/19/policy-digest-environmental-issues) Amanda Maxham of the Ayn Rand Institute.

Neil deGrasse Tyson's Fibs: (http://thefederalist.com/2014/09/18/why-is-wikipedia-deleting-all-references-to-neil-tysons-fabrication/) Sean Davis of the Federalist offers credible evidence that Neil deGrasse Tyson has made up a few of the quotes he's used to mock people regarding their ignorance of math and science. This is interesting, and Tyson should check the accuracy of his quotes, but I think Davis is making too much out of the issue. My opinion about Tyson has changed 360 degrees (see the article for the reference).

Why I'll (Probably) Vote Straight Republican This Year

September 21, 2014

You want to talk about a "war" on certain segments of voters?

I am not among those who think the "Republican War on Women" is entirely a Democratic fabrication; the existence of the "(http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2013/10/colorado-personhood-measure-would-outlaw-all-abortions-and-more/) personhood for zygotes" measure on Colorado's ballot this year (again) is evidence that such a war exists (using the term "war" metaphorically, of course).

But the Democrats have waged their own wars on other blocks of citizens—and those are the wars driving the 2014 elections. Mainly, these are the war on gun owners, the war on energy producers and consumers, the war on doctors and patients, and the war on taxpayers. At the national level, you can add Obama's war on self-respecting and security-conscious Americans—he has almost single-handedly turned the United States into an object of ridicule among Islamic jihadists and Communist throwbacks around the world—and Obama's late-term malaise will almost certainly impact numerous state and local elections.

Here in Colorado, I will never forgive Mark Udall (aka Marack Obama Udall) for (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/03/26/dem_sen_mark_udall_i_would_vote_for_obamacare_again.html) supporting ObamaCare and for (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_25987022/mark-udall-votes-no-keystone-says-more-time) throttling the Keystone Pipeline (an indicator of his general hostility toward fossil-fuel energy producers).

I will never forgive John "(http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2014/06/john_hickenlooper_what_the_fuck_video_wtf.php) What the F**k" Hickenlooper (aka Michael Bloomberg) for supporting the (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2013/07/16/dems-leave-making-sense-of-gun-magazine-ban-to-attorney-general/) idiotically drafted, rights-violating gun-restriction laws.

I will never forgive Colorado's Democratic legislators for passing the so-called "Amazon tax" pertaining to online sales—a measure that (http://www.durangoherald.com/article/20110128/NEWS01/701289989/-1/News01/GOP:-Repeal-'Amazon-tax') Hickenlooper defended—and (http://www.clearthebenchcolorado.org/2011/02/02/the-'dirty-dozen'-tax-increases-how-the-2010-colorado-legislature-exploited-a-colorado-supreme-court-ruling-to-unconstitutionally-take-more-of-your-money-without-asking/) other tax measures. (Yes, I have a long memory on that one. These are just a few indications of the types of issues bothering me.)

I am seeing red this year—and so are a lot of other voters. Obviously Colorado's Democrats had no idea how deeply they would anger large blocks of voters by pursuing their leftist policies.

I was frankly surprised—although not as surprised as the Democrats were—that the gun-driven recall elections resulted in three turnovers in the legislature. Remember, those were the first recalls in the state's history.

I was even more surprised to see (http://kdvr.com/2014/09/18/gardner-leads-udall-by-8-percentage-points-in-latest-quinnipiac-poll/) Quinnipiac polls showing Bob Beauprez up ten points over Hickenlooper and Cory Gardner up eight points over Udall. I don't know polling well enough to know which polls to trust and which to distrust, but for the Republicans even to be at a dead heat against the incumbents—as other polls indicate may be the case—is remarkable. Just three months ago I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/06/would-gessler-have-won-the-gop-primary-with-approval-voting/) predicted that Hickenlooper would easily best Beauprez.

This year, as is the case every year, many outcomes will hinge on voter turnout. In recent election cycles Democrats floated on the Obama Bubble, but now that bubble has burst. Younger voters, I think, are starting to figure out that maybe "hope and change" depends on something more substantial than velvety rhetoric, that maybe we don't want government continually spying on us (Udall's work in this area is his main redeeming virtue), and that maybe a Kumbaya foreign policy doesn't work when the other guy wants to cut your head off. Meanwhile, a variety of indicators, including the recalls and the recent polls, indicate that the right may be especially motivated this year. I for one am spitting mad.

I've long described my attitude toward Colorado politics this way: "Which party do I hate the most? It depends on which one I'm thinking of at the moment." Recently Democrats have given me plenty of reasons to think about them, and, surprisingly, Republicans haven't.

Both Beauprez and Gardner have more-or-less successfully defused the "war on women" bomb, mainly by running as fast as they can away from the so-called "personhood" measure. I was pleasantly surprised to read (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/09/18/beauprez-stakes-position-abortion-personhood/112953/) these recent remarks from Beaupurez: "Nobody's taking that [the right to get an abortion] away—that's a false argument. That's the law of the land. Some like me are personally pro-life, but I'm not going to deny what the law provides you." (For once Beauprez's tendency to "squish" is working to his advantage.) And of course Gardner came out with a proposal to (http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_25995739/women-should-be-able-buy-pill-without-prescription) legalize over-the-counter birth control—which is not only the right position policy-wise but a genius political move. Although Gardner is a (http://blogs.denverpost.com/thespot/2014/09/02/cory-gardner-birth-control-senate/112040/) cosponsor of a national "personhood" proposal, it's hard to believe he takes that too seriously given his other proposal.

Although I reserve the right to change my mind and to make some exceptions, my default stance toward this year's election is "vote straight Republican." I even had a sign made up: "Dems BLEW It: This Year Vote Republican." (Attention CEW: I did not spend over $200 on this sign, and I did not coordinate with others about it, so you can keep your attack dogs on their leashes.) At first I considered having it read, "In 2014 Vote Republican"—but then I thought I might need to use it again sometime down the road.

I end with a special plea directed at Colorado Republicans. If you do manage to pull off some electoral successes this year, please don't screw everything up the way you almost always do. Don't make me replace this year's sign with one stating: "GOP BLEW It: This Year Vote Democrat." But if I have to I'll just get both signs and keep alternating them. Such is nature of Colorado politics.

People's Climate March and More: News Roundup for 9/22/14

September 22, 2014

Here are some of the important news stories and opinions from recent days.

Socialist Climate March: Among the signs displayed at the "People's Climate March" in New York were these: "(https://twitter.com/oliverdarcy/status/513747611338416129/photo/1) Capitalism Is Killing the Planet: Fight for a Socialist Future!" and "(https://twitter.com/CounterMoonbat/status/513815350702796800/photo/1) I'm Marching for Full Communism." One might be tempted to believe that socialism was a cure in search of a problem, and that "climate change" is now that "problem."

Epstein Reports: Alex Epstein of the Center for Industrial Progress interviewed people at the march and responded with his own pro-fossil fuel views. See his (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mojiBJ55G2g) first, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcgH62jiocA) second, and (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVBNelw4yks) third videos.

A New Consensus? John Fund (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/388535/crumbling-climate-change-consensus-john-fund) writes, "One reason the rhetoric has become so overheated is that the climate-change activists increasingly lack a scientific basis for their most exaggerated claims." Fund also quotes Roy Spencer, a former senior scientist for climate studies at NASA: "[T]he lack of surface warming in 17 years has forced those same scientists to now invoke natural climate change to supposedly cancel out the expected human-caused warming! . . . They fail to see that a climate system capable of cancelling out warming with natural cooling is also capable of causing natural warming in the first place."

Cheap Solar? Vivek Wadhwa (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/innovations/wp/2014/09/19/the-coming-era-of-unlimited-and-free-clean-energy/) claims, "By 2020, solar energy will be price-competitive with energy generated from fossil fuels on an unsubsidized basis in most parts of the world. Within the next decade, it will cost a fraction of what fossil fuel-based alternatives do." He bases his projection on recent decreases in the costs of solar, trends which may or may not continue. His article strikes me as long on wishful thinking and short on technical details. But, if this does happen, it would be wonderful—and the trend would help demonstrate that government should play no role in the matter.

Trees are Evil? Nadine Unger, "an assistant professor of atmospheric chemistry at Yale," (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/20/opinion/to-save-the-planet-dont-plant-trees.html) writes for the New York Times, "The assumption is that planting trees and avoiding further deforestation provides a convenient carbon capture and storage facility on the land." But that's wrong. "Considering all the interactions, large-scale increases in forest cover can actually make global warming worse." The basic theory is that planting trees in cooler regions may reduce the amount of sunlight reflected back into space. Also, she writes, "Worse, trees emit reactive volatile gases that contribute to air pollution and are hazardous to human health."

In other news:

Oil Exports: Mark Green (http://energytomorrow.org/blog/2014/september/good-news-on-oil-exports-and-gas-prices) writes, "The strong weight of new scholarship and analysis say that allowing exports of domestic crude will lower pump prices in this country—while also boosting economic growth, employment and wages and improving our balance of trade."

Iran Murders Again: The Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/iranian-blogger-found-guilty-of-insulting-prophet-mohammad-on-facebook-sentenced-to-death-9741572.html) reports: "Iranian blogger found guilty of insulting Prophet Mohammad on Facebook sentenced to death."

Arabian Collapse: "The Arab world today is more violent, unstable, fragmented and driven by extremism—the extremism of the rulers and those in opposition—than at any time since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire a century ago," (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/09/the-barbarians-within-our-gates-111116.html#.VB8e10scF1E) writes Hisham Melhem.

Elevator to the Sky: (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-21/japanese-construction-giants-promise-space-elevator-by-2050/5756206) ABC reports, "Japanese construction giant Obayashi announces plans to have a space elevator up and running by 2050."

McSnorter: (http://www.neatorama.com/2014/09/19/The-McDonalds-Cocaine-Spoon-Fiasco/) According to Neatorama, a McDonald's coffee stir spoon was a casualty of the drug war, because some people used them to snort cocaine.

Surveillance State: "A rapidly expanding digital network that uses cameras mounted to traffic signals and police cruisers captures the movements of millions of vehicles across the U.S., regardless of whether the drivers are being investigated by law enforcement," the (http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2024576014_apxlicenseplatescanners.html) Associated Press reports.

Moving News Aggregation to Twitter

September 23, 2014

Readers may have noticed that I've been trying out different strategies for aggregating news. I do want to track select items of news and views, not only to provide some potentially useful tips to others, but to help myself keep track of the items.

It seems that now I've come full circle. I started out using my (https://twitter.com/ariarmstrong) Twitter feed to collect news stories; more recently I set up an entire new web site (now defunct) devoted to news aggregation (see my (http://ariarmstrong.com/category/publications/rational-beacon/) explanation); and most recently I've posted "news roundups" to my personal page (see (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/09/peoples-climate-march-and-more-news-roundup-for-92214/) this morning's example).

For now at least, I'm going to go back to using Twitter to track the stories and opinions of interest to me—so now is an excellent time to (https://twitter.com/ariarmstrong) follow me on Twitter, if you do not already do so.

Of course, if I want to write something more substantial about some article than Twitter will accommodate, I'll probably do so as a blog post here. And, as should be obvious by now, I may change my mind about this.

Jeffco's Julie Williams Seeks to Replace One Brand of Activist Teaching with Another

September 28, 2014

Recently in Jefferson County, Colorado (my home county), teachers have staged "sick outs," and students have staged walk-outs, largely to protest a proposal by school board member Julie Williams "to create a Board study committee on Common Core Standards, (http://www.parcconline.org/parcc-assessment) PARCC assessments and Advanced Placement U.S. History." The board met on September 18 to discuss the proposal; see the "(http://www.boarddocs.com/co/jeffco/Board.nsf/Public) Agenda Item Details" for that meeting. (Williams's proposal was just that, a proposal; on September 23, Jeffco schools superintendent Dan McMinimee (http://www.jeffcopublicschools.org/media/releases/2014/2014.09.23%20sups_statement_protests.html) stated that "no decisions have been made regarding the curriculum committee.")

Unfortunately, many of Williams's critics have badly misrepresented what her proposal states and implies (more on this below). That said, what it states and implies is highly troublesome for anyone concerned about political propagandizing supplanting a sound education in tax-funded classrooms.

Here is (http://www.boarddocs.com/co/jeffco/Board.nsf/files/9NYRPF6DED70/$file/JW%20PROPOSAL%20Board%20Committee%20for%20Curriculum%20Review.pdf) what the proposal actually says about how the committee should handle its curricula reviews, starting with "a review of the AP US History curriculum and elementary health curriculum":

Review criteria shall include the following: instructional materials should present the most current factual information accurately and objectively. Theories should be distinguished from fact. Materials should promote citizenship, patriotism, essentials and benefits of the free enterprise system, respect for authority and respect for individual rights. Materials should not encourage or condone civil disorder, social strife or disregard of the law. Instructional materials should present positive aspects of the United States and its heritage. Content pertaining to political and social movements in history should present balanced and factual treatment of the positions.

Aspects of these statements are unobjectionable (and pointless); for example, who would disagree that a presentation of history should be "accurate" and "factual"? It's not as though anyone is chanting, "Hey, ho, factually accurate history has got to go!" Of course, the questions of which facts are accurate, and how facts should be interpreted, make for rougher going.

Other aspects of Williams's statements are nonsensical. For example, what does it mean that "theories should be distinguished from fact?" No one confuses a broad theory, which integrates many facts, with an isolated fact. Perhaps what Williams has in mind is that she wishes the committee to distinguish true theories which are supported by facts—as examples, the theory of gravity and the theory of evolution—from propositions or hypotheses which are not supported by facts or which are only partially supported by them. But there is the rub: Why should anyone expect a board-appointed committee to rationally evaluate such things? A controversial proposition is not going to become less controversial because some committee blesses it as a "theory" or a "fact."

Consider another example: What does it mean for materials to "promote citizenship?" Legally, either you are a U.S. citizen, or you are not. I take it that Williams is not here concerned with persuading people without U.S. citizenship to seek such citizenship, nor with promoting legal changes that would grant U.S. citizenship to more people. What, then, is she proposing? Apparently by "citizenship" she refers to certain attitudes and beliefs that typify a citizen. But what might those be, and, again, why should anyone expect a government committee to rationally determine such things?

Other aspects of Williams's statement clearly call for advocacy "teaching"; that is, the promotion of ideological views over the presentation of historical facts. Specifically, "Materials should promote citizenship, patriotism, essentials and benefits of the free enterprise system, respect for authority and respect for individual rights."

So here we have a "conservative" school board member asking a government-appointed committee to instruct government-funded teachers to "promote . . . respect for authority" among their students. Students are supposed to respect the "authority" . . . of what? This niggling detail is left to the imagination, but the most straight-forward reading is that government schools should promote "respect" for the authority of government. Remarkable.

Consider another aspect of the proposal. I am a full-blown capitalist, but I do not want teachers in government schools "promoting"—and what can this mean other than propagandizing in favor of?—the "free enterprise system." Even to the degree that teachers correctly identify what the "free enterprise system" is, history teachers have no business promoting one ideology over another. Instead, history teachers should concern themselves (and I know this is controversial) with teaching history.

Of course, part of teaching history, depending on the era at hand, involves discussion of the Industrial Revolution and capitalism, and the social and economic effects they have had. The problem is that how one evaluates such things, and what facts one sees as relevant in considering them, depends very much on one's ideology. This is obvious; to see the point one need only contrast the writings of Marx and Mises on the matter. In such cases, what I hope for in teachers, whether they work in government or private schools, is that they fairly present the major lines of thought in the field, along with the relevant facts. For example, it would be wrong of a teacher to discuss only the pollution caused by the Industrial Revolution, without also discussing industry's profound effects on rising standards of living.

Although teaching is a complex art, the basic point here is that history teachers should teach history, not promote their own (or the school board's) particular ideological views (beyond the broad views that facts and intellectual honesty are paramount).

If there is to be a committee to review curricula, then, its purpose should be to weed out indoctrination in tax-funded classrooms, not to impose some new type of indoctrination.

Although I oppose Williams's proposal, some of the criticism of it are far off base. Consider three examples. Jefferson County PTA President Michele Patterson (http://co.chalkbeat.org/2014/09/18/jeffco-parents-fear-censorship-as-board-considers-new-curriculum-panel-ap-history/#.VCcU2UscF1G) said of the proposal, "Does that mean we're going to eliminate slavery from class discussions, because that wasn't a particular positive time of our history? Hiroshima didn't necessarily look great." MoveOn.org (http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/dont-let-the-youth-of.fb47?source=s.icn.fb&r_by=11322461) urged people to "stop public school boards from outlawing historical events such as the Civil Rights Movement, Native American genocide, and slavery." And Caitlin MacNeal (http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/colorado-students-ap-us-history-protest) claimed at TPM that Williams's proposal would "remove the teaching of 'civil disobedience' in the AP U.S. History curriculum."

Those are ridiculous misreadings of what the proposal says. The proposal does not say that materials should not cover historical episodes involving "civil disorder, social strife or disregard of the law"; it says "materials should not encourage or condone [among students] civil disorder, social strife or disregard of the law." Further, the proposal says that "instructional materials should present positive aspects of the United States and its heritage," not that they should exclude negative aspects of them.

It should be needless to say, but obviously the point needs to be explicitly stated here, that misrepresenting what Williams's proposal says does not promote rational discussion of the matter.

Williams's proposal is bad enough when read straight; why many of Williams's critics also feel compelled to fabricate "facts" about it is beyond me. Political activists have no more business fabricating "facts" than history teachers do.

Of course, if we employ the "critical thinking" skills the College Board (the creator of the AP history test) is so eager for us to employ, we will note that, just because Williams's proposal is substantially misguided, doesn't imply that all of Williams's concerns are misplaced or that either the College Board or the teachers' unions are guided exclusively by the angels. But those are topics for another day.

The Denver Post's Ridiculously Biased Story on Bob Beauprez and IUDs

October 2, 2014

If there's one thing that makes me more angry than politicians endorsing stupid policies, it's journalists writing biased and fact-distorting "news" stories. Frankly I usually don't expect any better from politicians. But I do expect better from journalists, who are supposed to be the defenders of truth, justice, and America's constitutional republic.

John Frank's recent article in the Denver Post, "Bob Beauprez's IUD Remark in Debate Generates Controversy," represents the worst kind of biased (and frankly partisan) "reporting."

By way of background, it is no secret that I advocate a woman's right to get an abortion and that I strongly oppose the so-called "personhood" ballot measure. Indeed, I've spent many hours researching and writing about the "personhood" efforts over the years (see the (http://www.seculargovernment.us) paper I coauthored with Diana Hsieh). In 2006, the last time Beauprez ran for governor,(http://www.freecolorado.com/2006/10/rittervote.html) I endorsed Democrat Bill Ritter over Beauprez, largely over "Beauprez's religious stand against abortion." This year, (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/09/why-ill-probably-vote-straight-republican-this-year/) I have (tentatively) endorsed Beauprez over incumbent John Hickenlooper, partly because Beauprez has substantially run away from his efforts to outlaw abortion, and largely because I'm sick of Hickenlooper's antics.

But whatever my personal positions, and whatever Frank's personal position may be, intellectually honest people can at least be open and candid about the facts. On that score Frank has failed, miserably.

Frank correctly notes that, in a recent debate, "Beauprez suggested that intrauterine devices, known as IUDs, cause abortion." Specifically, he said, "IUD is an abortifacient."

Then Frank writes,

Beauprez drew a rebuke from experts in the medical community who called his assertion false. . . . The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and 10 other physician organizations, as well as the Federal Drug Administration, define IUDs as contraceptives that prevent a pregnancy. . . . Dr. Daniel Grossman, an ob/gyn who does reproductive research and who practices in San Francisco, said the definition of a pregnancy as the implantation of a fertilized egg is an established scientific standard. He said IUDs are not abortifacient.

But the relevant debate is not whether an IUD can kill a zygote once it has implanted in the uterus; rather, it is whether an IUD can kill a zygote before it implants in the uterus—and for Frank to ignore that issue is journalistic incompetence (or else intentional fraud). Basically, Frank is trying to trip up Beauprez on a definition, rather than address the substantive underlying issues.

So what are the facts? In 2012, Pam Belluck (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/06/health/research/morning-after-pills-dont-block-implantation-science-suggests.html?pagewanted=3&_r=0) wrote for the New York Times:

By contrast [to hormonal birth control pills], scientists say, research suggests that the only other officially approved form of emergency contraception, the copper intrauterine device (also a daily birth control method), can work to prevent pregnancy after an egg has been fertilized.

A web site for Paragard, a brand of copper IUD, (http://www.paragard.com/How-it-works.aspx) states, "The copper in Paragard . . . interferes with sperm movement and egg fertilization. Paragard may prevent implantation." Implantation of what, you may ask? Obviously, of a zygote. And what happens if a zygote does not implant in the uterus? It dies. The FDA-approved prescription information for Paragard (http://www.paragard.com/Pdf/ParaGard-PI.pdf) states, "Mechanism(s) by which copper enhances contraceptive efficacy include interference with sperm transport and fertilization of an egg, and possibly prevention of implantation."

In other words, the copper IUD can work by preventing fertilization, and it can work by preventing the implantation of a (fertilized) zygote. If it works by the first means, it is a "contraceptive," meaning that it prevents conception. But if it works by the second means, calling it a "contraceptive" is misleading, which is why the so-called "pro-life" crowd calls it "abortifacient." But, by the definition of Frank's "experts," it's not an abortion if it kills a zygote before it implants in the uterus. Well, they can define it that way if they want, but the definition used does not alter the underlying facts.

Let's use another example to illustrate the point. I could define a "journalist" as a writer of news stories who gets his facts straight and who does not omit relevant facts. By that definition, John Frank is not a "journalist" ("hack" might be a better descriptive, at least in this case). But another common meaning of "journalist" is simply anyone who gets paid to write for a news organization. By that definition, Frank is a "journalist." But real journalists (in the first sense of the term) do not play "gotcha" games with definitions as a way to obscure the relevant issues.

I believe the editors of the Denver Post do have integrity and do try to publish good, factually complete stories, so I call on them to issue a correction to Frank's story.

Of course, as a matter of policy, it should matter not at all whether an IUD can act to prevent the implantation of a zygote. Women have a moral right to use the birth control methods of their choice and to seek an abortion if they wish to do so. A zygote is not a "person" and does not have rights. Frank does helpfully report that Beauprez said "in an interview after the debate" that "the use of IUDs [is] a 'personal choice.'" Indeed it is—and it should continue to be.

Why I Cannot Vote for "Personhood" Supporter Laura Woods

October 7, 2014

I confess that I tried not to look too closely at the Republican candidate for my Colorado senate district (number 19), Laura Woods, because I was afraid of what I might find. After gleefully witnessing the fall of Evie Hudack following her (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2013/11/29/hudak-denies-voters-choice-after-supporters-suppressed-democratic-action/) reckless, Bloomberg-inspired campaign against peaceable gun owners (after which Democrats replaced her with Rachel Zenzinger, now the Democratic candidate), I really wanted the seat to turn Republican.

After the fiascos of ObamaCare (implications of which played out in the state legislature), the Democrats' persecution of gun owners, the Democrats' war on energy producers and consumers, and other matters, this would have been an excellent year for the GOP to punish the Democrats and win back some seats. But, Republicans being Republicans (aka "The Stupid Party"), Republicans in my district nominated a candidate I cannot possible vote for.

Thus, just a couple of weeks after announcing I (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/09/why-ill-probably-vote-straight-republican-this-year/) planned to vote a straight-Republican ticket, I now have to make an exception and declare that I cannot and will not vote for Laura Woods. The basic problem is that Woods enthusiastically endorses total abortion bans, including the insane and horrific "personhood" measure on the ballot this year.

(I won't vote for Zenzinger either. I'll probably just blank that vote, unless I can figure out how to write in "(http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0705922/) Turd Sandwich.")

So congratulations to Mainstream Colorado, "Ashley Stevens, registered agent," for prompting me to take a closer look at Woods and to thereby change my vote. (This is the first time I can recall in which a political ad has actually had any influence whatsoever on my voting.)

I'll begin by reviewing a couple of campaign mailers I received from Mainstream. One ad cleverly borrows the language of the right by touting, "Freedom. Responsibility. Hard Work. These are the values Coloradans have cherished for generations." The ad continues (in part), "Rachel Zenzinger believes women have the right to make their own health care decisions [but not their own self-defense decisions] with their family, their doctor and their faith—without government or bosses getting in the way." Of course, the bit about "bosses" is a reference to the ObamaCare requirement forcing insurers to cover birth control. Although I don't agree with Zenzinger on that issue, I definitely agree with her that women have a right to get an abortion.

Then comes the ad's attack on Woods:

Laura Woods would take away a woman's freedom to make her own health care decisions. . . . Laura Woods doesn't think women are responsible enough to make their own decisions [except regarding their self-defense]. Woods supports an extreme plan that would ban all abortions, including in cases of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is in danger. The plan would criminalize doctors who treat women and allow law enforcement to investigate women who suffer miscarriage. She even supports a constitutional amendment that could ban common forms of birth control.

Although some of that language is imprecise and incomplete, it is essentially correct.

A second ad from the outfit makes the same basic claims.

A political flyer reads Laura Woods would take away a woman's freedom to make her own health care decisions.

So what are the facts behind the claims in question? Colorado Campaign for Life (http://coloradocampaignforlife.wordpress.com/2014/06/03/53/) claims, "Laura Woods answered her Colorado Campaign for Life Survey 100 pro-life (sic)." (The organization also likens Woods's opponent, Lang Sias, to the baby murderer Kermit Gosnell.) And Colorado Right to Life, which (http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/node/363) asks candidates if they "oppose all abortion," (http://coloradorighttolife.blogspot.com/2014/06/2014-pre-primary-candidate-info.html) affirms that Woods "has rigorously affirmed she is pro-life (sic)." As CBS Denver (http://denver.cbslocal.com/2014/06/24/rmgo-hands-the-colorado-senate-to-dems-in-jeffco-wins/) reports, Woods is a "staunch supporter of the Personhood ballot issue."

As for why women have a right to get an abortion (and to use the birth control and in vitro fertility treatments of their choice),  and for why the "personhood" measure is not about personhood and is indeed anti-life rather than "pro-life," see the (http://www.seculargovernment.us) detailed paper on the matter by Diana Hsieh and me.

Roundup on Jeffco Schools

October 7, 2014

I've written four articles (three for other sites) about the protests and union-board fights in Jefferson County, Colorado:

1. (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/09/jeffcos-julie-williams-seeks-to-replace-one-brand-of-activist-teaching-with-another/) Jeffco's Julie Williams Seeks to Replace One Brand of Activist Teaching with Another

2. (https://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2014/10/political-chaos-colorados-jefferson-county-schools-illustrates-problems-government-control/) Political Chaos in Colorado's Jefferson County Schools Illustrates Problems of Government Control

3. (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/10/01/the-leftist-biases-of-the-ap-u-s-history-course/) The Leftist Biases of the AP U.S. History Course

4. (http://completecolorado.com/pagetwo/2014/10/02/a-lesson-on-censorship-and-civil-disobedience-for-jeffco-students-teachers-and-observers/) A Lesson on Censorship and Civil Disobedience for Jeffco Students, Teachers and Observers

What's more, I interviewed three participants in an October 3 protest in Westminster; here's the video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFGZs63ZF3k

In other news, a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0lAX5OuIoo) video from an outfit called "Jeffco Truth" indicates that at least some of the protesting students had no idea what they were protesting. And a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HjSHQUG4Qs) video from Corey Scott shows that at least one of Julie Williams's supporters wished to use the proposed review curriculum to promote religious ideology.

Will Tracy Kraft-Tharp Condemn Effort to Turn Horrific Murder into a Political Stunt?

October 9, 2014

October 13 Update: Although I still have not personally heard from Kraft-Tharp, 9News (http://www.9news.com/story/news/politics/2014/10/13/ridgeway-family-disgusted-by-political-ad/17215257/) reports that she stated, "I publicly denounce this ad" (see below for details). Christine Ridgeway, Jessica's grandmother, told 9News, "I am just totally disgusted by this [set of ads]. When I first saw this I was speechless for like four hours. I was just so angry and so upset that I just couldn't speak." Good for Kraft-Tharp for condemning the political mailers in question. However, I'd still like to know her answers to my questions regarding the Fourth Amendment. —AA

I've seen nasty political ads, as have we all. But a recent set of mailers in my Colorado state house district are beyond nasty; they are reprehensible. An independent expenditure committee, Priorities for Colorado ("Jim Alexee, registered agent") has turned the horrific murder of a little girl into a political stunt.

The ads target (http://susanforcolorado.com) Susan Kochevar, the Republican candidate running against (http://tracyforstaterep.com) Tracy Kraft-Tharp, state representative for District 29. One ad states, "Susan Kochevar refused to cooperate with the FBI in the Jessica Ridgeway case." The relevant fact, as Kochevar confirmed via email, is that the FBI requested to search her home on three different occasions, without a warrant, and she declined the warrantless searches—as is the Fourth Amendment right of every American. But the smear campaign treats her sensible actions as somehow sinister, asking, "What kind of person refuses to cooperate when a 10 year old girl goes missing?"

But the appropriate question is, what kind of person turns the horrific murder of a little girl into a political stunt? The answer is Jim Alexee and Julie Wells do. They are the "registered agent" and "designated filing agent" for (http://tracer.sos.colorado.gov/PublicSite/SearchPages/CommitteeDetail.aspx?OrgID=28494) Priorities for Colorado IE Committee. (I will email copies of the ads on request.)

What Kochevar did precisely is (https://www.aclu.org/drug-law-reform-immigrants-rights-racial-justice/know-your-rights-what-do-if-you#5) follow the advice of the ACLU:

If the police or immigration agents come to your home, you do not have to let them in unless they have certain kinds of warrants.

Ask the officer to slip the warrant under the door or hold it up to the window so you can inspect it. A search warrant allows police to enter the address listed on the warrant, but officers can only search the areas and for the items listed. An arrest warrant allows police to enter the home of the person listed on the warrant if they believe the person is inside. . . .

If an FBI agent comes to your home or workplace, you do not have to answer any questions. Tell the agent you want to speak to a lawyer first. If you are asked to meet with FBI agents for an interview, you have the right to say you do not want to be interviewed. If you agree to an interview, have a lawyer present.

Apparently Alexee and Wells need a refresher on the text and significance of the Fourth Amendment. We'll start with the language itself:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Quite simply, the Fourth Amendment is our basic protection against living in a police state.

This is a very personal story for me. I live within a few minutes' walk of Ketner reservoir, where the murderer in question once (before he killed) (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/23/jessica-ridgeway-case-pol_n_2004872.html) attempted to abduct a woman who was out for a jog. My wife and I walk the very trails where this murderer walked; the woman he attempted to abduct might as easily have been my wife or someone I know in the neighborhood. My theory is that, after the murderer failed to abduct an adult woman, he turned his sights to a younger, smaller victim in the neighborhood. Before I heard about the girl's disappearance, I saw crews of people sweeping a local field, so I knew something was up. It was as though a black cloud descended on the entire neighborhood, as first we waited and hoped, then we wept in sorrow and outrage. It was a horrible time, and obviously unspeakably horrific for the friends and family of the victim.

Everyone in the neighborhood was relieved when the perp was caught, and I'm very glad the FBI participated in the investigation. However, despite the fact that the FBI did some great work, the FBI also arguably violated people's rights in my neighborhood by harassing them if they did not consent to warrantless searches or warrantless collections of DNA. ((http://ariarmstrong.com/2012/10/an-open-letter-to-my-westminster-neighbors/) See my write-up.) In my view, the FBI did these things, not primarily to collect evidence, but to "sweat" people and see what might crack open. Looking at this from the perspective of law enforcement, I kind of understand the tactic. When you've got little to go on, and there's a brutal child killer on the loose, I'm sure it can be very tempting to cut some constitutional corners.

However, nothing about the story justifies American citizens consenting to warrantless fishing-expedition searches. We do not live in a police state. Law enforcement ought not go door to door searching houses without cause, and certainly FBI agents, who have sworn to uphold the Constitution, ought not harass citizens for invoking their Fourth Amendment rights.

We already know where Jim Alexee and Julie Wells stand. They are perfectly happy to turn a vicious murder into a sick political game.

What I want to know is, where does Tracy Kraft-Tharp, my representative in the legislature, stand on these issues? Does she stand with the ACLU in support of the Fourth Amendment, or does she believe that people ought to submit to warrantless, fishing-expendition searches and DNA collections? In short, does Kraft-Tharp support the Bill of Rights, or not?

I asked Kochevar and Kraft-Tharp about their views on the Fourth Amendment; so far, I have heard from Kochevar, but not Kraft-Tharp (I emailed her and left her two voice messages). Here are my questions and Kochevar's answers:

1. Do you believe the government has a moral or legal right to search people's homes or collect their DNA without a warrant or probable cause?

No, the government must show probable cause to a judge and a warrant must be granted.

2. Do you believe that citizens have a moral and legal right to refuse the request of a government agent to conduct a search or to collect DNA, when such agent has neither a warrant nor probable cause?

Yes, citizens do have a moral and legal right to decline a search or the collection of DNA without a warrant.

3. Do you believe that government officials properly are bound by the Bill of Rights?

Yes, I do believe government officials are bound by the Bill of Rights. Government officials swear an oath to the Constitution.

4. In your opinion, what is the significance of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution?

The Fourth Amendment is a limitation on the government to protect the people from unreasonable searches and seizures.

I asked Kraft-Tharp an additional question via email: "Do you condemn the effort by an independent expenditure committee to smear Susan Kochevar by turning the horrific murder of a little girl in my neighborhood into a political stunt?"

Regarding the Bill of Rights, if Kraft-Tharp cannot plainly state that she supports the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, then she has no business serving in government at any level.

Regarding the smear campaign, Kraft-Tharp's answer—or, if I do not hear from her, her lack thereof—will say a great deal about her character.

Notice: I Did Not Authorize "Libertas Institute Colorado" To Reproduce my Content

October 19, 2014

This morning a user on Twitter asked me if I was involved with LibertasColorado.org, the "Libertas Institute Colorado." I was horrified to learn that the web site had stolen the last two years' worth of my blog posts and was reproducing them in full. I did not authorize this reproduction of my content. (The site was also pulling in other content without permission.) After I notified the person to whom the web site is registered, he pulled down the page.

The same Twitter user said she received a late-night robocall on behalf of Libertarian candidate Gaylon Kent, and she thought that the robocall may have been associated with Libertas Institute Colorado.

I do not know if the robocall was associated with the same organization that stole my intellectual property, or if the robocaller is totally unrelated and merely used a similar-sounding name.

Gaylon Kent says he (http://www.thefreedomtrain.com/robocallspressrelease.htm) did not authorize the robocalls. See also the (http://www.9news.com/story/news/politics/2014/10/19/colorado-candidate-addresses-late-night-robocalls/17548503/) 9News story on the matter. I contacted 9News, and reporters there were not sure who originated the robocalls. I have not obtained or heard any audio recording of the robocalls. [See below.]

Obviously I had nothing to do with the robocalls; prior to this morning, I had never heard of Gaylon Kent or of Libertas Institute Colorado or any like-named group. (I probably saw Kent's name on my ballot, but I paid no attention to it.)

All in all, this has been a frustrating morning, first to have to deal with the theft of my intellectual property, and then to be associated with a dubious campaign effort (even if by accident) of which I had no knowledge.

October 20 Update: I just realized that (http://www.9news.com/story/news/politics/2014/10/19/colorado-candidate-addresses-late-night-robocalls/17548503/) 9News includes the audio of the call in question. It ends, "This message brought to you by the Libertas Institute."

Libertarians Nearly Cost Colorado Republicans the State Senate; Approval Voting Would Solve

November 11, 2014

In a year when Republicans made large gains throughout much of the nation, Colorado Democrats nearly maintained control of state government—thanks in part to Libertarians. As it was, Republicans squeaked by with a single-seat advantage in the state senate, while losing the state house and the governor's race.

The Libertarian almost certainly cost the Republicans a state senate seat from District 20, where Cheri Jahn beat Larry Queen by 33,303 to 32,922 votes—a difference of only 381 votes. Meanwhile, Libertarian Chris Heismann earned 4,968 votes. (I'm relying on "(http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/CO/53335/148826/Web01/en/summary.html) unofficial results" from the Colorado Secretary of State throughout.)

Of course, there's no reason to think that everyone who voted Libertarian would otherwise vote Republican, but in this case it's hard to believe that Jahn would have won except for the Libertarian on the ballot.

Meanwhile, in District 5, Democrat Kerry Donovan beat Republican Don Suppes by 27,044 to 25,981 votes, a difference of 1,063. The Libertarian earned 2,339 votes (so it's less clear the candidate cost the Republican).

In District 19, Libertarian Gregg Miller arguably nearly cost Republican Laura Woods her narrow victory; Miller earned 3,638 votes, while Woods won by only 689 votes. (However, Woods, a supporter of abortion bans and so-called "personhood" legislation, alienated many liberty-minded voters, (http://ariarmstrong.com/2014/10/why-i-cannot-vote-for-personhood-supporter-laura-woods/) including me.)

In District 24, Republican Beth Martinez-Humenik probably would have lost if a Libertarian had been in the race; she beat Democrat Judy Solano by only 876 votes.

Remarkably, Libertarians did not cost Republicans any state-wide races. Republican Cory Gardner won the U.S. Senate seat (although he got less than 50 percent of the vote), and Republican Bob Beauprez lost by substantially more votes than the Libertarian received. (Each U.S. House victor received over 50 percent of the vote.)

Claims that Libertarians cost Republicans races are nothing new; they crop up every two years. As another example, this year Libertarian Robert Sarvis (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/all-opinions-are-local/wp/2014/11/07/warner-owes-sarvis-a-big-thanks/) most likely cost Republican Ed Gillespie a U.S. Senate seat in Virginia. "Spoilers" are an inherent aspect of single-vote, winner-take-all elections with more than two candidates.

Is there any alternative? To date, Republicans have attempted, without much success, to persuade Libertarians to stay off the ballot. Then, after elections, Republicans berate Libertarians for "costing" them races. This inevitably leads to nasty exchanges between Republicans and Libertarians, with the end result that Libertarians become angrier than ever toward Republicans and resolve to keep running candidates. Some Libertarians even argue that their source of power and influence is their ability to cost Republicans some elections.

There is a better way, and it is approval voting. Approval voting simply allows voters to vote for more than one candidate. So, for example, someone could vote for both the Republican and the Libertarian (or the Democrat and the Libertarian, or whatever combination). Then the candidate with the most votes overall wins. (Total votes exceed total voters, because many voters cast more than one vote.) There are no rankings and no runoffs; it's a very simple voting system to understand and to implement.

With approval voting, it might still be the case that some Republicans lose by a smaller margin that the Libertarian's vote total. If so, Republicans could not complain that Libertarians "stole" an election, because voters had an opportunity to vote Republican as well, yet chose not to.

Another advantage to approval voting is that it would provide a better indicator for how much support the victor actually has. Currently, it is common for candidates to win with less than 50 percent of the vote. Under approval voting, winning with less than 50 percent would indicate widespread dissatisfaction with the victor.

Approval voting obviously would be good for Colorado Republicans. The GOP often faces Libertarian competition, whereas Democrats rarely face left-leaning minor candidates.

Approval voting also would be good for third parties, I think. Rather than regard Libertarians as dangerous competitors, Republicans would see an opportunity to woo Libertarian votes.

Approval voting likely would be bad for Colorado Democrats electorally, at least in the short run, but it's hard to see how Democrats can in good conscience oppose a voting system that is more democratic in important ways. If it's good that people are able to vote for one candidate, as Democrats incessantly claim, then is it not better if people are able to vote for more than one candidate in a race? And it remains possible that Democrats will face stiff competition from a third party—remember Ralph Nader in 2000.

My aim, of course, is not to maximize democracy (e.g., mob rule), but to maximize government's protection of individual rights. But I think approval voting likely would be, on net, both more democratic and (marginally) more supportive of rights-respecting government. Why not implement it?

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