Donald B. Hawthorne
Senator John McCain (R-AZ) prides himself on his “straight talk.” However, recent times have shown that his appreciation for his own free speech does not frequently apply to others’ right to free speech. First, he led the effort to curtail free speech via the euphemism called campaign finance reform. Second, George Will recently captured some…
Among the weighty phrases thrown around in our public discourse, few are as provocative or poorly understood as “social justice” and “inequality.” A perspective on social justice was previously offered here. With a H/T to Cafe Hayek, David Schmidtz’s article When Inequality Matters offers a philosophical perspective on the issue of inequality. (Note: His definition…
David Boaz, the Executive Vice President of the Cato Institute, recently wrote these words about why lobbyist reform initiatives will fail: When you spread food out on a picnic table, you can expect ants. When you put $3 trillion on the table, you can expect special interests, lobbyists and pork-barrel politicians. That’s the real lesson…
In an earlier posting, I introduced a book entitled The New New Left: How American Politics Works Today by Steven Malanga and a review of the book in the Claremont Review of Books. The core theme of the book was described by one reviewer as “American politics is not about [political] parties, it is about…
We frequently hear phrases like “the government should do something about that.” Do any of us really know what that phrase truly means? Moreover, do any of us really think the government is capable of doing something constructive about the numerous challenges across a society? (If so, why do most government programs fail to meet…
The encouraging school choice proposal by Cranston Mayor Steve Laffey, discussed here, and the absurd response by Senator Chafee has led me to repost below an expanded version of a November 18, 2005 posting on the moral imperative for school choice. Contrasting this week’s posting with an earlier posting on this issue – also by…
One of the most powerful long-term benefits of the Senate hearings for Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito was that the American people were reintroduced to the proper and limited role of the judiciary as envisioned by our Founders. In other words, conservatives were not simply seeking to confirm judges who will be activists –…
One of those periodic clean-up efforts at home led to the discovery of some random quotes which I had been collecting. Here they are: From a description of Carroll Quigley’s The Evolution of Civilizations in the Liberty Fund Catalog: The Evolution of Civilizations is a comprehensive and perceptive look at the factors behind the rise…
George Will has written an editorial entitled For the House GOP, A Belated Evolution in which he makes the following comments: …And now among House Republicans there are Darwinian stirrings, prompted by concerns about survival. In Washington, such concerns often are confused with and substitute for moral epiphanies… The national pastime is no longer baseball,…
Walter Williams, once again, cuts through all the political posturing about the rationale for lobbying reforms in his latest editorial: …Whatever actions Congress might take in the matter of lobbying are going to be just as disappointing in ending influence-peddling as their Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, known as the McCain-Feingold bill. Before we…