Jim Bovard | The Libertarian Institute

Will TSA Steal Your Face?

by Jim Bovard | Dec 12, 2022 | Criminal Justice, Featured Articles

The Transportation Security Administration is running a pilot program in which travelers stand in photo kiosks that compare their face with a federal database of photos from passport applications, drivers’ licenses and other sources. TSA promises that its new airport regime, which could vastly expand next year, will respect Americans’ privacy. What could possibly go wrong? Aside from everything? Will Americans tolerate an out-of-control agency intruding ever further into their lives? The Washington Post warned in 2019 that airport facial recognition systems are “America’s biggest step yet to...

Joe Biden, Executor-In-Chief

by Jim Bovard | Dec 7, 2022 | Featured Articles

On July 4, President Biden declared, “Liberty is under assault…rights we assumed were protected are no longer.” Biden, however, was referring solely to a few Supreme Court decisions he deplored, not to the federal supremacy he championed for almost 50 years in the Senate and the White House. Though Biden took office preaching the need for “unity,” he increasingly rules like an elective dictator, relying on executive orders and dubious decrees. The Constitution is not permitted to impede the president from any action that might temporarily increase his approval ratings by one or two...

Will Joe Biden Make the Trains Run on Time?

by Jim Bovard | Nov 30, 2022 | Featured Articles

“I intend to be the most pro-union President leading the most pro-union administration in American history," President Joe Biden promised last year. But Uncle Joe has found his “inner Mussolini” and nothing is as important as the trains running on time. Biden is currently hammering Congress to enact legislation to effectively outlaw a strike next week by 100,000 railroad freight workers. Unions are threatening a work stoppage to compel railroad owners to provide more sick leave. Biden said yesterday, “I share workers’ concern about the inability to take leave to recover from illness or care...

College Graduates Are the New Favored Class of Democratic Largesse

by Jim Bovard | Nov 28, 2022 | Featured Articles

When Americans make lists of the persecuted, downtrodden groups in our society, college graduates rarely top the ranking. But President Joe Biden is offering one bribe after another to convert college graduates into perpetual dependents of the Democratic Party. Biden’s handouts helped prevent a "red wave" of Republican victories on Election Day and he appears hellbent on forcing taxpayers to pay any price to continue buying votes for his party. Federal subsidies for higher education have been one of the least recognized boondoggles of recent decades. Federal-backed loans for higher education...

Vote Buying Surges in Advance of Georgia Runoff

by Jim Bovard | Nov 23, 2022 | Featured Articles, Politics

President Joe Biden is tottering on the edge of his most inefficient vote-buying binge yet. As the runoff race for Georgia’s Senate seat enters its final weeks, the Biden administration may rubberstamp a nationwide handout to snare a handful of Peach State ballots. Georgia has been the scene of some of the most brazen political shenanigans and worst demagoguery in recent years. When Democratic candidate Raphael Warnock was in a runoff in January 2021 for the seat, his campaign distributed fliers promising, “Want a $2,000 Check? Vote Warnock.” Biden endorsed that promise, and Warnock’s...

Did Federal Censors Swing the 2020 Election?

by Jim Bovard | Nov 14, 2022 | Featured Articles, Politics

Did the Russiagate conspiracy entitle the federal government to censor Americans forever? Did federal shenanigans swing the 2020 election? A new report reveals how a new federal agency and federal grantees exploited a 2016 scam to launch the greatest covert censorship campaign in U.S. history. In 2016, top FBI officials and the Obama administration fueled a conspiracy that the Trump presidential campaign was colluding with the Russian government. Numerous false FBI claims spurred a massive wiretapping operation approved by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The allegations led to...

Political Cynicism Won on Tuesday

by Jim Bovard | Nov 10, 2022 | Featured Articles, Politics

Cynics had another great Election Day on Tuesday. Expectations of a vast red wave became little more than scattered sightings of Democratic road kill. President Joe Biden took a “no red wave” victory lap in a White House press conference Wednesday and promised to make no changes to his policies. It’s hard to improve on perfection — even though his party probably lost control of the House of Representatives and may lose the Senate. While some commentators hail the results as a reaffirmation of “constitutionalism,” almost all the politicians who trampled the Constitution got re-elected. Gov....

Biden Goes Begging for Saudi Barrels

by Jim Bovard | Nov 7, 2022 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy

Why don’t you talk about something that matters?” President Biden replied to a journalist asking about why he fist-bumped Saudi dictator Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) during his “begging for barrels” trip to the Middle East in July. Biden hoped the Saudis would rescue his presidency by pumping more oil in order to lower American gasoline prices and prevent the demolition of the Democratic Party in the mid-term elections. On the eve of Biden’s “begging for barrels” tour, federal data confirmed the wreckage of his economic policies. The inflation rate soared to 9.1%, much worse than forecast....