Jacob Hornberger

The Fear Racket

by Jacob Hornberger | Apr 21, 2017 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy

Ever since the conversion of the U.S. government to a national security state after World War II, the coin of the realm has been crisis and fear. Seize on crises — and sometimes even instigate them — and then when fear strikes the hearts and minds of the citizenry, that’s when it’s time for the national security establishment, specifically the military, the CIA, and the NSA, to seize more power and more money, in the name, of course, of keeping people “safe.” None of this is new. It’s one of the biggest big-government rackets in history. And U.S. officials are not the only ones to employ it....

The National Security State Was One Big Mistake

by Jacob Hornberger | Apr 19, 2017 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy

The year 1989 brought an unexpected shock to the U.S. national-security establishment. The Soviet Union suddenly and unexpectedly tore down the Berlin Wall, withdrew Soviet troops from East Germany and Eastern Europe, dissolved the Warsaw Pact, dismantled the Soviet Empire, and unilaterally brought an end to the Cold War. The Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA never expected such a thing to happen. The Cold War was supposed to go on forever. The communists were supposedly hell-bent on worldwide conquest, with the conspiracy based in Moscow. For months and even years after the Berlin Wall came...

Trump’s New War for America

by Jacob Hornberger | Apr 9, 2017 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy

With President Trump’s undeclared attack on Syria, a sovereign and independent nation, he has confirmed, once and for all, that he is just another foreign interventionist, no different from his predecessors Barack Obama and George W. Bush. That means, of course, another four years of war, bombings, assassinations, shootings, terrorism, war on terrorism, travel restrictions, walls, surveillance, incarceration, POW camps, torture, out of control federal spending and debt, and everything else that comes with an imperialist and interventionist national security state. It’s important to point out...

The Lynching of Lynne Stewart (1939-2017)

by Jacob Hornberger | Mar 14, 2017 | Featured Articles, Justice

Convicted felon Lynne Stewart passed away on Tuesday. She was a noted criminal defense attorney in New York City who federal officials prosecuted, convicted, and punished for supporting terrorism. It was a bogus charge, one that perfectly reflects the extent to which the U.S. national-national security state has warped the mindsets, principles, and values of people within the federal government and also within the private sector, especially the mainstream press. Stewart was representing Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, the blind Egyptian cleric who was convicted in U.S. District Court in New York...

Donald Trump, Standard Conservative

by Jacob Hornberger | Mar 1, 2017 | Economics, Featured Articles, Foreign Policy, Libertarianism

In the second month of Donald Trump’s presidency, it is crystal clear that he is nothing more than a standard conservative, one with a unique personality but a standard conservative nonetheless. Consider the drug war. After decades of manifest failure, death, destructiveness, and loss of liberty among the American people, what does Trump want to do with the drug war? Why, he wants to ramp it up and wage it even more fiercely. What conservative doesn’t love that? He wants to beef up the military with even more money, notwithstanding two facts: (1) the military establishment already receives...

Debt Ceiling Déjà Vu

by Jacob Hornberger | Feb 27, 2017 | Economics, Featured Articles

Two days ago, President Trump sent out a tweet crowing that the national debt went down by $12 billion in the first month of his administration, as compared to the first month of the Obama regime, when it went up by $200 billion. If Trump really believes that he is responsible for that reduction in the amount of the national debt, we are in much bigger trouble than everyone thinks we are. But if he didn’t really believe it, why would he say it? The debt ceiling debate is upon us once again. The total amount of the federal government’s debt — currently $19.979 trillion and climbing by the...

Libertarianism and Immigration Enforcement

by Jacob Hornberger | Feb 23, 2017 | Featured Articles, Justice

For the past several years, there has been a running debate within the libertarian movement between libertarians who favor government immigration controls and those who favor open borders. As an advocate of open borders, I have never been able to figure out how those libertarians who favor government-controlled borders are able to reconcile their position with the libertarian non-aggression principle, which condemns the initiation of force against others and holds that people should be free to do whatever they want so long as their conduct is peaceful. I have also been unable to understand...

Four More Years of Bush-Obama, and Maybe Worse

by Jacob Hornberger | Jan 31, 2017 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy

The verdict is in. After 16 years of death and destruction in the Middle East and Afghanistan at the hands of the U.S. national-security establishment, America is now facing four more years of the same. How do we know this? Because President Trump has now clearly signaled that he intends to travel the Bush-Obama road. First of all, there is the Muslim ban on those seven countries with predominantly Muslim populations. Trump says that he is imposing the ban to keep Americans safe from terrorists who would do American harm if they were permitted to enter the United States. Second, there is a...