Sheldon Richman | The Libertarian Institute

TGIF: Evict the President

by Sheldon Richman | Aug 13, 2021 | Economics, Featured Articles, Justice, Libertarianism, Politics, Sheldon Richman, TGIF

President Biden has reversed himself under pressure from his progressive flank and has given the go-ahead for a new moratorium on renter evictions throughout most of the United States for individuals making up to $99,000 a year (couples, $198,000). The twist is that Biden acknowledges that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which reports to his secretary of health and human services, has no legal authority for the action. Most courts have agreed about the lack of authority, syndicated columnist Jacob Sullum reports, and Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh said in June...

TGIF: Why Wouldn’t Government Grow?

by Sheldon Richman | Aug 6, 2021 | Featured Articles, Justice, Libertarianism, Sheldon Richman, TGIF

One of the least mysterious things in life is why the government grows. The better question is why it ever shrinks. People who devote lots of time to thinking about the importance of individual liberty know that government is inimical to human flourishing. So they notice every sign of state growth. But most people rarely if ever focus on liberty or government per se because they understandably are busy with the usual cares and aspirations of life. Even if they occasionally sense that something ominous is afoot, they can do little about it. They might as well attend to things that are more...

TGIF: How Science Becomes Religion

by Sheldon Richman | Jul 30, 2021 | Sheldon Richman, TGIF

The popular slogan today is "Believe in science." It's often used as a weapon against people who reject not science in principle but rather one or another prominent scientific proposition, whether it be about the COVID-19 vaccine, climate change, nutrition (low-fat versus low-carb eating), to mention a few. My purpose here is not to defend or deny any particular scientific position but to question the model of science that the loudest self-declared believers in science seem to work from. Their model makes science seem almost identical to what they mean by, and attack as, religion. If that's...

No Mandatory Vaccination!

by Sheldon Richman | Jul 27, 2021 | Blog

George Mason University Professor Donald J. Boudreaux has written an article worthy of everyone's attention: "'Externality' Is No Good Excuse for Mandatory Vaccination." Some people think the case for mandatory vaccination is irrefutably made by simply saying that the unvaccinated person presents a risk to people other than himself. No so, Boudreaux responds. Here's a taste: Shouting “externality!” is not the trump card that many economists (and non-economists) naïvely suppose it to be. In a world in which not every human being lives an isolated existence – that is, in our world – each of us...

TGIF: Critical Race Theory and the Schools

by Sheldon Richman | Jul 23, 2021 | Economics, Featured Articles, Justice, Libertarianism, Sheldon Richman

The government's K-12 schools--aka "public schools--are once again a battleground on which a bitter dispute is playing out. Wait!--once again? The government's schools have been a battleground since their inception in the 19th century. Since that's where the children are, how could it have been otherwise? For an institution that was supposed to produce social unity, it's done the exact opposite. Today's battle is over Critical Race Theory (CRT), which in one form or another is being pushed by a lobby that has a stake in having us believe that all of American history, up to the present, can...

TGIF: Who’s the Aggressor? Who’s the Victim?

by Sheldon Richman | Jul 16, 2021 | Economics, Featured Articles, Justice, Libertarianism, Sheldon Richman, TGIF

When a libertarian says that the most basic individual right is the right not to be aggressed against, a clever interlocutor may accuse the libertarian of begging the question, of stuffing the rabbit into the hat. The trick, the critic will say, is in the word aggress: libertarians allegedly rig the game by restricting the category of aggression to only the actions they disapprove of, thereby institutionalizing many corrupt activities. For example, If Jones tells Smith to get off land to which Jones has legal title, is it really clear that Smith is in the wrong and Jones is in the right? The...

TGIF: Watch the Forest as Well as the Trees

by Sheldon Richman | Jul 9, 2021 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy, Sheldon Richman, TGIF

It's always important not to miss the forest for the trees. U.S. government announcements, such as its report of the turnover to the Afghan government of the seventh and last military base in Afghanistan, Bagram, should lead no one to think that U.S. foreign policy has changed worldwide or even in that particular region. Far from it. This is true even if virtually all U.S. troops, except for 600 military personnel, most of them left to guard the U.S. embassy, have left Afghanistan, as reported by Politico. (Who knows what the special operations forces will be up to?) White House spokesperson...

Appearance on the Noah Blaylock Show

by Sheldon Richman | Jul 3, 2021 | Blog

I was a guest on the Noah Blaylock Show for a discussion of education and the consequences of government control of schooling. Listen to the podcast here.

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TGIF: Evict the President

TGIF: How Science Becomes Religion

No Mandatory Vaccination!

TGIF: Critical Race Theory and the Schools

TGIF: Who’s the Aggressor? Who’s the Victim?

TGIF: Watch the Forest as Well as the Trees

Appearance on the Noah Blaylock Show

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