Won’t Back Down, a film about the struggles of a single mom and a dedicated teacher to take over their failing Pittsburgh school using a parent trigger law, was released last month (see here and here for more)—on the same day the New York City teachers union, the United Federation of Teachers, announced that...
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Economic and political reforms have had mixed results in the former Soviet republics following the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. One of the success stories is the Republic of Georgia. Elections held October 1 will replace the party responsible for that success, raising questions about Georgia’s future. Many of the former Soviet...
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In the 1990s, I read an interview with a rock star optimistic about the country’s direction. He thought President Clinton’s admission to having tried marijuana was a good sign. America was becoming more socially liberal. The new generation was in charge. And as one consequence, maybe the disastrous war on drugs would end. Not...
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I am leaving tomorrow to teach in a week-long economics program for college students in the Republic of Georgia. Georgia was one of the Soviet republics until the Soviet Union dissolved 21 years ago, and the country has made remarkable strides in the two decades since. After a slow start, Georgia instituted major economic...
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In the aftermath of 9/11, we found ourselves almost bereft of friends and allies, as so many we had thought were fellow-travelers—sharing our dedication to core principles of the sanctity of every individual’s right to life and liberty; the danger of the welfare/warfare state; and the primacy of securing and protecting economic and civil...
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In the last two weeks, we have seen the weakness of many left-liberals’ support for civil liberties. Last week, progressive bloggers, activists, and politicians piled on Chick-fil-A, whose president Dan Cathy has spoken critically of and supported groups that oppose gay marriage. For his stance on this issue, which is not all that different...
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The horrendous and calculated, July 20th shootings in Aurora, Colorado, are a great tragedy not just for the victims and their families but for everyone who can clearly see the utter evil of such acts and the helplessness we all feel as a result. However this massacre might have been far less likely for...
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Many readers will be aware that last week in a speech President Obama said “If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.” There have been many comments on this already — most of them I’ve seen have been negative — but I’m still going to add a...
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Recently my fellow blogger Robert Higgs put up a post on The Beacon with this title, and I am following up with a post of the same name, after my attendance at the annual meeting of the Association for Heterodox Economics (AHE) last week. The AHE is an organization of academic economists from throughout...
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I had a weird dream the other day. Immigration, which is in a downward spiral in the U.S., continues to fall dramatically. At a certain point the debate shifts to the desperate need to attract foreigners. Eventually, headlines such as “a million immigrant visas to be granted on a first come, first serve basis...
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