Representative Peter King, Chair of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, has scheduled hearings on Islamic extremism to begin March 10. There is no benefit to holding these hearings, which will in some ways be counterproductive. 1. Everybody already knows the world-wide problems caused by Islamic extremism. The hearings will not reveal anything...
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The Wall Street Journal reports that the State of Michigan will soon make practicing massage without a license a felony. In the age of Yelp, why the explosion of state licensure? After all, if a masseuse is no good, word will soon get around, and it’s difficult to comprehend, in any event, just how...
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As just another example that the Nanny State is alive and flourishing in San Francisco—the city that delights in calling itself a bastion of “freedom”—here are a few of the rules if you wish to hold your child’s birthday party in one of its public parks: Don’t bring Mylar balloons. Don’t attach non-Mylar balloons...
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Over at the New York Times Robb Mandelbaum notes how the Small Business Administration has caved to political pressures and once again made the definition of “small” business so broad as to include virtually every firm in the economy. This was a key theme of two books I wrote in 1996 and 2001, including...
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Continued from Part 1: Part 3 Moral Relativism and Utilitarianism Of central importance in Lewis’s discussion of natural law is his critique of the moral relativism of utilitarianism (“the end justifies the means”) as a theory of ethics and guide to behavior. Lewis claimed that the precepts of moral ethics cannot just be innovated...
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I recently ran a nationally-syndicated column “The Presidential Race Card.” Well, Jon Stewart shows that the race card isn’t working on its targets (guilty whites) like it used to “back in the day.” Check this out: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-august-5-2010/race-card-is-maxed-out

At least since 9/11, the Democrats have, if anything, been even worse than the Republicans in their push for a national ID. I recall the Bush administration, very early on, dismissing this totalitarian idea, although Bush soon enough signed the Real ID Act into law, with the support of hawkish and anti-immigration conservatives. But...
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Henry Louis Gates, Jr. has never deserved his reputation on the right as a simplistic race-baiter. His book, Colored People: A Memoir, is proof enough of this point. For this reason, and others, my sympathies were generally with Gates when he alleged abuse by the Cambridge Police Department. My main criticism of Gates was...
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I saw a huge new billboard in San Francisco the other day—part of the $350 million ad campaign supporting this year’s $14 billion Census—picturing an American Indian in full regalia against a black background, apparently in the process of worshiping the sky, with the stylized text “Tell your story.” If he’s wise, he might...
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After writing Race and Liberty in America: The Essential Reader (2009), I’ve bumped into a few articles that come to the same unorthodox conclusions about individuals I profile in my “race reader.” One such “unorthodox” column appeared in the Wall Street Journal on 25 November 2009. In “Not-So-Silent Cal Wrote with Eloquence,” Ryan Cole...
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