Free kibbles

COMMUNISM:

New mass grave discovered in Stalin-era Russia.

ECONOMY:

Investor advises Americans to buy land, barbed wire and guns. Prediction that silver is under-priced.

TAX AND SPEND:

Art Laffer warns that higher tax rates in 2011 may spark an economic collapse by incentivizing producers to maximize production this year then reduce it next year.

EDUCATION:

Fantastic graphs show that while our spending on government schools has rapidly increased since 1970, student performance remains virtually unchanged.

GLOBAL WARMING:

Senate fails to block EPA from classifying CO2 as a pollutant.

WAR ON DRUGS:

US drug warriors arrest 400 people associated with Mexican drug cartels in 14 states as part of a joint operation with somebody, presumably Mexico, that arrested 2,200 total. This raid is presented as a success, but that's ridiculous. We've been fighting the war on drugs for nearly a century. We've been fighting it in earnest since Nixon. Reagan stepped it up. Every president since has stepped it up. And here's what has happened as a result:

"A recent report by the US justice department suggested Mexican criminal groups had expanded their activities in the US with heroin production doubling in 2008.

In its National Drug Threat Assessment, the justice department said trade in marijuana, ecstasy and methamphetamine had also grown.

The report found that Mexican groups were active in every region of the US."

How insane or evil do you have to be to consider this a success? This is indisputable evidence that the drug cartels are winning over the drug warriors as easily as the New York Yankees over a little league team. Calling this raid a success is like calling a killing one roach a success even though 10,000 others have entered your home.

"More than 22,000 people have been killed in Mexico since Mr Calderon came to power, most of them in drug-related gun battles."

Not to mention, and the article doesn't mention, all the murders in the US and elsewhere in the world because of the war on drugs. Only an insane or evil person could justify this carnage.

"[Mexican President Calderon] said that he was confident his country would win its fight against drug gangs with US cooperation."

What a joke. That's like Saddam Hussein saying he was going to defeat the US military while tanks were driving down the streets of Baghdad. All this raid will do is reduce the supply of drugs causing the price to rise, further enriching and empowering the drug cartels so they can further invade and corrupt every country in the world - especially the US. The laws of economics are laws of nature like any other, and governments can't change them. But they sure kill a lot of people pretending they can.

WAR:

NATO troops discover that clearing Kandahar of militants is harder than expected.

In a sad reminder that government can't do anything right, the Army reports it has lost or mis-marked hundreds of remains and graves in Arlington cemetery. At least somebody got fired. That's almost unheard of in government. In the hour since I wrote this, the number of mistakes exploded from 200 to thousands. It's sad. It's sick. It's the nature of government.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION:

Illegal immigrants reportedly leaving Arizona before the new law takes effect. And Nazis made the trains run on time. Police state tactics work. No doubt about it. But this law is still a bad law. I have no problems with the state of Arizona enforcing illegal immigration laws; the problem is with the reasonable suspicion standard. In practice, in a courtroom, that standard is no standard at all. It means a cop can accost anybody for any reason, shake them down and get away with it by claiming he suspected the individual was in America illegally.

FOREIGN POLICY:

Hamas, which is waging war against Israel, will try to sue Israel. Israel isn't stupid like the US. That would work against the US, but not Israel.

It cracks me up that conservatives who realize the US government can't run a bingo game in America think it can run foreign countries. The disconnect is stunning.

POLITICS:

More examples of how all politicians lie without conscience. Some are just better at it than others.

Isn't funny, I mean sick, how the left doesn't care about Americans dying in war when a Democrat is in charge. This is the ultimate hypocrisy.

Chris Matthews is afraid tea partiers will enforce their view of the Constitution with guns. But apparently it's OK with him that the government enforces its view of the Constitution with guns. I'm sure he'd say we elect leaders to use the guns, but that's like a choosing between Don Corleon and Tony Soprano. Either one you choose, the government robs you and your life is under constant threat, but unlike the mafia, government makes it all legal.

LOCAL:

Only government could take a year to widen this major intersection.

MISC:

It looks like market discipline will win out despite all the regulations and government interference that reduces it as BP is in danger of going bankrupt. No other oil company will cut corners like BP did in a similar situation. Regulations can never make that happen. Only market discipline can.

The Road to Serfdom leaps to number one on Amazon. How come that never happened when I mentioned it?

What kind of parents allow their 16 year old daughter to sail around the world alone? I'm one of the strongest proponents of empowering teenagers. I think they should graduate at 16 or 14. Top students should have (real, not today's dumbed down...) college degrees by the time they're 18. Parents coddle and infantize their children way too much to their detriment and the detriment of everybody. But nobody should sail around the world by themselves. It's stupid, and it's especially stupid for a 16 year old. Parents should know better. Whoever keeps these child records should stop. They prompt teens to take risks they aren't prepared for, risks that not even the most experienced people in the world should take, and some of them are going to die for no good reason. I hope somebody finds this girl and takes her home.

In praise of the movie Brazil. This movie was hard to watch when it first came out. I think I'll rewatch it too.

A man who lost 100 lbs on a paleo-inspired diet. It's interesting to note that different people tune the diet to their own tastes and still enjoy the benefits.

The vital role of the speculator.

"The oft-quoted objection remains that the speculator causes food prices to rise. If his activity is carefully studied, however, it will be seen that the total effect is rather the stabilization of prices.

In times of plenty, when food prices are unusually low, the speculator buys. He takes some of the food off the market, thus causing prices to rise. In the lean years that follow, this stored food goes on the market, thus causing prices to fall."

The speculator also acts as the canary in the coal mine. For example, because demand for oil is growing faster than supply, speculators tend to bet that the price of oil will rise in the future. Therefore they buy oil now, driving up the price and prompting producers to produce more oil, bringing supply and demand back into equilibrium. As oil becomes more scarce, speculators will bid up the price prompting entrepreneurs to develop more cost efficient, alternative energy sources.

Ten benefits of expatriation. As government gets more oppressive, these benefits will grow.

"The biggest guaranteed return on your capital that you’ll ever have is investing your money free of taxes."

There's no doubt about that.

Aggressively enforcing government IP laws is killing the record industry. They're flying in the face of economic reality. Once a song is created, there are no additional costs. Distributing this work to every individual is free. Trying to artificially limit supply by charging for it is doomed to fail.

Claim that the threat from mercury in tuna is overblown. I thought this was the case.

Japanese spacecraft successfully deploys first solar sail.

In praise of Milton Friedman's series Free to Choose.