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Liberty and Power

  • Jul 1, 2004

    Make Stanley Cry!

    by Liberty and Power

    Gee whiz. Poor Stanley Kurtz, never pausing even for an instant in his campaign against All Things Gay, is having a very tough summer. The Senate will vote on the Federal Marriage Amendment in July, and Stanley wants everyone to contact their Senators and tell them To Fight For The Preservation of Civilization and Every Good Thing That Has Ever Existed Since the Beginning of Time.

    Actually, I shouldn't say everyone. Stanley only wants you to contact your Senators if

  • Jul 1, 2004

    Don't encourage them

    by Liberty and Power

    Jacob Levy explains why he is considering voting Dem this November. All of the reasons he gives for being dissatisfied with Bush are perfectly valid, but I don’t see why that implies voting for Kerry. Why not vote 3rd party, or just stay home that day? Bush’s shortcomings aren’t pluses for Kerry if Kerry himself is also objectionable, as Jacob notes he is. More to discuss here, but my teaching duties call…
  • Jul 1, 2004

    Indeed?

    by Liberty and Power

    It's not April 1, is it? No? OK then, you know that rhetorical scare tactic where you try to wake right-wingers up to the dangers of concentrating power in the executive branch by saying,"yes, I understand that you trust George W. Bush, but he won't be the last president to wield these powers. What if the next president is [pause for effect]... Hillary?" Well, I don't think that's gonna work anymore if Instapundit is any indication:

    HILLARY AS VP? I'm hearing that again, though

  • Jul 1, 2004

    Libertarian Hawk v. Dove

    by Liberty and Power

    Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Randy Barnett raises the issue of the relationship between libertarian principles and foreign policy, and more specifically the connection between libertarianism and war policy. (He also lavishes great praise on Liberty and Power’s intellectual caliber, which as guest blogger I can second without unseemliness!)

    Barnett notes that although most of the L&P bloggers are anti-war, other libertarians have been more hawkish without wa

  • Jul 1, 2004

    Waldo's Treasure

    by Liberty and Power

    How many times has this happened to you. You are stuck at a dinner party or faculty reception when the topic of conversation turns to the environment. Everyone in the discussion assumes basic agreement that we must do ANYTHING to save spotted owls or speckled minnows or whatever is on the cover of the Sierra Club magazine.

    You face a fundamental dilemma. Do you slither off to the bar in search of more booze to help you make it through the night and avoid this meeting of liberals or do y

  • Jul 1, 2004

    US-Saudi Chickens Coming Home to Roost

    by Liberty and Power

    As the winds of change batter the regimes of the Middle East, from Iraq to Iran—Saddam Hussein himself being arraigned today on charges for" crimes against humanity"—fundamental questions are being raised about the state of Arab culture and politics. Fareed Zakaria has written a thought-provoking article,"Islam, Democracy, and Constitut

  • Jun 30, 2004

    Upholding standards?

    by Liberty and Power

    This is my kind of prof! But seriously, for her to get fired over this based on student whining speaks very poorly of that college.
  • Jun 30, 2004

    The New Fascism, or Corporate Statism, American-Style

    by Liberty and Power

    Here's the most recent installment about a subject I have discussed many times before:

    Hundreds of U.S. military and government officials routinely leave their posts for jobs with private contractors who deal with the government, a process that has eroded the lines between government and the private sector, according to report released by a watchdog group on Tuesday.

    "There is a revolving door betwee

  • Jun 30, 2004

    "A Heartbeat Away"

    by Liberty and Power

    I don't have a problem with Dick Cheney telling Pat Leahy off on the Senate floor. Anything short of a Sumner-Brooks incident is preferable to the cloying bipartisanship that folks like David Broder advocate. And I think the phrasing with which the Washington Post chose to report it is odd:

    The exchange ended when Cheney offered some crass advice.

    "Fuck yourself," said the man who is a heartbeat from the
  • Jun 30, 2004

    Fascism or Broccoli?

    by Liberty and Power

    Hillary Clinton’s remark yesterday that “We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good” is already getting lots of attention in the blogosphere, but if I’m understanding this stuff correctly, that’s a reason why I should comment on it also. The comments thread at Yglesias is particularly instructive, as well as amusing. A couple of the commentators there observe that this is an
  • Jun 30, 2004

    Aw, Nothing to Worry About

    by Liberty and Power

    Well, I'm sure there's absolutely nothing to be concerned about here:

    The government needs to establish guidelines for canceling or rescheduling elections if terrorists strike the United States again, says the chief of a new federal voting commission.

    Such guidelines do not currently exist, said DeForest B. Soaries, head of the voting panel.

    Soaries, a Republican and for

  • Jun 29, 2004

    Bush v. the Supreme Court -- Game, Set and Match to the President

    by Liberty and Power

    Most people concerned to any serious degree with individual rights appear to think that the three Supreme Court anti-terrorism decisions announced this week represent a significant victory on behalf of civil liberties, and that they rein in the government in important ways.

    Now that I've read most of the three opinions, as well as much commentary about them, I think that view is wrong.

    I explain my reasons in some detail,

  • Jun 29, 2004

    Sovereignty is about sovereigns

    by Liberty and Power

    First of all, let me say that I’m happy to have been invited to guest-blog here. I am in august company. I’d been contemplating starting a blog, but between summer teaching and non-wired (gasp!) vacation plans, I decided to put that off until the new semester begins. But I’m delighted to try it out as a guest. (In case anyone’s curious, my first name is pronounced as if it were “Ian.”)

    On to an actual topic: Roderick Long writes (below)<

  • Jun 29, 2004

    Iraq: "Privatization," or "Crony Corporatism?"

    by Liberty and Power

    A excellent example of the squandered aid effort in Iraq which I discussed here yesterday can be found in today's New York Times op-ed column by Paul Krugman, "Who Lost Iraq?."

    While Paul Bremer screamed about the need for"Privatization," key positions went to relatives and cronies of the Bush administration with little or no expertise in the fields in question, and massive, often no-bid contracts went to those corpo