The
Rational Argumentator
Issue CLVI
May 21-24, 2008
Rain, Rain, Go Away:
Jeffrey Tucker
May 21, 2008
Jeffrey Tucker writes that what creates the problems experienced during droughts is public ownership of the means of production and the utterly irrational system under which the price doesn't change regardless of availability. There is no real profitability here. Nor are there losses. So there is no economic calculation going on. Prices are determined by extra-market indicators.
On Those Oil Profits:
Robert P. Murphy
May 21, 2008
Dr. Robert Murphy argues that if politicians are concerned about gas prices, they shouldn’t erect extra hurdles for those companies in the business of finding new supplies of oil. If the government really wants to do something, it can roll back restrictions on offshore and Alaskan drilling. Beyond that, it should just let market prices and the profit motive do their jobs.
What Causes Prosperity: The Estonian Example:
Emily Rose
May 24, 2008
Today’s Estonia is nearly unrecognizable from its days of communist rule. It is one of the most prosperous countries in Eastern Europe, and its prosperity is due to massive free-market reforms. Emily Rose describes the steps Estonia's government took to make that country's economy freer.
New Legislation in EU Member States Threatens Postal Liberalization and Jobs:
Molinari Economic Institute
May 24, 2008
All
types of postal items are set under EU impetus to be opened to competition not
later than
2011. Consumers – whether businesses or individuals – can legitimately expect
lower prices or higher-quality service.
However, a new study from the Institut économique Molinari shows that the
potential benefits to consumers and to employment from this liberalisation are
threatened by new social legislation such as the institution in December 2007 of
a legal minimum wage in Germany’s postal market.
***
Sarkozy's Insufficient Labor Market Reforms:
Valentin Petkantchin
May 24, 2008
Fiction
I was an In-Patient in a Major Teaching Hospital:
James d'Acier
May 24, 2008
This short story by James d'Acier, the first in a series of three, gives a fictionalized account of a man's experiences recovering from a successful surgery in a modern hospital and being told by a leftist university professor that a bucolic world of the past, in which the modern technology that cured him did not exist, was superior. This story is an excellent satire of mainstream academia's ignorance and misdirection regarding the American health care system.
Politics
What to Do When You Don't Like Any of These Candidates:
Tom DeWeese
May 21, 2008
Tom DeWeese suggests the institution of a legally binding "None of the above" option on all ballots for elections at all levels so that voters displeased with all available candidates can vote for none of them and, if no candidate manages to gain a majority of votes, the election must be done anew with new candidates.
Oppose Funding for and Seek Repeal of Real ID Act!:
American Policy Center
May 21, 2008
The American Policy Center urges you to add your voice to a growing movement to oppose implementation of the 2005 Real ID Act, which 22 states to date have refused to comply with. This act is a gargantuan intrusion on the liberty and privacy of every American; it needs to be stopped before it even becomes a practical reality.
Hollywood Rewrites History... Again:
Alan Caruba
May 24, 2008
Alan Caruba writes that despite Hollywood’s effort to convince Americans how much better off they would have been had Al Gore been elected in 2000, it would be useful to consider that he stands revealed as one of the greatest liars on the face of the Earth, thanks to his megalomania about global warming.
Our Military Need Real Support, Not Empty Rhetoric:
Chuck Baldwin
May 24, 2008
Dr. Chuck Baldwin writes that if our politicians in Washington, D.C., really wanted to "support our troops," they would follow the Constitution, stop meddling in the internal affairs of other countries, restore the benefits and medical care for our veterans, and never send another American soldier to bleed and die for the United Nations. Anything less than that is only political grandstanding and empty rhetoric.
"Here I encounter the most popular fallacy of our times. It is not considered sufficient that the law should be just; it must be philanthropic. Nor is it sufficient that the law should guarantee to every citizen the free and inoffensive use of his faculties for physical, intellectual, and moral self-improvement. Instead, it is demanded that the law should directly extend welfare, education, and morality throughout the nation."
~ Frederic Bastiat
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