The
Rational Argumentator
Issue CCI
July 26, 2009
CNBC Hates Saving:
Robert P. Murphy
July 26, 2009
Robert P. Murphy critiques a recent article from CNBC, titled, "Higher Savings Rate Is Great, But What About the Economy?" When the title itself is nonsense — why would high savings be great if they destroyed the economy? — you know the article will be chock full of entertaining assertions and faulty logic.
Mish Should Ditch His Deflation Fears:
Robert P. Murphy
July 26, 2009
We who are advocates of sound, free-market money need to get our story straight. Are we predicting hyperinflation or massive deflation? Personally, Robert Murphy is much more worried about the former problem. Using a recent article by Mish, Dr. Murphy hopes to show that no one has made a convincing case for falling prices.
Why on Earth is Healthcare "Different"?:
Bradley Doucet
July 26, 2009
The United States of America, a nation that was founded on principled individualism, seems poised to expand government intervention into the health care sector. A rowdy debate has been joined in newspapers across the country: one side condemns the failure of the free market to provide Americans with affordable care, while the other warns against Canadian-style waiting lists and doctor shortages.
History
When We Walked on the Moon:
Edward Hudgins
July 26, 2009
Dr. Edward Hudgins writes that the Moon landing highlights two views of humans and our place in the universe. As Ayn Rand noted at the time, Apollo represented the view that the human mind is our unique tool for survival and for flourishing, and that joy and happiness from our achievements, most dramatically represented by the Moon landing, are our proper goals.
The Jerusalem Quandary:
Alan Caruba
July 26, 2009
Alan Caruba has often wondered why it is such a tiny nation as
Politics
The Billings Murders:
Chuck Baldwin
July 26, 2009
By now, most Americans are familiar with the horrific murder of a
Firestorm in Spokane:
Tom DeWeese
July 26, 2009
Tom DeWeese gave a speech that caused a firestorm in Spokane as he detailed exactly how an organization called the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) is operating in more than 600 American communities (including Spokane). That group is guiding the local officials to impose Sustainable Development, the UN monster that transforms their community into a little soviet, with top-down control, robbing people of their private property, as it operates through non-elected boards and councils. As a result of Mr. DeWeese's presentation, concerned citizens of Spokane have begun speaking out against ICLEI's influence.
Forests of Concrete and Steel:
Paul Driessen
July 26, 2009
As the national and congressional debate over global warming and renewable energy heats up, there has been a proliferation of ads and pronouncements, extolling the supposed virtues of wind energy, as a substitute for coal, oil, and natural gas in generating the electricity that powers so much of America. Two vital realities have been ignored in these adulations. Actual experience with wind-based power systems has been expensive, job-killing, and disappointing. And the raw material needs of a wind-based energy system are leagues removed from assertions that the system would be eco-friendly and sustainable. Indeed, moving to wind power would result in our landscapes being blanketed with forests of concrete and steel. Paul Driessen's article this week delves into both of these realities.
Fed Independence or Fed Secrecy?:
Ron Paul
July 26, 2009
Claims are made that auditing the Fed would compromise its independence. However, by independence, Fed proponents really mean secrecy. The Fed clearly cherishes its vast power to create and spend trillions of dollars, diluting the value of every other dollar in circulation, making deals with other central banks, and bailing out cronies, all to the detriment of the taxpayer, and to the enrichment of themselves. Rep. Ron Paul is happy to challenge this type of “independence”.
Healthcare is a Good, Not a Right:
Ron Paul
July 26, 2009
Natural law states that people have rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. A good is something you work for and earn. It might be a need, like food, but more “goods” seem to be becoming “rights” in our culture, and this has troubling consequences. It might seem harmless enough to decide that people have a right to things like education, employment, housing, or healthcare. But if we look a little further into the consequences, Rep. Ron Paul shows that we can see that the workings of the community and economy are thrown wildly off balance when people accept those ideas.
"Hide not your talents. They for use were made. What's a sundial in the shade?"
~ Benjamin Franklin