In Canada, Big Brother wants control of how citizens think and speak. Tragically, this Orwellian nightmare is becoming a reality. The government’s trilogy of censorship bills—Bill C-11 empowered the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to tell us what to watch, Bill C-18 extorted millions from big tech to help fund legacy media, and the recently introduced On-Line Harms Act Bill C-63 will impose authoritarian censorship laws the likes of which are found in places like Iran or China. Bill C-63, which recently passed its first reading in the House of Commons ..read more

Pay no attention to the balance sheet behind the curtain. In the wake of the recent Federal Open Market (FOMC) meeting, few people are talking about the Fed’s balance sheet. While the FOMC took no action on their interest-rate target, they enacted a significant change to their quantitative tightening policy. This change tells us that the Fed is quite happy with the new normal of providing massive liquidity to markets with very little accountability. Fed officials began its quantitative tightening in August 2022 to help bring inflation down, allowing maturing securities to “roll-off” the balanc ..read more

Last October, the Food and Drug Administration began surveying ground cinnamon products. By November, the agency identified elevated levels of lead and chromium in applesauce pouches across several producers. Suspecting the worst, the FDA mandated recalls and began investigating whether lead was intentionally added to these products.  By December 2023, the FDA amassed 65 reports of adverse effects linked to recalled products. In February 2024, it had received 400 reports of adverse effects. Between then and now, the FDA was able to trace the contamination to a single c ..read more

I’ll admit up front that one reason I’m writing this is that I am a disgruntled TSA customer. My tax dollars pay for the “service” I get from the TSA, and I’m not happy with the service. I don’t want to have to take off my shoes as a prerequisite for boarding an airliner. Travelers from European airports don’t have to and don’t seem more at risk because of it. I’ve been harassed by TSA employees that I’m sure fit the definition of sexual assault. Also, I’ve missed more than one flight because the TSA lines were backed up. (OK, I’ve missed a total of two, but that’s still too man ..read more

I ran across this article on CNN’s website and found it quite interesting. It appears that the appeal of Karl Marx among Latin Americans is waning and being displaced by the ideas of Ludwig von Mises. Perhaps twenty years ago (long enough ago that I can’t recall exactly when), I gave a series of lectures at five different universities in Guatemala. With one exception, those universities had a distinctly Marxist orientation. I recall speaking in lecture halls that featured pictures of Marx. I could tell by the questions students asked that their economics education was very ..read more

An article on CNN’s website says that Donald Trump’s criticism of the deep state is “a declaration of war on the federal government...” that will transform federal government employees into “an army of suck-ups.” It goes on to say, “Trump seeks to sweep away civil service protections that have been in place for more than 140 years. ... His plans would eliminate or dismantle entire departments.” The article relies on a 900-page “Project 2025 document,” even though it quotes a Trump spokesperson who says, “None of these groups or individuals speak for President Trump or his campaign... Poli ..read more

Who knew canceling student loans for millions of highly educated, well-to-do Americans could run up the federal government’s budget deficit by billions? The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget knows. The CRFB ran the numbers on how costly President Biden’s latest effort to zero out the student loan debt of millions of Americans will be. They came up with some very large numbers: The Biden Administration recently announced a new plan to cancel student debt for up to 30 million borrowers and released a preliminary rule this morning detailing parts of this plan. The proposal, wh ..read more

The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability recently hosted Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Robert Califf in a hearing to discuss the agency’s recent blemishes. The Committee’s website stated that “under the Biden Administration, the FDA has stumbled from crisis to crisis.” The amount of “stumbling”—even for a government agency—has been dumbfounding. To list a few examples: In 2022, the US underwent a crippling national shortage of infant formula. While store shelves remained empty, the FDA maintained its mandatory 90-day waiting period for form ..read more

The story of where the Oakland Athletics baseball team will play after they leave the Oakland Coliseum this season has taken some surprising turns. If you’ve been following that story, you already know that as the 2023 MLB season ended, there were real questions about where the team would play its next several seasons. Its deal to play at the city’s stadium had come to an end. Still, it will be years before it has a new stadium built in Las Vegas at the site of the old Tropicana Resort and Casino, which closed in early April 2024. The buildings on the landmar ..read more

This November, Floridians will vote on an amendment that would allow citizens over 21 years old to use and possess marijuana for recreational reasons. Early polls indicate bi-partisan support. However, whether the amendment builds enough support to reach the 60 percent approval threshold in the next seven months is anyone’s guess.  If passed, Florida would become the 25th state to legalize recreational marijuana. Even if it doesn’t, ten other states could legalize recreational marijuana use this year. Over the past twelve years, recreational marijuana legalization has rapidly expanded thr ..read more