Stop-and-Frisk: How Government Creates Problems, Then Makes Them Worse
Two recent law-enforcement decisions illustrate yet again that when government sets out to solve a problem it created, things get much worse. ...
About: Sheldon Richman
Posts by Sheldon Richman
How to Help Fast-Food Workers
Doubling the minimum wage may seem like a good way to help fast-food workers, but it would hurt them instead. So what should we do? We must sweep away...
The Economics Lesson Obama Needs to Learn
President Obama is again turning his attention to the elusive economic recovery. His “pivot” will be for naught, however, as long as he continues to ignore two important points:...
Zimmerman Case Is No Grounds for Gun Control
From the beginning, people who would ban all private guns if they could have used the George Zimmerman case to push their agenda. ...
Big Brother, not Snowden and Greenwald, Is the Story
If the media spent half the time investigating Obama’s Big Brother operations that they spend sneering at Snowden and Greenwald, Americans might demand that the government stop spying on...
Motives Aside, the NSA Should Not Spy on Us
You need not suspect the motives of those responsible for NSA surveillance to detest what they are doing. In fact, we may have more to fear from spies acting...
Obama Speaks With Forked Tongue on Surveillance
The government’s response to Edward Snowden’s leaks about the National Security Agency’s secret monitoring of the Internet and collection of our telephone logs is a mass of contradictions. ...
Bangladeshi Workers Need Freed Markets
A passionate debate now rages over whether international safety standards should be enforced against manufacturers in the developing world and their Western retailers. Unfortunately, the debate is unnecessarily narrow....
Abolish the IRS — and the Income Tax With It
Nothing will have been learned from this scandal if all that happens is the firing of some IRS administrators and the issuance of new guidelines on 501(c)(4) applications. That...
Gun-Control Demagogy
Demagogues offend us because they try to bypass our rational faculty with appeals to gut emotion. That pretty well sums up what gun controllers have done since the Newtown...
The Absurdity of “Universal” Background Checks
Those who favor “universal” background checks on gun buyers make some ridiculous arguments. ...
Progressives Believe in Money Magic
It’s hard to believe that in the 21st century, educated people believe the government can produce real wealth by creating money. It’s especially ironic that the main preachers of...
How the News Media Betrayed Us on Iraq
The tenth anniversary of the start of America’s illegal and aggressive war against Iraq should not pass without recalling that the mainstream news media eagerly participated in the Bush...
The Disasters That U.S. Intervention Created
The enormity of the crime committed by the Bush administration, with the complicity of cheerleading politicians (Republican and Democrat), journalists, and foreign-policy “experts” cannot be adequately calculated — and...
The Dow Jones Is Lying
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is at a record high, and the unemployment rate has ticked down to 7.7 percent, but this is no time to celebrate. The...
Cutting Government Would Boost Economy
Budget sequestration is as modest a step toward cutting Leviathan as one can imagine. Further progress will be difficult as long as people believe that slashing the size of...
The Minimum Wage Harms the Most Vulnerable
Crocodile tears are flowing again for low-income people. In his State of the Union address, President Obama proposed raising the minimum wage from $7.25 to $9 an hour. A...
Hagel’s Retreat
Some observers are mystified by Chuck Hagel’s pathetic showing at his Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, but there should be no mystery about it. He performed as he did...
The Ominous U.S. Presence in Northwest Africa
Ominously but unsurprisingly, the U.S. military’s Africa Command wants to increase its footprint in northwest Africa. What began as low-profile assistance to France’s campaign to wrest control of northern...
Mali: Here We Go Again
In testimony before Senate and House committees, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton enthusiastically endorsed increased U.S. intervention in Africa. When government officials seem incapable of learning obvious lessons from...