Bush’s Pro-Democracy Strategy Is Pro-Terrorism
December 29, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
Washington, D.C. – The acts of war by Hamas against Israel are precisely what people should expect from Bush’s so-called democracy strategy in the Middle East.
The administration campaigned for elections in the strongholds of various Islamist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, groups that it should have worked to destroy. In the Palestinian territories, Bush insisted that Hamas be allowed to participate in the 2006 elections–and the jihadist group won a landslide. Thanks to that political victory, Hamas gained an unearned legitimacy for its vicious war to exterminate Israelis and Westerners. Winning power with the aid of their enemy confirmed for these Islamists that the West will abet its own destroyers.
America’s self-defense entails crushing Islamic totalitarianism–not ushering its jihadists into political office and galvanizing them to redouble their war against us.
Open the Borders, End the Housing Glut
December 11, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
Washington, D.C. – As the housing glut continues to send home prices spiraling downward, leaving millions of homeowners unable to unload houses they can’t afford, Washington is debating ways to address the oversupply of housing.
“This crisis was caused by government intervention into the economy, yet every proposal to fix the housing market involves more power for Washington,” said Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights. “Instead of more government distortion of markets, we should be looking for ways to get the government off our backs. That will require us to think outside the box, so here’s one–admittedly radical–suggestion to get us started: free up immigration.
“At a time when Americans are suffering from an oversupply of housing, it is tragic that the government continues to forcibly prevent millions of peaceful people around the globe from bringing their wealth, talent, and ambition to this country.
“Imagine if the number of annual immigrants increased from around 650,000 a year to, say, five million. Virtually overnight we would see money pour into the American real estate market, as millions of new businessmen and workers bought and rented homes. Not only would this eliminate the oversupply of houses, we would enjoy the broader, long-term economic benefits of welcoming legions of highly skilled and motivated individuals into the American economy.”
The Left and the Right vs. Free Speech
November 21, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
Washington, D.C.–Calling for a return of the Fairness Doctrine, Senator Chuck Schumer noted that some of the same people who oppose such “equal time” mandates support restrictions on broadcasting they deem offensive. According to Don Watkins, a writer for the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights, “Schumer’s comments highlight an ominous fact: that both the left and the right are opponents of free speech.
“Conservatives have long supported the FCC’s war on so-called indecency, arguing that broadcasters should not have the right to engage in ‘offensive’ speech. The liberals, meanwhile, have been eagerly trying to resurrect the so-called Fairness Doctrine, which would allow the government to dictate which ideas deserve how much airtime, and lead many radio stations to avoid discussing controversial issues altogether.
“In fact, this is a disagreement without a difference: both sides endorse the principle that the government should be dictating what Americans can and can’t say–they just want to use the censor’s pen to support their own political agendas.
“Whoever values free speech should oppose government regulation of the airwaves. Freedom of speech is the freedom of every American to say whatever he wants, regardless of how offensive others find it, through any medium he can rightfully access. There seem to be no such defenders among liberals or conservatives–and that is truly offensive.”
Nationalization Is Theft
November 7, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
Venezuela, Russia, and other countries that nationalize natural resources are violating private property rights.
For years, the Canadian operator of a huge Venezuelan gold project known as Las Cristinas has been seeking an environmental permit to start digging. Well, Crystallex International Corporation can stop waiting–the mine is being nationalized as part of dictator Hugo Chavez’s long-running program of socialist takeovers. “This mine will be seized and managed by a state administration” with help from the Russians, said Mining Minister Rodolfo Sanz.
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No Copyright Exceptions
October 31, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
By Thomas A. Bowden (New York Times, October 28, 2008)
Re “Copyright and Politics Don’t Mix” (column, Oct. 21):
Lawrence Lessig’s proposal for copyright reform commits the same error as the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. Both take for granted that lawmakers should be carving up speech into political, commercial, artistic, and other categories, and then offering different legal protection according to how society values the output.
But speech is speech, and the individual speaks by right, not permission. Just as political speech deserves full First Amendment protection, it deserves full copyright protection as well. Media outlets that profit from disseminating political statements should have ready access to procedures for enforcing their property rights against YouTube or other infringers. That’s not censorship; that’s justice.
Government Found Guilty of Assaulting the Economy
October 16, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
By David Holcberg (International Herald Tribune, October 11, 2008)
You don’t have to be a professional detective to realize who the main culprit is in today’s financial crisis. The government’s fingerprints are all over the crime scene.
The government had the motive (the widely lauded goal of promoting “affordable housing”); it had the means (the Fed’s control of interest rates and the money supply, Fannie and Freddie, the federal Community Reinvestment Act, the “too big to fail” bailout policy); and it had the opportunity (courtesy of voters who think the government should have the power to regulate and interfere with the free market and manage our entire economy).
Of course, the government can’t be arrested or put in jail, no matter how damning the evidence against it. But we should not shy away from pronouncing the “Guilty” verdict.
Totalitarian Islam and the Threat to Free Speech
October 14, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
Totalitarian Islam and the Threat to Free Speech
A panel discussion at American University
What: A panel discussion on the nature of totalitarian Islam and its threat to free speech, followed by a Q&A
Who: Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute; Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum; and Flemming Rose, cultural editor of the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten
Where: Ward One, Auditorium One, American University, Washington, D.C.
When: Thursday, October 23, 2008, at 6 pm
Admission is FREE and open to the public.
Description: What is the nature of totalitarian Islam–is it limited to terrorism or is it a broader movement? Are non-Muslims its only victims? Who precisely is the enemy? Does the West bear responsibility for creating this movement? What policies can defeat it?
Defenders of Islam around the world have striven to silence critics with threats, protests and acts of violence. How should the West respond to demands for censorship, as in the Danish cartoon controversy?
Panelists will address these critical issues in a lively discussion.
Bios:
Dr. Yaron Brook is executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute and a recognized Middle East expert who has written and lectured on a variety of Middle East issues. Dr. Brook has discussed the Israeli-Arab conflict and the war on Islamic totalitarianism on hundreds of radio and TV programs, including FOX News, CNN, and a C-SPAN panel of experts on terrorism.
Daniel Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum. Abroad, he appears weekly in Israel’s Jerusalem Post, Italy’s l’Opinione, Spain’s La Razón and monthly in Canada’s Globe and Mail. His Web site, DanielPipes.org, is one of the most accessed Internet sources of specialized information on the Middle East and Islam. Mr. Pipes has appeared on ABC World News, CBS Reports, Crossfire, Good Morning America, NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Nightline, The O’Reilly Factor, The Today Show, the BBC and Al-Jazeera.
Flemming Rose is a Danish journalist, author and the cultural editor at the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. In September 2005 Mr. Rose commissioned a series of cartoons depicting Prophet Muhammad. He was concerned about the tendency toward self-censorship in Europe and some Muslims’ insistence on special treatment of their religious sensitivities in the public domain, which he wanted to bring forward for debate. The backlash from Muslims around the world caused an international crisis and the Danish government experienced its worst foreign policy crisis since the Nazi occupation during WWII.
For more information: e-mail media@aynrand.org
Please note: The above event is organized, hosted and sponsored by an individual campus club. Although ARI provides financial support, educational materials and speakers for eligible student clubs, campus clubs are organizations independent of ARI. ARI does not necessarily endorse the content of the lectures and sessions offered.
The Looming Crisis over Free Speech
September 29, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
What: A lecture examining the escalating censorship in America and explaining what is needed to protect our freedom of speech
Who: Eric Daniels, research assistant professor at Clemson University’s Institute for the Study of Capitalism
Where: 101 Morgan Hall, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720
When: Monday, October 6, 2008, 7 pm
Description: In this lecture, Dr. Daniels examines the state of free speech in America and finds that it is under serious threat. From campus speech codes to anti-discrimination and harassment law, from campaign finance to commercial speech, Americans today enjoy less and less freedom in communicating their ideas. Today’s colleges and universities have become a hotbed of censorship, producing generations of Americans who have accepted suppression of speech as the norm. Daniels argues that the emerging crisis is a result of the lack of a proper understanding of individual rights, especially property rights. Only by understanding the proper basis of rights can we act to secure our freedom of speech and to protect the rights that give rise to it.
Bio: Dr. Eric Daniels is a research assistant professor at Clemson University’s Institute for the Study of Capitalism. He has lectured internationally on American history, particularly on American intellectual history, business history and political history. He taught for five years at Duke University’s Program on Values and Ethics in the Marketplace, where he was nominated for a university-wide teaching award. Dr. Daniels was a contributor to the recently published Oxford Companion to United States History, and wrote a chapter in The Abolition of Antitrust. He has appeared on C-SPAN and Voice of America Radio.
For more information on this lecture, please e-mail media@aynrand.org.
Big Business: Home of Individualism
September 24, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
By Yaron Brook and Alex Epstein (Ariadne Capital Journal, September 23, 2008)
Through much of the 20th century, the world was bombarded with the collectivist idea that the individual is insignificant, and that human progress is the achievement of society as a whole. In The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, novelist-philosopher Ayn Rand powerfully illustrated that progress is in fact the product of the individual through the use of his independent reasoning mind.
Abolishing the Housing Welfare-regulatory Apparatus
September 22, 2008 by Administrator · Leave a Comment
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Abolishing the Housing Welfare-regulatory Apparatus
By Alex Epstein (Wall Street Journal, September 16, 2008)
Bert Ely is right that the Fannie-Freddie implosion “must spark fundamental rethinking about how best to finance American home mortgages.” But while his proposals, such as “covered bonds,” may have some merit, he misses the fundamental point.
Decisions about how best to finance mortgages should not be made by politicians or by editorial page columnists — they should be made by individuals in a truly free mortgage market, where lenders are free to lend as they choose and reap the full consequences of their decisions. The problem with the current system is not that borrowers and lenders have been unaware of more sensible financing options, but that implicit bailout guarantees have made reckless, shortsighted lending options more appealing. Abolishing the housing welfare-regulatory apparatus is the only “fundamental reform” that will do.
