Dave is a professional coach and a volunteer advocate for international liberty and international animal welfare.


President Obama: Mercantilist

December 5, 2010

David Hume, in his 1752 essay, “Of Commerce,” wrote: “The greater part of mankind may be divided into two classes; that of shallow thinkers, who fall short of the truth; and that of abstruse thinkers, who go beyond it.” The December 4, 2010 “Remarks by the President at the Announcement of a U.S.-Korea Free Trade […]

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Climateers’ Command and Control

November 28, 2010

This responds to an opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal, “How to Change the Global Energy Conversation–Forcing countries to agree to emissions caps will never work, argue Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger. Instead, they say, the focus should be on technology innovations.” The authors recommend that governments use taxpayer money to “invest” in clean […]

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China: Embrace Economic Freedom, Reject Controls

November 24, 2010

Consider an article in today’s Wall Street Journal, “China Steps Up Efforts to Contain Growth.” It is consistent with much of the news concerning China, and its government’s efforts to control the economy. Those who praise China’s economy often fail to recognize that it would be much stronger with a free market. Leaving aside the […]

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Financial Diagnosis of State Retiree Health Insurance: Sick

October 14, 2010

We have been learning more about the problem of underfunded pension plans of state and local governments. Another problem now is getting attention—these governments’ unfunded health insurance for retirees. In a New York Post article summarizing a report by the Manhattan Institute’s Empire Center for New York State Policy, director E.J. McMahon notes, “Governments in [New York […]

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Labor Day 2010: Let’s Not Labor Under Misconceptions

September 6, 2010

Labor Day may serve a useful function as a holiday that commemorates the symbolic end of summer. In view of the myths associated with Labor Day, though, could we rename it? How about just End of Summer Day? Myth: Labor Day Celebrates Labor Consider this from the U.S. Department of Labor website: “Labor Day … […]

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Fed Up With the Fed

August 24, 2010

The August 23, 2010 edition of the Wall Street Journal story, “Fed Split on Move to Bolster Sluggish Economy,” reports on the August 10, 2010 meeting of top officials of the Federal Reserve System. The article advises, “After steering the economy away from another Great Depression, Mr. Bernanke confronts a painfully slow rebound.” Correction: The […]

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Latin America Should End Its Drug War

August 4, 2010

The AP reported today, “President Felipe Calderon [of Mexico] said he would consider a debate on legalizing drugs Tuesday as his government announced that more than 28,000 people have been killed in drug violence since he launched a crackdown against cartels in 2006.” As noted by Juan Carlos Hidalgo of the Cato Institute, in a […]

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Financial Reform Bill: Don’t Bank on Government Regulation

July 25, 2010

President Obama this week signed the financial regulation bill. Our faith in government to make things worse has yet again been vindicated. Government tends to create problems, and then respond by developing new rules that cause even more harm. In this case, government created a housing bubble, and then reacted to the crash by bailing […]

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Scientific Progress Amidst Economic Myth

July 19, 2010

The Wall Street Journal’s July 16, 2010 edition has a review by Jamie Hamilton, “The Lessons of Living Things–How the processes of biology are guiding computer design and purpose,” of the intriguing new book, Natural Computing: DNA, Quantum Bits, and the Future of Smart Machines, by Dennis Shasha and Cathy Lazere: [The authors profile] scientists who are pushing […]

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Afghanistan: Michael Steele Was Right

July 2, 2010

Often, the truth and importance of a statement is proportional to the uproar over its utterance. We saw this recently when Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) apologized to BP for the White House “shakedown.” Republican leaders immediately forced Rep. Barton to apologize. (“BP Chief on Hot Seat,” WSJ.com, June 18, 2010.) The Republican leadership apparently thought […]

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