HANOI, Vietnam — When local police arrived in riot gear to evict the Vuon clan, family members were ready with homemade land mines and improvised shotguns. In a guerrilla-style ambush reminiscent of a Vietnam War battle, they wounded six officers.
But instead of drawing public condemnation, last month's rare violence by fish farmers trying to hold onto leased land in the northern port city of Hai Phong has made a national hero of family ringleader Doan Van Vuon and ripped op... (more)
We now live in extraordinarily dangerous times in America. A majority of primary voters support three out of the four remaining Republican candidates for President who believe that the U.S. government may commit acts of aggression and start wars against foreign peoples who were of no threat to us, and who want to use the power of government and police to impose various social views onto others. Only Ron Paul wants to legalize freedom in America, and wants to end our government's aggressions abro... (more)
Last year, we wrote about how the UK was following in the footsteps of the US's Homeland Security/ICE domain seizures. As we noted, the process there is even less rigorous than in the US -- often without a court being involved at all. Law enforcement just had to ask, and Nominet would take down the domain. Still, we hadn't heard about any specif... (more)
“To be governed is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be placed under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then,
Female passengers say they are being targeted by TSA screeners for sexual harassment, with one Texas woman being forced to pass through a naked body scanner three times so chuckling male TSA workers in a back room could get a good look at her “cute” figure.
The incident occurred at DFW International Airport earlier this month. Wife and mother Ellen Terrell was asked by a female TSA screener “Do you play tennis?” When Terrell asked why, the screener respond... (more)
OTTAWA—The government says anyone who opposes federal plans to make electronic surveillance easier for police and spies is siding with child pornographers.
It’s the first salvo in a battle that will resume Tuesday when the government reintroduces legislation that would expand online monitoring powers.
The issue pits the desire of intelligence and law-enforcement officials to have easier access to information about Internet users against the individual&rs... (more)
Announcing his budget plans for fiscal year 2013 in an address at Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale, Va., President Barack Obama characterized the current income tax rates--signed into law by President Bush a decade ago--as a form of government spending.
Essentially, the president said that the federal government "spends" when it does not raise taxes.
“Right now, we’re scheduled to spend more than $1 trillion more on what was intended to b... (more)
The U.S. has been “overmedicated” by public policy and should consider the government’s 1920’s response to recession, said James Grant, editor of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer.
Responding to a severe economic downturn from 1920 to 1921, the Federal Reserve increased interest rates and the national budget was balanced, moves that kept the painful recession short, New York-based Grant said. In contrast, he said U.S. policy makers are prolonging the pai... (more)
Advocates of government stimulus are running victory laps on recent developments that appear to vindicate their strategy. In particular, Paul Krugman compares the sluggish growth in Europe to the somewhat-less-sluggish growth in the US to prove that stimulus was more effective than austerity. Other economists are using government inflation measures to defend Fed Chairman Bernanke's easy-money policy. The only problem is, they're calling the race before the finish line is even in sight. ... (more)
RAEFORD — A preschooler at West Hoke Elementary School ate three chicken nuggets for lunch Jan. 30 because a state employee told her the lunch her mother packed was not nutritious.
The girl’s turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, potato chips, and apple juice did not meet U.S. Department of Agriculture guidelines, according to the interpretation of the agent who was inspecting all lunch boxes in her More at Four classroom that day.
Many have compared the coordinated propaganda campaign now being disseminated about The Iranian Threat to that which preceded the Iraq War, but there is one notable difference. Whereas the American media in 2002 followed the lead of the U.S. government in beating the war drums against Saddam, they now seem even more eager for war against Iran than the U.S. government itself, which actually appears somewhat reluctant. Consider this highly illustrative, one-minute report yesterday from th... (more)
Less than 24 hours after Baltimore police received a general order that they must allow citizens to record them in public, officers threatened to arrest a man for doing just that.
A female 54-year-old unarmed children's volunteer worker sitting in a parking lot was killed after cops were called because she was heard "arguing loudly."
The officer who responded killed the woman and concocted an elaborate tale of the woman closing her window on his arm, but a nearby witness said that didn't happen and he just shot her for closing her window against his orders.
Via WUSA9:
CULPEPER, Va. (WUSA) -- An eyewitness to a fatal p
I’m sorry to put it in such a crass way, but that is exactly what they are doing. Ever since the September 11th attacks, these power-grabbing scoundrels have been putting policies in place that were planned well before 9/11, searching us, trackin... (more)
President Barack Obama’s budget plan calls for taxing dividends received by high-income taxpayers as ordinary income, raising the top rate to 39.6 percent from 15 percent as part of a $1.4 trillion tax increase on top earners over the next decade.
The proposal, in the president’s fiscal 2013 budget released today, would reverse his previous policy that called for taxing dividends more lightly than wage income. The plan would treat dividends as ordinary income for marri... (more)
With trillions of dollars in debt, the U.S. government, like a runaway shopaholic, still manages to find ridiculous things to throw its dollar bills at. From pancakes to prostitutes, monkey poop to video games, here are the 25 craziest things the U.S. government spends money on.
Wherever intelligent people gather to discuss current trends in government, we wonder what it is about freedom that people don't like. Why do we let the police power of the state take over and inev... (more)
From Warren Buffet's newsletter:
Even in the U.S., the dollar has fallen a staggering 86% in value since 1965 when I took over management for Berkshire Hathaway.
It now takes $7 to buy what $1 did in 1965. Consequently, a tax free institution would have needed 4.3% interest annually from bonds over that period of time just to maintain itself. ... (more)
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