From Imperialism and Social Classes by Joseph Schumpeter, translated by Heinz Norden (Meridian Books, 1955) pp. 50-52 [T]he policy of the [Roman] Empire was directed only toward its preservation and therefore was not imperialist within our definition. True, there was almost continuous warfare, because the existing situation could be maintained
Why does it always have to be California? New York? Massachusetts? Why not New Hampshire ? New Hampshire: The Land of “Live Free or Die: Death is not the worst of evils.” The home of Daniel Webster, Horace Greeley, Mary Baker Eddy, Franklin Pierce, Robert Frost, Maxfield Parrish, Alan B. Shepard Jr, J.D. Salinger, Ken Burns, and Dean Kamen. Home
From conservative author Rod Dreher, of National Review and the Dallas Morning News, on a broadcast essay at NPR: “As President Bush marched the country to war with Iraq, even some voices on the Right warned that this was a fool’s errand. I dismissed them angrily. I thought them unpatriotic. “But almost four years later, I see that I was the
The Heritage Foundation offers one of those site polls designed to keep you tooling around, and this one I thought was interesting. Do liberals exaggerate threat to civil liberties from security measures like the Terrorist Surveillance Program? Yes. Security programs like the TSP protect the nation and keep civil liberties intact. No. The TSP and
AOL News is reporting an AP story with the telling opening sentence, “Thirty years after it began as just another quirky movement in Berkeley, Calif., the push to ban smoking in restaurants, bars and other public places has reached a national milestone.” Think about all the other quirky ideas being kicked around, ideas that seem innocuous now yet
In Washington, words such as “cost,” “tax,” “subsidy,” “spending,” and other fiscal terms have no fixed meaning. For example, it is considered costly to cut taxes, and a subsidy to provide a tax break. This morning, we read that Bush wants to provide a tax break to low income people who buy private coverage, while taxing people “for some workers
I noted recently how many libertarians ignore or disregard the federalist aspect of our Constitution—e.g., when they use the term “government” to mean state and federal government. Including both state and fed governments in the term “government” is a subtle way to put forward the centralist idea that the Fourteenth Amendment gives all kinds of
For years, domestic sugar producers have benefited from import quotas that limit competition from foreign suppliers of sugar. As with all protectionism beneficiaries, they roll out all manner of bogus arguments to defend it (aptly characterized by William Graham Sumner’s description that “A wants protection; that is, he wants B’s money. A talks
Reichsführer Perry is mad with power . How else can you explain his executive order mandating that Texas girls ages 11 and 12 receive the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine before entering the sixth grade starting in September 2008? The principled Libertarian view is that Perry’s order is an aggression on the bodies of these young girls. But, of
Representative democracy in actio n in RobespiBlaire’s Gulag UK. The Government is to press ahead with preparations for nationwide congestion charging despite the millionth signature on a petition opposing the idea. An experiment in internet democracy, in which people were invited to place petitions on the No 10 website and vote for them by
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.