The Cato Institute

LOL, Beware the Robespierres... even one of our greater founding patriots, Thomas Paine, almost lost his head during the french revolutions 'reign of terror'. Personally, I can think of a few Maximiliens that should be put to the guillotine... face-up... figuratively speaking... of course!

I have been to Russia about a dozen times since 2000. The most striking thing in Moscow these days is the proximity of glitz and glamour with pretty abject poverty. The no bars hold privatization effort there left a lot of people as losers and a very small group of massive winners. There is no doubt that life in Moscow and St Petersburg, Norilsk ... Read Moreand other centers has improved from the raw material boom of the past few years. Go further east or in the rural areas that are some distance away from these urban centers and life is pretty grim. Russia in my view has been slowly returning to its original structure of the czarist period where a tiny elite wielded immense power, supported by a small middle class in the more prosperous town, all propped up on a sea of poor peasantry (that would be mostly industrial workers these days). Beyond its regular elections, that country still misses basic democratic tenets, such as equal opportunity, and independent legal structure, and transparent rule of law. Today the belief that with enough money everything can be purchased has rendered Russians cynical. Putin has been unpredictable and has scared some of the oligarchs, yet, it is not so much a systematic crack down than a changing of the guard, towards his cronies mainly from the former KGB. So I am sure in a survey asking the Russians whether they live better now or back in the USSR, you would have mixed responses depending on where and whom you are asking. In many ways similar to here, except in reverse. While the American Mid West and rural areas in general are largely pro market and conservative, US urban centers tend to be more liberal and socially oriented. In contrast while the big urban centers of Russia are the promoters of free enterprise, much of rural Russia remembers the Kholkhoze, and large industrial kombinats, and the relatively sheltered lives these provided for the large number of employees working there.

The logical and philosophical error comes in when a government that is divided in terms of institutional function (i.e., legislative, executive, and judicial branches) is confused with a government that is divided in terms of party philosophy (the statist vs the free market). Our founders saw the value in the separation of powers when it came to ... Read Morethe branches of government. However, this does not imply a value in creating impediments to libertarian action should libertarians acquire the reins of more than one branch of government.

Divided government or not the problem still exists. The only difference between a divided government and a dictatorship is that the process takes longer to accomplish the same goal. Both systems disregard the individual and subject man to the the wills of the "public." The public being the mass of people jockeying for the power to pickup the ... Read Morepolitical club in order to force others to participate in programs, behave in a manner which is not beneficial to them, or to simply steal the fruits of their labor be it property, money, or other things. Although government is theoretically divided we can look back at our history and see that the Supreme Court changes faces depending upon the political context and a Presidents ideology. Just take a look at the court under the FDR administration. The legislative no longer represents us but groups that have the money to be heard. If they were about listening to us they would go back to what was laid out in the constitution thus we would have 10,000 representatives.The Executive has morphed overtime as well taking on oppressive war powers and dictating policy to ranking members of congress. I don't give cheers to divided government I would rather see it destroyed. No matter how minarchist your ideology may be the government still has the power to take and take until it has its way as has been shows under the ever evolving system of American government.

The so-called western intellectual establishment, especially in Western Europe, is driven by a believe that every human on the planet has the same right to property and prosperity. Lost in their desire to right the world... Read More’s wrongs, they forgot a basic human quality: individualism. Intellectual and humanist had for centuries tied up individual happiness to a collective profile. The ‘need of the many, out weights the need of the one’ is one of the premise the utilized to rationalize the collective good. Unfortunately for them and the system they are pushing (communist), this form of thinking crashes with the reality of our human nature. In that rest the failure of any collective political system.

I agree with you 100% Raul. Unfortunately too many people buy into collectivism believing it is the right thing to do for humanity. It is a death toll for freedom and individual rights.

soon a goverment commisar will be the only customer

Reminds me of a great New Yorker cartoon. Two businessmen sitting at a table. One to the other: "These new regulations will fundamentally change the way we get around them."

The problem wasn't the derivatives themselves. It was the fact that there was not an open market to accurately establish value and distribute risk. The absolute failure of the seller financed government sanctioned credit rating cartel to accurately evaluate risk exacerbated the problem. One of these derivatives could even provide a solution. I ... Read Morewould argue that a total open CDS market could easily replace the credit rating agencies to establish credit worthiness based upon distributed market information.

End the Fed-a masterpiece written by Ron Paul!FRB, 1913-2009: 96 years of monetary excesses that caused four big bubbles. "The case against the Fed"-Murray Rothbard, a prophetic book about the consequences of having a statist monopoly of printing (fiat) money

The Fed has to go but until our government quits (and Great Britain, France, and Germany) believing in the flawed economic theory (Keynesian) that government borrowing and deficit spending is the answer to any economic downturn, the Fed will enjoy the benefits of this excess. .

good article!

Profiting from secret info isn't bad, people do it all in time in intellectual property law. And, if a corp wants insider trading to be banned they could contract it in.