Barron’s, August 20, 2016 Farmers Should Farm for a Living by James Bovard And politicians should stop dishing out the pork. The U.S. Department of Agriculture forecasts that spending for federal farm-commodity programs will increase eightfold from 2015 to 2017. Since the 1930s, Congress has rarely missed a chance to shower rural America with more […]
Tag Archives | Subsidies
How Dependency Destroys Democracy – Mises Institute
From the new issue of the Mises Institute The Austrian newsletter Jan. 2016- How Government Buys Your Support by James Bovard In Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. military officers routinely handed bundles of cash to local residents to buy influence and undermine resistance to the American occupation. Such payments came in especially handy after US troops […]
Washingtonian Tags my WSJ Silent Shakespeare Piece as “Defining” D.C. in 2015
Along with Donald Trump, Gov. Chris Christie, the Washington Redskins (with a name that liberals now hate), and reviled pro-Confederate flag protestors, Washingtonian magazine credits me with one of the “17 Moments of Local Outrage That Defined 2015.” Here’s an outtake from the Washingtonian article: July 14: Wall Street Journal vs. Wordless Shakespeare Synetic Theater wins bushels of awards […]
USA TODAY: Budget Bill Leaves No Boondoggle Behind
USA TODAY, December 17, 2015 BUDGET BILL LEAVES NO BOONDOGGLE BEHIND by James Bovard Republican congressional leaders are like a football coach who believes the secret to winning is to punt early and often. House Speaker Paul Ryan and others are claiming victory over the 2,000-plus page appropriations bill, but this is a “no boondoggle left […]
USA TODAY: Abolish the Sugar Program
USA TODAY, August 12, 2015 Rubio’s sweet but wasted bravery by James Bovard Fighting to kill jobs won’t win election America would be more prosperous if not a single sugar beet or sugar cane were grown anywhere in the United States because bankrolling sugar production in Florida makes as little sense as growing bananas in […]
FFF: Know-Nothing Democracy on Capitol Hill
Future of Freedom, March 2015 (posted 5/22/15) Know-Nothing Democracy on Capitol Hill by James Bovard “You can lead a man to Congress but you can’t make him think,” quipped Milton Berle in 1950. Last December’s congressional approval of the 1,603-page, $1.1 trillion omnibus bill (known as “Cromnibus,” because it was also a Continuing Resolution) also […]
FFF: ObamaCare Racketeering & Intellectual Knavery
From the Future of Freedom Foundation’s February 2015 magazine – ObamaCare Racketeering and Intellectual Knavery by James Bovard Paternalism is a desperate gamble that lying politicians will honestly care for those who fall under their power. This axiom has been made stark with the controversy arising from a video of Jonathan Gruber, one of the […]