Freeman, June 2011 Fear-Mongering and Servitude by James Bovard In his 1776 essay, “Thoughts on Government,” John Adams observed, “Fear is the foundation of most governments; but it is so sordid and brutal a passion, and renders men in whose breasts it predominates so stupid and miserable, that Americans will not be likely to approve […]
A decade ago, many Washington politicians and pundits pretended that torture was no peril to liberty. The Bush administration championed “enhanced interrogation” as a key to preserving public safety, and its apologists scoffed at anyone who objected to “getting tough” with suspected bad guys. When I gave a speech at the Foundation for Economic Education […]
At a time when the New York Times and many liberals are romanticizing communism, a refresher course on tyranny is in order. Here’s the story of my visit to communist Romania two years before a popular uprising overthrew the most oppressive government in Europe. An early version of this piece ran in the Freeman in 2010, thanks to one […]
Forty years ago, my first article in a national publication appeared in the Freeman. This was also the first piece of mine which paid something other than free copies of the periodical. Actually, the five cents a word pay rate was more than enough to cover a month’s rent. The Freeman, published by the Foundation […]
I heartily support Catalonia’s referendum on secession even though I was almost arrested the only time I visited Barcelona. I hit Spain as the next-to-last country in a 5000-mile hitchhiking jaunt in the summer of 1977. Within 10 minutes of getting dropped off south of the French border, I realized that my two years of Spanish […]
Will any police face charges for violence inflicted on Catalonian voters? If not, Spanish “rule of law” is a charade #CatalanReferendum — James Bovard (@JimBovard) October 2, 2017 Will the media downplay Spanish police's #CatalanReferendum attacks as merely a vast number of "extra-judicial beatings"? — James Bovard (@JimBovard) October 2, 2017 The Spanish government's aggression […]
Hugh Hefner, the founder of Playboy magazine, passed away yesterday at the age of 91. One of his best lines serves also as his epitaph: “Life is too short to be living somebody else’s dreams.” Hefner was one of the great hellraisers of modern America and had a huge impact for much of the second half of the 20th century. Playboy was a champion of freedom of speech and freedom of […]
Sean
I always thought the C couple in Romania were a ba
Mr Keebassa
After a string of Democrat mayors, "hope over
