Food Stamps and the Federal War on Self-Reliance James Bovard, November 12 2025 During the recent government shutdown, the temporary interruption of benefits to 42 million food stamp recipients was hyped as practically the greatest human rights violation of our time. A Nation magazine headline howled: “The United States Is Letting Its People Starve.” But […]
From the Future of Freedom Foundation – Obama’s Cynicism Racketeering by James Bovard Barack Obama captured the presidency in part because of his appeals to “hope and change.” But after more than six years in power, he is now spending far more time denouncing cynicism. As usual, the worst example of cynicism is citizens who […]
Scott Horton and I had a rowdy chat on the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta on his radio show. Everyone seems to have forgotten how King John tried to slaughter the barons after he promised to limit his power. Following is the nub of my comments in this interview: From the mid-1200s onwards, English kings were […]
I recall how my liberal friends assured me in 2008 that Obama would launch a brave new era in American politics. As Obama unleashes the bombs on Iraq and on Syria, we are back to the same pointless killing that defined the George W. Bush administration. I hope that more of the folks who courageously […]
From the FFF‘s April 2014 issue of the Future of Freedom – Foreign Aid Clobbers the Third World by James Bovard The U.S. government loves to preen about its generosity to the world’s downtrodden. However, a long series of presidents and their tools have scorned the evidence that their aid programs perennially clobber recipients. Nowhere is this […]
June 25, 2014 The Medals of Freedom vs. America’s Freedom by JAMES BOVARD For almost 50 years, politicians have used Medals of Freedom to reward their henchmen who started wars or subverted freedom. Prior to the 1960s, the U.S. government avoided the temptation to distribute nonmilitary awards by the bucket. However, in 1963, President […]
I had a lively chat yesterday with Mises Institute President Jeff Deist regarding Hayek, Mencken, Washington venality, the Great Books, that bastard Nixon, and some of my muckraking over the past decades. I was not aware that folks had considered me a unicorn – I’m more accustomed to being compared to weasels or guttersnipes. Their interview description refers […]
Tennessee Budd
You forgot the lie of 1861. Some Americans, seeing
