Radley Balko, now on the staff of the Washington Post, challenges his colleague Michael Gerson’s arguments in favor of the so-called “war on drugs.” Radley’s challenge is powerful, eloquent, and filled with facts as well as with perspectives too seldom taken. A slice:
But even if we accept the argument that legalization could lead to widespread use, significantly more addiction, and whatever itinerant harm comes with both, these arguments almost always fail to acknowledge the catastrophic harm inflicted by drug prohibition itself. If we’re truly concerned about policies that “degrade human nature,” “damage and undermine families,” and “deprive the nation of competent, self-governing citizens,” it seems like we should consider not only the effects of illicit drugs themselves, but also the effects of prohibiting them.
Here’s the opening paragraph from Richard Rahn’s latest column:
The administration and many in Congress seem to have learned nothing from the Obamacare disaster. Now that they have destroyed the world’s best health care system, they are in the process of further destroying what was at one time a very functional global financial system.
My old professor Randy Holcombe is lukewarm about David Stockman’s new book on cronyism.
Doug Bandow argues sensibly against Uncle Sam’s restrictions on the exporting of energy.
Reason’s Nick Gillespie anticipates tonight’s State of the Union address. (The last episode of this spectacle that I subjected myself to was Bill Clinton’s first such address, in 1993. It was so deeply insulting to anyone of intelligence and whose ethics oppose treating private property as public ‘property’ that I swore I would never again watch another episode of such political ‘vaudevillainism’. I intend to keep that pledge to myself for the rest of my days.)
Marty Mazorra sees what Paul Krugman does not. A slice from Marty’s essay:
The funny thing is, as I’ve stated here before, Krugman often makes legitimate points with regard to the pernicious concentration of power wielded by “organized money”, but his insistence that some solution lies in placing yet more power in the hands of the very individuals (politicians) who empower those power-wielders is the definition of ludicrous.
Krugman demonstrates time and again his unwillingness to look beneath the surface of his many assertions (I suspect he fears that what he’d find wouldn’t sit well with his fans).
