On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee voted to continue with a target federal funds rate of 0.25 percent, and to continue with large-scale asset purchases. According to the committee’s press release: The Committee decided to keep the target range for the federal funds rate at 0 to 1/4 percent and expects it …

Policymakers know they hold immense power to regulate and punish firms that don’t play ball. Industry leaders know this too. So it’s likely both sides will indeed end up “playing ball.”  The Democrats in Congress want comprehensive regulation of social media which will ultimately allow regime regulators to decide what is and what is not …

Today, the political system really is in many ways what H.L. Mencken suggested when he described elections as a sort of “advance auction of stolen goods.” The only answer lies in reducing the number of stolen goods available. Original Article: “Why Corporate Lobbyists and Special Interest Groups Won’t Go Away” This Audio Mises Wire is …

Scotland still hasn’t given up on holding another independence referendum within the next several years. Although London opposes the measure, it is notable that the debate over Scottish secession is not over whether or not a secession vote is moral or legal. Rather, the question is over whether or not such a vote is prudent …

There is no place in a free society for a government that sues private citizens for defamation. But even between private parties, defamation suits are often used by the powerful to silence others. Original Article: “How Defamation Suits Are Used to Stifle Free Speech” This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon. Narrated …

Texas governor Greg Abbott yesterday announced that the State will build its own border wall and will jail anyone “who enters our state illegally and is found trespassing, engaged in vandalism, criminal mischief, or smuggling,”  Moreover, Abbott announced plans to pursue an interstate compact with Arizona for purposes of border control. This new move is just the …

The twentieth century was a century of secession. Since the end of the Second World War, the number of independent states in the world has nearly tripled as new states, through acts of secession, have come into existence. This was driven largely by the wave of decolonization that occurred following the Second World War.1 From …

Corporate America—from Facebook to Google to Major League Baseball—got rich by giving the consumers what they want. Now these big firms will use their riches to crush their ideological enemies. That’s life in a “mixed economy.”  Original Article: “How Facebook Turned its Market Success Into a Culture War on America” This Audio Mises Wire is …

The average American can be forgiven for assuming that he or she can freely criticize the government and government personnel without fear of being sued by the government for libel or slander. This is indeed true most of the time. But it doesn’t mean that government agents with hurt feelings won’t sometimes try suing private citizens …

Throughout much of human history, a political ruler was often considered to be only as good as his ability to distribute gifts, booty, and other material rewards to his most valuable and loyal servants. In the “barbarian” days of northern Europe, military men expected their kings to lead them to booty, and to distribute gifts …

It’s too late for American member states to assert real independence from the central government without facing an avalanche of legal, political, and even military opposition. Europeans would be wise to not put themselves in a similar position. Original Article: “Decentralization: Why the EU May Be Better Than the US” This Audio Mises Wire is …

In twenty-first-century America, millions of Americans—Christians and social conservatives especially—are finding that the nation’s most influential institutions appear to be implacably hostile toward them. These institutions include universities, public schools, the news media, and government bureaucracies. Moreover, corporate America has increasingly embraced a posture of hostility toward groups considered to be “right wing” or conservative. Recent examples …

Like any other piece of aggregate government data, cause-of-death data is used to justify new government interventions and policies. But there are good reasons to suspect there are many problems in compiling and auditing this data. Original Article: “Why Cause-of-Death Stats Aren’t as Reliable as the CDC Wants You to Think” This Audio Mises Wire …

Over the years, I’ve been pretty hard on the European Union. Both as an editor and a writer, I’ve published articles criticizing its central bank and its unelected, bureaucratic central government. Especially objectionable is the EU ruling class’s propensity for cynical politics built around threatening and intimidating voters and national governments who don’t conform to …

Historically, the overwhelming majority of Americans have ignored death certificates and the topic of how they are processed, produced, and compiled for purposes of government statistics. During 2020, however, death certificates rose to a level of unprecedented prominence in the United States. This was due to the fact that both state and federal government agencies …

Being a former academic myself, I have many unpleasant memories of endless debates over methodology. Among these topics is the question of how quantitative methods ought to be used in economics, and when it is appropriate (if ever) for use in discovering and refining economic laws and axioms. But academics aren’t the only ones who discuss …

Advocates for vaccine passports are a bit like abusive husbands. They say they want to be nice to you. But you keep screwing up and refusing to take your vaccines. So now you’re forcing them to keep you locked down forever.  Original Article: “Vaccine Passports Are Just a Way for the Regime to Expand Its …

In any given year during the past decade in the United States, more than 2.5 million Americans have died—from all causes. The number has grown in recent years, climbing from 2.59 million in 2013 to 2.85 million in 2019. This has been due partially to the US’s aging population, and also due to rising obesity levels and drug overdoses. In fact, since 2010, growth rates in total deaths has exceeded population growth in every year.
In 2020, preliminary numbers suggest a jump of more than 17 percent in all-cause total deaths, rising from 2.85 million in 2019 to 3.35 million in 2020.
The increase was not all due to covid. At least one-quarter to one-third appear to be from other causes. In some cases, more than half of “excess

The Treasury department has issued its spending and revenue report for April 2021, and it’s clear the US government is headed toward another record-breaking year for deficits. According to the report, the US federal government collected $439.2 billion in revenue during April 2021, which was a sizable improvement over April 2020 and over March 2021. …

In any given year during the past decade in the United States, more than 2.5 million Americans have died—from all causes. The number has grown in recent years, climbing from 2.59 million in 2013 to 2.85 million in 2019. This has been due partially to the US’s aging population, and also due to rising obesity …

Billionaire plutocrats at Apple, Google, Microsoft, Cisco, and other tech companies don’t spend all their time deciding whether or not to boycott your state or lecture you on the “correct” voting laws.  No, sometimes they have time to plot ways to rip off the taxpayers to the tune of more than 50 billion dollars. At …

The US has millions of idle workers. In a normal economy this would put a damper on demand. But in our money-printing economy, consumer demand is surging even as production falls behind. An employment bubble is the result.  Original Article: “How Trillions in Newly Printed Money Created a Labor Shortage​” This Audio Mises Wire is …

Now that the average American voter is barely paying attention—and that the US is facing an economic crisis and weak recovery—it has become politically expedient to move further toward wrapping up a couple more lost wars.  Original Article: “The United States Has Declared Defeat in Two More Wars​​” This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored …

The Pope Who Would Be King: The Exile of Pius IX and the Emergence of Modern Europeby David KertzerRandom House, 2018xxx + 474 pages
Historian David Kertzer made a name for himself with his 1997 book The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara. The book covers the until then rarely mentioned case of an Italian Jewish boy who was illicitly baptized by the housekeeper, and then kidnapped in 1858 by Papal State authorities on the grounds that Jews in the Papal States could not be permitted to raise a Christian child.
Because so few books or in-depth articles have been written on the topic in English, Kertzer now enjoys a position as perhaps the preeminent expert on the case. This is no small thing since a number of filmmakers—including Steven

Earlier this month, the conservative magazine known as The Spectator published an article with the absurd title “The Libertarian Case for Vaccine Passports.” The online version now bears the title “Vaccine Passports Are a Ticket to Freedom,” but the physical print version is perhaps more descriptive of what the author is trying to do.

The author, a former Conservative politician named Matthew Parris, apparently believes that the forever lockdowns are an inescapable feature of reality, and that the only way around them is for the regime to enact a vaccine passport scheme. For Parris, covid lockdowns are just a force of nature, like gravity. Now, if only we could find a way to get around these nature-imposed lockdowns!
By now the

[The Pope Who Would Be King: The Exile of Pius IX and the Emergence of Modern Europe by David Kertzer Random House, 2018 xxx + 474 pages] Historian David Kertzer made a name for himself with his 1997 book The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara. The book covers the until-then-rarely-mentioned case of an Italian Jewish boy …

The political climate that fostered panic and lockdowns a year ago is now changing. Legislatures are turning against governors and the public is no longer hysterical with fear. Politicians aren’t sure what to do.  Original Article: “Not Even Gretchen Whitmer Wants More of the CDC’s Lockdowns​” This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher …

Don’t expect Fauci and his supporters to give up on insisting that New York and Michigan are doing “the right thing” while Texas and Florida are embracing “human sacrifice” as a part of a “death cult.”  Original Article: “Texas Ended Lockdowns and Mask Mandates. Now Locked-Down States Are Where Covid Is Growing Most” This Audio …

If you’re tired of binge-watching Netflix, there are likely a few restaurants in your neighborhood who would love to hire you. A job might help relieve the boredom. On the other hand, why work when one can just be one of the more than 6 million former workers now collecting “pandemic unemployment insurance”? Those millions …

President Biden announced last week that he planned to remove all combat troops from Afghanistan by September, which he says will mark the end of what is now a twenty-year war in the central Asian country. A week earlier, the US and Iraq reaffirmed a deal to withdraw “any remaining combat forces” from Iraq, and to …