Politicians left and right often use pet phrases to justify their positions: states rights, individual liberty, personal responsibility. Rarely are these consistently applied. Even more rarely do politicians or political parties offer a coherent framework for deciding when a higher level of government should preempt a lower level of government or when individual liberty trumps state … Read More
On Tuesday Democrats lost big when they ran a candidate but won big when they ran an issue. In 42 states about 150 initiatives were on the ballot. The vast majority did not address issues dividing the two parties (e.g. raising the mandatory retirement age for judges, salary increases for state legislators, bond issues supporting a … Read More
Scotland and Catalonia are brothers in arms. Independence movement leaders communicate regularly. On September 18, when Scotland voted on uncoupling from the United Kingdom Catalans were there. When Catalonia votes on independence, a vote originally scheduled for November 9th but delayed pending a court decision, Scots will certainly be in attendance. Scotland and Catalonia have much … Read More
Since 1945 the number of nations has soared from about 60 to more than 180. The first wave of new sovereign states came with the decolonization movement of the 1960s and 1970s; the second in the early 1990s with the break-up of the Soviet Union. Scotland’s independence movement is part of a third wave. Dozens of would-be … Read More
When two politicians debate the role of government, it is almost always Democrat vs. Republican. Which is why it was so refreshing and instructive to read of the debate taking place among Republicans in a small city in southeastern Kentucky. On July 19, after years of complaints about local gasoline prices being higher than those in … Read More
The United Kingdom privatized its national rail system in 1993. Some 20 years later the unsurprising consequences of transforming a public monopoly into a private monopoly are clear. Higher prices. Worse service. Even more public subsidies. Read the article.
In July the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) stirred up a hornets’ nest by announcing it might overturn state prohibitions on municipally owned broadband networks. Republicans protested that Washington should keep its grubby hands off state authority. Giant cable and phone companies contended that local governments are incapable of managing telecommunications networks and the resulting failure will … Read More
David Brancaccio is a solid reporter. Perhaps the cognitive dissonance of talking about public ownership on a program called Marketplace caused him to go astray. Nevertheless a few days ago he did his listeners a disservice when he commented on the city of Somerset, Kentucky’s new venture: Selling gasoline directly to city residents. Somerset’s entrepreneurialism got … Read More
