Think Tank West

“When some lawyer tells me ‘Evo, you’re making a judicial mistake; what you’re doing is illegal,’ well, I keep going even though it’s illegal. I then tell the lawyers: ‘If it’s illegal, go ahead and make it legal. That’s what you went to school for.’” – Evo Morales, president of Bolivia, candidly admitting to violating [...]

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Faithful readers of this blog may recall my three-part series (here, here, and here) about the hassle of re-registering a car in the wonderful Commonwealth of Virginia. As you can imagine, that was a libertarian-reaffirming experience. But just in case you were wondering whether the effect was wearing off and I was about to be [...]

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In the face of widespread public demand for changes in the U.S. health care system, both Barack Obama and John McCain have offered detailed proposals for reform. In the new study, ”A Fork in the Road: Obama, McCain, and Health Care,” Cato scholar Michael D. Tanner examines the candidates’ plans, and concludes that, while Senator McCain’s [...]

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Had you asked anyone knowledgeable in the area a year ago, they would have told you that Congress was going to make “E-Verify,” the federal government’s immigration background check system, mandatory for all employers by the end of 2008. Well, a headline in National Journal’s Congress Daily yesterday tells quite a different story (paylink): “Reauthorization [...]

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Advocates of limited government often joke (otherwise we would cry) that Republicans are the Stupid Party and Democrats are the Evil Party (this is why taxpayers should hide their wallets the moment there’s talk of “bipartisanship,” but I digress). One of the reasons that the GOP is the Stupid Party is that Republicans generally are [...]

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Frankly, I don’t expect the scholars, lawyers, and judges who have been steeping in traditional Fourth Amendment doctrine their entire careers to get the thesis of my recent American University Law Review article. But you can! And, eventually, if I do enough work, they will. Here are some highlights from the introduction to “Reforming Fourth [...]

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This weekend the FBI will celebrate its 100th anniversary. As you might expect, the Bureau is trumpeting its record, i.e., the FBI has protected America from gangsters, Nazis, Communists,  mobsters, terrorists, and so forth.  The image has always been super-competent, super-honest agents who hunt down the evil-doers. But what about the actual record of the FBI? Sen. [...]

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In a recent Cato@Liberty post that I’m particularly proud of (because it’s about TV! – “TV is Great“), I pointed out an example where a midwestern farming couple victimized by the recent flooding weren’t expecting help from the government. Said Barb Boyer: We’ve always lived our life that we’re responsible for our own choices, our [...]

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Chris Edwards rightly takes the Wall Street Journal to task for its breathless report that “the stumbling U.S. economy is forcing states to slash spending and cut jobs in order to close a projected $40 billion shortfall in the current fiscal year.” Like he says, smaller spending increases are “certainly no crisis after the orgy of budget [...]

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I’ve been nothing if not dogged about responding to DHS’ advocacy for REAL ID and E-Verify. I’ve had fun responding to post after DHS post on the “Leadership Journal” blog promoting E-Verify. But I let one recent post from DHS Assistant Secretary for Policy Stewart Baker go by. Enough people have pointed me to it [...]

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