Mar 28, 2012

The inexorable march of creative destruction

In retreat, Sears set to unload stores — The Wall Street Journal, Feb. 24 Retreat need not mean surrender. Still … In 1886, a shipment of $25 watches from a Chicago jeweler was rejected by the addressee in Redwood Falls, Minnesota. The jeweler offered ...

Feb 23, 2012

Proposed monument misses why we like Ike

Two coming developments, one dismal and one excellent, pertain to America’s memory of a great man. One of several oversight panels soon will consider a proposed memorial to Dwight Eisenhower. The proposal is an exhibitionistic triumph of theory over function — more a monument ...

Feb 4, 2012

The political hygienists' assault on free speech

Dina Galassini does not seem to pose a threat to Arizona’s civic integrity. But the government of this desert community believes you cannot be too careful. And state law empowers local governments to be vigilant against the lurking danger that political speech might occur ...

Jan 28, 2012

Can Romney the turnaround artist do it again?

An Illinois lawyer who had a way with words once characterized a particular argument as weaker than soup made from the shadow of a pigeon that died of starvation. The argument for Mitt Romney benefiting from South Carolina’s voting is almost as weak as ...

Jan 25, 2012

A snapshot of freedom of expression in America

Shawn Nee, 35, works in television but hopes to publish a book of photographs. Shane Quentin, 31, repairs bicycles but enjoys photographing industrial scenes at night. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department probably wishes both would find other hobbies. Herewith a story of today’s ...

Jan 16, 2012

Government lags in redistributing happiness

Liberals have a rendezvous with regret. Their largest achievement is today’s redistributionist government. But such government is inherently regressive: It tends to distribute power and money to the strong, including itself. Government becomes big by having big ambitions for supplanting markets as society’s primary ...

Jan 7, 2012

Suddenly a fun candidate, but GOP is in trouble

The complaint that Iowa is not a typical American state is true but trivial because there is no such state. Can you name one whose political culture, closely considered, is more like than unlike any other state’s? Anyway, someplace has to go first, and ...

Nov 16, 2011

Who in America gets to judge political truth?

The Stolen Valor Act of 2005, a compound of political pandering and moral exhibitionism, was whooped through the Senate, aka the “world’s greatest deliberative body,” by unanimous consent; the House, joining the stampede, passed it by a voice vote. So Xavier Alvarez now hopes ...

Nov 9, 2011

This time, how about a debate of substance?

The GOP presidential candidates, their sinews stiffened and their blood summoned up, may rightly dread Wednesday’s version of what are inexplicably called debates. The candidates have some explaining to do, particularly regarding two subjects that deserve more searching examination than is possible in 60-second ...

Nov 5, 2011

Conformity enforced in the name of diversity

Illustrating an intellectual confusion common on campuses, Vanderbilt University says: To ensure “diversity of thought and opinion” we require certain student groups, including five religious ones, to conform to the university’s policy that forbids the groups from protecting their characteristics that contribute to diversity. ...

Nov 2, 2011

Mitt Romney, the pretzel candidate

The Republican presidential dynamic — various candidates rise and recede; Mitt Romney remains at about 25 percent support — is peculiar because conservatives correctly believe it is important to defeat Barack Obama but unimportant that Romney be president. This is not cognitive dissonance. President ...

Oct 29, 2011

No escaping the noise at Nanny State Airlines

You step onto an airport’s moving walkway, a flat metal conveyor belt that conveys travelers down an airport concourse, sparing them the indignity of burning a few calories by walking a bit. And soon a recorded voice says: “The moving sidewalk is coming to ...