On February 9, the US Justice Department announced that US President Joe Biden, as in so many other areas, intends to serve Donald Trump’s second term when it comes to persecuting heroes guilty of exposing US war crimes and embarrassing American politicians.
Tag: history
Jim Powell: Greatest Emancipations, How the West Abolished Slavery (1h10m)
This episode features a lecture by historian Jim Powell from 2011. For thousands of years, slavery went unchallenged in principle. Then in a single century, slavery was abolished and more than seven million slaves were freed throughout the Western hemisphere. The scope and speed of this transformation make it one of the most amazing feats in modern history. Powell concisely illuminates the beginnings of the abolitionist movement, then proceeds through the processes, the battles, the final victory of emancipation, and the incredible impact of its aftermath. Ultimately, Powell argues, the more violence was involved in the emancipation process, the worse the outcomes were, making a provocative case for peaceful antislavery struggles.
Socialism Doesn’t Work
Last week, I reported on two myths about socialism. My new video covers three more.
Revolution is the Hell of It: Algerian Edition
In 1968, Abbie Hoffman famously wrote a book called Revolution for the Hell of It. In 1973, this negatively inspired David Friedman to write a chapter called “Revolution is the Hell of It.” Last month, I watched The Battle of Algiers, probably the most famous pro-terrorist (or at least anti-anti-terrorist) movie in history. If you don’t […]
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President* Biden
The most suspicious point in favor of there having been election funnybusiness (a safe euphemism?) on a large enough scale to change the outcome is how desperate those on the “winning” side are to sweep the idea under the rug. To make it an off-limits…
Big Tech’s Playing Monopoly; It’s Going to Lose
They see the handwriting on the wall. Regulation is coming whether they like it or not, but they’re big players with plenty of lobbying money. They expect to influence the coming regulation to their own advantage.
Robinhood: Stealing from the Poor to Give to the Rich
Robinhood’s terms of service specify that it “may, in its discretion, prohibit or restrict the trading of securities.” That clause may or may not sufficiently cover the company’s posterior in a legal sense. But in this application, it gives lie to the company’s name and supposed mission.
Political “Unity” is Neither Necessary Nor Desirable
“[T]o restore the soul and to secure the future of America,” President Joe Biden said in his inaugural speech, “requires more than words. It requires that most elusive of things in a democracy: Unity. … This is our historic moment of crisis and challenge, and unity is the path forward.” The bad news: Where politics is concerned, “unity” is a pipe dream.
Hey Joe, Where You Goin’ With That Pen in Your Hand?
On his first partial day as president, Joe Biden issued 17 “executive orders, memorandums and proclamations” — two more than America’s first five presidents issued over their 36 years in office.
Lysander Spooner: The Forgotten History of the Man Who Started the First Private Post Office
Lysander Spooner is an important – and not exactly obscure – figure in the history of the liberty movement. He’s an idiosyncratic figure from the 19th century with no small cheerleading section in the 21st century. A bit of a throwback to a very different time, Spooner was a champion of the labor movement and was even a member of the First International at a time when socialists and anarchists coexisted peacefully within that movement.