Comments for Trying Liberty

Comment on 10 Reasons Not to Abolish Slavery by Bloom

Bloom — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 17:57:19 +0000

the exact some thing is on http://mises.org/daily/5076

Comment on “Poor governance creates poor policy. That’s what we have.” by James kaviti

James kaviti — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 10:42:34 +0000

Selfishness, corruption, & tribalism are the major cause of economic retardation

Comment on Why I Hate Politics by kaluzer

kaluzer — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 18:10:01 +0000

While campaigning in North Carolina, other electioneers standing next to me were passing out flyers for “The Black Ballot” as individuals were entering the polls. Also, I overheard some people looking at my candidate’s flyer say: “Oooo. He looks like a handsome respectable young man. I’ll vote for him.” I cringed every time I heard this.

Apparently, politics is not founded on a philosophical or an ideological basis. Rather, decisions for voting are largely based on qualities not at all pertaining to policy ideologies.

Comment on Treed? by sjcammenga

sjcammenga — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 14:24:06 +0000

This is craziness… thank you for sharing the details!

Comment on Treed? by Richard Dieterle

Richard Dieterle — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 18:22:41 +0000

Terrific review of the Tree Ordinance ! This governmental overreach is frightening ! The people who concoct hyper-compulsive ordinances such as this have too much time on their hands. Sensical and rational practicality gets lost in the dust ……. and in the paper trails. What a pity !

Comment on The (Government-free) Pursuit of Artsy-ness by cjdieterle

cjdieterle — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 17:08:18 +0000

Perhaps the greatest example of private philanthropy supporting the arts is the life of Andrew Mellon. The extraordinarily wealthy banker and one-time Secretary of the Treasury (up until 1932) amassed an unparalleled private collection of art work. Late in life he donated it (along with an extra $10 million) to start the National Gallery. Even FDR, Mellon’s longtime nemesis given his administration’s anti-business rhetoric, was thrilled to receive Mellon’s art collection. For a closer look at Mellon’s life (as well as his role in combating much of the New Deal), I’d strongly suggest Amity Shlaes “The Forgotten Man” to any free marketeer.

Comment on Why I Hate Politics by JM

JM — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 13:28:46 +0000

It would be no different under those revised instutional arrangments.
Stick with your first answer. “Incentives” is easy enough for free marketeers to understand.

Comment on Urban Sprawl, RIP? by cjarrettdieterle

cjarrettdieterle — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 12:44:19 +0000

Interestingly, Tom told me that he penned an editorial back in his newspaper days arguing that if we REALLY wanted to fight urban sprawl we should get rid of eminent domain laws. The theory being that highways abet sprawl as make it easier for surburbanites to travel into the city. Therefore, if government couldn’t seize land to build more highways then there wouldn’t be as many people willing to live outside city limits. This has the duel purpose of reducing sprawl and eliminating eminent domain’s threat to private property rights. A rather intense argument, but theoretically it’s true. If people want to stop sprawl at all costs, everything should be on the table.

As to “market solutions” that can negate sprawl’s consequences, it’s hard to be certain since we’ve never really tried a market-oriented approach to sprawl. Houston is the closest example of a non-regulated city and there is no direct way of measuring sprawl in Houston (unless one actually undertook an empirical study). I insinuated that Houston’s lack of a housing bubble might mean that it did not suffer as much sprawl, but that is admittedly an argument without verification. If I could choose, I would abolish government subsidization of housing, deregulate city planning and then see what happens. It couldn’t be worse than what we have now (less sprawl after the economy collapsed, but still stuck with lots of government programs to combat it).

Comment on Urban Sprawl, RIP? by akoehlinger

akoehlinger — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 12:29:31 +0000

One additional argument explaining urban sprawl asserts that public highways and roads are partly at fault. Had there been more private road ownership, urban sprawl would have been significantly less prevalent.

What market solutions if any do you think can negate urban sprawl’s consequences and return to us some of those wide open spaces?

Comment on Why I Hate Politics by akoehlinger

akoehlinger — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 12:23:45 +0000

Unfortunately, there are incentives for politicians to do what they do and to be who they are. Simply follow the money.

Revisionist history: I wonder how American political history would be different had we continued to have indirect election of senators and the Vice President was the candidate who finished second in the presidential race.