Category: Column

So as to give some perspective, I’m going to ask readers for their guesses about human behavior before explaining my embarrassment by some of my fellow economists. Suppose the prices of ladies jewelry rose by 100 percent. What would you predict would happen to sales? What about a 25 or 50 percent price increase? I’m […]

The Republican Party simply doesn’t get it. A new poll this week shows 2012 presidential nominee and 2008 primary candidate Mitt Romney leading the field of potential 2016 Republican candidates. According to ABC News/Washington Post, 21 percent of Republican voters would vote for Romney in the primaries; Jeb Bush and Mike Huckabee tie at 10 […]

Never let it be said that Mother Nature doesn’t appreciate irony. A new study led by researchers at Occidental College and the University of California at Santa Barbara has found that the oil platforms dotting the California coast are fantastic for sea life. In a 15-year study, researchers found that the ecosystems that build up […]

If you believe Houston Mayor Annise Parker, then you have to believe that when lawyers for her city subpoenaed five local pastors and demanded their sermons, the episode represented an unfortunate instance of lawyer overreach, with no intent to harass or intimidate the opposition. This story begins in May, when the Houston City Council passed, […]

It all started in September, when Houston Mayor Annise Parker and City Attorney David Feldman issued an “overly broad” subpoena for the sermons of select ministers who opposed the city’s equal rights ordinance. Because of intense national opposition from even Texas’ attorney general, this past Wednesday, Parker and Feldman appeared to recant or at least […]

Can you walk out on the messiah? Appearing at a campaign rally for gubernatorial candidate Anthony Brown in Maryland on Sunday, President Obama sought to capture the magic that had electrified audiences in 2008 and, to some considerable degree, even in 2012. Obama isn’t doing much stumping this year. He limits his campaigning mostly to […]

Francis Fukuyama picked an auspicious publication date for his latest book, “Political Order and Political Decay.” The news is full of stories of political decay: the Centers for Disease Control and Ebola; the Department of Veterans Affairs’ health service; the Internal Revenue Service political targeting. Europe gives us the dysfunctional euro and no-growth welfare states. […]

As territory in the Middle East falls under control of the brutal fanatics of ISIL, many Americans may be wondering how this could happen in the backyard of major U.S. allies. In particular, frustration with Turkey’s reluctance to move against ISIL, even as it massacres civilians and creates instability on the Turkish border, is growing […]

Why do some things scare people more than others? One reason is that people engage in a rational assessment of risk and conclude the appropriate level of fear. For example, people feel free to walk alone at midnight in Times Square but not in Central Park because they have made a rational assessment: Times Square, […]

Former Clinton Administration Labor Secretary Robert Reich recently called on the government to force young people to spend two years either “serving” in the military or performing some other type of government-directed “community service.” Neoconservative Senator John McCain has introduced legislation creating a mandatory national service program very similar to Reich’s proposal. It is not […]

Houston recently passed an ordinance through its city council that has sparked quite a bit of controversy amongst conservative evangelicals. The Houston Equal Rights Ordinance (HERO), a broad-sweeping, left-leaning law trumpeted by the City of Houston and its openly gay mayor, Annise Parker, is supposed to protect gay, lesbian and transgender people from discrimination. All […]

Eight days before 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot and killed in Ferguson, Missouri, he received his high school diploma from Normandy High School in the Normandy School District near Ferguson. In January 2013, Normandy district schools lost their accreditation from the Missouri state Board of Education because of poor performance on standardized tests and poor […]

The Ebola outbreak has been a disaster in politics, but a boom for capitalism. Weird how that works, but it is how many things work. President Obama’s handling of the Ebola outbreak has been an unmitigated disaster. At first, he dismissed it. Then, he panicked and started canceling campaign and fundraising events to engage in […]

Arrogance doesn’t sit well with most Americans for very long. Only when it’s accompanied with overwhelming success, like the Pittsburgh Steelers, do we say, “Well, they’ve earned it, haven’t they?” As soon as they start losing, the arrogance of players like quarterback Ben Roethlisberger becomes the fans’ first criticism. Quarterback Barak Obama’s Democratic Party spins […]

Add Ebola to our long and growing list of federal screw-ups. On Wednesday morning we learned a second nurse was infected by the virus in a Dallas hospital while taking care of the Ebola patient from Africa who died October 8. When the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Tom Frieden, […]

Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes is running for U.S. Senate in the great state of Kentucky. She is a woman of conviction, of substance, of principle. “I’m not an empty dress,” she insists, “I’m not a rubber stamp, and I am not a cheerleader! I am a Clinton Democrat.” I’m old enough to remember when “Clinton […]

In the face of unprecedented challenges ranging from Islamic terrorism to Ebola, U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and Secretary of State John Kerry have proudly asserted “Climate Change” is our greatest international foe. I kid you not. The largest supporter of worldwide terror, Iran, may soon acquire the capacity to produce nuclear weapons. That […]

Once upon a time, the liberal position was to reject the old discriminatory branding of people by the color of their skins rather than by the content of their characters. Not now. Political and career advantage is found in trumpeting — or occasionally making up — genealogies. Take the inexact category of Latino or Hispanic […]

In an article in the UK’s Telegraph on October 10, veteran economic correspondent Ambrose Evans-Pritchard laid bare the essential truth of the nearly universal current embrace of inflation as an economic panacea. While politicians, CEOs and economists talk about demand stimulus and the avoidance of a deflationary trap, Evans-Pritchard reminds us that inflation is all, […]

If you were just dying for soup — and you were NBC medical editor Dr. Nancy Snyderman, bent on breaking an Ebola quarantine that you figured didn’t really apply to you because you’re so special — what soup would it be? Ginger sweet potato? Cream of tomato? White beans & escarole? Thai hot & sour […]

Some people I know refuse to watch the news or read the papers these days, and who can blame them? The headlines are depressing and no one seems to be in charge. The stock market rises and falls, playing “now you see it, now you don’t” with your 401k, the Ebola virus is on the […]

There are at least two things that the public expects the government to get right, even when it fails at nearly everything else: public safety and national security. The Obama administration has a responsibility to protect its citizens. There is no excuse for the failures we’re witnessing — from the containment and eradication of Ebola […]

While disposing of a body in a mass grave, one man in a hazmat suit turns to another and asks, “When did we run out of body bags?” “Two days ago.” Fortunately, the scene is only from the movie “Contagion,” though it’s probably close enough to what is going on in parts of West Africa […]

After World War II, the Marshall Plan helped rebuild a devastated Europe. The key word in that sentence is “after.” Last weekend at a conference of donor nations held in Cairo, Egypt, to discuss rebuilding Gaza, following the latest exchange of rockets between Hamas and Israel, Secretary of State John Kerry pledged an additional $212 […]

According to Forbes magazine, at least 5,000 Americans contacted healthcare providers fearful they had contracted Ebola after the media reported that someone with Ebola had entered the United States. All 5,000 cases turned out to be false alarms. In fact, despite all the hype about Ebola generated by the media and government officials, as of […]

“Dad, why does America celebrate Columbus Day?” “Well, Billy, in 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed from Europe to America and founded the very first European settlement in the New World. His arrival marks the beginning of America as we know it.” “But didn’t he discover America by accident, dad?” “Columbus believed the Earth was a sphere. […]

Tomorrow used to be called Columbus Day, but no more. Thanks to Seattle, it’s now “Indigenous Peoples’ Day!” Sound stupid? That’s only because it is. This week the city council of Seattle voted unanimously to rename the day—within the city only; Columbus Day as we know it is a federal holiday—because, like with everything these […]