The three volumes of The Gulag Archipelago — one continuous, extended scream of outrage — are, paradoxically, brilliant, bitter, disbelieving and infused with awe: awe at the strength characterising the best among us, in the worst of all situations. In that monumental text, published in 1973, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn conducted “an experiment in literary investigation” — a hybrid […]
History
V for Vendetta: A Culturally Poignant Exposé
V for Vendetta is more than just a movie or another piece of mindless fiction…it is a testament of our time and rare exposé detailing just what can happen (and really what might happen in this country) if we allow our rights to be taken away. The history of Guy Fawkes circles around his 1605 […]
Get Government OUT of the Marriage Business
Social Right-wingers: Just imagine how you’re all going to look in 40 years… 🙁 Why do we even need the government involved in marriage?!? It has nothing to do with the government and never did. Libertarians advocate for getting the government to stop backing/supporting/granting/licensing ANY type of marriage of any kind – gay, straight, or […]
Commodity Prices During “The Bernanke Era”
What people today call inflation is not inflation, i.e., the increase in the quantity of money and money substitutes, but the general rise in commodity prices and wage rates which is the inevitable consequence of inflation. ~Ludwig von Mises
Ken Burns’s The War
Further to my previous post, here is a great summary of Ken Burns’s recent documentary “The War”, which is actually worse than his Civil War one.
Ken Burns’s Civil War
The following article ends up by making an important point regarding the famous Ken Burns documentary on the Civil War: “Watching the film, you might easily forget that one side was not fighting for, but against the very things that Burns claims the war so gloriously achieved. Confederates, you might need reminding after seeing it, […]
The fall of the United States?
From the Guardian: Decline and fall of the American Empire Key passage: “Let me put an alternative hypothesis. America in 2011 is Rome in 200AD or Britain on the eve of the first world war: an empire at the zenith of its power but with cracks beginning to show. The experience of both Rome and […]
On the Price of Corn and Management of the Poor, November 1766
Ben Franklin, November 1766 I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I traveled much, and I observed […]