Aug 20

Climatologist Patrick Michaels: Private Citizens Should Closely Monitor the Government’s Temperature Claims

BOSTON 2015

Climatologist Patrick Michaels recently notified the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA, the government agency maintaining certain government thermometers) that the agency’s thermometers at Reagan National Airport were reporting temps that were 2 degrees hotter than the agency’s thermometers at the Dulles airport (also in Washington, D.C., just miles away). Michaels had tracked this 2-degree difference for more than a year. See here.

The 2-degree difference could not have been real; both airports are located in the same weather system. NOAA quickly admitted that the temps being reported at Reagan National were inaccurate, and adjusted the digital thermometer “sensor” at National to more closely match the thermometer at Dulles.

But the agency announced that it would not “adjust” the past year’s temperature record. The record would stand as it had been reported–admittedly hotter than real temperatures for at least a year.

The government has, however, “adjusted” temp records where it suits the government. NOAA climatologists have been systematically “adjusting” the temp record for earlier decades to make that older record appear colder than the actual temp readings. See here, here, and here.

The lesson is that the public should do its own temperature and weather monitoring–and should constantly check and challenge the government’s reported temperatures. Join us on Sunday, September 13 at Glacier National Park for our glacier-photographing trip. See here. And here.

Aug 19

Government Universities Continue Their Suppression of Dissenting Opinions

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The brilliant Walter E. Williams has written another essay about the embarrassing state of ideological oppression at America’s government-sponsored colleges and universities. See here.

For example, Oberlin College and Georgetown University have both issued “trigger warnings” to students prior to campus visits by the noteworthy scholar Christina Hoff Sommers.

According to the dominant government-supremacist culture that now controls such campuses, Sommers’ “very presence on campus” was “a form of violence” and she was threatening students’ mental health. At Oberlin, 30 students and the campus therapy dog retired to a “safe room” with soft music, crayons and coloring books to escape any uncomfortable facts raised by Sommers.

Perhaps we can “tolerate” Oberlin’s and Georgetown’s repression. They are, after all, private institutions which have the right to promote their own socio-religious worldviews.

But even the University of New Hampshire–a government institution which is subject to the equal-protection and free speech clauses of the Constitution–has recently suppressed anti-government-correctness speech. UNH has published a “Bias-Free Language Guide,” which “is meant to invite inclusive excellence in (the) campus community.” Terms such as “American,” “homosexual,” “illegal alien,” “Caucasian,” “mothering,” “fathering” and “foreigners” are deemed “problematic.” Other problematic terms include “elders,” “senior citizen,” “overweight,” “speech impediment,” “dumb,” “sexual preference,” “manpower,” “freshmen,” “mailman” and “chairman” are described in the Guide as problematic.

Florida State University–another government school–has an “Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination Statement,” which actually infringes on equal opportunity and promotes discrimination. “Behavior that may be considered offensive, demeaning, or degrading,” says the Statement, “will not be tolerated.”

In practice, such government-approved “Statements” foster a climate of fear and discrimination against anti-government voices and those who distrust expansive government.

Aug 17

Whole Foods CEO: America’s professors tend to hate capitalism because they subconsciously envy business leaders

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John Mackey is the cofounder and CEO of a Fortune 500 corporation, Whole Foods. As many libertarians know, Mr. Lackey identifies as something of a libertarian, and he has made a number of fairly courageous statements about various state-authoritarian policies (such as the government’s slave-plantation healthcare).

Here is a decent interview of Mr. Mackey by Reason Magazine.

What is most interesting about the interview is Mr. Mackey’s insight into the totalitarianism of “intellectuals” in academia. Academics tend to identify with the state, and to promote the state’s agenda of government control over individual autonomy and choice.

Mackey suggests that professors at most government-approved universities hate capitalism largely because the professors are subconsciously jealous of successful businesspeople. Business leaders, after all, gain riches by pleasing and helping people, while the officials of the state tend to achieve “success” by hurting and controlling others.

Aug 15

New Study: For Every New Dollar a College Receives in Student Loans, a College Raises its Tuition by 65 Cents

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We all know that the Federal Student Loan Program has driven up college tuition costs because the Program subsidizes artificial demand.

Now a New York Fed study has found that:

for every new dollar a college receives in Direct Subsidized Loans, a school raises its price by 65 cents. For every dollar in Pell Grants, a college raises tuition by 55 cents. This is one reason tuition has outpaced inflation every year for decades, while the average borrower now finishes college owing more than $28,000.

See here.

These words are taken from a column by economist John C. Goodman, who provides several other interesting facts:

* The U.S. has the most expensive higher education in the world.

* Middle class families who “save” for their children’s higher education are punished severely–by the combination of high taxes on savings, artificially-low interest on savings, and skyrocketing tuition rates. In fact, for every dollar saved, MORE THAN A DOLLAR IS LOST TO this combination of factors!

* And Government “support” for higher education has produced devastating results for poor people. “Low-income students in the United States often end up with the short straw: no degree, no job and a bundle of debt that they must pay anyway.”

* and finally, for-profit schools that do not take or accept government subsidies (such as Lysander Spooner University) are far cheaper than those which do!

Aug 14

Reason Magazine: When Government Gives Diet Advice, You Should Always Do the Opposite

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Generally speaking, every government in the world seeks to increase its advantage over its subjects (and therefore, to increase the DISADVANTAGE of its subjects in comparison to the state).

Thus, one should generally do the very opposite of what government advises–especially regarding investing or nutrition.

For years, observers have noted that the government’s “food pyramid”–which every school kid is forced to digest (no pun intended) from an early age–is largely a product of lobbying interests, such as Iowa grain growers.

Now Reason Magazine has insightfully pointed out that a prudent person would be wisest to do THE VERY OPPOSITE from whatever the government advises with regard to nutrition.

See here.

Aug 13

Government-supported universities continue censoring and suppressing individualist ideology

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Whenever you walk from the free world onto a government-supported college campus, you are entering a world where products and services are more expensive and where your freedoms are decreased.

Everything at most modern government-supported colleges is more expensive than off-campus. In Bozeman, Montana, for example, parking is free everywhere. Except in one location: the campus of Montana State University. At Montana State University, you can buy a sandwich for 7 bucks that would cost 5 bucks elsewhere in Bozeman.

These high costs are directly attributable to the Student Loan Program, which artificially boosts demand and fills students’ pockets with artificially-available cash.

Here is a column by Walter E. Williams about the University of California. It is a public institution, which presumably is subject to the Bill of Rights, including the First Amendment. Yet the California university system has put out a list of disfavored (pre-banned?) statements; which students are warned not to utter.

The disfavored statements include:

* “America is the land of opportunity.”
* “I believe the most qualified person should get the job.”
* “Everyone can succeed in this society, if they work hard enough.”

See here.
Of course, these statements are statements of political ideology, so California’s public universities are unconstitutionally censoring the expression of certain–especially individualist, free-enterprise, capitalistic–ideas.

Aug 13

Poll: Americans are largely ignorant of the country’s tax structure

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For years, politicians have won elections by claiming a desire to tax “the rich” at higher rates. This incessant messaging has even percolated into the debate over campaign finance, where activists routinely claim that “the rich” are controlling American politics by their political spending.

But the actual tax distribution of the United States shows that those nasty “rich” are big losers in the game of wealth redistribution. The top 5 percent of earners are already paying 60 percent of all taxes. The top 20 percent of earners pay fully 80 percent of all tax receipts.

A recent Reason-Rupe poll found that only about 20 percent of Americans knew the actual share of federal income tax dollars paid by the top 5 percent of households, which is roughly 60 percent of all tax receipts.

See here.

Aug 13

Upcoming Courses for August 2015

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Lysander Spooner University will be offering a one-day course on “How Government Harms the Poor” at the Manhattan, Montana Potato Festival on Saturday, August 15. Tuition is free; the exam is $5. Find us at the Libertarian Party table at the Festival.

Every government measure aimed at helping the poor actually harms the poor. Consider the government’s support for higher education. Government-subsidized universities, combined with the federal Student Loan Program (which greatly increases demand without increasing supply, causing prices to rise), have caused tuition prices to skyrocket over the past 30 years.

As Professor Paul F. Campos writes, “If over the past three decades car prices had gone up as fast as tuition, the average new car would cost more than $80,000.”

See here.

Aug 10

New U.S. Army Manuel Says Journalists may be Treated as “Unprivileged Belligerents”

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For centuries, governments have sought to suppress open debate about their wars and violent aggression. Now the new U.S. Law of War Manual contains passages indicating that the Pentagon considers some journalists to be “belligerents.” A belligerent is the same broad category that includes guerrillas or members of al-Qaeda.

The U.S. government (like all governments) has been waging war against press freedom for decades.

The organization “Reporters Without Borders” puts out an annual ranking of worldwide press freedom. And the U.S. has been slipping steadily downward for years.

This year the U.S. was placed 49th on the list – behind El Salvador, Tonga and Chile. Reporters Without Borders cited the US campaign against Wikileaks and the persecution of Jim Risen, a New York Times reporter who was asked to reveal his sources in a high-profile leak case.

Read about it here.

Aug 09

Venezuelans resort to pet medications to survive

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Socialism is a curse that one should wish only on a hated enemy. To adopt it is to set a course toward gradual poverty, sickness, weakness, pollution and disease. The only question is when.

Venezuelans have voted for hard-line socialist politicians (such as the enigmatic Hugo Chavez) for decades. Venezuela has adopted “single-payer” (slave plantation) health care, government nationalization of energy, and other typical socialist measures.

Here is a news report that Venezuelans–with their “utopian” single-payer government medical system–are resorting to black market purchases of pet medications to survive in some instances.