In 1955, the Fifty States – and the world – were far different places than the States here in 2025 or the world today.
As freedom goes, as liberty is found or lost, we sometimes think everything is worse today than in the past. Especially in that “Golden Age” when “The Greatest Generation” was nearly over the trauma of the Second World War and busy producing Baby Boomers and “Made in America” products of all kinds.
Go back to that time with us and let’s do some comparisons.
Continue readingGovernment stupidity is always with us: An incredibly strong argument for why human, mandatory government is dangerous, immoral, and to be avoided. Or put down.
Consider Yellowstone National Park. And visit this story in Cowboy State Daily.
To put it simply, the old government ban on carrying (open or concealed) weapons for self-defense has been overturned. You can legally have a weapon on you in national parks: the FedGov was forced to follow the Bill of Rights. At least partially.
The problem? Stupid laws.
Continue readingIn a recent commentary, we noted the famous quote about democracy usually attributed to Sir Winston.
In November 1947 Winston Churchill delivered a speech to the U.K. House of Commons. He made a memorable remark about democracy, but he employed the prefatory phrase “it has been said”. Thus, he signaled that the remark was already in circulation. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:1
Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time; but there is the broad feeling in our country that the people should rule, continuously rule, and that public opinion, expressed by all constitutional means, should shape, guide, and control the actions of Ministers who are their servants and not their masters.
Obviously, whatever his public statements, Sir Winston did not really believe this – not because he was a supporter of the British Monarchy and Imperialism, but because of his actions as PM, in which political opinion – when not actually molded by His Majesty’s Government – was routinely ignored.
Continue readingReturning to a subject we have touched on more and more, we see more evidence across all Fifty States and especially in the District of Criminals that the black robed judges – at all levels – consider themselves to be the true rulers of these States, and indeed, overpowering above not just every government at any level, but the people in toto and individually.
Some of the most recent evidence comes from the great State of Wyoming. It is, overall and despite many blemishes, one of the freer States in our Union. But as recent articles in Cowboy State Daily show, it is a judge-ridden State like most of the rest. It seems that half of the articles appearing over the last week or so featured some action going on in court – regardless of the activities involved.
Things like school funding, hunting, fishing, property taxes, driving down the highway, voting, buying and selling food, getting medicine, and hundreds of other daily activities by millions of Americans are fair game for judges. Who jerk people around daily and for weeks and months and even years.
Continue readingPolitics and political troubles, like other forms of war, distract us from real-world problems that can and do harm and even kill us. While many are man-made entirely, others are natural events. Natural? Yes, but influenced and modified (made worse) by humans.
But not necessarily all of them. Despite the screams from various groups, not every weather-related problem or disaster is the fault of humans. Or even of governments.
The recent massive number and size of tornadoes and thunderstorms in many of the States are an example of that. So are the recent massive amounts of precip in Texas and New Mexico. (And the droughts in many areas, we remind everyone.)
Continue readingNewsweek, one of the pitiful remnants of the print mainstream media, just before Independence Day published an article telling us that polls show that more Californians than ever (44% of those polled) want independence from the United States.
Here at The Price of Liberty, our first thought is “good luck, have fun, goodbye.” Oh, and don’t come crawling back when your mess gets even worse.”
Who would be better off if California were to secede, or be kicked out of the Union? We argue that despite the big hole in the economies of the remaining 49 States, the other States would be the primary winners. Much better off. Especially given how many people would flee California if that were to happen. (See the observation at the end of this commentary for some thoughts on that.)
We warrant that under its current powers-that-be, California itself would be far worse off: With the core cities already approaching the economic and social conditions of some of the worst Third-World urban areas, this move would speed up the collapse of California. Led by the very “elites” who have worked so hard to create the modern situation.
Continue readingToday is Bastille Day. On this day, in 1789 (235 years back), a mob stormed the prison in Paris, the Bastille, to liberate a grand total of seven prisoners, none of them actually there for significant political reasons. Another “crowd” (mob) also attacked the Hotel des Invalides to get at the weapons stored there.
Today, as “le 14 jullet” and “la fete nationale” Bastille Day is the “national day” (NATO term) of the French Fifth Republic (since 1958).
The contrast between the “national days” and patriotic holidays of France and the United States is severe and educational.
We point out that both national holidays are in essence hypocritical: the ideals and conditions that led to the original events celebrated are still touted but in reality, lost in history.
But the great differences between the events so long ago (1776 in the States and 1789 in France) are reflected in not just the character and society of the two entities, but in their history and prospects for the future.
Continue readingAs the Summer Violence Season (SVS) is apparently upon us for 2025, here are some quotes to think about. Lovers of liberty generally tend to be lovers of peace and prosperity. We want to treat others as we want to be treated; we eschew aggression, both physical, moral, and implied, against others because we don’t want to be aggressed against!
But as a certain science fiction writer once said, lovers of liberty are “small-mouthed pacificists.” We don’t start “rumbles” or “riots” but we see the need to end such things. To defend ourselves and others against aggression. And against tyranny, which can be characterized as “organized” or “official” aggression.
We also recognize that rhetoric is often more palatable than the actions of the persons making the speeches. And that it is easy to succumb to temptation to justify our own aggression (and that of others) as being defensive and moral in nature.
“We fight not for glory, nor for riches, nor for honour, but only and alone for Freedom, which no good man lays down but with his life.” –Declaration of Arbroath, Scotland, 1320
“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse. A man who has nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance at being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.” –British philosopher John Stuart Mill
“Whoever attentively considers the different departments of power must perceive, that, in a government in which they are separated from each other, the judiciary, from the nature of its functions, will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them.” –Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 78, 1788
“[T]he only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments.” –Benjamin Rush, On the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic, 1806
The Price of Liberty 
Guest editorial: the evils of educational central planning
Kerry McDonald recently published this commentary in her email newsletter. It is worth pondering:
In an article earlier this week in the large education news site, The 74, 7th grade teacher Ronak Shah laments that today’s school-choice programs enable families to switch schools too often. On the basis that this can be problematic for students, he argues for greater regulation and government oversight, including establishing set enrollment windows, outside of which switching schools would be rare. “In every other sector,” he writes, “we regulate choices to minimize collateral consequences. Why not in K-12 education?”
Continue reading →While I’m sure this teacher is well-meaning, his recommendations reflect the folly of central planners the world over, or “The Pretence of Knowledge,” as Friedrich Hayek called it. As he accepted his Nobel Prize in economics in 1974, Hayek spoke about the troubling tendency to believe that an individual or institution has sufficient knowledge of the countless, diverse preferences and needs of others to make decisions for them in a top-down manner.
“To act on the belief that we possess the knowledge and the power which enable us to shape the processes of society entirely to our liking, knowledge which in fact we do not possess, is likely to make us do much harm,” said Hayek.
Indeed, while the teacher I mentioned above has concerns about the harm that frequent school-switching might have on students, the harms of centrally planned solutions are likely to be far worse.
Hayek explained that “the erroneous belief that the exercise of some power would have beneficial consequences is likely to lead to a new power to coerce other men being conferred on some authority. Even if such power is not in itself bad, its exercise is likely to impede the functioning of those spontaneous ordering forces by which, without understanding them, man is in fact so largely assisted in the pursuit of his aims.”
Let individuals and families be free to make the choices that are right for them—as often as they choose—without seeking permission from central planners.