Huffington Post

Arianna Huffington on Michael Moore’s New Movie

Mon, 09/28/2009 - 10:06am | posted by Chris Moody

Ms. Huffington went to see Michael Moore’s new movie, Capitalism: A Love Story, and after penning a glowing review, she was sure to qualify everything by splitting with Moore on a key issue.

In the film, Michael describes capitalism as evil. I disagree. I don’t think capitalism is evil. I think what we have right now is not capitalism.

In capitalism as envisioned by its leading lights, including Adam Smith and Alfred Marshall, you need a moral foundation in order for free markets to work. And when a company fails, it fails. It doesn’t get bailed out using trillions of dollars of taxpayer money. What we have right now is Corporatism. It’s welfare for the rich. It’s the government picking winners and losers. It’s Wall Street having their taxpayer-funded cake and eating it too. It’s socialized losses and privatized gains.

Can I get an *amen* from all the libertarians in the house? It’s absolutely true. Some of the biggest problems with our corporatist system come from A) Government looking the other way when rights are violated, B) Creating unnatural incentives that lead to bad business practices and C) Taking money from the middle class and poor to pay for rich mistakes.

After all, Huffington is riding on a goldmine created by capitalism, and, well, so is Moore. Plus, there’s the all-too-obvious irony that I wish more would point out, that Moore will be charging money for people to see his film, hiring talented producers and marketers and using corporate media to spread the word.

Barr & Drugs

Mon, 09/15/2008 - 5:32am | posted by Michael Orion Powell

In an article at the Huffington Post, Bob Barr lays out why he has changed his mind on the issue of federal drug policy. He also lays out how he would change the policy as President:

As both a U.S. Attorney and Member of Congress, I defended drug prohibition. But it has become increasingly clear to me, after much study, that our current strategy has not worked and will not work. The other candidates for president prefer not to address this issue, but ignoring the failure of existing policy exhibits both a poverty of thought and an absence of political courage. The federal government must turn the decision on drug policy back to the states and the citizens themselves.

My change in perspective might shock some people, but leadership requires a willingness to assess evidence and recognize when a strategy is not working. We are paying far too high a price for today’s failed policy to continue it simply because it has always been done that way.

Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama has addressed this issue a few times, sounding quite sensible but not advocating the sweeping change that Barr does. Republican presidential nominee John McCain is nowhere fast on this issue, and will likely continue federal drug policy as it has been for the last thirty years. Barr presents the best choice on this issue.