America

America, Marijuana, Polls

Most Americans support marijuana legalization

Research from YouGov shows that a majority of Americans now support legalizing marijuana. 52% of Americans now support legalization, while only 34% oppose it. This is slightly up from 48% support for legalization when the question was last asked in March 2015.  Over half of all adults under the age of 65 support it, but over-65s do tend to oppose (49%) rather than support (39%) legalization.  Politically, Democrats (66%) and independents (51%) want to legalize marijuana but half of Republicans are oppose

Via YouGov | Most Americans support marijuana legalization.

America, Constitution, Courts, Encryption, Federal Government, History, Law, Privacy, Surveillance, Technology

All Writs Act

While the All Writs Act is not used every day, the act has been successfully invoked by the government to compel telephone companies to install wiretaps, for phone companies to hand over call records, and to obtain CCTV footage, handwriting exemplars, and DNA samples. It has even been cited to force a defendant to cough up his computer password.

What’s more, it has played a part in copyright piracy cases. In a forthcoming law journal article,Annemarie Bridy, a law professor at the University of Idaho, writes that “some courts granting broad preliminary orders against non-parties in ‘pirate site’ cases have cited the All Writs Act as a source of authority.”

The All Writs Act was originally part of the Judiciary Act of 1789, which established the Supreme Court, the lower courts, and spelled out the basic powers of the judicial branch of government. In 1990, former Justice Sandra Day O’Connor described the Judiciary Act as “probably the most important and most satisfactory Act ever passed by Congress.”

Via How Apple will fight the DOJ in iPhone backdoor crypto case @ Ars Technica.

America, Donald Trump, Economy

Rising, Not Falling

The rumors of American manufacturing’s death have been greatly exaggerated. Sales revenues and output are rising. In 2014, value-added by the industry set a new record. While it’s true that manufacturing is a smaller share of the U.S. economy than it once was, that’s not because it isn’t growing—other sectors of the economy are simply growing faster.

The reason that so many goods found in a U.S. convenience store say, “Made in China,” is because U.S. manufacturing has shifted towards high value-added products like aerospace equipment, not because the U.S. has stopped “making things.”

Via Trump Is Wrong: America Makes Tons of Stuff | Cato@Liberty.

America, Immigration

The Power of Multiculturalism

Pew reported that at current rates, non-Hispanic whites will make up less than half of the U.S. population by 2055, at which point it will begin becoming more difficult to recognize any clear racial majority in the nation.

A separate poll from Rasmussen suggests that most Americans would view the changing racial makeup of the nation as a positive, with 44 percent of respondents saying that multiculturalism is good for America. That’s compared to 26 percent who said multiculturalism hurts the nation and 15 percent who said it neither hurts nor improves the U.S.

Via Immigrant families will drive 88 percent of future population growth @ Personal Liberty.

America, Faith

Is Catholicism Compatible with the American Experiment?

“In a much-cited 2014 article in the American Conservative, the political philosopher Patrick Deneen argued that the real debate unfolding among American Catholics was not one of “conservative” versus “liberal” Catholics. That discussion, Deneen suggested, is passé. This is partly because (as Cardinal John Henry Newman observed) liberalism in religion is ultimately self-immolating. But it’s also because post-Vatican II “liberal Catholicism” is fast collapsing into plain-old secular liberalism….”

Via Is Catholicism Compatible with the American Experiment? @ Acton Institute.

America, Foreign Affairs

Millennials – 87 million strong – on foreign policy

“First, Millennials perceive the world as significantly less threatening than their elders do, and they view foreign policies to deal with potential threats with much less urgency. Second, Millennials are more supportive of international cooperation than prior generations. Millennials, for example, are far more likely to see China as a partner than a rival and…

America, Torture

The Case Against Torture

The case against torture rests, fundamentally, on our own civilization’s proper understanding of humanity, and a rejection of our enemies’ inferior understanding.

America, Ethics, Foreign Affairs, Torture, War

McCain on the CIA Torture Report

Goodness knows libertarians have had countless differences with Sen. John McCain, on domestic and foreign policy.  We could have no disagreement, however, with his condemnation of the CIA’s use of torture for interrogation of America’s enemies.  Our politics – including the acknowledgment of our own ethical failures -should be of the highest standards.  To use…

America, Crime, Liberty, Police, Police Brutality, Police Misconduct

Charles Pierce on Policing in America

Over at Esquire, Charles Pierce writes with a question that every American should ask about policing in America: ARMIES OF OCCUPATION OR LOCAL U.S. POLICE FORCES? About this matter, Mr. Pierce offers a few simple, and incontrovertibly true, principles about policing in a free society: We should have meetings everywhere. And those meetings should have…

America, Foreign Affairs, Military

The Evergreen Error of the Iraq War Hawks

James Fallows considers their record: Am I sounding a little testy here? You bet. We all make mistakes. But we are talking about people in public life—writers, politicians, academics—who got the biggest strategic call in many decades completely wrong. Wrong as a matter of analysis, wrong as a matter of planning, wrong as a matter of…

America, History, Law, Liberty

Understanding America Backwards

There’s a longstanding maxim of liberty that Americans inherited from England: ‘those things not prohibited by law are permitted.’ The burden is on the state: if there’s no express ban under law, then a person is free to act.  Since government has to enumerate restrictions if it wants to enforce them, a free society places…