Speech to the U.S. House of Representatives on Foreign Policy (July 4, 1821)
John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State

AND NOW, FRIENDS AND COUNTRYMEN, if the wise and learned philosophers of the elder world, the first observers of nutation and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and
Shrapnel shells, should find their hearts disposed to enquire what has America done for the benefit of mankind?

Let our answer be this: America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government. America, in the assembly of
nations, since her admission among them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous reciprocity.

She has uniformly spoken among them, though often to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal liberty, of equal justice, and of equal rights.

She has, in the lapse of nearly half a century, without a single exception, respected the independence of other nations while asserting and maintaining her own.

She has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when conflict has been for principles to which she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart.

She has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of that Aceldama the European world, will be contests of inveterate power, and emerging right.

Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be.

But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.

She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.

She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.

She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example.

She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom.

The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force….

She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit….

America’s glory is not dominion, but liberty. Her march is the march of the mind. She has a spear and a shield: but the motto upon her shield is, Freedom, Independence, Peace. This has been her Declaration: this has been, as far as her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind would permit, her practice.

The following is copied from: https://www.fff.org/2026/08/20/conservatives-are-wrong-about-morality-responsibility-and-freedom/

Conservatives Are Wrong About Morality, Responsibility, and Freedom

by Jacob G. Hornberger

August 20, 2026

One of the fundamental differences between libertarians and conservatives pertains to the concepts of morality, responsibility, and freedom. Conservatives are wrong and libertarians are right on this issue.

Conservatives hold that before people can be permitted to be free, they have to be moral and responsible. Thus, the reason that many conservatives oppose freedom for the American people is because, conservatives say, the American people are not sufficiently moral and responsible. As soon as they become sufficiently moral and responsible, conservatives say, they will have earned the right to be free.

Thus, we need a drug war, conservatives say, because too many Americans consume illicit drugs. They even break criminal laws to do it. That shows that they are simply too immoral and irresponsible to live in a free society—that is, one that has no drug laws. As soon as Americans become moral and responsible by ceasing to consume illicit drugs, they’ll be permitted to live without drug laws.

Or consider the welfare state. Americans, conservatives tell us, are not sufficiently moral and responsible to decide for themselves whether to help out others who need help. We can’t, for example, repeal Social Security because children are not yet sufficiently moral or responsible to help out their parents or grandparents. They simply cannot be trusted to handle this on their own. That’s why we need Social Security, conservatives tell us. It’s also why conservatives tell us we need welfare programs for the poor. Since Americans are not sufficiently moral or responsible, we need a federal “safety net.”

There is, of course, one big problem with this conservative position: It lasts indefinitely. The lack of freedom becomes permanent. That’s because it is virtually impossible for people to become sufficiently moral or responsible when they are denied the freedom to choose. Without freedom of choice, people remain mired in immorality and irresponsibility.

Libertarianism holds that people have the right to be free regardless of whether they are sufficiently moral or responsible. Freedom is a natural, God-given right. It doesn’t depend on whether people are already moral or responsible. In other words, even if people are totally immoral and irresponsible, they nonetheless have the right to be free.

But here’s the catch: It is only through freedom that people can become moral or responsible. The conscience is like a muscle—it must be constantly exercised to be strengthened. When people are faced with such questions as “Should I help my ailing parents or grandparents in need?” or “Should I help that poor person in need?” or “Should I donate to my church?” they are necessarily exercising their conscience. That process is what elevates not only the sense of morality and responsibility within the individual but also society generally.

The best thing Americans could ever do is reject conservatism (as well as progressivism, which forces people to be good, caring, and compassionate). The best thing Americans could ever do is embrace libertarianism and the freedom, morality, and responsibility that come with it.

The book by Ben Bachrach, “Analysis of Audio Transducers using Bond Graphs” has been published on line at: https://aat.benbachrach.com/wp/

Here is an essay on Dr. Fauci
It may have been written before the disclosure of Fauci’s diary.
Published August 3, 2026 at:
https://robertringer.com/evil-versus-arrogance/

“Evil” is one of those words people use freely but rarely define. It is usually reserved for murderers, dictators, and assorted sociopaths who make no effort to conceal their contempt for human life. But the more interesting question is whether evil must involve cruelty or whether it can arise from something far more commonplace, e.g., vanity, ambition, self-deception, or the hunger for power.

Which brings us to Anthony Fauci. The temptation is to choose between two simple portraits: Fauci the selfless public servant or Fauci the evil calculating villain. To Fauci’s admirers, he was the calm voice of science during an unprecedented crisis. To his critics, he became the symbol of an arrogant public-health establishment that demanded obedience, discouraged dissent, and arrogantly presented uncertain judgments as settled facts.

Before classifying anyone as evil, we have to distinguish between bad intent, bad judgment, and bad results. A person can make disastrous decisions without desiring disastrous consequences. We’ve all made such decisions, but incompetence is not evil. Nor is arrogance.

Even the desire for fame and power, unattractive though it may be, does not automatically make someone evil. On the other hand, intentionally harming others is evil. Evil begins when a person knowingly places his own interests above the lives, liberty, or well-being of others and continues to do so even after he is aware of the damage he is causing.

Much of the case against Anthony Fauci involves his handling of scientific uncertainty. Mask recommendations changed. Claims about vaccination and transmission proved to be wrong. Lockdowns and school closures imposed enormous economic, educational, psychological, and medical costs. Critics of prevailing policies were often treated not merely as mistaken but dangerous.

Fauci would argue that recommendations changed because the evidence changed and that officials had to make decisions under emergency conditions. That defense cannot be dismissed out of hand. COVID-19 was a new disease, information was incomplete, and officials faced the possibility of mass death.

Nevertheless, uncertainty is not a blank check for authority. When government officials are uncertain, their moral obligation is to clearly say so. The public can tolerate uncertainty. What it will not indefinitely tolerate, however, is being told that science requires obedience today, only to discover tomorrow that yesterday’s commandment was provisional, exaggerated, or politically motivated.

The questions surrounding research funded through EcoHealth Alliance are particularly troubling. A federal inspector general concluded that both EcoHealth and the National Institutes of Health failed in important monitoring and reporting responsibilities, creating “missed opportunities” to oversee research properly. Even so, that finding does not prove Fauci created the virus, caused the pandemic, or committed a crime, but it does demonstrate that the system he helped lead was not the flawless temple of scientific competence portrayed to the public.

A Republican-led congressional investigation later accused public-health leaders of serious failures and excessive secrecy. Testimony and records released by the committee raised legitimate questions about transparency, recordkeeping, the definition of gain-of-function research, and the treatment of the laboratory-origin hypothesis.

Fauci, for his part, has insisted that he kept an open mind about COVID’s origins and denied suppressing the laboratory-leak possibility. He also defended NIAID’s research investments as necessary preparation for emerging diseases.

So, was Fauci evil? The evidence available to the public does not justify declaring, as an established fact, that Fauci deliberately sought widespread suffering. Nor is there clear evidence that personal fortune was the central motive behind his pandemic decisions. Fame and power are more plausible explanations, because Fauci clearly became a celebrity and exercised extraordinary influence. But plausibility is not proof of what was in his mind.

The more defensible judgment is that Fauci displayed the classic dangers of institutional power: excessive certainty, resistance to outside criticism, concern for bureaucratic reputation, and an apparent belief that experts should manage what ordinary people are permitted to hear and decide. That attitude can produce evil consequences even when the official involved believes himself to be virtuous.

Indeed, some of history’s worst abuses were not committed by people who awakened each morning thinking, “How can I be evil today?” They were committed by people convinced that their intelligence, credentials, or noble objectives placed them beyond ordinary moral restraints.  No doubt even Stalin and Mao thought they were acting virtuous on behalf of their people.

The final verdict on Anthony Fauci may depend upon evidence not yet available and upon facts that may never be known. But perhaps the most important lesson has less to do with Fauci than with human nature. The lust for fame, fortune, and power is not the opposite of evil, but it is often the road leading to evil. And that road becomes especially dangerous when the traveler insists that he alone represents science, truth, and/or the public good.

Thus, for the sake of fairness, it is entirely possible that Anthony Fauci is not an evil man, but merely an annoying little scoundrel who finagled his way into a breathtaking position of power over millions of innocent people. Which begs the question: Should an annoying little scoundrel who destroyed the lives of millions of people be punished the same as an evil person? It’s an interesting question—perhaps even a moral question—because for someone who lost a loved one to COVID, does it really matter if the cause was evil intent or arrogance?

Tom Woods has a short 1 hour interview with Keith Knight about his 4 hour podcast arguing against Democratic Socialism.

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Discussion from legalclarity.org

Pro and Con snippets from the Legal Clarity article are given below.

The Case That FDR Prolonged the Depression

The Cole-Ohanian Study

The most influential academic argument that New Deal policies extended the Depression came from economists Harold Cole and Lee Ohanian in a 2004 study published in the Journal of Political Economy. Using a dynamic general equilibrium model, they concluded that policies under the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 and the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 effectively cartelized large portions of the American economy, keeping output and employment well below where they should have been.

Their core finding was striking: New Deal cartelization policies accounted for roughly 60 percent of the gap between actual economic output and where it would have been based on long-run trends. By 1939, real wages were far above what the labor market could sustain, output per adult remained 27 percent below trend, and private hours worked were 21 percent below trend. The NIRA had allowed industries to set prices collectively and suspended antitrust enforcement, while labor provisions empowered unions to bargain for wages that, in Cole and Ohanian’s model, priced many workers out of jobs entirely. Although the Supreme Court struck down the NIRA in 1935, the researchers argued that the Roosevelt administration continued to tacitly permit these monopolistic arrangements for years afterward.

Ohanian estimated that these policies lengthened the Depression by approximately seven years, reducing real income and output by 14 percent compared to a scenario where the NIRA had never been enacted.

Economist Robert Higgs offered perhaps the most focused version of the investment argument. His “regime uncertainty” thesis held that the Depression persisted not because of any single bad policy but because the cumulative weight of New Deal legislation — the Social Security Act, the National Labor Relations Act, the Revenue Acts of 1935 through 1937, and the threat of more to come — made business owners too afraid to invest. Net private investment for the entire period of 1930 to 1940 totaled negative $3.1 billion.

The Case That the New Deal Aided Recovery

Growth Was Actually Spectacular

Critics of the prolongation thesis point to what the economic data actually show about the recovery’s pace. Christina Romer, the Berkeley economist who later chaired President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, documented in a widely cited 1992 paper that real GNP grew at an average rate exceeding 8 percent per year between 1933 and 1937. Between 1938 and 1941, it grew at over 10 percent annually. Romer called this “spectacular” growth and noted it was among the fastest sustained expansions in American history outside of wartime.

The puzzle is that despite these growth rates, the economy remained below its long-run trend. GNP was still 26 percent below trend in 1937 — but that was because the hole created by the 1929–1933 collapse was so deep, not because recovery was slow. The economy had fallen 35 percent from 1929 to 1933; climbing back from that depth at 8 percent a year simply took time.

Romer attributed the recovery primarily to monetary expansion rather than fiscal policy. The money supply grew at nearly 10 percent per year from 1933 to 1937, driven largely by gold inflows after Roosevelt devalued the dollar in 1933 and by capital fleeing political instability in Europe. Without this monetary expansion, Romer calculated, real GNP would have been roughly 25 percent lower by 1937.

What Complicates the Debate

Several factors make a clean verdict difficult. One is the question of what counts as “prolonging” the Depression. If the standard is whether unemployment returned to 1929 levels, it did not until wartime mobilization — unemployment was still 14.6 percent in 1940. If the standard is whether growth was rapid, it clearly was: 9 percent annual real GDP growth from 1933 to 1937 is hard to characterize as stagnation. The Cole-Ohanian model measures the gap between actual output and a theoretical trend; critics counter that assuming the economy would have snapped back to trend without intervention is itself an unproven assumption, especially given the banking collapse and deflationary spiral of 1929–1933.

Jim Babka in a Facebook post remined us of the following.

Mexican migrants to the USA didn’t create U.S. imperialism, war fascism, the New Deal, or the military-industrial-congressional complex. They didn’t ratify the Sixteenth Amendment, create the Fed, or enact Medicare and Medicaid. They didn’t build up a ruinous public debt, pass the USA PATRIOT Act, or maintain a torture facility at Guantanamo. They didn’t turn the local police into Rambo wannabes with SWAT teams and armored vehicles. They don’t scoop up and record everything you write on the Internet, say on the telephone, or post on Facebook.

Why then are people so afraid that letting Mexicans enter the USA to work will lead to a loss of freedom, rather than afraid of the red-white-and-blue-blooded Americans who have already stripped them of nearly every liberty their forefathers enjoyed and who are eager to crush every liberty that remains? – Robert Higgs 7/7/13 yet seemingly timeless.

From the WSJ – 7/8/2026

Mark Penn and Andrew Stein are right to warn that “The Socialist Threat Is Real” (op-ed, July 3). But they overlook its true origin. The Democratic Party’s current socialism didn’t emerge in a vacuum; it is the logical extension of the New Deal and the Great Society, which transformed the federal government from a relatively limited constitutional republic into the nation’s primary provider of income, retirement, healthcare and welfare.

Once Americans are taught that Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are not government programs but inalienable rights, the philosophical foundation for socialism has already been laid. If retirement income and medical care are rights guaranteed by Washington, why shouldn’t housing, college tuition, child care and a guaranteed income be rights as well? Democratic socialists merely carry this premise to its logical conclusion.

The debate has shifted from whether the government should redistribute wealth to how much redistribution is enough. Democratic socialists simply argue that if the government can tax one group to finance benefits for another, then even higher taxes on upper-income Americans and greater government control over private property are justified in the name of the “common good.”

Those who wish to halt the advance of socialism must challenge its intellectual roots, not merely its latest political manifestations.

Murray Sabrin

After explaining why comparing today’s governments intervening in the economy should not be considered just returning to the policies of Alexander Hamilton, Dave gives an introduction to economics starting at about 35:00.