Given the toxic legal climate in the United States for business in general, it should have surprised no one that a federal judge has ruled that families who lost loved ones in the September 11 attacks can sue United Airlines, American Airlines, Boeing and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. That the plaintiffs and their lawyers are not
I have a friend serving time in the federal prison camp near Cumberland, Maryland, and I visit him whenever possible. (Like many other federal prisoners, he should not be incarcerated at all, but that is material for another story at another time.) During my last visit, we were discussing prison medical care, or the lack thereof. “Bill,” he said,
The Martha verdict appears quite popular with the political classes and the vaunted “man on the street,” not to mention the nation’s mainstream journalists. The post-trial comments of one juror, Chappell Hartridge (Juror Number Eight), say it all: “Maybe this is a victory for the little guys who lose money thanks to these kinds of transactions.
Ken Lay, Martha Stewart, and now Frank P. Quattrone must have been the culprits who caused the recession of 2001 and are also responsible for the relatively poor performance of the economy since then. We can think of no other reason as to why the U.S. Government has embarked upon numerous criminal investigations of business firms and their
The recent federal indictment of former Enron Chairman Ken Lay seems to be quite popular with the political classes and the public at large, following the trend in prosecutions of “white collar crime” over the past few years. Attorney General John Ashcroft might be unpopular among Democrats and the mainstream media for many things, but the press
For the past few weeks, I have been following the Richard Scrushy trial in Birmingham, Alabama. Like so many other highly-publicized trials, this one has had its media drama, the hype, and all of the other things that come with high-profile cases – sans murder – and it provides part of the “bread and circuses” that the public and news media seem
The U.S. Supreme Court’s 9-0 decision overturning the obstruction of justice verdict against Arthur Andersen Company comes too late to save the firm or the jobs of thousands of employees who found themselves out of work when the government destroyed the firm three years ago. Indeed, the Andersen decision—despite going against federal
Ramilaben Patel owns some small convenience stores in the Chattanooga, Tennessee, area, with gasoline being one of the many goods that his businesses sell. For about 30 minutes on September 1, his Tiptop Food Mart #3 in East Ridge advertised regular gasoline at $4.99 per gallon. Even with the recent price increases due to supply disruptions in the
It was only a decade ago that the Clinton Administration had decided that Microsoft was an Enemy of the People and tried (mostly unsuccessfully) to litigate the company into oblivion. While the principals in that set of lawsuits have gone on to other things, the “anti-monopoly” propaganda machines are turning their sights elsewhere. It seems that
Concerning the federal court conviction of Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, the punditry has been consistent: the “system” works because people who committed huge crimes have been convicted and will spend all or most of their last years in prison. Thus, Forbes (”The Guiltiest Guys in the Room” by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind) could crow: Guilty!
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.