Reason TV Video: Gun Fiction vs Gun Facts

On April 25 in Washington, D.C., supporters of gun control held a "Stop the NRA Rally and March." Designed to counter what organizers feel is the outsized influence of the National Rifle Association and other pro-Second Amendment groups, the march was widely recognized as a bust, with a stunningly low turnout.

But it wasn't just a disappointment in terms of sheer numbers. The protesters who did show up had an amazingly weak grasp of basic trends related to the number of mass shootings, the effectiveness of assault-weapon bans, and the use of firearms in violent crime.

Reason TV's Amanda Winkler and Joshua Swain attended the rally. Here's what they found.

You're being governed by the uninformed anxieties of people who still watch television (and actually think it's real life). #democracy

Hopefully they will all take the time to read the Justice Department's newest report outlining the dramatic drop in gun violence over the last two decades: http://reason.com/blog/2013/05/07/gun-control-would-address-declining-crim

And then download 3D gun designs.

Thomas Sowell Returns

By: Thomas Winslow Hazlett Reason

How To Cripple The Real Estate Market In Five Easy Steps

If the government and the banks had just allowed real estate prices drop to market equilibrium, we'd be out of this mess and housing would truly be affordable. But the government is determined to artificially prop up housing prices, whatever the cost to the economy. If you were head of Central Planning (howdy, Ben!) and were tasked with crippling the real estate market, here's what you would recommend. Choke the market and banking sector with zombie banks... Have the central bank (the Federal Reserve) buy up $1 trillion in toxic, impaired mortgages... Lower the rate that banks can borrow from the Fed to zero, and then pay the banks interest on all funds deposited at the Fed... Try to prop up the housing market by giving poor credit risk buyers loans with only 3% down... Load young people up with the equivalent of a mortgage in student loans... OK,let's see how our Organs of Central Planning are doing: check, check, check, check, check: a perfect score! they're...

Tax Bill Is Beginning of Formal Debt Criminalization

The noose is tightening on liberty. The United States Congress is steadily headed to a place where those who owe money to the US government shall be treated criminally. This phenomenon is advancing domestically and now, increasingly, internationally. The first shot in this latest campaign took place in 2010 when US President Barack Obama signed into law The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. It demanded, basically, that foreign banks withhold up to 30 percent of the income that an American abroad might earn. This bill isn't working so well because overseas banks are not cooperating (a state of affairs that was certainly expected). Thus, there is a need for something else: Senate Bill 1813, recently introduced by Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA). This bill, in part, states that taxpayers with unpaid taxes over US$50,000 may find their passports confiscated. This isn't criminal per se, but the IRS has recently made noises about "sharing" information with police a...

The Humble Libertarian original

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