Author Archive | Stuart Benjamin

Which famous North Carolina politician said the following to Business North Carolina magazine about President Bush’s tax cut?: “I would not have voted for the tax cut, based on what I know. I think he was eager for attention, so the fellow down at the pool hall could say, `Boy, that fellow has guts.’ There […]

Eugene makes a good point (below) about the way that Breyer’s and Scalia’s positions gives room to both liberal and conservatives to take a position seemingly at odds with their ideologies. I would add that there is a way in which Breyer’s and Scalia’s votes are completely unsurprising: Scalia’s position is in line with his […]

I’ve had time to give today’s opinions only a quick review, but I was struck by the dissent’s language in Rumsfeld v. Padilla. The majority didn’t reach the merits, because it found that the case had been filed in the wrong jurisdiction. Stevens’ dissent (joined by Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer) focused on the jurisdiction/venue issue, […]

(First read my post, then Jacob’s response.) I think your guess is basically correct. Countercyclical effects appear to count for some of the negative relationship, but not a lot of it. I believe that they chose 1981 to 2000 in part because it covers full economic cycles (and, of course, allows for looking at whether […]

I’ve run across a fascinating paper by William Niskanen and Peter Van Doren of the Cato Institute (which Niskanen has kindly allowed me to quote). In a paper that Niskanen published in 2002 and that Niskanen and Van Doren have just updated (and presented to the Public Choice Society), they discuss the “starve the beast” […]

Until Janet Jackson’s breast appeared for .7 seconds (an FCC friend tells me that FCC staffers watched it dozens of times to count the number of frames containing an image of her breast), FCC penalties for broadcast indecency were rare and relatively small. Only three fines since 1999 were greater than $50,000. The fifth-highest fine […]

The NBA playoffs start tomorrow. The Minnesota Timberwolves are the 1st seed in the Western Conference – meaning that they play the 8th seeded Denver Nuggets. If the Timberwolves had the choice, they might well prefer to play the 7th seeded Houston Rockets, who slumped badly at the end of the season and are playing […]

Condoleezza Rice is going to testify tomorrow. Many people (myself included) will be interested in what she has to say and have not already made up their minds about her and her testimony. But many others have made up their minds — notably, the partisan talking heads who populate shows like “Hardball.” They already have […]

We live in a partisan world, of course, and so it is no surprise when partisan Republicans attack Richard Clarke. But I find the attacks from Rush Limbaugh and other partisans particularly disappointing. For most aspects of economic and social policy, ordinary citizens have access to the same data as the decisionmakers (e.g., unemployment figures, […]