LewRockwell.com
Encyclopedia
Libertarianism
Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
web magazine operated by Burton Blumert
Burton Blumert
Burton S. Blumert was the president of the Center for Libertarian Studies in Burlingame, California, chairman of the Mises Institute, and the publisher of LewRockwell.com...
(publisher, died on March 30, 2009), Lew Rockwell
Lew Rockwell
Llewellyn Harrison "Lew" Rockwell, Jr. is an American libertarian political commentator, activist, proponent of the Austrian School of economics, and chairman of the Ludwig von Mises Institute.-Life and work:...
(editor-in-chief
Editor in chief
An editor-in-chief is a publication's primary editor, having final responsibility for the operations and policies. Additionally, the editor-in-chief is held accountable for delegating tasks to staff members as well as keeping up with the time it takes them to complete their task...
), Eric Garris
Eric Garris
Eric Garris is an activist in the libertarian movement in the United States, known as the founding webmaster of two prominent libertarian websites.-Background:...
(webmaster), and others associated with the Center for Libertarian Studies
Center for Libertarian Studies
The Center for Libertarian Studies was a libertarian and anarcho-capitalist oriented educational organization founded in 1976 by Murray Rothbard and Burton Blumert, which grew out of the Libertarian Scholars Conferences...
(CLS); its motto is "anti-state, anti-war, pro-market". Rockwell has commented that off-point association with paleoconservatism
Paleoconservatism
Paleoconservatism is a term for a conservative political philosophy found primarily in the United States stressing tradition, limited government, civil society, anti-colonialism, anti-corporatism and anti-federalism, along with religious, regional, national and Western identity. Chilton...
has been an unfortunate association of the term "paleolibertarian
Paleolibertarianism
Paleolibertarianism is a school of thought within American libertarianism associated with the late economist Murray Rothbard, and the Ludwig von Mises Institute. It is based on a combination of right-libertarianism in politics and cultural conservatism in social thought...
". Andrew Napolitano
Andrew Napolitano
Andrew Paolo Napolitano is a former New Jersey Superior Court Judge and now a political and legal analyst for Fox News Channel. Napolitano started on the channel in 1998, and currently serves as the network's senior judicial analyst, commenting on legal news and trials...
in his book Lies the Government Told You has described LewRockwell.com as "the best monitor of government excess in America today," and Congressman Ron Paul
Ron Paul
Ronald Ernest "Ron" Paul is an American physician, author and United States Congressman who is seeking to be the Republican Party candidate in the 2012 presidential election. Paul represents Texas's 14th congressional district, which covers an area south and southwest of Houston that includes...
has written that he "especially value[s]" the site.
Closely associated with the Ludwig von Mises Institute
Ludwig von Mises Institute
The Ludwig von Mises Institute , based in Auburn, Alabama, is a libertarian academic organization engaged in research and scholarship in the fields of economics, philosophy and political economy. Its scholarship is inspired by the work of Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises...
, the site is known for advocating Austrian school
Austrian School
The Austrian School of economics is a heterodox school of economic thought. It advocates methodological individualism in interpreting economic developments , the theory that money is non-neutral, the theory that the capital structure of economies consists of heterogeneous goods that have...
economics and hard money policy
Hard money (policy)
Hard money policies are those which are opposed to fiat currency and thus in support of a specie standard, usually gold or silver, typically implemented with representative money....
, and opposition to war
Anti-war
An anti-war movement is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts. Many...
and imperialism
Imperialism
Imperialism, as defined by Dictionary of Human Geography, is "the creation and/or maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural, and territorial relationships, usually between states and often in the form of an empire, based on domination and subordination." The imperialism of the last 500 years,...
. For instance, a Blumert article referred to criticisms of gold investors as "scurrilous" marginalization. Its writers also sometimes express positions on topics such as the global warming controversy
Global warming controversy
Global warming controversy refers to a variety of disputes, significantly more pronounced in the popular media than in the scientific literature, regarding the nature, causes, and consequences of global warming...
. Polemics have been directed against police
Police
The police is a personification of the state designated to put in practice the enforced law, protect property and reduce civil disorder in civilian matters. Their powers include the legitimized use of force...
abuse of civil liberties
Civil liberties
Civil liberties are rights and freedoms that provide an individual specific rights such as the freedom from slavery and forced labour, freedom from torture and death, the right to liberty and security, right to a fair trial, the right to defend one's self, the right to own and bear arms, the right...
. Occasional articles criticize Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
, usually in context of the libertarian doctrine of the right of secession
Secession
Secession is the act of withdrawing from an organization, union, or especially a political entity. Threats of secession also can be a strategy for achieving more limited goals.-Secession theory:...
and the tendency for government powers to be increased during wartime. The website has sometimes provided a forum for fringe and heterodox science
Fringe science
Fringe science is scientific inquiry in an established field of study that departs significantly from mainstream or orthodox theories, and is classified in the "fringes" of a credible mainstream academic discipline....
; the site has published critics of the 2009 swine flu vaccination
2009 flu pandemic vaccine
The 2009 flu pandemic vaccines are the set of influenza vaccines that have been developed to protect against the pandemic H1N1/09 virus. These vaccines either contain inactivated influenza virus, or weakened live virus that cannot cause influenza. The killed vaccine is injected, while the live...
and advocates of AIDS denialism. However, the columns are deliberately idiosyncratic and therefore disclaimed as not necessarily representing Rockwell.
In 2007, LRC published numerous articles endorsing Ron Paul
Ron Paul
Ronald Ernest "Ron" Paul is an American physician, author and United States Congressman who is seeking to be the Republican Party candidate in the 2012 presidential election. Paul represents Texas's 14th congressional district, which covers an area south and southwest of Houston that includes...
's 2008 presidential campaign
Ron Paul presidential campaign, 2008
Ron Paul was a Republican Party primary candidate in the 2008 United States presidential election.Initial opinion polls during the first three quarters of 2007 showed Ron Paul consistently receiving support from 3% or less of those polled...
, and, as such, it registered as a 501(c)(4) entity as of June 30, 2007, in order to legally separate it from the nonprofit Center for Libertarian Studies
Center for Libertarian Studies
The Center for Libertarian Studies was a libertarian and anarcho-capitalist oriented educational organization founded in 1976 by Murray Rothbard and Burton Blumert, which grew out of the Libertarian Scholars Conferences...
, at which time it moved from Burlingame, California to Auburn, Alabama.
As of July 21, 2008, LRC provides a podcast called the Lew Rockwell Show on weekdays, often with interviews with economists affiliated with the Mises Institute
Ludwig von Mises Institute
The Ludwig von Mises Institute , based in Auburn, Alabama, is a libertarian academic organization engaged in research and scholarship in the fields of economics, philosophy and political economy. Its scholarship is inspired by the work of Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises...
.
Notable contributors
Sources:
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William S. Lind William S. Lind is an American expert on military affairs and a pundit on cultural conservatism.-Education:Lind graduated from Dartmouth College in 1969 and from Princeton University in 1971, where he received a Master's Degree in history.-Military expertise:Alongside several U.S. officers, Lind... Jim Lobe James R. Lobe is an American journalist and the Washington Bureau Chief of the international news agency Inter Press Service. He has also written for Foreign Policy In Focus, Oneworld.net, Alternet, TomPaine.com, Asia Times, and other internet news publications. Lobe is best known for his... John Lott John Richard Lott Jr. is an American academic and political commentator. He has previously held research positions at academic institutions including the University of Chicago, Yale University, the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Maryland, College Park,... Tibor R. Machan Tibor Richard Machan, Ph.D. is a Hungarian-American philosopher. A professor emeritus in the department of philosophy at Auburn University, Machan holds the R. C... Eric Margolis Eric S. Margolis is an American-born journalist and writer. For 27 years, ending in 2010, he was a contributing editor to the Toronto Sun chain of newspapers, writing mainly about the Middle East, South Asia and Islam. He contributes to the Huffington Post and appears frequently on Canadian... Wendy McElroy Wendy McElroy is a Canadian individualist anarchist and individualist feminist. She was a co-founder along with Carl Watner and George H. Smith of The Voluntaryist in 1982.-Sex-positive:... Ilana Mercer Ilana Mercer is a writer, born in South Africa to Rabbi Ben Isaacson and raised in Israel, where the family decided to move after Rabbi Ben Isaacson's anti-apartheid preaching and activism led to their harassment by South African security forces... Loretta Nall Loretta Nall is the founder of the United States Marijuana Party which calls for the legalization of cannabis. She was a write-in candidate for governor of Alabama in 2006.... Ron Paul Ronald Ernest "Ron" Paul is an American physician, author and United States Congressman who is seeking to be the Republican Party candidate in the 2012 presidential election. Paul represents Texas's 14th congressional district, which covers an area south and southwest of Houston that includes... John Pilger John Richard Pilger is an Australian journalist and documentary maker, based in London. He has twice won Britain's Journalist of the Year Award, and his documentaries have received academy awards in Britain and the US.... Ralph Raico Ralph Raico is an American historian, libertarian, and specialist in European classical liberalism and Austrian Economics. He is currently a professor of history at Buffalo State College and a senior faculty member at the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Raico was a student of Ludwig von Mises and... Justin Raimondo Justin Raimondo is an American author and the editorial director of the website Antiwar.com. He describes himself as a "conservative-paleo-libertarian."-Background:... Fred Reed Fred Reed is a technology columnist for The Washington Times and the author of Fred on Everything, a weekly independent column. He also writes books and other material. He has also written for The American Conservative and LewRockwell.com... Charley Reese Charley Reese is a syndicated columnist known for his anti-Isreal and conservative views. He was associated with the Orlando Sentinel from 1971–2001, both as a writer and in various editorial capacities... Morgan Reynolds Morgan O. Reynolds is a former professor emeritus at Texas A&M University and former director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis headquartered in Dallas, TX.... Jeff Riggenbach Jeff Riggenbach is an American libertarian journalist, author, editor, broadcaster, and educator.Riggenbach's first book, In Praise of Decadence , argued that the baby boomers turned out to be far more libertarian in their personal philosophy than had been expected.His second book, Why American... |
Paul Craig Roberts Paul Craig Roberts is an American economist and a columnist for Creators Syndicate. He served as an Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan Administration earning fame as a co-founder of Reaganomics. He is a former editor and columnist for the Wall Street Journal, Business Week, and... Murray Rothbard Murray Newton Rothbard was an American author and economist of the Austrian School who helped define capitalist libertarianism and popularized a form of free-market anarchism he termed "anarcho-capitalism." Rothbard wrote over twenty books and is considered a centrally important figure in the... Peter Schiff Peter David Schiff is an American investment broker, author and financial commentator. Schiff is CEO and chief global strategist of Euro Pacific Capital Inc., a broker-dealer based in Westport, Connecticut and CEO of Euro Pacific Precious Metals, LLC, a gold and silver dealer based in New York... Hans Sennholz Hans F. Sennholz was an economist of the Austrian school of economics who studied under Ludwig von Mises. After serving in the Luftwaffe in World War II, he took degrees at the universities of Marburg and Köln. He then moved to the United States to study for a Ph.D. at New York University... Cindy Sheehan Cindy Lee Miller Sheehan is an American anti-war activist whose son, U.S. Army Specialist Casey Sheehan, was killed by enemy action during the Iraq War. She attracted national and international media attention in August 2005 for her extended anti-war protest at a makeshift camp outside President... Joseph Sobran Michael Joseph Sobran, Jr. was an American journalist and writer, formerly with National Review and a syndicated columnist, known as Joe Sobran. Pundit Pat Buchanan called Sobran "perhaps the finest columnist of our generation", although Sobran was fired from National Review by his one-time mentor... Vin Suprynowicz Vin Suprynowicz is a U.S. libertarian columnist who writes editorials for the Las Vegas, Nevada based Las Vegas Review-Journal. He is the author of two nonfiction compilations of his newspaper columns: Send In the Waco Killers and The Ballad of Carl Drega... Mark Thornton Mark Thornton is an American economist of the Austrian School. Thornton has been described by the Advocates for Self-Government as "one of America's experts on the economics of illegal drugs." Thornton has written extensively on that topic, as well as on the economics of the American Civil War,... Jeffrey Tucker Jeffrey Albert Tucker is the publisher and executive editor of Laissez Faire Books. He is past editorial vice president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute and past editor for the institute's website, Mises.org... Ron Unz Ronald Keeva Unz, is a former businessman and political activist, best known for an unsuccessful race in 1994 for the governorship of California, and for sponsoring propositions promoting structured English immersion education. In March 2007, The American Conservative named him its new publisher... Jude Wanniski Jude Thaddeus Wanniski was an American journalist, conservative commentator, and political economist.- Early life and education :... Walter E. Williams Walter E. Williams, is an American economist, commentator, and academic. He is the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, as well as a syndicated columnist and author known for his libertarian views.- Early life and education :Williams family during childhood... Clyde N. Wilson Clyde N. Wilson is a professor of history at the University of South Carolina, U.S., a paleoconservative political commentator, a long-time contributing editor for Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture and Southern Partisan magazine, and an occasional contributor to National Review... Thomas Woods Thomas E. "Tom" Woods, Jr. is an American historian, economist, political analyst, and New York Times-bestselling author. He has written extensively on the subjects of American history, contemporary politics, and economic theory... Kevin Zeese Kevin Zeese is an American political activist who has been a leader in the drug policy reform and peace movements and in efforts to ensure a voter verified paper audit trail. He was on the ballot as the nominee of the Maryland Green Party for a U.S. Senate seat during the 2006 election, receiving... |