ROBERT HIGGS, Ph.D., Senior Fellow RICHARD K

The INDEPENDENT NEWSLETTER OF THE INDEPENDENT INSTITUTE VOLUME XIII, NUMBER 3 Policy Forums on Recently in The War and Global Trade Independent Review ecent Independent Institute policy forums he Independent Institute’s quarterly jour- Raddressed the pre-emptive war in Iraq and T nal The Independent Review continues to cultural trade and globalization. publish path-breaking articles and reviews (in- • PREEMPTIVE WAR STRATEGY: A dividual subscriptions: $28.95 per year). NEW U.S. EMPIRE? (June 25): Foreign policy • Ireland is one of the great economic suc- experts shared their insights at this Independent cess stories of the last decade. In the mid-1980s, Policy Forum. “There is a long history of U.S. in- unemployment reached 17 percent, emigration tervention, covert action, proxy wars, and direct had soared, and government deficits grew so military intervention in the Middle East by both large that IMF intervention became a real pros- Democratic and Republican administrations since the end of World War II,” Stanford historian Joel Beinin began. “The significance of the new policy Joel Beinin, Ivan Eland and Edward Olsen address the Independent Policy Forum on pre-emptive war. is that because of the ideological commitments of the neoconservatives, this policy far exceeds the traditional concerns of both Republican and Democratic administrations since World War I, which have been primarily to secure the political stability and control of the oil of the Persian Gulf.” Long-term control of the Middle East is beyond the reach of the United States, Beinin said, but “this is obscured from the view of (continued on page 3) The Independent Review, Summer 2003. pect. But by the end of 2000, Ireland had re- IN THIS ISSUE: versed its course—economic growth had reached 10 percent per year in the late 1990s Independent Policy Forum ...................... 1 and tens of thousands of emigrants returned The Independent Review ........................... 1 home to new jobs. President’s Letter ...................................... 2 James B. Burnham (Prof. of Business, Report on Climate Change and the EPA ... 3 Duquesne U.) explains the reasons for Ireland’s Independent Institute in the News .......... 4 change of fortune in an insightful article, “Why New Book: Strange Brew .......................... 5 Ireland Boomed,” from The Independent Re- Extra! Extra! Extra! ................................. 7 view (Spring 2003). New Internet Site: OnPower.org ............. 8 (continued on page 6) 2 The INDEPENDENT EXECUTIVE STAFF DAVID J. THEROUX, Founder and President MARY L. G. THEROUX, Vice President ALEXANDER TABARROK, Ph.D., Research Director BRUCE L. BENSON, Ph.D., Senior Fellow IVAN ELAND, Ph.D., Senior Fellow ROBERT HIGGS, Ph.D., Senior Fellow RICHARD K. VEDDER, Ph.D., Senior Fellow K. A. BARNES, Controller PENNY N. BURBANK, Publications Manager ROBERT B. CALVERT, Development Director CARL P. CLOSE, Academic Affairs Director RAY MASSIE, Publications Director JONAH STRAUS, Sales and Marketing Director BOARD OF DIRECTORS ROBERT L. ERWIN, Chairman, Large Scale Biology Corporation JAMES D. FAIR, III, Chairman, Algonquin Petroleum Corp. JOHN S. FAY, President, Piney Woods Corporation PETER A. HOWLEY, Chief Executive Officer, The connectME Center President’s Letter: BRUCE JACOBS, President, Grede Foundries, Inc. WILLARD A. SPEAKMAN, III, President, Speakman Company W. DIEDER TEDE, President, Audubon Cellars & Winery DAVID J. THEROUX, Founder and President, The Independent Institute A Revolt Against MARY L. G. THEROUX, former Chairman, Garvey International PETER A. THIEL, Founder, PayPal, Inc. BOARD OF ADVISORS MARTIN C. ANDERSON Political Power? Keith and Jan Hurlbut Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution HERMAN BELZ Professor of History, University of Maryland THOMAS BORCHERDING Is the recent landslide victory of Arnold Professor of Economics, Claremont Graduate School BOUDEWIJN BOUCKAERT Schwarzenegger in California’s historic recall Professor of Law, University of Ghent, Belgium JAMES M. BUCHANAN election a manifestation of a new anti-political Nobel Laureate in Economic Science, George Mason University ALLAN C. CARLSON President, Howard Center for Family, Religion, and Society revolt against entrenched interests beginning to ROBERT D. COOTER Herman F. Selvin Professor of Law, University of California, Berkeley take hold? The corrupt and incompetent Gray ROBERT W. CRANDALL Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution RICHARD A. EPSTEIN Davis was certainly widely disliked, but the real James Parker Hall Distinguished Service Professor of Law, University of Chicago A. ERNEST FITZGERALD issues are that government deficits, spending, Author, The High Priests of Waste and The Pentagonists B. DELWORTH GARDNER and controls have reached unprecedented and Professor of Economics, Brigham Young University GEORGE GILDER Senior Fellow, Discovery Institute onerous records. Federal deficits are now pro- NATHAN GLAZER Professor of Education and Sociology, Harvard University jected at nearly $400 billion and California is WILLIAM M. H. HAMMETT Former President, Manhattan Institute RONALD HAMOWY facing a record $38 billion deficit, larger than Emeritus Professor of History, University of Alberta, Canada STEVE H. HANKE the combined deficits of all other states. The Professor of Applied Economics, Johns Hopkins University RONALD MAX HARTWELL state’s budget of about $100 billion has grown Emeritus Professor of History, Oxford University JAMES J. HECKMAN Nobel Laureate in Economic Science, University of Chicago in size by 40 percent in just the past five years. H. ROBERT HELLER President, International Payments Institute Yet, despite the economic stagnation cre- WENDY KAMINER Contributing Editor, The Atlantic Monthly LAWRENCE A. KUDLOW ated by the burden of federal and state power, Chief Executive Officer, Kudlow & Company JOHN R. MacARTHUR including from the “War on Terrorism,” politi- Publisher, Harper’s Magazine DEIRDRE N. McCLOSKEY cians and interest groups clamor for even more Distinguished Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago J. HUSTON McCULLOCH Professor of Economics, Ohio State University taxes, regulations and other powers for an ever- FORREST McDONALD Distinguished University Research Professor of History, University of Alabama expanding array of problems, most of which THOMAS GALE MOORE Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution CHARLES MURRAY are of their own making. Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute WILLIAM A. NISKANEN With the stunning recall, what should now Chairman, Cato Institute MICHAEL NOVAK be done to overcome the enormity of problems Jewett Chair in Religion and Public Policy, American Enterprise Institute JUNE E. O’NEILL Director, Center for the Study of Business and Government, Baruch College facing California and elsewhere? In articles in CHARLES E. PHELPS Provost and Professor of Political Science and Economics, University of Rochester the Los Angeles Times and elsewhere, Indepen- PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS Chairman, Institute of Political Economy NATHAN ROSENBERG dent Institute Research Fellow William Fairleigh S. Dickinson, Jr. Professor of Economics, Stanford University SIMON ROTTENBERG Shughart II (editor of the Institute’s book, Tax- Professor of Economics, University of Massachusetts PAUL H. RUBIN ing Choice) has shown the way, proposing the Professor of Economics and Law, Emory University BRUCE M. RUSSETT Dean Acheson Professor of International Relations, Yale University liquidation of the huge and wasted assets held PASCAL SALIN Professor of Economics, University of Paris, France by governments. In California, for example, the ARTHUR SELDON Founder-Director, Institute of Economic Affairs, London WILLIAM F. SHUGHART II state owns more than 1 million acres of land in Robert M. Hearin Chair and Professor of Economics, University of Mississippi VERNON L. SMITH fifteen high-priced counties. A bill in the Cali- Nobel Laureate in Economic Science, George Mason University JOEL H. SPRING fornia Senate has since been submitted to be- Professor of Education, State University of New York, Old Westbury RICHARD L. STROUP Professor of Economics, Montana State University gin the process, an approach which, if adopted, THOMAS S. SZASZ Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry, State University of New York, Syracuse could easily cover deficit costs as well as al- ROBERT D. TOLLISON Robert M. Hearin Chair and Professor of Economics, University of Mississippi ARNOLD S. TREBACH low for major tax reductions. Concurrently, eco- Professor of Criminal Justice, American University GORDON TULLOCK nomic liberalization and the protection of civil University Professor of Law and Economics, George Mason University GORE VIDAL liberties should be rigorously pursued. Author, Burr, Lincoln, 1876, The Golden Age, and other books RICHARD E. WAGNER Hobart R. Harris Professor of Economics, George Mason University Such change will depend on whether the SIR ALAN WALTERS Vice Chairman, AIG Trading Corporation citizenry can see past the usual interest-group PAUL H. WEAVER Author, News and the Culture of Lying and The Suicidal Corporation WALTER E. WILLIAMS propaganda. The Institute’s web sites such as Distinguished Professor of Economics, George Mason University CHARLES WOLFE, Jr. OnPower.org (p. 8), publications (pp. 1, 5), Senior Economist and Fellow, International Economics, RAND Corporation events (p. 1), and media programs (p. 4) pro- THE INDEPENDENT (ISSN 1047-7969): newsletter of The Independent Institute. Copyright © 2003, The Independent Institute, vide

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