By Bill Wilson — Since Barack Obama assumed office, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the total population over age 16 has grown by 5.845 million to 240.5 million , and yet, since then, the civilian labor force has actually shrunk by 349,000 — from about 154.2 million to 153.8 million. This is a startling contradiction, and it is at the heart of why the unemployment rate is much […]

By Bill Wilson — There’s a first time for everything. On Jan. 4, Barack Obama made four recess appointments: Richard Cordray to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Sharon Block, Terence Flynn, and Richard Griffin to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). In itself, that’s not unusual.  […]

The appointment of Richard Cordray to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau , and all acts he may take while in his post, are not worth the paper they are printed on.  Barack Obama has rammed through a phony ‘recess’ appointment when there is no recess, and now he borders on being a tyrant.  Obama cannot […]

No deal is better than a bad deal on extending the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits.  This plan will blow a $180 billion hole in the budget, and right now there are no offsetting spending cuts on the table to help pay for it.  […]

By Bill Wilson — According to former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich , employment needs to grow by at least 90,000 a month just to keep up with the growth of the population. But, since the fall of 2008 , the civilian labor force has actually shrunk from 154.7 million to 153.8 million , a contraction of about 900,000. It’s not that fertility […]

By Bill Wilson — Faced with a barrage of criticism for new legislation that professes to deal with Internet piracy, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Lamar Smith has introduced a manager’s amendment that has, according to Smith , “addressed I believe all of the legitimate concerns out there.” There’s only a small problem. It doesn’t come close to addressing all of the […]

Even with the changes proposed by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Lamar Smith, this bill will essentially criminalize the Internet, making it impossible to upload and share content.  Any service that allows for storing files or posting hyperlinks could be targeted, and on the Internet, […]

NRD Editor’s Note: This article was originally published at The Hill . By Bill Wilson — What began as an attempt to restrain foreign piracy on the Internet has morphed into a domestic “kill switch” on First Amendment freedom in the fastest-growing corner of the marketplace of ideas. Proposed […]

By Bill Wilson — Nightly Americans are bombarded with countless “news” stories of the fight in Congress over government spending and the latest crisis-filled battle over funding the government.  As the country drags itself toward the next so-called deadline of Dec. 16, the din is likely to […]

By Bill Wilson — Twenty-seven years before a massive Japanese carrier task force set sail from Hitokappu Bay in Iturup to attack the U.S. Naval base at Pearl Harbor, a single Japanese ship steamed southeast into Chuuk (then called “Truk”), a tiny island with a deep lagoon […]