“Capitalism” on The Daily Caller

After making its return with this month’s May Day demonstrations, the Occupy Wall Street movement will be out in force this weekend to protest the NATO summit in Chicago. Although the OWSers are not very good at articulating what they’re for, it’s clear what they’re against: capitalism. Many idealistic young people are seduced by the message that government, in the name of “fairness,” must “correct” the income disparity between the super-wealthy 1% and the other 99%. Is there a way to get these young idealists to appreciate the superior morality of capitalism? I believe that there is. (more)

When Time, Newsweek, The Huffington Post and the balance of America’s left-wing scribes hailed Barack Obama as the smartest man ever to enter the Oval Office, they may have been underselling him. Furthermore, I retract every critique I’ve ever made of our 44th president, hail him as a genius of the first order, and humbly bow my head in awe at his singular accomplishment. I’m embarrassed to admit that it took me so long to understand the intellectual majesty behind Obama’s actions as our nation’s commander-in-chief. (more)

The voters of South Carolina succumbed on Saturday to the considerable charms that former Speaker Newt Gingrich holds for conservatives. As a conservative myself, I too had succumbed to those charms not too long ago — before we learned that Freddie Mac had made Gingrich the world’s highest-paid “historian”; before Gingrich unveiled his bizarre ideas for bringing recalcitrant judges into line; and, most importantly, before he blithely threw capitalism under the bus in his vengeful rage against Mitt Romney. These and other things eventually brought me to my senses about Gingrich. If the GOP is to have any hope of defeating President Obama, Republicans who are getting swept up in the second coming of Newt-mania will also have to come to their senses. (more)

“For over a hundred years,” F.A. Hayek wrote in 1961, “we have been exhorted to embrace socialism because it would give us more goods. Since it has so lamentably failed to achieve this … we are now urged to adopt it because more goods after all are not important.” (more)

It’s no surprise that Steve Jobs worked until six weeks before he died. Nor is it shocking that he left behind a secret gift to Apple, its shareholders, and its employees: a four-year product pipeline, a reverse time capsule for future generations to open and see what will be — versus looking back to see what was. This is what creative geniuses do, and it is how Jobs defined tech-cool and masterminded the single greatest comeback in corporate history. (more)

With the sad passing of Steve Jobs, everyone is talking about what an awesome entrepreneur he was. But what exactly do entrepreneurs like Jobs do for the economy? (more)

“Moneyball,” the new movie about baseball, does something that few Hollywood films do: It respects and celebrates innovation and entrepreneurship. (more)

Everybody knows that libertarians are greedy capitalists who favor the maximization of profit above all else. “Taxation is theft!” they cry, but the exploitation of the working classes fails to elicit any similar moral outrage. Libertarians, everybody knows, care about the rich to the utter neglect of the poor and vulnerable. (more)

“Atlas Shrugged: Part I,” which opens April 15th, is a movie unlike any other. Based on Ayn Rand’s novel, it dramatizes the fundamental conflict gripping our world: the battle between those who create value and wealth through their own efforts (the producers) and those who seek them through force (the looters and moochers). (more)

“Atlas Shrugged: Part 1,” the film adaptation of Ayn Rand’s prescient, unabashedly pro-free market capitalism novel, hits theaters April 15. Its timing could not be better. (more)

Last week at Salon.com, Michael Lind of the New America Foundation declared the failure of “shareholder capitalism,” Mr. Lind’s unique way of describing an economic system in which the production of goods and services is owned and directed by private interests. (more)

Proof that you don’t have to live in New York or Hollywood to be a left-wing knothead was the decision by a Chicago high school to boycott a basketball tournament in Arizona because someone — the principal perhaps — opposed Arizona’s immigration policy. A policy, as we all know, that is the mirror image of federal law. Then, having shown the world what they think of those racists in Arizona, they went off to play an exhibition game in a country that serves as a role model for freedom-loving people everywhere . . . China! (more)

Today marks the anniversary of the publication of Adam Smith’s most famous work, The Wealth of Nations, which was published on March 9, 1776. It’s one of my favorite books. (more)

In “The Tragedy of Modern Environmental Thought,” I introduced a controversial idea: resources will never run out so long as humans have the necessary institutions (mainly free markets) to coordinate information and decision making. Some critics have raised fair questions: What about the period before environmental regulation, when there were well-documented ecological catastrophes? How does one take advantage of voluntary institutions to achieve ends consistent with both human flourishing and environmental protection? And how can a society correct for market failure? (more)

Last month American reporters expressed concern at a recent study published by the Conference Board which claimed that the US economy would be overtaken by China in two short years.  This alarming news came just weeks after a ranking of the world’s most powerful people put President Barack Obama at number two — beaten into second place by Chinese premier Hu Jintao. (more)

Trying to solve our economic problems with more stimulus is like the captain of the Titanic trying to solve his iceberg problems with more acceleration. (more)

Why don’t politicians pay more attention to the town hall meetings and the Tea Party members? Can’t they see the grassroots resistance to the direction they are taking the country? Is it so hard for them to comprehend that a significant number of citizens might rise up on their own in opposition to out-of-control government spending, unimaginably huge federal deficits, promised increases in taxes, a weak approach to terrorism and defense, and government takeovers of significant parts of the private sector? (more)

“It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.” — Adam Smith (more)

Is President Obama a socialist? According to actual socialists, the answer is an emphatic “no.” (more)

Cuba’s plan to lay off half a million state workers is another bid to save its economy through gradual but strictly controlled reforms that lean toward, if not fully embrace, capitalism, Tracy Wilkinson reports in The Times. (more)