Week in Review: August 26, 2017

By: Mises Institute

On Monday, President Donald Trump decided to go against his own “instincts” and committed to a renewed military surge in Afghanistan. Already Congress commits to spending more in year 16 of the conflict than any European nation spends on their entire military, aided by a Federal Reserve prepared to monetize ever growing debt. Of course, Trump’s shift isn’t surprising. As Ryan McMaken noted this week, it makes political sense for an increasingly isolated president to try to consolidate support behind military action. Unfortunately, it’s still bad economics.

To dive deeper into Trump’s foreign policy shift, Daniel McAdams joins Jeff on Mises Weekends. The costs of our wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria — human and economic — keep piling up. How do such deeply unpopular wars go on so long? Why do sensible notions of peace and non-intervention fail to gain a foothold in Congress or the White House? How does the War Party in DC play both sides? And how do they silence anti-war voices like Tulsi Gabbard?

And in case you missed them, here are this weeks Mises Wire and FedWatch articles, covering a wide array of topics:

• Murray Rothbard: An Uncompromising Optimist by Jeff Deist
• Are Central Banks Nationalizing the Economy? by Daniel Lacalle
• Southern Secession Was One Thing — and the War to Prevent It Was Another by Ryan McMaken
• The King Hath a Heavy Reckoning to Make by Matthew McCaffrey
• Gun Control Laws Have Failed Latin America by José Niño
• Domestic Politics Is Dictating Our Foreign Policy by Ryan McMaken
• The Milk of the Poppy by Chris Calton
• The Fiscal Benefits of Free Trade by Alasdair Macleod
• How Rand Paul Can Free Americans from the Fed by Tho Bishop
• The Eclipse: How Markets Could Have Prevented the “Traffic Nightmare” by Ryan McMaken
• Austrian Monetary Theory vs. Federal Reserve Inflation Targeting by Richard M. Ebeling
• Ron Paul Institute Statement on Trump’s Afghanistan Speech by Daniel McAdams
• The Chinese Economy’s Fatal Flaws by William Hongsong Wang
• The Real Cause of America’s Opioid Epidemic by Mark Thornton
• The Levellers: The First Libertarians by Roberta A. Modugno
• The Relationship Between Saving and Money by Frank Shostak

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