The mess in Europe has been rather frustrating, largely because almost everybody is on the wrong side. Some folks say they want “austerity,” but that’s largely a code word for higher taxes. They’re fighting against the people who say they want “growth,” but that’s generally a code word for more Keynesian spending. So you can […]

I’m in Vilnius, Lithuania, where I just finished speaking to a regional conference of the European Students for Liberty. I subjected the kids to more than 90 minutes of pontificating and 73 PowerPoint slides, but I could have saved them a lot of time if I simply showed them this Rahn Curve video and then […]

For quite some time, I’ve thought of Herman van Rompuy as the poster child of Europe’s incompetent political elite. Virtually unknown to people in the real world (his sole claim to fame is that a British MEP, in a speech that went viral on YouTube, said he resembled a “low-grade bank clerk”), the President of […]

With all the fiscal troubles in Greece, Spain, Ireland, Portugal, and Italy, there’s not much attention being paid to Cyprus. But the Mediterranean island nation is a good case study illustrating the economic dangers of big government. For all intents and purposes, Cyprus is now bankrupt, and the only question that remains to be answered […]

Yesterday, I did a serious post outlining the absurd policies being pursued in France, Italy, and Greece, along with some much-deserved scorn for the throw-fuel-on-the-fire statist analysis of the International Monetary Fund. Later in the day, I posted a cartoon about Greece and also included links to other amusing posts about the mess across the […]

Every day brings more and more evidence that Obamanomics is failing in Europe.  I wrote some “Observations on the European Farce” last week, but the news this morning is even more surreal. Let’s start with France, where I endorsed the explicit socialist over the implicit socialist precisely because of a morbid desire to see a […]

Spain’s received a bailout, Greece is having another election tomorrow, and the European political elite is pushing for more centralization. In other words, business as usual in the continent where voters think you can get nothing for nothing (this satirical cartoon is now European reality) and politicians think every problem can be solved by more […]

Guido Westerwelle is supposed to be the German version of a libertarian. Currently serving as Foreign Minister, he was the chairman of the supposedly pro-market Free Democratic Party for 10 years and Wikipedia says he was known as a “proponent of an unlimited free market economy.” Sounds like a good guy, right? Just the type […]

It seems that there’s nothing but bad news coming from Europe. Whether we’re talking about fake austerity in the United Kingdom, confiscatory tax schemes in France, or bailouts in Greece, the continent seems to be a case study of failed statism. But that’s not completely accurate. Every so often I highlight good news, such as […]

I wrote last year about a tax protest in Ireland, and I wrote earlier this year about a tax revolt in Greece. But Irish and Greek taxpayers are wimps compared to their Italian compatriots. When Italians decide to have a tax revolt, they don’t kid around. Here are some remarkable details from the UK-based Telegraph. […]