Libertarianism was once the ideology of cranks. While not the kind of people to hand out leaflets at the airport or solicit your house uninvited, libertarians were humorously derided by many and considered suspect by the rest. Then, during the 1970s and ’80s, as the country became disenchanted with government activism, libertarian ideas began to […]
What will welfare reform mean for medical care of the poor? Welfare recipients today get Medicaid, which amounts to government-paid free health care. If they go to work they will sooner or later lose Medicaid, leaving some without health insurance altogether. Thus, any plan to end “welfare as we know it” must deal with the […]
Anti-Choice Some weeks ago, a Calvert reporter went to a conference jointly hosted by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and People for the American Way (PFAW), a liberal organization founded in 1980 by Norman Lear. The NAACP/PFAW marriage goes under the name, “Partners for Public Education,” a partnership whose mission, […]
Governor Parris N. Glendening (D) has proposed a sizable cut in income-tax rates for Maryland. While the governor has taken an important step in recognizing that the key to economic growth is a lower tax burden for state residents, his proposal has several key defects that must be remedied before enactment. The Glendening Proposal On […]
According to scholars Anthony Downs, Katherine Bradbury and Kenneth Small, Baltimore was a city in distress as early as 1982.1 Today, the town is in a similar state, if not worse, given the diminishing tax base and increased demand for services that have occurred over the last several years. Many of Baltimore’s – and other […]
Tod Lindberg contends that the winning Republican coalition of the 1980s is cracking up. The state legislatures, the governorships, the Congress – all are increasingly Republican, while the presidency has now twice gone Democratic for the first time since FDR. Lindberg argues that practical Republicanism sells at the local level. But the Republicans’ ideology does […]
It is by now well known that the General Assembly’s Joint Committee on Welfare Reform has recommended that legislation be crafted allowing the state to screen welfare applicants for drug use. The task force is co-chaired by Senator Martin G. Madden (R-Howard and Price George’s) and Delegate Samuel I. Rosenberg (D-Baltimore City/County). There are a […]
Governor Glendening has reneged on his pledge to cut taxes. This is a political mistake as well as an economic one for the state. While he may pay the political price that befell George Bush in 1992 and the Democrats in 1994 after they broke their promises on taxes, it is Maryland residents who will […]
With Bill Clinton’s reelection to the White House, doubtless there will be intensified talk of “revisiting” welfare reform – largely with a view to gutting it. Likewise, at the state level, this reporter recently participated in a public debate on welfare reform at Loyola College in Baltimore. A well meaning opponent earnestly defended the old […]
Evil, like beauty, is often in the eye of the beholder, and the religious right serves as a good case in point. Some Americans, mostly liberal and secular, believe the religious right poses the greatest threat to American democracy since the country’s founding. Others, mostly conservative and religious, believe it represents God’s last battalion in […]