Personal Responsibility Lawyer Michael Lovins

The Texas House is considering #HB19, which shifts the costs of tragic wrecks caused by trucking companies onto the victims, and away from insurance companies and trucking companies. “Tort reform" is usually thought of as coming from “conservative” Republicans. There is nothing conservative about this bill; it is a horrible example of #CronyCapitalism and a gift to socialists who attack capitalism because it lets them compare socialism to crony capitalism instead of free market capitalism. If you compare socialism to crony capitalism, you have a fair fight. But socialism has no chance against true free market capitalism.

Problems can be solved. This episode is all about solving the problems related to the gap between outcomes for black communities as compared to white communities. 
Race and racial tensions dominate the headlines. Very little of the news or arguments focus on how to make things better. This episode is all about solutions.
Dr. Richard A Johnson III is the director of the Booker T. Washington Initiative. He has been instrumental in crafting policies to help break the school to prison pipeline, and how to improve public safety, public works, healthcare. and housing.

China may be a bad actor in international trade, but are tariffs the way to deal with them? The candidacy and presidency of Donald Trump has brought international trade policy—especially with respect to China—to the forefront of political discussion. The pre-Trump Republican Party was staunchly free trade, but Trump has challenged and changed that to a great extent, for better or worse.
Free trade advocates (like your intrepid host!) may rightly oppose tariffs in principle, but does that mean we have no way to respond to nations who don't play by fair trading rules? Simon Lester of the Cato Institute says we have several arrows in our quiver.
A few specific topics we covered:
 
What is fair trade? We use the phrase a lot, but we should be clear about what we mean. Are trade deficits good? Bad? Indifferent? Why? Is China actually abusive in its trade conduct? Are tariffs the best way to respond to China's behavior? What other strategies and tactics does the US have at its disposal? Are there national security implications to being heavily reliant on a foreign power for our supply chain?  

Unless you've been under a rock, you know that a huge part of the US economy has been shut down by shelter in place orders in nearly every state. The idea behind this is to limit human interactions, which then at least theoretically limits the transmission of the novel coronavirus. It makes sense, at least in theory.
But what are the costs? And how do we make fiscal policy--both in Congress and at the Federal Reserve--that minimizes the long term damage of shutting down.
The purpose of this discussion isn't to debate whether the economy should shut down, how long it should remain shut down, or whether the economic cost is worth the public health benefits. The purpose is to discuss how to anticipate and mitigate the economic damage that the shutdown has caused and will continue to cause.

We have never had such a huge part of the American economy shut down immediately, without warning, and without an end in sight. What do we do now? How do we get ready to re-open? How do we limit the damage to the economy without risking excessive caronavirus carnage? Has Congress's relief package provided much relief? Rob Henneke of the Texas Public Policy Foundation and I dive into these questions and more.

The first freedom mentioned in the Bill of Rights is the freedom of religion. "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." First Liberty is a public interest law firm based in Texas that helps people live out that freedom. I had the opportunity to sit down with Jeremy Dys (@JeremyDys) to talk about a recent landmark decision that First Liberty won at the United States Supreme Court.
The case is often referred to as the Bladensburg Cross case, but its formal style is American Legion v. American Humanist Association. You can read the official opinion here.