Fighting For the Pole

Business, Protectionism
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In the era of franchised unisex stylers like Supercuts and Great Clips  it’s hard to imagine that barbers and cosmetologists are fighting over who can have a barber pole advertising their shops.  The latest legislative fights over the swirling red, white, and blue poles are in the states of Minnesota, Michigan and North Carolina.

“The barber pole is the oldest sign in town besides the cross. It should not be displayed where there is not a licensed barber,” long time Arkansas barber Charles Kirkpatrick, told the Associated Press.  Kirkpatrick keeps tabs on such legislation for the National Association of Barber Boards of America.

Notice Kirkpatrick said “licensed” barber.  The implication is that the licensing signals to the customer that a certain level of quality can be assured by the government’s stamp of approval.  Yet according to Morris Kleiner, “Occupational licensing has either no impact or even a negative impact on the quality of services provided to customers by members of the regulated occupation. Additionally, as occupations become licensed, members of regulated occupations see their earnings go up.”

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A Pirate Gets Licensed

Business, IP Law, Protectionism
By / / 5 minutes of reading
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Obtaining an unlimited gaming license in Nevada isn’t easy.  The Gaming Control Board does months and months of investigation into an applicant’s past.  No stone goes unturned.  Youthful mistakes can keep a potential owner from opening for business.  Instead of customers deciding who has the requisite morals to plug in the slot machines and roll out the green felt, government gumshoes and politically-appointed wise ones decide who is worthy.  Casino patrons must be protected.

Legend has it that Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel was driving through the desert, envisioned an oasis, built the Flamingo, and created Las Vegas. That’s not the way it happened.

Casino gambling was legalized in 1931, and Siegel’s Flamingo flopped when it opened in December 1946, after successful premiers of other hotels. “In reality,” John L. Smith explains in his book Sharks in the Desert, “[Meyer] Lansky and several lesser-known racketeers, together with some plain old transplanted gamblers, played much greater roles than Siegel.”

One of those gamblers was Benny Binion, who left his Dallas bookmaking and racketeering empire and set out for Las Vegas in 1946 with his wife and children. Binion’s Horseshoe Club in downtown Las Vegas was a fixture from its opening in 1951 until his daughter, Becky, ran it into the ground in 2004.

The ability of gamblers and bookmakers to leave their clandestine operations behind in the east to re-open them unfettered in the bright sunshine of Las Vegas ended in 1955, when the Nevada Legislature founded the Nevada Gaming Control Board and the Nevada Gaming Commission.  Some long-time Nevadans observe that the Silver State has gone down hill ever since.

While Las Vegas was settled by gamblers and made men, Nevada’s newest licensee is a 65-year old singer/songwriter who turned 15 minutes of inspiration into a business empire.  Applicant James W. Buffett penned a little ditty back in 1977 called “Margaritaville,” that would spawn a happy-hour movement of the middle-aged.  The parrothead anthem has blossomed into an unmistakable brand for Buffett’s retail stores, restaurants, consumer products, and now, casinos.

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Jeff Tucker on Reddit’s “Ask Me Anything”

(Austrian) Economics, Anti-Statism, IP Law, Libertarian Theory, Technology
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Jeff Tucker was invited to submit a video reply to the most popular questions submitted to him via a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” thread. See feedback on Part I; the two video parts are below. Fascinating interview from one of my favorite modern libertarians and a good friend. In the interview he argues that “Stefan (Molyneux) is one of the single most influential libertarian thinkers of our times” (21:30 – 22:00) and also has nice things to say about Hoppe, Higgs, and me (11:00-14:50). Good discussion of IP in Part I at about 9:15, and again at 22:00, and also at 11:00-14:50 in Part II, and many other stimulating comments.

Jeffrey Tucker’s Answers to “Ask me anything” Reddit thread – Part I from Jeffrey Tucker on Vimeo.

Jeffrey Tucker’s Answers to “Ask me anything” Reddit thread – Part 2 from Jeffrey Tucker on Vimeo.

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Don’t Read the TSA Blog at an airport!

Police Statism
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Regarding the recent TSA flap where “a TSA-critic and blogger named Jonathan Corbett has been making the viral video rounds, supposedly showing how “anyone can get anything past the TSA’s scanners.” The TSA,  in addition to apparently warning the media not to cover this story, has also responded on its own blog. The post has an amazing line:

For obvious security reasons, we can’t discuss our technology’s detection capability in detail, however TSA conducts extensive testing of all screening technologies in the laboratory and at airports prior to rolling them out to the entire field. Imaging technology has been extremely effective in the field and has found things artfully concealed on passengers as large as a gun or nonmetallic weapons, on down to a tiny pill or tiny baggies of drugs. It’s one of the best tools available to detect metallic and non-metallic items, such as… you know… things that go BOOM.

Things that go BOOM. Wow. So… if you are reading the TSA’s own blog out loud at the airport, you are subject to arrest.

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Reporters Warned By TSA Not To Report On Scanner Failures

Police Statism, Technology
By / / 2 minutes of reading
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The agency that is “tasked” with keeping flights “safe” is warning reporters not to report on scanner failures. You see, if terrorists were to find out these weaknesses it could jeopardize the security of passengers and indeed national security.

Via Slashdot:

“When anti-TSA activist Jonathan Corbett exposed a severe weakness in TSA’s body scanners, one would expect the story to attract a lot of media attention. Apparently TSA is attempting to stop reporters from covering the story. According to Corbett, at least one reporter has been ‘strongly cautioned’ by TSA spokeswoman Sari Koshetz not to cover the story. If TSA is worried that this is new information they need to suppress to keep it away from terrorists, that horse may have left the barn years ago. Corbett’s demonstration may just be confirmation of a 2010 paper in the Journal of Transportation Security that concluded that ‘an object such as a wire or a boxcutter blade, taped to the side of the body, or even a small gun in the same location, will be invisible’ to X-ray scanners.”

One of the first things that the state eliminates under the guise of national security are freedom of the press and of speech. Good thing that the Internet still manages to remain decentralized and largely uncontrolled (though this is sadly changing as well). Here’s the YouTube video that apparently kicked off recent TSA frenzy.

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