Heritage Foundation

Jobs, Unemployment Stuck

Today’s jobs report is a broken record, with the unemployment rate stuck at 8.2 percent. The Department of Labor reports that only 80,000 jobs were added in June—consistent with other data revealing the economy has downshifted from slow to slower. This picture is starkly different from the economy President Obama promised of a strong recovery and millions of “saved or created” jobs a few years ago.

Governor Walker Breaks New Ground in Higher Ed

Governor Scott Walker (R-WI), already well known for his efforts to curb union power, has now set out to tackle an equally big task: busting the higher education bubble.

Does the Declaration of Independence Still Matter?

The Declaration of Independence was partly intended as a list of grievances against a distant monarch. And both George III and the colonists who disagreed with his rule are long dead. But so are many of those who’ve argued that the Declaration is obsolete. In fact, this is exactly what those who called themselves “progressives” were saying a century ago.

The Energy Revolution and Its Discontents

With all the gloomy economic news coming out of late, one bright spot flew under the radar last week: the United States is poised to be the proverbial center of the energy universe.

Join the Fight to Repeal Obamacare

Fellow Americans, Like you, I am disappointed by the Supreme Court’s Obamacare decision. The Court misread and rewrote Obamacare in order to save it. Such contortions are not the proper role of judging. Most Americans are with you and me and deeply dislike this law.

Obamacare After the Court

The policy landscape will change dramatically after 10 a.m. today. If the Supreme Court does not strike down Obamacare in its entirety, Congress should move to repeal it. Americans support repeal of the health care law, as they have demonstrated in more than 100 polls since it passed in 2010. The infamous individual mandate is only the beginning of the problems Americans face under this law. Most importantly, Americans need real health care reform, and we need to begin moving toward a patient-friendly system where people have the freedom to choose the care that is best for them.

How Unions Just Shot Workers in the Foot

Union bosses are excited that they have prevented their members from getting raises.

Supreme Court Upholds Immigration Checks, but Administration Counters

The Supreme Court handed down its decision on the Arizona immigration law yesterday, striking some portions of the law in a 5-3 ruling but unanimously upholding immigration status checks by law enforcement. The Obama Administration countered by announcing it would tell Arizona to release most of the people whose status was in question.

Protecting Religious Liberty from Obamacare

The Supreme Court will hand down its verdict on Obamacare this week, making it a timely occasion for Americans to show their support for religious freedom—only one of many freedoms steamrolled by the health care law.

Imperial Presidency

The United States was born when rebellious colonists declared their independence from an imperial ruler who had vastly overstepped his bounds. “The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States,” they wrote in their Declaration of Independence.

President Obama’s Fast and Furious Scandal Grows

On the night of December 15, 2010, U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was shot and killed by an untraceable assault weapon that was deliberately handed to Mexican drug lords by U.S. officials via Operation Fast and Furious. Ever since, the Terry family and Americans across the nation have asked how this could have happened.

Obama’s War on Domestic Energy Production

Today, the Senate will vote on the fate of one of the most expensive regulations of all time–a regulation that threatens to create an America with no new coal-fired power plants, where existing energy producers might have to close their doors, snuffing out jobs and making electricity dramatically more expensive.

School Choice in D.C. Saved…For Now

President Obama has begun “evolving“ his positions on various policy issues as polls show him neck and neck with Mitt Romney. His latest about-face restores a popular school voucher program for needy children in Washington, D.C.—after he had yanked its funding.

The Grecian Formula for Economic Decline

The President and his team have been blaming “European headwinds” for some of the U.S. economy’s woes. But the truth is that the policies pursued by Washington and Athens are frighteningly similar—and the outcomes are not good for either country. Both countries are in need of comprehensive fiscal reforms, yet their leaders have avoided the tough decisions in favor of bailouts and political posturing.

How Taxmageddon Will Impact You

“I’ve said that this is a make-or-break moment for the middle class, and I believe it,” President Obama told an Ohio crowd yesterday. Indeed it is—because in a sluggish economy, American taxpayers are about to be clobbered by the largest tax increase in history.

The American Spirit

Many Americans proudly hang the Stars and Stripes on June 14 to celebrate Flag Day. On that day in 1777, the Second Continental Congress formally adopted the emblem under which generations of Americans have lived, fought and died. More than any other flag in the world, it symbolizes freedom and celebrates the optimism of our Founding Fathers.

Unions Out to Divide and Conquer Workplaces

Unions suffered a resounding defeat in Wisconsin last week. They’re far from down and out, however. Unable to reverse their decline in membership under existing law, they are circumventing Congress and using the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to create an entirely new type of union. A new rule hatched by the Obama-appointed board, authorizes the creation of union cells—organizing a few employees within a company to gain a foothold—which will severely impact businesses.

After Obamacare

For the past two years, America has witnessed headline after headline reporting on flaws in President Barack Obama’s health care law. And as America learns more about this intolerable act, the opposition to Obamacare continues to grow. Yesterday, a new poll conducted by The New York Times and CBS News showed that more than two-thirds of Americans want to see the Supreme Court strike down Obamacare in whole or in part, and only 24 percent would keep the law in place.

Dysfunctional Washington

Within one year of being elected, Governor Scott Walker (R) reformed the state’s public sector pension system, eliminated a $3.6 billion budget deficit without raising taxes, saved taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, and helped create the conditions that have allowed Wisconsin’s economy to grow again. Meanwhile, thanks to the dysfunction in Washington, America continues to suffer high unemployment, out-of-control spending, and faces a historic tax hike that could send the country over a fiscal cliff.

A Historic Win for Reform in Wisconsin

The state of Wisconsin has once again lived up to its billing as a Midwestern incubator of Big Ideas. In yesterday’s case, when voters resoundingly defeated a liberal effort to recall Governor Scott Walker (R), the Big Idea was that reformers who come armed with the strength of their convictions can carry the day–even against mobs, labor unions, Hollywood, the media, academia and everything else the left throws up these days. All reformers need to do is lead.