The 1099 reporting requirement will force businesses to divert scarce resources to complying with additional bureaucratic red tape. [Links]

The President’s emerging housing narrative promises to treat symptoms, not causes. [Links]

With an ascendant China determined to flex its diplomatic and military muscle, American leadership is needed now more than ever. [Links]

The Obama Administration should adopt policies that bolster U.S.–European military relations. [Links]

The assault against elected judges has entered a new and more dangerous phase: Millions of dollars are being poured into efforts to promote “merit” selection of state judges, a system in which unelected, unaccountable experts and special interests recommend for appointment—and in some cases select—judges as a way to combat politicization. Yet merit selection does not remove politics from the judicial selection process; it merelydrags politics out of the public spotlight, much to the advantage of liberal special interests—and to the detriment of public accountability. While not perfect, judicial elections are far more effective than “merit” selection as a means of promoting judicial independence and public accountability. [Links]

Legislation targeting the yuan may feel good, but it will not accomplish anything. [Links]

Special interests are engaged in a well-funded campaign to alter the composition of America’s state courts. [Links]

The President’s new infrastructure spending plan is merely an effort to shore up support within organized labor. [Links]

A powerful lesson of recent months is that gimmickry makes good bumper stickers but lousy economic stimulus. [Links]

India’s recovery from the crisis is partly illusory—its growth is not sustainable and is not creating broad prosperity. [Links]

Proponents of raising taxes have offered many straw man arguments and myths to support their case. [Links]

The rebound in the labor market that was so promising in the spring wilted under the summer heat.  [Links]

Diane Katz, an accomplished policy analyst from Detroit, has joined The Heritage Foundation as a research fellow in regulatory policy. [Links]

Unions have been a familiar part of American working life for more than 70 years. Less familiar is the state of the union movement today: More union members now work for the government than for private employers. The above-market salaries and benefits that government employees receive are paid for by taxpayers. So, the union movement that began as a campaign to improve working conditions and salaries for workers in the private sector, now pushes for ever-higher taxes to increase the generous compensation that government employees enjoy. Heritage Foundation labor policy expert James Sherk details the changes in the union movement, and explains how Congress can react to this new reality. [Links]

President Barack Obama has said that America would reach out to other countries as “an equal partner” rather than as the “exceptional” nation that many before him had embraced; that “any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail”; and that “[o]ur problems must be dealt with through partnership” and “progress must beshared.” He has laid out in his public statements the tenets of a doctrine that, if enacted, would enable his Administration to remake America as one nation among many, with no singular claim either to responsibility or exceptionalism: (1) America will ratify more treaties and turn to international organizations more often to deal with global crises and security concerns like nuclear weapons, often before turning to our traditional friends and allies; (2) America will emphasize diplomacy and “soft power” instruments such as summits and foreign aid to promote its aims and downplay military might; (3) America will adopt a more humble attitude in state-to-state relations; and (4) America will play a more restrained role on the international stage. These tenets, however well-intentioned, will make America and the world far more insecure. Examining President Obama’s doctrinal statements and actions more closely demonstrates why reasserting American leadership on behalf of liberty would be the wiser course. [Links]

A flawed civil nuclear liability law may cast a pall over the historic U.S.–India civil nuclear deal. [Links]

Extradition treaties serve an essential function in cases that cross international borders. When the United States delayed ratification of the 2003 extradition treaty between the United States and Great Britain, the delay was heavily criticized in Britain. More recently, the ratified treaty has come under intense criticism in Britain. But the perceived problems are not inherent in the treaty or the fault of the U.S.; they stem from the fact that the past Labour government deliberately set out to make it easier, both bilaterally and through use of the European arrest warrants (EAWs), for foreign nations to extradite individuals from Britain. At the same time, Britain’s acceptance of EU judicial supremacy and the consequent erosion of British sovereignty mean that it is now harder to extradite a terrorist than it is to extradite individuals accused of less serious offenses. The new British government should defend British liberties and put an end to privilegesfor accused terrorists by asserting its sovereignty and creating a “reasonable basis” minimum standard for all extraditions—a standard that, though incompatible with the EAWs, is compatible with the 2003 treaty. [Links]

The consistent finding of increased parental satisfaction should inform the continuing debates over charter schools. [Links]

Although there are many scholarly treatments of the Founders’ understanding of property and economics, few of them present an overview of the complete package of the principles and policies upon which they agreed. Even the fact that there was a consensus among the Founders is often denied. Government today has strayed far from the Founders’ approach to economics, but the older policies have not been altogether replaced. Some of the Founders’ complex set of policies to protect property rights are still in force. America has abandoned the Founders’ views on the gold and silver standard, the prohibition of monopolies, the presumption of freedom touse property as one likes, freedom of contract, and restricting regulation to the protection of health, safety, and morals. But in other respects, America continues to offer a surprising degree of protection to property rights in the Founders’ sense of that term [Links]

President Obama should act decisively to protect vital American interests by successfully finishing the jobs in Iraq and Afghanistan. [Links]