Fed to Ship Dollars to “Crisis-Wracked” Euro Zone

by John W.B. Huie Exclusive to The American Mercury TODAY THE FEDERAL RESERVE, America’s private central bank, began to ship billions of dollars to the central bankers of Europe in an attempt to stem the fall in the value of the euro created by Greece’s debt crisis. The total value of the deal could easily top $1 trillion according to Continue Reading →

We Evolved in Villages; Cities are Unhealthy

by Day Brown AT THE OPENING of The Golden Sayings of Epictetus, he notes how young artists practice with the eye, musicians the ear, athletes the body — and wonders if it is not possible to strengthen the mind before taking on the issues of philosophy. After all, weight lifters do not start out with the most massive objects. So, Continue Reading →

The New Aristocracy

by Robert Henderson QUIETLY AND almost unobserved, a new aristocracy has been evolving for the past two centuries. This evolution has reached the stage where this elite, like the mediaeval nobility, have sympathy for their own class anywhere and contempt and unconcern for the mass of people everywhere. Their power is increasing by bounds. They seek to extend it ever Continue Reading →

Henry Hazlitt’s Books: More Relevant Than Ever

by Gideon Dene THE WORKS of American Mercury contributor and editor Henry Hazlitt (he was H.L. Mencken’s chosen successor) are brilliant gems of economic insight which, if they were only more well known, could change the downward spiral of the West’s economic fortunes. Did you know, for example, that inflation is not a rise in prices? Did you know that Continue Reading →

Raising the Wind

or, Diddling Considered as One of the Exact Sciences by Edgar Allan Poe [Editor’s Note: Poe’s hilarious essay – on the subject of cons and con men –  shows that the master of the macabre had an understanding of human nature rivaling Mencken’s. ] Hey, diddle diddle, The cat and the fiddle SINCE THE world began there have been two Continue Reading →