Earlier this week President Obama announced a shift in America’s policy toward our neighbor Cuba. This decision is the first major change in our relationship with Cuba in more than fifty years. America’s association with the island is long and fraught with controversy. In the late 1890s American foreign policy was mobilized to pressure Spain into relinquishing its control of Cuba, which eventually led to the Spanish-American War. That conflict ended with America directly influencing much of the former Spanish Empire, which included nations such as the Philippines. The Platt Amendment, which governed our policy toward Cuba for much of the first half of the 20th century, gave the United States the authority to unilaterally intervene in Cuban domestic affairs (incidentally, the Platt Amendment also forms the basis for our continued lease of the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base).
Read MoreBudget and Tax Lessons from President Calvin Coolidge
December 10, 2014
Today’s policymakers from both political parties can learn from the lessons on budget and tax policy from President Calvin Coolidge. Perhaps one of the most urgent domestic policy problems today is the federal budget and the enormous national debt that is approaching $18 trillion, and this does not include the trillions in unfunded entitlement obligations of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. President Coolidge understood, what he termed “economy in government” was essential not just for a sound economy, but was a moral and constitutional responsibility. During the 1920s President Warren G. Harding and President Coolidge made “economy in government” a centerpiece of their administrations. Economy in government meant a balanced budget, tax rates that were low and reasonable, and paying down the national debt.
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