la liberté avant tout
Last week, American tech company Meta announced in a blog post it will postpone the launch of its Meta AI product to European users. The company had hoped to offer the same product now available in other countries, integrating a personal assistant into the various suite of Meta apps, but that plan will be on hold until legal matters are…
On 360 Round with anchor Nicole Petallides on Schwab Network, I discussed recent antitrust actions by the FTC and the DOJ, and how this is harmful not only to American innovation, but also to the choices and well-being of consumers.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) loves to cast herself as the ultimate public defender of consumers and the arch-nemesis of bankers on Wall Street. However, with her recent record opposing popular mergers and shutting down regulatory reform for Bitcoin and its crypto-offspring, Warren has sided more with the major banks rather than new players that stand…
Beginning this year, any individual with shares in an American domiciled company will be required to submit identifying information to FinCEN. This record collection from the US Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network is intended to “curb illicit finance” by requiring a national database of every “beneficial owner” of an LLC. As stipulated by the Corporate Transparency Act, passed by Congress in…
The Supreme Court recently delivered a decision on the constitutionality of one of the federal government’s most peculiar and least understood agencies, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Unlike the Fifth Circuit Court, which earlier ruled that the agency’s unique funding model violates the Constitution, Justice Clarence Thomas argued in the majority opinion the government’s funding of the CFPB “satisfies…
Biden is waging war on financial privacy, and not everyone is happy. The last several weeks have weighed heavily on those in Bitcoin who use privacy tools and software. Between the ceremonious arrests across two continents, Justice Department press releases, FBI warnings, and souring mood in Washington, many popular services for both sovereign and private…
Is vaping safer than smoking? Obviously YES. Nicotine is not your enemy. But watch me debate those who think differently: Prof. Stanton Glantz, Stanford and Sheila Duffy of Action on Smoking and Health, Scotland. It’s Consumer Choice vs. neoprohibitionism. Who wins? YouTube: X:
Should regulations aimed at halting the financial activity of alleged criminals and terrorists be vastly expanded to include cryptocurrencies and firms that use them? Could this potentially harm entrepreneurial spirit and consumer freedom to deal in digital assets? Those were the questions asked this week in Washington as officials from the Treasury Department seek new…
Last week, a discussion draft of the American Privacy Rights Act was published. Considering I’ve written about the need for a national privacy law for some time, I wanted to be sure I gave it a honest read. I will publish a more detailed summary on the Consumer Choice Center website here soon. Herein you’ll…
A video of my panel session at the 2024 Bitcoin Policy Summit on the current landscape of state and local bitcoin policies:
It’s not often that the head of a U.S. federal agency is given the red carpet treatment on Comedy Central, but for Jon Stewart, it’s to be expected. Lina Khan, chair of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), appeared on the revamped Daily Show featuring Stewart as host on Monday nights, to hype up the FTC’s work battling…
Now that Congress has come to its senses about a forced divestiture plan to uncouple TikTok from the Chinese Communist Party, we’d be remiss not to explore other examples of how powers such as China influence American institutions. Let’s look at our justice system. In a handful of local court cases around the country, a Shenzhen-based firm has been…
Could your free checking accounts, rewards, and cash-back programs be axed by the Federal Reserve? Late last year, the Federal Reserve proposed a rule to lower the cap on transaction fees businesses pay to financial institutions on every debit card swipe, also known as “interchange fees.” These are the small fees that banks and credit unions charge…
When we think of American energy, we conjure up images of oil drillers, refineries, pipelines, and end products we put into our cars or the plastic products we use daily. There are millions of jobs and billions of products sourced from energy production that make our society abundant and wealthy. That’s especially true today under…
Washington, D.C. – Yesterday, a bipartisan group of US House legislators introduced a bill that would force ByteDance Ltd. to sell its US version of TikTok or face massive fines and federal investigations. This would have big ramifications for the video-sharing app, which is estimated to have over 150 million users in the US. In practice, HR7521 designates the popular…
While I was in Washington, D.C., I spoke to freedom maximalist and “Don’t Hurt People and Don’t Take Their Stuff” author Matt Kibbe about online privacy and the Internet, the Kids Online Safety Act, Bitcoin and its enemies, central bank digital currencies, and the weaponization of the FTC. It was published on the Kibbe On…
I joined Stephen Kent on WIBC 93.1 to break down the case for a bill blocking the use of CBDC’s in Indiana. Sen. Eric Koch introduced Senate Bill 180 (SB180) to prohibit state agencies from accepting payments made with a central bank digital currency for any service, tax, license, permit, fee, information, or other amount…
When iPhone users see a green bubble pop up in their text messages, it has a way of dulling the experience. Emoji reactions, Facetime video calls, or even high-quality images over WiFi are immediately broken once a green-bubbled Android user slides into a group thread. This is the reality of Apple’s iMessage protocol, the default…
Washington, D.C. – This week, a bipartisan cohort of US Senators unveiled a new version of the Kids Online Safety Act, a bill that aims to impose various restrictions and requirements on technology platforms used by both adults and minors. Yaël Ossowski, deputy director of the Consumer Choice Center, a consumer advocacy group based in…
Richmond, VA – In the name of “safety” and the “best interests” of children, the Virginia Senate this week passed a draconian age-verification bill for online platforms which would require youth who want to use social media to provide exhaustive proof of their age and to seek parental consent. This legislation is not as common-sense…