Interview with Eddie Griffin, an African-American historian and activist from Fort Worth, Texas. Griffin discusses his family origins, growing up in segregated Fort Worth, the Fort Worth economy and discrimination, white neighborhoods, attending I. M. Terrell High School, black newspapers and histories, JFK's visit, attending Arlington State College, being drafted into the Army and stationed in Germany, becoming a revolutionary, robbing a series of banks, being incarcerated, activism in prison and political prisoners, returning to civilian life, the rediscovery of his faith, and his career as a local historian. In appendix are several photographs of Griffin and his family, and selections of literature featuring Griffin.

Adam Smith published The Theory of Moral Sentiments in 1759 and established the ethical foundation for The Wealth of Nations (1776) as well as the important role played by custom and fashion in shaping behaviors and outcomes. Kendall P. Cochran believed in Smith’s emphasis on value-driven analysis and seeking solutions to major problems of the day. Cochran believed that economists moved too far in the direction of analysis free of words like ought and should and devoted his career to establishing that economics is a moral science. A recent study by two Harvard professors, Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff, Growth in a Time of Debt (2010), asserted that healthy economic growth and high levels of government debt are incompatible. These conclusions are associated with the austerity movement, which calls for policymakers to reduce government spending in order to reduce the government’s debt and improve long-term growth prospects. The austerity movement has been used to justify the sharp decline in public sector employment that has restrained job growth since the recession of 2007. In 2013, a graduate student named Thomas Herndon discovered an error in the calculations of Reinhart and Rogoff, publishing his findings in a paper co-authored by his professors, …