Today LewRockwell.com has an excerpt from Libertarianism Today on why libertarians shouldn’t revere Ronald Reagan.
Check it out, and if you like it, there’s more where that came from.
View CommentsAt the beginning of his show this morning, Glenn Beck started ripping into the imam that all the talk-radio hosts love to hate, because the imam has (correctly) pointed out that the U.S. has killed many more innocent non-Muslims than al-Qaeda has.
Beck went on to defend the U.S. embargo against Iraq that killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people during the 1990s, argued that we should have fought the Iraq war “full on” from the beginning (meaning we shouldn’t have been so squeamish — as if “we” were — about killing innocent people), and claimed that the current U.S. government is the only one in the history of the world that has ever fought wars in a manner that avoided killing civilians.
Last year, Beck promoted a rally in Washington to protest the federal government’s taxing and spending. This year, he’s holding a rally to glorify the U.S. military. Can there be any doubt that by the time the Republicans regain control in Washington, Beck and his many followers will be right back where all the conservatives were during the George W. Bush years? Only it will be much worse, because they’ll have much bigger, more powerful government at their disposal, which they will not reduce one bit. And one shudders to think of what the apparent growing extreme, irrational hatred of Muslims may lead to.
Unless, that is, Ron Paul and other true libertarians can steer the Tea Party movement onto the right track before it’s too late.
As a good first step, it’s time for everyone — including some people who should know better — to stop suggesting that Glenn Beck is any sort of libertarian.
View CommentsDavid Gordon’s review of Libertarianism Today for the Mises Review is now online. Here’s how it starts:
Jacob Huebert’s outstanding survey of libertarianism ranks as the best work of its kind since Murray Rothbard’s For a New Liberty. Huebert navigates successfully difficult waters. Many people, when they first hear of libertarianism, dismiss it as extreme and irresponsible. How can libertarians seriously propose to end public and compulsory education, repeal all regulations on drugs, and consign medicine entirely to the market? Huebert brings to bear a wealth of argument and historical evidence to show that, in these and other instances, libertarians have a convincing case.
Incidentally, people keep asking about the Kindle version of the book. Apparently there have been some technical difficulties on Amazon’s end, but the publisher assures me that it’s coming very soon. Meanwhile, Amazon, which was sold out for a while, now has hardback copies in stock for immediate shipment, and you can get the paperback at Mises.org.
View CommentsNormally, when one party is in power in Washington, libertarians tend to root for the party out of power. When the Republicans are running things, the Democrats start to seem good, and when the Democrats are running things, the Republicans start to seem good. And of course, when the out-of-power party gets back in power, they disappoint you terribly by pursuing all the things on which they’re bad and forgetting the things on which they’re supposedly somewhat good — and you’re embarrassed that you ever (kind of, grudgingly) rooted for them.
Now, though, the right is making things much easier than usual. The Republicans’ incessant whining about the non-mosque that is not at Ground Zero, their war on immigrants, and their calls for war against Iran make me hate both parties equally — so I won’t have to feel at all bad for temporarily liking one of them (I don’t) or feel betrayed by them (since they never showed any real promise anyway).
View CommentsThe furor over the “Ground Zero Mosque” (which is neither a mosque nor at Ground Zero) doesn’t make me very optimistic about the prospects for liberty.
As a libertarian and just a live-and-let-live kind of guy, I can’t imagine caring much about, let alone vocally protesting, what someone is building two blocks away from me.
Yet apparently many of my fellow Americans are such busybodies that they’ll whine for weeks about something being built hundreds or thousands of miles away from them, in a city they don’t live in and probably won’t even visit. And many of the complainers are among the Tea Party set whom we are occasionally told are “libertarian,” even though they seem to hate Muslims and Mexicans and love war at least as much as they hate the federal government and love liberty.
Jonah Goldberg claims that the conservatives who object “mostly” recognize that the Muslims have a legal right to build their center. But what I hear on talk radio makes me doubt this. A common argument there seems to be that since “liberals” don’t care about the Constitution or property rights in general, they aren’t entitled to invoke them now — as though liberals somehow have the power to waive Muslims’ rights.
In any event, even if Goldberg is correct, it’s hard to imagine that the spirit of liberty resides in the sort of people who get so worked up over this sort of thing. The ease with which they’ve been distracted by this issue suggests that reducing government isn’t going to be their top priority once their team is back in control in Washington.
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Earlier this month, the anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had conservatives once again defending the U.S. government’s slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent people.
Normally one doesn’t find political pundits devoting entire columns to defending things the government did more than half a century ago, but I can see two reasons why they do so here.
One, of course, is the atrociousness of what the government did. A nuclear attack on a civilian population is so heinous that it might make people think about the violent, criminal nature of their rulers. So you have to keep reminding everyone that it was okay because it was (supposedly, not really) necessary to save grandpa’s life.
The other purpose — for neoconservatives, the main purpose — is to justify in advance doing it again to Persians and others who have been deemed less than human.
This is why libertarians must never shy away from this issue. It’s also why it’s especially disgusting to see the bombings defended in an official publication of my alma mater, Grove City College. What defending mass murder has to do with “Christian scholarship” or the school’s advertised “authentically Christian” education, I can’t fathom. (I would say it’s a new low, but they did it last year, too.)
View CommentsLast week, Brian Wilson guest-hosted The Michael Smerconish Program and had me as a guest to talk about libertarianism and Libertarianism Today.
This week, he talked with me again, this time on his own show. Here’s the audio:
Jacob Huebert on The Brian Wilson Show, 8.10.10
View CommentsI had a great, fun conversation about libertarianism on the nationally syndicated Michael Smerconish Program this week with guest host Brian Wilson. We touched on many of the topics covered in Libertarianism Today. Highlights include our discussions of education (at 27:00) and intellectual property (at 32:00).
Here’s the audio:
Jacob Huebert on The Michael Smerconish Program, 8.4.10
View CommentsEarlier this week, I talked with Antiwar Radio‘s Scott Horton about my book, Libertarianism Today — and specifically about why war and libertarianism aren’t compatible.
Here’s the audio:
Jacob Huebert Interviewed by Scott Horton, 8.2.10
The libertarian Free Talk Live radio show interviewed me about Libertarianism Today earlier tonight. Here’s the audio:
Jacob Huebert on Free Talk Live, 7.30.10
Next up: Antiwar Radio, Monday at 1 p.m.
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