Kathianne
01-03-2009, 05:41 AM
Very interesting essay for 'conservatives' and even 'libertarians':
http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/01/an_appeal_for_d.html
An appeal for disunity
Perry de Havilland (London) North American affairs
2009 is going to be an interesting year, particularly in the USA. Big State Democrat Barack "The One" Obama crushed Big State Republican John "I Support the Bail Outs" McCain and this means the country is going to have a new president whose politics make him the most committed statist since LBJ. The country was given a choice between statism and statism and it voted for... statism.
Well to quote Mencken, the American electorate are going to get what they voted for good and hard, because this is also the year the global economy is truly going to crash, big time, plunging us into a recession and indeed a depression that will last longer and be driven deeper by the policies being implemented by governments on both sides of the Atlantic.
And this presents friends of liberty with a great many opportunities....
...The simple fact is that people can be fellow travellers on a path that leads to liberty without all marching in ideological lock-step. It just boils down to asking the question "do you want the state to have less control over people's lives or more control?" If a person can honestly answer that they think the state is too powerful and needs to be reduced, that is a fellow traveller.
This is the time to apply that test to Republican politicians, every last one of them... and drive any who fail that simple test out of the party by whatever means necessary. Now is the time for a figurative internal 'Night of the Long Knives'. This is the opportunity to destroy a great many political careers and remake the Republican Party into the party of constitutionally limited government and to start fighting the culture war that the party should have been fighting since the day Ronald Reagan left office with his job only half done....
http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/2009/01/an_appeal_for_d.html
An appeal for disunity
Perry de Havilland (London) North American affairs
2009 is going to be an interesting year, particularly in the USA. Big State Democrat Barack "The One" Obama crushed Big State Republican John "I Support the Bail Outs" McCain and this means the country is going to have a new president whose politics make him the most committed statist since LBJ. The country was given a choice between statism and statism and it voted for... statism.
Well to quote Mencken, the American electorate are going to get what they voted for good and hard, because this is also the year the global economy is truly going to crash, big time, plunging us into a recession and indeed a depression that will last longer and be driven deeper by the policies being implemented by governments on both sides of the Atlantic.
And this presents friends of liberty with a great many opportunities....
...The simple fact is that people can be fellow travellers on a path that leads to liberty without all marching in ideological lock-step. It just boils down to asking the question "do you want the state to have less control over people's lives or more control?" If a person can honestly answer that they think the state is too powerful and needs to be reduced, that is a fellow traveller.
This is the time to apply that test to Republican politicians, every last one of them... and drive any who fail that simple test out of the party by whatever means necessary. Now is the time for a figurative internal 'Night of the Long Knives'. This is the opportunity to destroy a great many political careers and remake the Republican Party into the party of constitutionally limited government and to start fighting the culture war that the party should have been fighting since the day Ronald Reagan left office with his job only half done....