New at Reason

reason Senior Editor Brian Doherty reviews The Politics of Freedom, a new collection by the Cato Institute's David Boaz, and gives it two thumbs up: "The Politics of Freedom reminds you of the service libertarians provide to public discourse: They can point out the hypocrisy, power grabs, hubris and counterproductive folly issuing from Washington under either political brand name since they are beholden to neither."

Read the whole review, which appeared in The New York Post, here.

Comments

alpha | February 25, 2008, 4:00pm | #

'David Boaz has come up with a kindergarten-level—yet wise—summation of the libertarian message: "Don't hit other people, don't take their stuff and keep your promises." '

That would be great if Boaz meant it literally, but do I detect a qualifying 'unless' after that statement?

sv | February 25, 2008, 4:06pm | #

As Boaz wryly notes, "Money isn't corrupting politics; politics is corrupting money."

brilliant!

economist | February 25, 2008, 4:12pm | #

joe will be here any minute now...

Tbone | February 25, 2008, 7:40pm | #

They can point out the hypocrisy, power grabs, hubris and counterproductive folly issuing from Washington under either political brand name since they are beholden to neither.

Whilst being mostly ineffective at getting either party to listen to us.

Ebeneezer Scrooge | February 25, 2008, 9:39pm | #

Boaz insists that a significant percentage of Americans are libertarian based on their stated political beliefs—from 13 to 21 percent. This should matter to politicians

Politicians might care if it was anywhere near the truth.

"Libertarian" includes no small number of anarchists, who consistently argue for positions that will never sell on the national stage. Whoever self righteous they may get, it won't change the fact that most people aren't anarchists.

Some libertarians vote Rep for economics. Others (seems like a majority but maybe I'm wrong) vote Dem for civil rights issues. A nice little split. So tell me again why politicians should care?

Ron Paul is the best libertarian we've been able to field and he immediately went down in flames. Because his opening shot -- on the Republican stage of all places -- was "Stop the Iraq War Now!".

You can take whatever angle you want on Iraq (in fact, it's a tad bit more complex than whether the "surge" is working or isn't -- Iran plays a way huge role in what actually happens over there). But saying that about Iraq for a Republican nominee-hopeful was political suicide, plain and simple. And the next thing people heard out of his mouth was "we gotta get back to the gold standard". It's going to make people think he's weird, at minimum. In sum, it left Paul without a snow ball's chance.

There's no reason for anyone to care about "libertarians", whatever that word might mean. Because "libertarians" are politically impotent no matter what our percentages may or may not be, regardless of Boaz' dreamy blabber.

Third Rail | February 27, 2008, 6:15pm | #

Check our interview tonight Wed. Feb. 27th at 8pm EST with the Vice President of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, David Boaz and author Johnnie B. Garmon II. Feel free to call in and speak with him live on-air. You can listen to it at http://thirdrailradio.com by clicking the listen live banner or the on air lights at various bitrates.