Steve Horwitz - How Did we Get Here? (Good Read)

[XTreat]

Educational read for sure, I learned somethings.

I don't like the idea that we have to kiss the ass of either the left or the right.

 

[Forty Twice]

Wow, this has been an incredibly interesting thread.

I understand how the 80s Libertarians must have been frustrated with Corporate Republicans success with the Southern Strategy. It used a few non-monetary issues
to trap a majority bloc of voters into voting Republican for decades. The corporate and neo-con interests behind the scenes provided the money in exchange for RNC
support of their economic and foreign policy initiatives. I guess Libertarians figured if they wanted any chance of winning, they had to pander to these people too.
The newsletters got there because they'd had their asses kicked for too long.

When W won in 2000, I think the Corporatist Republicans saw their Southern Strategy was about to die. So took from America in 8 years what they would have normally spent 30 years squeezing. The 99% noticed.

Fast-forward to 2011 when the Southern Strategy is on life support. Newt and Perry use it but don't stand a chance. Romney is morphing into Obama to capture what
seems to be a majority coalition. The political system is in flux. Corporatists need a new "strategy". They might even re-constitute their coalition before it's over. But the 99% is awake now and has better communication tools with which to fight. For better or for worse (I definitely think for better) we have Ron Paul as standard
bearer for the 99%. Kucinich, Nader, and Grayson are on the left for the 99% but it's a tiny army.

Now the corporate media know Ron's Achilles heel is "the newsletters". Releasing them during primaries, especially just before southern primaries, is most damaging to our
campaign. Because many of the Southern primary voters still have Confederate flags on their windshields. It would be much easier to disavow in the general election because these voters will still vote Republican. But right now, disavowing will lose voters to Newt. He would paint us as leftists (gay-loving, druggies). At least that's what MSM hopes.

So we have to deal with the newsletters now and not in the general. We will have a non-stop barrage of negative news on the newsletters. I think Ron's strategy of
confining the issue to "it wasn't me, I don't know who did it, and I disavow it" is smart for him. But I don't think it will be enough. We do not have a single MSM talking
head who will go to bat for us. As individuals who spend hours a day thinking about this, we need to stand firm. Remind people to not be distracted from the big picture.

For those of us who have the advantage of being black, homosexual, or Jewish, I recommend each of you to upload a testimonial to YouTube like TMOT's:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxtT2SdZ8ZU . His is the best response I've seen. We just need a thousand more.

 

[William R]

bump

 

[AlexMerced]

We just need to keep reaching out, keep explaining, most people I've personally discuss about the newsletters havn't been hard to demonstrate that Ron Paul didn't write them, they stay on the Ron Paul bandwagon, but every agree it was stupid these ever came out.

 

[Conza88]

We just need to keep reaching out, keep explaining, most people I've personally discuss about the newsletters havn't been hard to demonstrate that Ron Paul didn't write them, they stay on the Ron Paul bandwagon, but every agree it was stupid these ever came out.

http://web.archive.org/web/20090217070049/http://libertarianthinktank.org/2008/02/25/dear-cato-institute-and-david-boaz-thanks-for-nothing/

Dear Cato Institute and David Boaz, THANKS FOR NOTHING!

Newsletter commentary. Flashback. Quality read.

 

[osan]

http://bleedingheartlibertarians.co...-20-year-old-newsletters-matter-so-damn-much/

This article will probably piss a lot of people off, but I thought it was worth reading from a fairly regarded austrian economist

thoughts?

Boring wall of text almost smelling like a faint hit-piece on Ron Paul.

He is welcome to go pound salt.

 

[AlexMerced]

Boring wall of text almost smelling like a faint hit-piece on Ron Paul.

He is welcome to go pound salt.

Steve Horwitz is a fairly respected person in the Liberty movement, been around a lot longer than most of us in this movement, and I think this was just a honest perspective.

I love Ron Paul, we love Ron Paul, but we got to stop acting that if anybody has a different perspective than us that:

- It's a dishonest smear attempt
- They don't believe in liberty like we do
- they are part of the "system"

Yes, the Mainstream media is conducting huge smear trying to make it out that ROn Paul wrote the letter, what Horwitz and Weigel have both said in their respective articles is not quite that, but looking into the context of the period of time using facts such as tax records to help explain why these came about.

Horwitz is in the article even implies that we should still vote Ron Paul, but discussing the implication of the past of the movement as a whole.

Not everything is soley about Ron Paul.

I campaign hard, I want Paul to win, but let's not get tunnel vision either.

 

[yongrel]

Steve Horwitz is a good economist and a groovy dude. He's right, you know.

 

[bbartlog]

Horwitz may be a decent guy, but in writing the article he's way more interested in showing what an enlightened guy he is than in trying to actually advance the cause of liberty. It actually *isn't* Ron's fault, and doesn't reflect poorly on him, that some guys from Stormfront support him. Freedom is popular even with marginal characters and if his Goldwater-style in-theory-only opposition to the Civil Rights act makes them think he's blowing some sort of dog whistle for them, he isn't to blame for that. I'd also be curious what evidence he has that the Mises guys are associated with anti-semites (it would be pretty ironic since as I recall Mises was Jewish).
I would also say that much of the supposedly awful material from the newsletters is pretty weak, as racist material goes.
Mostly I'd say this is yet another case of one of the cosmopolitan libertarians being secretly pissed off that someone from the paleo side is doing far better than anyone from their faction has ever done.

 

[Conza88]

Steve Horwitz is a fairly respected person in the Liberty movement, been around a lot longer than most of us in this movement, and I think this was just a honest perspective.

I love Ron Paul, we love Ron Paul, but we got to stop acting that if anybody has a different perspective than us that:

- It's a dishonest smear attempt
- They don't believe in liberty like we do
- they are part of the "system"

Yes, the Mainstream media is conducting huge smear trying to make it out that ROn Paul wrote the letter, what Horwitz and Weigel have both said in their respective articles is not quite that, but looking into the context of the period of time using facts such as tax records to help explain why these came about.

Horwitz is in the article even implies that we should still vote Ron Paul, but discussing the implication of the past of the movement as a whole.

Not everything is soley about Ron Paul.

I campaign hard, I want Paul to win, but let's not get tunnel vision either.

I'm glad you added "fairly" there, to me I read "barely", and agreed wholeheartedly.

I'm sorry but who has done what you are suggesting? Name names... because general statements like that call for the assertion/accusation to be backed up. I'm highly doubtful.

Comments on David Boaz and Cato please. Reason is part of that crowd.

Steve Horwitz is a good economist and a groovy dude. He's right, you know.

Who is Steve Horwitz? /double entendre

 

[milo10]

Steve Horwitz is a fairly respected person in the Liberty movement, been around a lot longer than most of us in this movement, and I think this was just a honest perspective.

I love Ron Paul, we love Ron Paul, but we got to stop acting that if anybody has a different perspective than us that:

- It's a dishonest smear attempt
- They don't believe in liberty like we do
- they are part of the "system"

Yes, the Mainstream media is conducting huge smear trying to make it out that ROn Paul wrote the letter, what Horwitz and Weigel have both said in their respective articles is not quite that, but looking into the context of the period of time using facts such as tax records to help explain why these came about.

Horwitz is in the article even implies that we should still vote Ron Paul, but discussing the implication of the past of the movement as a whole.

Not everything is soley about Ron Paul.

I campaign hard, I want Paul to win, but let's not get tunnel vision either.

I'm not sure what you're looking for. You posted this, many of us didn't agree with what he wrote and gave our reasons. I know I couldn't care less one way or the other about the author. I'm not here to be in a "liberty movement" club, I am here to get Ron Paul elected.

This probably should not have been posted in Grassroots.

 

[agorist ninja]

Meh, another beltway big-L Libertarian attempt to discredit the philosophical underpinnings of small-l libertarianism.

Disappointed you would post this here, Alex. It clearly goes out of its way to paint the Mises Institute as some bastion for all the ills in society, when nothing could be further from the truth. Horwitz even finds the nerve to claim that he wants to "put the 'liberal' back in libertarianism", as though it was ever in there in the first place. That sort of insane revisionism will be the death of the liberty movement. Libertarian refers to the word, and principle of, liberty. Liberalism is a wretched ideology that eschews morality and tries to replace it with government-as-your-third-parent. No thanks.

Nothing different in that article than what we've seen time and time again from Koch-backed Reason/Cato crowd. Ron Paul, and those who have found him through the Mises Institute, are the last intellectual and philosophical bulwark stopping the one party progressive movement and their desperate push towards 1984, as it was written. Once this goes, kiss everything goodbye. That's why they try to smear Ron with so much vigor.

 

[osan]

Steve Horwitz is a fairly respected person in the Liberty movement, been around a lot longer than most of us in this movement, and I think this was just a honest perspective.

Honest opinion, perhaps, but then ignorant. In such things causes do not matter for much. What counts is whether one speaks in competent truthfulness or spews a bunch of nonsense, however well and honestly intended. Some of the statements he made in the article were objectively classifiable as false. I call people on their shit just as I accept being called on mine. This is what honest and competent people do. If I fuck up I sure as hell want to know about it.

I love Ron Paul, we love Ron Paul, but we got to stop acting that if anybody has a different perspective than us that:

- It's a dishonest smear attempt
- They don't believe in liberty like we do
- they are part of the "system"

I agree, but that is not what I did. I simply pointed out that the article has the stink of a hit on it, mild as it may have been. Perhaps his journalistic style leaves something to be desired, rendering him prone to expressing himself in questionable ways. You say he is respected - I will accept this at your word, but I read the article and his assertions and innuendos I found disagreeable in either their outright falsehood or their deceptive twists. I suppose we could do a line-by line to de-ball this "logic", but I don't think it is worth the time. I told you what I thought and you disagree and that is OK.

IMO when you are writing such pieces, the honest and COMPETENT writer expresses himself in the most clear, complete, and unequivocal style possible. There should he no profusion of implications, particularly on important points. If you support Ron Paul then say so explicitly. If you think people should vote for him then say it clearly and with no wiggle room. It is not that difficult to do. If one fails at this, then either his abilities or ethics come into question and he should he doing something else to pass his time, like push a mop down the hallways at some high school. Clear communication really is that important, no matter how casually the vast majority of people seem to treat the skill.

 

[Dreamofunity]

It's interesting how things aren't really so black and white in a lot of cases despite what people like to tell themselves.

Somewhat relevant. Sometimes it is necessary to get beyond the good vs. evil story mode.