Lately, he seems to have been posing as a political prophet and libertarian pied piper. We're under attack from the state! If this can happen to Dennis Hastert who can't it happen to?!
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2015/06/scott-sumner-dennis-hastert-and.html
It's rather ironic that someone lie Hastert who has had nothing but contempt for civil liberties his entire career is now in Sumner's mind a libertarian Cause Celeb. It tells you there may just be something fatuous in the whole libertarian ideal.
I can understand why this might be-after all his brilliant proposal for an NGDP futures market is in tatters, so he'll try to convince the dittoheads-I always say he's the Rush Limbaugh of monetary economics-he has something earth shattering to say about politics.
So when he looks for those who have had their civil liberties violated it's GOP fat cats like Hastert or Reason magazine. I'm sure there are people at Reason who don't vote Republican. LOL
http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=29585
As I've suggested before, to me what passes for 'libertarian' in the US is just an euphemism for 'conservative' albeit someone who spends most of their time talking not about social issues but economic ones.
However, you notice they never have any problem supporting the positions of social conservatives. If you read Sumner right here you will see that his indignation about civil liberties is pretty selective.
"In the future, selling pot will be legal in all 50 states. Historians will look back in disbelief that 400,000 people were in prison for using and selling drugs. They’ll read about Republican politicians who only began worrying about dirty needles when it affected their voters. They’ll read about Democratic politicians who were more interested in inequality, gay marriage and a few hundred terrorists in Guantanamo than in 400,000 people (disproportionately African American) in prison for engaging in capitalism between consenting adults. People like Ulbricht (and Ed Snowden) will be viewed as martyrs. Both parties (and much of the media) are so corrupt, so authoritarian, that the voters are finally rising up in one state after another. It’s a pretty sad state of affairs when the masses have more enlightened views on criminal justice than the elites."
I agree about drugs-though he doesn't note that it's mostly Democrats who are leading pot legalization. He likes to give the impression that President Obama is 'authoritarian' but while Obama is not in the position to legalize pot on his own-separation of powers Scott-at least he has allowed the states that have legalized pot not to have to worry about federal prosecution in their state.
And why is Sumner sniggering at gay marriage and 'a few hundred terrorists' in Guantanamo?
I guess these are folks who don't deserve civil liberties like Speaker Hastert.
Part of civil liberties is the presumption of innocence-which Sumner doesn't afford those in Guantanamo who he just assumes are all terrorists.
UPDATE: He later clarifies that he does think gay rights matter though what he says still leaves something to be desired.
"Some commenters thought I was implying that gay rights are not important. On the contrary, I think they are very important. But I think that right now the war on drugs is a far more important problem. In 1950 I would have argued (I would hope) that gay rights were a far more pressing issue than the war on drugs."
I don't see why we can't chew gum and walk at the same time. Ending the War on Drugs doesn't require anyone putting gay rights on the back burner.
People do what he did here all the time; in their mind one issue is clearly a key issue of civil liberties the other isn't. Madonna got knocked for saying that gay rights are much more advanced than women's rights.
If you judge women's rights by access to abortion and other contraception and health services for women, she has a point. And of course, you never hear Sumner talk about the Republican War on Women-that Hastert was always in front lines on while GOP Speaker.
Which just goes to show that libertarians are not really about liberty per se-they're about maintaining traditional lines of authority-for employers, property rights but not for workers and they say nothing about women.
I guess reproductive freedom is another one of those issues that Sumner thinks just distracts from ending the war on drugs.
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2015/06/scott-sumner-dennis-hastert-and.html
It's rather ironic that someone lie Hastert who has had nothing but contempt for civil liberties his entire career is now in Sumner's mind a libertarian Cause Celeb. It tells you there may just be something fatuous in the whole libertarian ideal.
I can understand why this might be-after all his brilliant proposal for an NGDP futures market is in tatters, so he'll try to convince the dittoheads-I always say he's the Rush Limbaugh of monetary economics-he has something earth shattering to say about politics.
So when he looks for those who have had their civil liberties violated it's GOP fat cats like Hastert or Reason magazine. I'm sure there are people at Reason who don't vote Republican. LOL
http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=29585
As I've suggested before, to me what passes for 'libertarian' in the US is just an euphemism for 'conservative' albeit someone who spends most of their time talking not about social issues but economic ones.
However, you notice they never have any problem supporting the positions of social conservatives. If you read Sumner right here you will see that his indignation about civil liberties is pretty selective.
"In the future, selling pot will be legal in all 50 states. Historians will look back in disbelief that 400,000 people were in prison for using and selling drugs. They’ll read about Republican politicians who only began worrying about dirty needles when it affected their voters. They’ll read about Democratic politicians who were more interested in inequality, gay marriage and a few hundred terrorists in Guantanamo than in 400,000 people (disproportionately African American) in prison for engaging in capitalism between consenting adults. People like Ulbricht (and Ed Snowden) will be viewed as martyrs. Both parties (and much of the media) are so corrupt, so authoritarian, that the voters are finally rising up in one state after another. It’s a pretty sad state of affairs when the masses have more enlightened views on criminal justice than the elites."
I agree about drugs-though he doesn't note that it's mostly Democrats who are leading pot legalization. He likes to give the impression that President Obama is 'authoritarian' but while Obama is not in the position to legalize pot on his own-separation of powers Scott-at least he has allowed the states that have legalized pot not to have to worry about federal prosecution in their state.
And why is Sumner sniggering at gay marriage and 'a few hundred terrorists' in Guantanamo?
I guess these are folks who don't deserve civil liberties like Speaker Hastert.
Part of civil liberties is the presumption of innocence-which Sumner doesn't afford those in Guantanamo who he just assumes are all terrorists.
UPDATE: He later clarifies that he does think gay rights matter though what he says still leaves something to be desired.
"Some commenters thought I was implying that gay rights are not important. On the contrary, I think they are very important. But I think that right now the war on drugs is a far more important problem. In 1950 I would have argued (I would hope) that gay rights were a far more pressing issue than the war on drugs."
I don't see why we can't chew gum and walk at the same time. Ending the War on Drugs doesn't require anyone putting gay rights on the back burner.
People do what he did here all the time; in their mind one issue is clearly a key issue of civil liberties the other isn't. Madonna got knocked for saying that gay rights are much more advanced than women's rights.
If you judge women's rights by access to abortion and other contraception and health services for women, she has a point. And of course, you never hear Sumner talk about the Republican War on Women-that Hastert was always in front lines on while GOP Speaker.
Which just goes to show that libertarians are not really about liberty per se-they're about maintaining traditional lines of authority-for employers, property rights but not for workers and they say nothing about women.
I guess reproductive freedom is another one of those issues that Sumner thinks just distracts from ending the war on drugs.
No comments:
Post a Comment