This blog post has been anticipated for a few weeks now, during which time I managed to put my notes and thoughts together in such a way that enabled me to finally patch together my first entry at AOTP. So here goes.

On the topic of political ignorance, political economy and the potentially debilitating cognitive barriers that inform the two, no contemporary collection of thinkers can match those who have contributed to the social science journal Critical Review (CR) in recent years. Launched in 1986 by then graduate student Jeffrey Friedman, and dutifully edited all the while by now professor Friedman of the University of Texas at Austin, CR has seen its modus operandi evolve from that of a self-critical libertarian academic journal into a cutting edge intellectual free-for-all. But truth be told, its generally libertarian-friendly roster of scholarly sparring partners is obvious to any casual observer.

The most relevant issue of CR for this post is entitled “Democratic Competence”, first published in late 2006 as a special triple issue. A kind of homage to the work of political scientist Philip Converse - the first to expose not only the dearth of political knowledge on the part of the masses, but the dogmatic tendencies of those few citizens who were informed – and including his original work “The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics”, this issue presented the views of contemporary empiricists, historians, economists and political philosophers to address mass democracy’s crisis of legitimacy (or, in some cases, the assertion of such a crisis at all.)

More recently, on August 31^st of this year, as the last of the activities of the meeting of the American Political Scientists Association (APSA) were wrapping up, the Critical Review Foundation held its conference on the “ignorant, closed-minded” and (possibly even) “irrational” American voter. More or less inspired by George Mason University’s Bryan Caplan and his recent book The Myth of the Rational Voter, the goal of the event was to bring together researchers in public opinion, political economy and even evolutionary psychology to hopefully converge upon an overall assessment of just what drives voters to think and behave the way they do. Ignorant, closed-minded and irrational. (Oh my.) As we’ll see, although these are considered undesirable character traits at the interpersonal level, politics in a mass democracy only tends to amplify them.

Probably the most popular and enduring political campaign issue in these United States is the generic economy. No presidential candidate is without a platform that speaks to this all encompassing realm of human activity (which may explain why, of course). With both Barack Obama and John McCain touting the need to “achieve energy independence”, “create strong jobs” and “protect American workers”, the classical liberal, laissez faire conception of freely contracting individuals unconsciously contributing to an overall increase in wealth and living standards – even across borders – is implicitly, if not explicitly, chucked aside. And the masses eat it up.

(more…)

In reading through the comments on Radley Balko’s chat here yesterday, I was thinking the greatest gap between libertarians and liberals is the belief in the free market. Don’t get me wrong. I believe free markets would work; I just don’t believe they exist. So I’m wondering what the libertarian take is on this lawsuit to block Bud-InBev’s potential monopoly on the US beer market.
(more…)

Here’s a concrete example of what Tom Friedman and the rest of the commentariat on the idiot box mean by “free markets” (via David Derauf, private email): (more…)

A recent email correspondent challenged a frequent assertion of mine:   that one of the most effective weapons we have against corporate power and its intellectual mouthpieces is to demonize the neoliberals in terms of their own professed “free market values,” and show them up for the corporate welfare parasites they really are.

In response, he asked:

Really? Can you show me one shred of evidence that this approach has been effective?

(more…)

Richard Posner writes:

Expanded drilling in U.S. territory (including our territorial waters) will reduce both U.S. dependence on foreign oil and the wealth of foreign oil-producing countries, many of which are hostile or potentially hostile to the United States. These are important benefits.

A friend of mine tweets, “this is simply untrue…Dependence would not be reduced in any meaningful sense.” He’s correct of course, but there’s more wrong with this claim than just the factual inaccuracy of the idea that offshore drilling can meaningfully reduce our dependence on foreign oil. (more…)

In the comments to my post on “free” public parking, Quasibill said that he would rather have decentralized power because local cronyism is less damaging than centralized cronyism. Here is his argument: (more…)

My friend Alex Marshall, in his newest post up on Governing magazine, asks “What’s up with groups that argue for less government but see publicly built highways as an expression of the free market?” Alex is highly critical of right-wing libertarians whose policy preferences are a simple Rorschach test of their own personal biases - people who label their preferences with the language of freedom, individualism and happiness, whereas any policy they dislike is labeled “socialism” or “tyranny”. Thus, if these people like to drive big cars, then any government action that supports their ability to drive big cars is a bold stroke for glorious emancipation, whereas any policy that interferes with their ability to drive big cars is a form of Stalinism so black that even Stalin himself would have thought it excessive. I encourage you to read the whole post. This is how it starts: (more…)