The Long March Through FAIR: How Big Can the Tent Become?

[_Gadianton]

Interesting. I do have one page from the Lew Rockwell website (so far) that will be included in the footnotes to my forthcoming seminal work debunking the Austrian School. The author of the article is a professor of finance.

Hey, where do Roger Garrison and Joseph Salerno fit into the spectrum?

[_Kishkumen]

Gary North is a major figure in the Lew Rockwell crowd. He has a ton of articles on Lewrockwell.com for a reason. He's in the inner circle. He's not the only Christian Reconstructionist, and, as it happens, virtually all Christian Reconstructionists are Austrians. I pointed to him as the extreme end of the theocratic wing that clearly exists within the Austrian crowd. If Gary North got his way, there would be mass executions on a scale that would make Hitler look like a joke. I, quite accurately, described that subgroup as being quite fascist. Moreoever, I am not a leftist. I am a libertarian taking note of the fringes of my own area on my political spectrum.

And there is a strong neo-confederate movement within the Mises/Rothbard crowd. And that flows directly from Rockwell and Tucker, both of which have close ties to the League of the South.

Wow! Birds of a feather and all that.

[_Droopy]

Gary North is a major figure in the Lew Rockwell crowd. He has a ton of articles on Lewrockwell.com for a reason. He's in the inner circle. He's not the only Christian Reconstructionist, and, as it happens, virtually all Christian Reconstructionists are Austrians. I pointed to him as the extreme end of the theocratic wing that clearly exists within the Austrian crowd. If Gary North got his way, there would be mass executions on a scale that would make Hitler look like a joke. I, quite accurately, described that subgroup as being quite fascist. Moreoever, I am not a leftist. I am a libertarian taking note of the fringes of my own area on my political spectrum.

And there is a strong neo-confederate movement within the Mises/Rothbard crowd. And that flows directly from Rockwell and Tucker, both of which have close ties to the League of the South.

In other words, out of upwards of 250 scholars at the Von Mises Institute, you and I together have come up with, as of the present time, three Christian Reconstructions.

The neo-Confederate movement is not "strong" in Austrian economics. Indeed, at best it appears to be a small wing of people with a particular fixation within the larger movement that spans the U.S. the U.K. and Europe.

Find something to get a grip on, E, and come back with some actual arguments, for once, if you can see your way through to do so.

[_Droopy]

If its any consolation, North appears to me to be a loon, but that's not a problem for me as a libertarian, any more then it was a problem to see a loon like Pat Buchanan walk away from the conservative intellectual movement.

[_Doctor Scratch]

That's interesting, Droopy. I hadn't realized that you were an adherent to the Christian Reconstructionist movement, but, of course, it makes perfect sense.

[_Droopy]

Moreoever, I am not a leftist. I am a libertarian taking note of the fringes of my own area on my political spectrum.

You are a secular humanist who has totemized the concept of "freedom," which places you as much of the Left as those who totemize "democracy" (i.e., Marxists).

The social issue positions of what I call "strong" libertarianism, are in many cases, almost indistinguishable from those of some of the most strident elements of the cultural Left.

[_Blixa]

Just a quick thanks to Gadianton and EAllusion: as usual both of you have given me some interesting information to think over.

[_Doctor Scratch]

Droopy:

Why do you think that the Austrian School has embraced a figure like Gary North with open arms?

[_Droopy]

Look, Scratch, just to be clear, I'll spell it out for the tiny part of your brain still susceptible to the processing of information taken in from your surrounding environment. I am not a "Christian Reconstructionist." Even you are intelligent enough to know, as you've been debating me here for some six years, that I would have no toleration for that kind of philosophy.

Austrian economics began in Europe, has adherents throughout the Western world, and has nothing to do with Christian Reconstructionism. There are a few such people in the Austrian libertarian movement (as there are some monarchists within traditionalist conservatism) but the libertarian movement, and in particular, the Austrian libertarian movement, is, for the most part, deeply secular in nature and approach, as are many of its scholars. There is room indeed, for a number of peripheral views in such a philosophy precisely because of its emphasis of liberty and the free play of ideas.

But enough enough of you and Delusion's ad hominem head games for now. It really does get to be a bit of a drag.

[_Droopy]

Droopy:

Why do you think that the Austrian School has embraced a figure like Gary North with open arms?

He's there, Scratch, and that's all you can say about the matter (as if you knew a bloody thing about Austrian economics or philosophy at all).

I'd suspect, however, his PhD in history from the University of California, Riverside, and his specialty in economic history from an Austrian perspective.

This is all kind of like asking how the Republican party can embrace the likes of Arlen Specter with open arms, or John McCain. Isn't it supposed to be a "conservative" party?

The answer is, of course, that North does not in any sense define Austrian libertarianism (as if it could in other Western countries and against the strong tide of secularism that dominates the intellectual approach of much of the movement).