A Stitch in Haste

"[Moulitsas'] post/essay basically says: Look, 'new' Democrats and libertarians have a lot in common, except that you need government instead of the market to do this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this and this."
--ZenPolitics

And I thought a lengthy blogpost was required. Silly me.

Moulitsas' post is long and rambling and surprisingly incoherent. Mine won't be:

But there are other reasons why this outpost of libertarianism works. The government has put in an infrastructure to support the region including, among many other things, roads, the Internet, government research grants, and the most important ingredient of all: education, from the lowliest kindergarten to the highest post-doc program. Such spending, while requiring a government bureaucracy that makes a traditional libertarian shudder, actually provides the tools that individuals need to succeed in today’s world.

Moulitsas is speaking of Silicon Valley, that cauldron of entrepreneurial innovation that Moulitsas is relieved "survived" Microsoft (huh?).

Forgive me, but if the most-read liberal blogger in the world does not understand that a road is a public good and a government research grant is not, then liberalism is in a pretty sorry state. And while reasonable minds can disagree about whether elementary and secondary education is a public good (which in turn only suggests public financing, not public provision — does Moulitsas embrace vouchers?), there is absolutely no room for discussion about whether "post-doc programs" are a public good — they are not, any more than law school is.

And I'm not sure why Moulitsas thinks Silicon Valley is somehow different from the rest of the country. Doesn't Cambridge, Massachusetts, have roads, the Internet and post-doc programs? Is that also a shining city on a libertarian hill?

Stated differently, such a mish-mosh of "neat-o" government expenditures (neat-o to Moulitsas, that is) does not represent any coherent public policy philosophy. It only represents Kip's Law — Moulitsas yearning for central planning, so long as he gets to be the central planner ... complete with government research grants in every garage!

It's easy, even cute, for Democrats and libertarians to seek some tertiary commonalities (yes, we like roads too), or to focus exclusively on civil liberties (perhaps Moulitsas could explain the never-ending Democratic capitulation on that issue?). But the notion that Democrats see libertarians as a source of "new ideas," rather than of mere votes against the Big Bad Republicans, remains completely unproven, even after Moulitsas' grand tome.

Hopefully the respondent essayists will, unlike Moulitsas, actually discuss some specific and substantive issues (outside of civil liberties). Social Security, smoking bans, campaign finance reform, the War on Drugs, farm subsidies, the Ninth Amendment, the estate tax and the War on Obesity might be a good start.

Stay tuned...

More thoughts from LLP, Inactivist, Hammer of Truth.