Chris Navin

Full piece here.

‘The State Department is looking to tap into unspent money meant for reconstruction in Iraq to beef up the security of diplomatic posts in dangerous parts of the world, according to a new proposal from the State Department sent to Congress on Monday. The request came just ahead of the release Tuesday night of a report by an independent inquiry that faults the State Department for a lack of security on the night of the Sept. 11 attacks in Benghazi, Libya.’

It wouldn’t hurt to discuss how well the overall liberal internationalist approach taken by Obama is working, either.

Adam Garfinkle At The American Interest: ‘What Did The Arab Spring Really Change?’

Via Reuters: ‘U.S. Ambassador To Libya Killed In Benghazi Attack’…From Eli Lake At The Daily Beast: ‘Exclusive: Libya Cable Detailed Threats’‘Eli Lake At The Daily Beast: ‘U.S. Officials Knew Libya Attacks Were Work of Al Qaeda Affiliates’ From The BBC Via Michael Totten: ‘Libya: Islamist Militia Bases Stormed In Benghazi’

How does America lead or pursue its interests in this new landscape?: We need to confront the rise of Islamism and the realities of many Muslim societies through our policy. Putting women’s rights and international institutions front and center when you’re dealing with Al Qaida and the Taliban, assorted enemies, a suspicious China and a weaker adversarial Russia has serious problems …Via Youtube-Uncommon Knowledge With Fouad Ajami And Charles Hill…Daniel Deudney tries to build a global raft partially upon Kant’s idealism and says the global institutions we’ve got are better than nothing: Repost-Daniel Deudney On YouTube Responding to Robert Kagan: ‘Liberal Democracy Vs. Autocracy’

Full piece here.

Maybe, maybe not, but Epstein makes a principled case for Michigan’s recent right-to-work bill.

Libertarians who only see liberty from where they sit, and the growth of big government and big labor since the New Deal, might need to make a better case for their cause to the public, Epstein argues (libertarians tend to rise in opposition to particularly liberal administrations):

‘The call for limited government doesn’t start with the radical proposition to disband the army, fire the police, or close public highways. Rather, it relies on the theory of public, or collective, goods. The sound theory of limited government uses the state to provide those essential public goods that ordinary individuals, acting either alone or in combination, cannot supply for themselves in voluntary markets.’

He finishes with:

‘Political leaders can be expected to hold back their punches to get legislation through. But the job of independent intellectuals is to offer principled defenses of these legislative changes in order to maintain the long-term coherence of, in my case, libertarian thought, which is needed to make future labor market reforms possible.’

Click through for a good defense against unions when laws are used to protect them, as they become an industrial cartel free-riding on the public good. That’s the line to draw, Epstein suggests.

Many people, quite frankly, find the moral case for government involvement in basic services compelling (taking people’s money involuntarily and promising to do things that voluntarily people would not do, nor do enough of). They are well aware that people are self-interested, sometimes selfish, and that there’s plenty of suffering and scarcity in the world.

Libertarians might find it hard to believe that to many Americans, the slippery slope argument fails, even if you point out that the slope can often involve free riding, inefficiencies, crony capitalism, reduced employment, reduced consumer choice and ultimately reduced economic and political liberty for all Americans. The system, for them, is solid, and functioning pretty well.

Obamacare supporters, in fact, point out the inefficiencies of our current health-care delivery system, the waste, the downsides of ‘the profit motive’ (as though it won’t be central going forward) as they argue that health-care is a fundamental right and function of the government.

Pointing out that modern liberalism isn’t like the old classical liberalism also sounds extreme to many Americans. The case will need to be made, solidly and reasonably, of the dangers already in our culture and institutions. Libertarians, as skeptically as they are viewed by conservatives, have a good handle on the faith that modern progressivism has in reason and the interests many modern liberals have in growing the State, and what can occur in the wake of that faith and those interests to freedom, opportunity, and the human spirit.

See also: Free riding in Canada, and threats to free speech when a Human Rights Commision acts like a kind of quasi-court: Update And Repost: ‘A Canadian Libertarian Making Noise: Ezra Levant’

The anarchic tradition on this site: A Few Thoughts On Robert Nozick’s “Anarchy, State and Utopia”… …Via Youtube: (1 of 3) Kant, Chomsky and the Problem of Knowledge…Link To Lew Rockwell Via A Reader…Repost-Two Quotations By Albert Jay Nock in ‘Anarchist’s Progress’…minimal state…Repost-Youtube Via Libertarianism.Org-David Friedman: ‘The Machinery Of Freedom

The classical liberal tradition…looking for classical liberals in the postmodern wilderness: Isaiah Berlin’s negative liberty: A Few Thoughts On Isaiah Berlin’s “Two Concepts Of Liberty”… From George Monbiot: ‘How Freedom Became Tyranny’…Looking to supplant religion as moral source for the laws: From The Reason Archives: ‘Discussing Disgust’ Julian Sanchez Interviews Martha Nussbaum.New liberty away from Hobbes?: From Public Reason: A Discussion Of Gerald Gaus’s Book ‘The Order of Public Reason: A Theory of Freedom And Morality In A Diverse And Bounded World’…Richard Rorty tried to tie postmodernism and trendy leftist solidarity to liberalism, but wasn’t exactly classically liberal: Repost: Another Take On J.S. Mill From “Liberal England”

Originalism vs. The living constitution: George Will Via The Jewish World Review: ‘True Self-Government’..Still fighting the battles of the 60′s…? A Few Thoughts On Robert Bork’s “Slouching Towards Gomorrah”…Catholic libertarianism: Youtube Via Reason TV-Judge Napolitano ‘Why Taxation is Theft, Abortion is Murder, & Government is Dangerous’