From the monthly archives: March 2013

Mmm, these bullets I’m biting are yummy.

By On March 30, 2013 · 49 Comments · In Current Events

Some conservative libertarians oppose expanding legal marriage to include same-sex marriage. (For example, see here.) Like the author in the link, a number of them have made the following argument:

Marriage establishes number of positive rights and privileges by government fiat. Positive rights and privileges established by government fiat are unjust. If 1 [...]

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Freedom and the fifty states

By On March 29, 2013 · 18 Comments · In Uncategorized

The fine folks at Mercatus have released an index of freedom in the fifty U.S. states that’s attracted quite a bit of attention, mostly uncomplimentary. (See the libertarian-leaning Timothy Lee, as well as Matt Yglesias, for example.) I have some substantive quarrels with both inclusions (right-to-work laws, for [...]

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The Challenging, Radical Anti-Statism of the Ancient Israelites

By On March 29, 2013 · 33 Comments · In Libertarianism

I’ve recently finished reading the great political theorist Michael Walzer’s book In God’s Shadow: Politics in the Hebrew Bible. Walzer’s thesis is that the Biblical writers were “not very interested in politics” in contrast to the ancient Greeks. In fact, “there is a strong anti-political tendency in the biblical texts.” [...]

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Koppl on Income Inequality

By On March 27, 2013 · 133 Comments · In Libertarianism, Links

At ThinkMarkets, Roger Koppl argues that Income Inequality Matters.

Some excerpts:

The surprise should be that we pro-market types have not spoken up more on this central issue, thereby letting it become associated almost exclusively with more or less “progressive” opinion. This indifference to income distribution is all the more mysterious because pro-market [...]

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Our Common Humanity in Death and Marriage

By On March 26, 2013 · 24 Comments · In Current Events, Libertarianism, Toleration

As the Supreme Court takes up the same-sex marriage issue, I wanted to re-post an old blog post of mine from Liberty and Power back in September of 2008.  Not only is it perhaps my favorite piece I’ve ever written on SSM, it seems to fit very nicely with the spirit of BHL.  [...]

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From Tucson to Montreal

By On March 25, 2013 · 7 Comments · In Announcements

Next Tuesday, April 2nd, around lunchtime, I’ll be giving a talk to the Federalist Society at the University of Arizona on price gouging. Contact info on the website, but they’ve got the date wrong. It’s Tuesday, not Friday.

Then, on Thursday, April 11th, I’ll be debating Debra Satz [...]

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Discussion Questions du Jour

By On March 24, 2013 · 70 Comments · In A Bleeding Heart History of Libertarian Thought, Libertarianism

Suppose socialism had never become anything more than an intellectual movement, i.e., that no actual regime came to power calling itself socialist and putting into place policies and institutions it believed were socialist.  What would classical liberalism/libertarianism look like today if that had been the way history unfolded?  How much of the content, rhetoric, and [...]

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Libertarianism – It’s About More than Just Markets

By On March 21, 2013 · 74 Comments · In Announcements

BHL readers might be interested in joining the webinar I’m doing for the European Students for Liberty next Tuesday afternoon at 3pm EDT.

More than the Market: The Rest of Libertarianism Matters Too

Join us next week on March 26th for a webinar with Steve Horwitz (3:00PM-4:00PM Eastern Time/8:00PM-9:00PM Central European Time) over [...]

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Richard Epstein AMA Tomorrow

By On March 19, 2013 · 22 Comments · In Announcements

The libertarian legal scholar Richard Epstein will be participating in an Ask Me Anything on Reddit.com tomorrow (Wednesday, March 20, 10am-12pm ET). It’s a great chance to ask whatever questions you have of him. You do need to be a member of Reddit to participate, but signing up is pretty painless.

I’ve long been [...]

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Tomasi Part III

By On March 19, 2013 · 6 Comments · In Book/Article Reviews

Last set of comments on Tomasi. Today: ideal theory, and the argument for social justice.

Justice in Fairyland

            When Tomasi was writing Free Market Fairness, I predicted it would have the effect of making left-liberals more skeptical of the value of “ideal theory”. They would see that it’s relatively easy for institutions to satisfy [...]

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