I do agree with that small bit, in general. But I think it supports my point, not yours. If Bush is tossing in some libertarian stuff just for extra heft, if Libertarianism is just a little stream in the watershed, and the real underlying principles are economic and moral ones, then Lunt/Lind was incorrect in labeling his bugaboo "libertarianism."
This, then, rapidly gets down to the proverbial "angels on the head of a pin" argument.
Here's where I am on this point. And I do appreciate this last attempt to focus. The Bushites took a core principle of libertarianism, its opposition to the welfare state, from which one may well deduce opposition to social security, they took that core principle and "wove it" into their push to privatize social security.
Ok, so the principle is at play. Now, one other level. There is little doubt that the Bushites thought that by doing so they would win a public opinion battle. Instead they learned that the public is not ready to privatize social security and, by inference, Lind argues that much of the drive to "privatize everything" is going down the drain. On that latter point, I think he's too hopeful.
So two places the libertarian argument is at play: "woven in" to the Bush argument and a hypothesized presence in the public mind.
It may not be libertarianism as you know it, but it's certainly opposition to the welfare state and opposition to social security on individualistic grounds. A libertarian label works for me. |
