Liberaltarians

If you've spent any time among the libertarian bloggers the past few days, you've seen scads of references to Brink Lindsey's "Liberaltarians" essay in The New Republic. I've read lots about it, but since the essay was "pay-per-view", I had not read it until today. Here is an ungated version directly from Cato.

If you don't know about it, let me summarize. Lots of folks (including MANY voters) recently have expressed unhappiness with the current version of the Republican party. Many, in fact, have switched sides or opted out of the whole political process because they seem to feel the party has, in some sense, betrayed its principles or something like that. Lindsey, on the other hand, says it's not that Republicans have betrayed conservative principles, it's that conservative principles have changed. He suggests that libertarians now might be more at home in the Democratic party.

I've long subscribed to the basic thesis of a deep conflict in the perceived libertarian "fusion" with the Republicans. Generally it's viewed as a tradeoff between common ground (fiscal issues and "size of government") and polar opposition (legislating morality). Now though, Lindsey argues, Republicans (and the conservative movement) have forsaken even the common ground of small government fiscal restraint (see the explosion of earmarks and continuation of extravagant farm subsidies since 2000, for example). According to Lindsey, it might be time to sign on with the Democrats.

As I said, I agree with the basic premise, but while I do find myself voting for more and more Democrats these days, I'm not optimistic we libertarians will find a home there either. See, I feel the "anti-globalization", "Wal-Mart bashing" wing of the Democrats will remain firmly in charge of the national party. [I have no great love of Wal-Mart, Target, etc.; it's the principle involved.] As long as the Dem party views John Edwards as "enlightened" for telling a story about his son chastising a classmate for wearing Wal-Mart shoes, I don't think that party will be reaching out to me. No, the Dems seem to be swinging way too far toward protectionism and populism for me. Wake up Dems -- without economic growth and free markets, many "progressive" achievements of the 20th century would not have happened (or at least would have been much less successful).

So where do I (and other libertarians) go? To me the answer is -- nowhere. The Repubs have chased me off and I don't think the Dems really want me. Lindsey seems to think the Dems might make a concerted effort to recruit libertarians, but I don't see that happening. I guess true to the spirit of libertarianism, it's good that we can't embrace either party. If you have any interest in this subject, though, read the whole thing. I think it's a serious examination of a relevant question and, for the most part, it's well done. In the end, though, it doesn't leave me optimistic. My favorite part expresses the gulf between the parties:

Here, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, the rival ideologies of left and right are both pining for the '50s. The only difference is that liberals want to work there, while conservatives want to go home there.

Of course people smarter than me (including Dan Drezner and the always insightful Sebastian Mallaby) have weighed in as well.