I reveal, over at the Guardian.
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Politics
The history of left-libertarianism
It’s not easy to talk about left-libertarianism. These days most people still associate libertarianism with the right, and the fact that most left-libertarians identify as anarchist must confuse those not too aware of political philosophy; one might think that think left-libertarians are another kind of collectivist anarchists. I would to start by quoting perhaps the most well-known left-libertarian alive, Sheldon Richman, who was a fellow at several libertarian think-tanks and whose articles are reprinted by both Reason and CounterPunch. Curiously enough his most didactic article on left-libertarianism appeared at The American Conservative:
Left-libertarians favor worker solidarity vis-à-vis bosses, support poor people’s squatting on government or abandoned property, and prefer that corporate privileges be repealed before the regulatory restrictions on how those privileges may be exercised. They see Walmart as a symbol of corporate favoritism—supported by highway subsidies and eminent domain—view the fictive personhood of the limited-liability corporation with suspicion, and doubt that Third World sweatshops would be the “best alternative” in the absence of government manipulation.
Obviously radical statements like that don’t sound like the usual “free market” reforms that some people promote in the GOP, not even something that one could hear from libertarian institutions like the Cato Institute. It’s is probably the complex history of the libertarian movement that is most useful in explaining left-libertarianism. The libertarian story is long and had a particular relation to American history. I still recommend the marvelous Radicals for Capitalism of Brian Doherty, to these the day the most complete history of the American libertarian movement, readers could be surprised to know that despite its name, Doherty devoted a long part of the book to the left-libertarian writer Karl Hess. Another very interesting work is History of the Libertarian Movement by Samuel Edward Konkin, obviously like all of his writings it was from a more left-libertarian perspective.
The most common point of origin left-libertarians point to is the precursors of libertarianism, sometimes called proto-libertarianism. The nineteen century had several radical individualist anarchists that were in favor of free markets, including thinkers like Lysander Spooner, Benjamin Tucker and Voltarine de Cleyre. Then in twentieth century the New Left-Old Right alliance that Murray Rothbard proposed in the context of the opposition to the Vietnam War was vital for the development of left-libertarianism. Probably the most known left-libertarians of this period is Karl Hess, the Goldwater speechwriter turned Black Panther ally, the National Review founder who wrote legendary manifesto The Death of Politics at Playboy, the man that leave the American Enterprise Institute for the Institute of Policy Studies, from working for the RNC to be an SDS activist.
The socialist case for gun rights
The surprise of this primary season is probably Bernie Sanders. The independent Senator from Vermont who calls himself as a democratic socialist and is running for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination is doing very well in polls, drawing large crowds to his events, and has even raised considerable funds for a politician who relies on small donors. Some might say Hillary Clinton should be worried. In the beginning no one bet anything on him, and some think that his support for gun rights would affect support from his liberal base, but that doesn’t seem to have happened.
In America, people usually assume that everyone on the left supports gun control. Outside America, not many people speak about gun rights. As a Peruvian lefty, I never thought about guns. The exception was when I saw Bowling for Columbine, after that I supported gun control even if in my own country buying guns is actually very complex. I think that non-American leftists tend to sympathize with Michel Moore and other progressives from Hollywood, not out of affection for liberalism but to oppose conservativism; all gun rights advocates in the liberal conception are portrayed as gun nuts.
Some years after I had taken a position on guns, I joined the Socialist Party of Peru and started to be interested in the history of the New Left, first in my own country, then in America. When I read the libertarian Anthony Gregory defending the use of guns by the Black Panthers, my position changed and I became a supporter of gun rights. But that wasn’t my first step to being sympathetic to guns, I think it was reading the left-libertarian Alexander Cockburn that I started to be suspicious of the liberal arguments for gun control.
The idea is very simple — self-defense. Minorities throughout history have had to defend themselves from the aggression of centralizing powers including the State, from the militia movement to the Zapatistas. It doesn’t matter if they are a minority based on ideas or ethnicity, the thing that matters is that they are going to be able to defend their community, just like the Panthers did before the Reagan crackdown.
It is funny that liberals still often portray gun enthusiasts as closet white supremacists or something similar. Sure Dylann Roof was a real racist, but what about the Huey P. Newton Gun Club? Despite the popularity of Bernie Sanders, I don’t think that liberals are going to agree with him on gun rights, I think they would had been more comfortable with a gun control liberal like Elizabeth Warren, but the fact that Hillary was far to the right that Bernie became a choice for an average Democrat voter. Even if Sanders’ popularity hasn’t anything to do with his position on gun rights, maybe there are baby steps to toward a left favorable to the Second Amendment.
Some argue Sanders’ support for gun rights is simply a matter of Vermont being a rural state where guns are popular and maybe there some truth in that, it would be very difficult to get elected as a supporter of gun control. Some people think socialists are just like liberals, but it’s more complicated. In the years of war against the Sandinistas in Central America, even some social democratic parties from Latin America were in favor of them. While social democrats oppose revolutionary socialism, they more or less agreed that the Nicaraguans should resist. If you say that you are a fan of Che Guevara, it doesn’t make sense to be in favor of gun control. On the contrary, if you want to empower people, give them guns and the possibility to defend themselves.
ObamaCare is American democracy at its finest
ObamaCare is the law of the land, now and forever. Well, at least until the country goes broke and the entitlement state falters.
The Supreme Court’s second upholding of President Obama’s health care law was as comical as it was predictable. Conservatives fumed over Chief Justice John Roberts’ dereliction of duty. Liberals basked in the victory, with the president proclaiming, “The Affordable Care Act still stands, it is working, and it is here to stay.”
And stay it will. The left already knows it. King vs. Burwell marks a huge victory in the march for progress. Many on the right are still unwilling to accept the loss, and can’t wrap their heads around the fact that the highest court in the land just effectively changed a law’s wording, thus legislating from the bench, instead of judging the law as it was. Such a maneuver represents a complete abandonment of the American conception of rule of law. For those who believe law should be strict and straight-forward, this was a devastating blow.
Mitch McConnell with a Confederate flag
See the picture over at TheDC
Admit It: an 18-year-old shouldn’t be allowed to vote
Reprinted from the Press and Journal
Mark my words: Come January 20th, 2017, Hillary Clinton will be sworn in as the first female president of the United States of America. The media will swoon, the nation will rejoice (at least the half that voted for her), and Chris Matthews will get that old thrill of up leg.
Hillary is, of course, the wife of former President Bill Clinton. She was Secretary of State under President Obama. And she served as a senator during the Bush administration, supporting most of his key initiatives, including the ill-fated Iraq War. With that kind of experience, Hillary will continue many of the same policies, domestic and foreign, that have defined Washington for the past 20 years.
There is something new, however. During her recent campaign kickoff on Roosevelt Island in New York City, Hillary announced that if America sends her back to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, she will implement “universal, automatic” voter registration for any citizen who turns 18-years-old. The crowd went wild over the idea.
At first blush, automatic voter registration doesn’t sound sexy. We live in a democratic republic, so it makes sense that citizens should be able to vote. But why the push for registering all 18-year-old citizens automatically?
