About Freedom in the Free World

Wall Street Journal ^ | Oct 14, 2002 | Robert Bartley

[The Raven]

LONDON--Friedrich von Hayek founded the Mont Pelerin Society in 1947 to combat the seemingly inexorable rise of socialism, along with its more virulent collectivist cousins, fascism and communism. As some 550 disciples gathered here last week, the prevailing mood might be summed up: If we finally won, how come we feel so glum? Hayek died in 1992 at age 92, having lived long enough to receive the Nobel Prize in economics in 1974 and to witness the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Neither outcome seemed remotely likely when he published "The Road to Serfdom" in 1944; John Maynard Keynes dominated economic theory, Fabian Socialism was rising in Great Britain and the New Deal prevailed in the U.S. Hayek's brilliant polemic argued that central economic management was an impossible task, leading to ever greater measures of authoritarian control and ultimately ending in totalitarianism.

[The Raven]

Strange---I had a post along the same lines yesterday....so I'll just repeat !!!

......

I've always wondered what the end game is for liberals.

I just got back from Sweden where they told me they are number one in the world in the category of taxation. I presume they mean - in semi-free governments since Cuba and North Korea would beat them out. George Will just pointed out that the libs have an ideology of condescending. Everything everybody else does is wrong. They then promote their arrogance as PC thought with peer pressure and group think countering any dissent.

So where is the end game? If everyone works for the government. If everyone is a park ranger, social security administrator, politician, or environmentalist. If everyone has free medical and free housing free education and free food and plays soccer to tie games. Who plows the corn fields?

The liberal end game is - as Ayn Rand pointed out - either headed toward communism or a Hitler-like socialism. Or maybe future generations will luck out and it will just be the road to serfdom as Hayek predicts. Since the ideology is inferior, they need to combat it with condescending rhetoric. "I'm smarter than you -- so shut up."

[RLK]

No practical person any longer talks of socialism. The idea of nationalized industries faded as early as 1948. After the collapse of communism in 1989, today everyone talks of privatization.

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By God, you could have fooled me. We have a present predecessor talking about how much we owe in servitude to the poor and undeveloped of the world. Socialism is becoming a bit like California new wave life style, It is being renamed every few years, or the word is being avoided while the specifics of implementation are instituted to produce the unspoken whole.

[The Raven]

Yep-- I had the same reaction. But notice they covered themselves with "No practical person any longer talks of socialism."

The word practical immediately disqualifies all but the realists

[T'wit]

For the record, the Mont Pelerin Society had an American spinoff, the Philadelphia Society, founded by Don Lipsett in 1964 soon after the Goldwater defeat. Don, alas, is gone, but the Philadelphia Society continues its work in robust health, and has had a great influence over the years. The Heritage Foundation was founded -- and held its early board meetings -- within the Philadelphia Society, of which Heritage President Edwin J. Feulner is a charter member. Other founders included Milton Friedman (here, too), William F. Buckley Jr. and Glenn Campbell, later of Hoover. Hayek made several appearances here, and quite a few scholars are members of both groups.

[fporretto]

Indeed. Today socialism is advanced piecemeal, as "programs" that target some "problem," rather than as an all-embracing ideology.

Of course, the end in view is still the same, and the consequences will be no better than those that attended the overt socialism of the Soviet Union.

The countermeasure, at least in part, is accurate reporting and the discussion of principles. Thank God for the Internet, for the Old Media are wholly in accord with the socialist program. If enough people can be engaged in the discussion of political principles, in particular the principles of American constitutionalism and what they provide for and forbid, maybe we can put a stop to this. Reversing it will take longer.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit The Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com

[PGalt]

Thanks for the post. Good analysis...thanks.