Liberty Defined

Copied below are the first few paragraphs of a book review by Lew Rockwell on Ron Paul's new book "Liberty Defined."  The point Lew makes in these introductory remarks echoes a fundamental theme of this blog:  i.e. that the political left and right in America have become two sides of the same "big government" coin.   In very simple terms, this mean the left argues for more "butter" and the right argues for more "guns" -- and we get too much of both funded by an accomodative central bank.  Liberty suffers.   When liberty suffers, so too does the dynamism and energy underpinning a free and prosperous society.

Following is a great quote from the Amazon book review of "Liberty Defined" that encapsulates Ron Paul's liberty-centric world view:  "Dr. Paul writes that to believe in liberty is not to believe in any particular social and economic outcome. It is to trust in the spontaneous order that emerges when the state does not intervene in human volition and human cooperation. It permits people to work out their problems for themselves, build lives for themselves, take risks and accept responsibility for the results, and make their own decisions. It is the seed of America."

My research into the science of spontaneous order suggests that Ron Paul is exactly right. 

The further the state involves itself in determining political, economic and social outcomes, the less room there is for liberty / spontaneous order -- and everyone suffers, most of all the "little guy" who is ostensibly supposed to have the most to gain from government interventions of various shapes and sizes. 

It's Time to Rethink Everything

Mises Daily: Wednesday, April 06, 2011 by Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr.

The worst effect of the state is intellectual. It puts our brains in a prison, simply by defining the terms in which we are permitted to think and speak. The one nonnegotiable point becomes the state itself. You are permitted to argue about what the state's priorities ought to be (bombs or butter), but not to question the fundamental model of a state-dominated society.

Believers in human liberty have played along with this game for too long. They've done this for decades. Sometimes they tack right and sometimes they tack left. What they should be doing is upending the game board itself. They need boldly to make that fundamental claim of the old liberal tradition, that society orders itself without the state. Liberty is the answer in every area of life.

This is precisely what Ron Paul does in his amazing book to be released April 19: Liberty Defined: 50 Essential Issues That Affect Our Freedompolicy." It is not a piece of legislation. It does not emerge from the political process. Precisely the opposite: liberty is the absence of all these things. It is what results in the absence of state interference. Liberty's only fundamental requirement is that the state let society alone to develop, grow, and prosper.

This point of view is hardly heard at all in the political debate today, which is otherwise hamstrung by partisan wrangling of what the state should be doing. By the time you finish the introduction to Ron Paul's book, you realize that you are going to be treated to a completely new and radical form of thinking about politics, one that reimagines the current world in the same way that Jefferson reimagined his world — and became the real father of this country.

for the full article go to this link:
http://mises.org/daily/5186/Its-Time-to-Rethink-Everything