http://www.economist.com/…

A LIFELONG libertarian, Alan Greenspan does not ordinarily advocate giving the government more power. But he does so in a new epilogue to the paperback edition of his memoir, parts of which were made available to The Economist. The crisis of the past year has convinced him it is the lesser evil. Better someone else be in charge of bail-outs, he argues, than the Federal Reserve, which he led for 18 years.

Mr Greenspan says a high-level panel of American financial officials should be given broad power to seize any financial institution whose failure threatens the entire economy, bail out its creditors and close it down. “We need laws that specify and limit the conditions for bail-outs” and do so transparently with taxpayers’ money, “rather than circuitously through the central bank, as was done during the blow-up of Bear Stearns,” he writes in “The Age of Turbulence”. (Penguin is to release the paperback on September 9th.)

If that means the government has to wade in, so be it. “Our country has long since abandoned the notion that we should leave crises to be resolved solely by the marketplace,” he says. “The critical need…is to formalise…the procedures improvised in the case of Bear Stearns. This should ensure that in the future, government financial assistance to lending institutions does not impact the Federal Reserve’s balance-sheet and monetary policy.”

He says a standby panel, empowered by Congress, should determine if an institution’s failure is dangerous enough to require taxpayer support. It would then form a vehicle to take the firm into “conservatorship”, wipe out the equity, preferably impose a “haircut” on its debts before guaranteeing them, and then sell its assets. Mr Greenspan’s model is the Resolution Trust Corporation (on whose board he served), created in 1989 to take over failing thrifts, sell their assets, then close itself down. He pours cold water on a proposal by Hank Paulson, America’s treasury secretary, to give the Fed broad responsibility over market stability.

Mr Greenspan’s proposal may be politically difficult. For years Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America’s mortgage giants, resisted the creation of a regulator that could close them down. With other large institutions—be they investment banks, hedge funds or insurance companies—there might be even more of a fuss. And the Fed is not yet ready to bow out. “Unless I hear from Congress that I should not be responding to a crisis situation, I think that it’s a long-standing role of the central bank to use its lender-of-last-resort facilities,” Ben Bernanke, Mr Greenspan’s successor at the Fed, said last month.

Just because the man used to hang out with Ayn Rand and was apparently a libertarian Objectivist doesn’t mean he continues to be one. Anyone who advocates aggression is not by definition a libertarian. But what better way to destroy a movement then by redefining the words? Eric Arthur Blair would be proud. It was done at around the turn of the 20th century with ‘liberal.’ In economics ‘inflation’ has been redefined. Now a concerted effort appears to be being made to change the meaning of ‘libertarian.’ People like Glenn Beck and Neil Bortz nationally claim to be libertarians. Advocating government manipulation of the market and money bailouts, immigration control and war with people who pose no threat is NOT libertarian.

http://www.nytimes.com/…

In years to come, when the oil-and-gas billionaire David H. Koch attends a gala performance of New York City Ballet or City Opera at Lincoln Center, the building he enters in black tie will bear his name.

Mr. Koch, recently called the wealthiest resident of New York City, has agreed to contribute $100 million toward the renovation of the New York State Theater, which is home to the two companies. His gift will be the largest private capital donation in Lincoln Center’s history and a triumph in a period of growing economic uncertainty.

“They seem to like me there, and I like them, so I think we’ve got a deal,” Mr. Koch, 68, said in a telephone interview on Wednesday from Boston, where he was traveling. “Its obvious that this theater needs modernization.”

“I’ve been going to the New York State Theater for 40 years,” he said. “I can assure you, I would not make a gift of this magnitude unless I was absolutely convinced that the quality of the work was world class.”

Mr. Koch, a major contributor to the Republican Party and supporter of conservative causes, was the vice presidential candidate on the Libertarian ticket in 1980. In 2003 he helped establish the nonprofit Americans for Prosperity Foundation, which supports free-market policies and promotes government spending limits. It split off from an earlier Koch-backed enterprise, now called FreedomWorks, which promotes similar goals.

He’s on the board of directors for both the Cato Institute and the Reason Foundation.

There is just something wrong about all this…

The things that the libertarian movement could do with that kind of money. Assuming McCain/Feingold didn’t exist think of what the Ron Paul or Bob Barr campaigns could do with half that? Or what the Free State Project could do with 1% of it?

It’s one thing for a “libertarian” not to give money to the cause. It’s another to voluntarily give money to the State. Why not buy this theatre? Why not build your own? It’s not like he doesn’t have the money to cover the extra cost.

http://lastfreevoice.wordpress.com/…

While I’m out at Pridefest 2008 raising awareness of libertarianism and the Libertarian Party, Bob Barr was on Fox News Sunday spewing anti-libertarian ideas of states rights. I recommend scanning through the comments of the article linked above as a few former LP presidental candidates comment on this. Steve Kubby says it well:

There is no such thing as “States’ Rights.” Only people can have rights and those rights are inseparable, indivisible, inalienable and non-transferrable.

States have powers, as enumerated in the 9th and 10th amendments, NOT rights. Furthermore, it is the duty of any government to recognize and uphold rights, not to grant or remove rights.

Libertarianism is about the rights of the individual, not the rights of states, nor any attempt to transfer rights away from the individual. States’ Rights may be a conservative idea, but it is also a totalitarian concept, that should be rejected by all true Libertarians.

and:

“States’ Rights” is a fraudulent and profoundly un-Libertarian concept that has no other purpose but to deceive and rob us of our natural, inalienable, inseparable, non-transferable rights as human beings.

The Ninth Amendment says: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain RIGHTS, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

In other words, just because the Constitution doesn’t mention a particular right, that doesn’t mean we don’t have that right. The US Constitution and Bill of Rights were conceived and written to limit government, not allow it to usurp our rights.

The Tenth Amendment says: “The POWERS not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

What part of “POWERS” does anyone NOT understand?

How can anyone logically argue that “powers” somehow includes a state government hijacking our “rights”?

and just as important a statement is Thomas Knapp’s:

You should probably start by learning the difference between “federalism” and “states rights.” They aren’t the same thing. One is a strategy. The other is one of many possibly justifications for the strategy … and a particularly BAD one.

Furthermore, Barr has now gone PAST making a “states rights” argument for libertarianism and is defining libertarianism as that particular argument for it. He’s not “introducing the LP and libertarian ideas,” he’s introducing the LP and linking it to ANTI-libertarian ideas.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

Three full months after GOP-Libertarian candidate Ron Paul announced his presidential campaign would be “winding down”, he’s actually throwing in the towel for real. Yes, the man who spent over a year pledging to dismantle the United States military has finally ended his quest to be elected its Commander in Chief. Often times portrayed as “crazy”, “batshit crazy” and “absolutely freaking nuts”, Paul marched to the beat of his own drummer. A drummer that supported building a 700 mile fence along the Mexican border because immigrants are the cause of all our welfare problems.

Ron Paul never did get his chance to abolish the IRS, but his hilarious cranky old man antics certainly did abolish a little bit of the sadness in all our lives. Let’s take a look back at the magical year we shared together.

I understand that 23/6 is a satirical site. However, while some may disagree, The Huffington Post isn’t. Do a search for Ron Paul on huffingtonpost.com and you’ll find this supposedly satirical story along with legit news. At least Google News has the decency to include a “satire” tag on all sites which are. This is nothing more than a pot shot and an obvious one at that. For being the only anti-war candidate to make it this far you’d think they’d at least show some support. I suppose their desire for more powerful centeralized government overtakes their supposed wish not to kill innocent individuals who posed no threat to any of us and any idea of individual freedom.

They could have at least been factual in their smear. He does not support building a fence. He supports ending welfare, for everyone in the long run and illegal immigrants in the short term, to remove any basis for blame on them for the ailing welfare state and then allowing far easier means to cross the border. Anyone who paid any attention to his dialog noticed he treaded lightly on the subject in order to pander to both sides. Did it bother me he kept his position a bit ambiguous in order to pick up support? Yes. But that doesn’t change the fact his true position was pro-immigration.