>From a libertarian perspective, diminishing taxes and the economic size of the state may be seen as a step in the right direction toward the libertarian ideal society. If you think that you can substitute market contracts for political authority, then a smaller state is a good thing.
On the one hand, you say libertarians refuse to weigh, and on the other theres this. I mean, if you want to be quantitative about it, considering both severity and the number effected, what non-economic coercion can come close to *spending half the GDP*? Society would collapse before you could enact something like that.
>This analysis surely applies to the U.S., but it would not be difficult to extend it to other countries – including France.
The US case is arguable, but I dont see how this would apply to the european right-populists. Theyve been around for a while, some staying small parties for decades, and then started getting votes. And the mainstream parties generally avoided them until they reached "major party" size. Who in the previous establishment is responsible?
This essay has wise counsel for the current moment.
I recall a hilariously naive essay, probably in the New Yorker, wondering how politicians and other elites who graduated from elite institutions could back an anti-elite, norm-overturning outsider (I think it was a profile of Ted Cruz). I remarked to a friend "this writer does know that politics is about power, don't they?" It just seemed obvious to me that someone on the outer circles of the elite world, with ambitions to be at the center, could look at their prospects and see that the outsider's success could be their route to power and influence, faster and more assuredly than the 'inside track'.
It's the same story everywhere throughout history where norms start to break down - they break down because the current system doesn't satisfy everybody, and an opportunity comes up where the outer elite believe they can get more of what they want, and if it takes breaking a few rules that's just fine.
>From a libertarian perspective, diminishing taxes and the economic size of the state may be seen as a step in the right direction toward the libertarian ideal society. If you think that you can substitute market contracts for political authority, then a smaller state is a good thing.
On the one hand, you say libertarians refuse to weigh, and on the other theres this. I mean, if you want to be quantitative about it, considering both severity and the number effected, what non-economic coercion can come close to *spending half the GDP*? Society would collapse before you could enact something like that.
>This analysis surely applies to the U.S., but it would not be difficult to extend it to other countries – including France.
The US case is arguable, but I dont see how this would apply to the european right-populists. Theyve been around for a while, some staying small parties for decades, and then started getting votes. And the mainstream parties generally avoided them until they reached "major party" size. Who in the previous establishment is responsible?
This essay has wise counsel for the current moment.
I recall a hilariously naive essay, probably in the New Yorker, wondering how politicians and other elites who graduated from elite institutions could back an anti-elite, norm-overturning outsider (I think it was a profile of Ted Cruz). I remarked to a friend "this writer does know that politics is about power, don't they?" It just seemed obvious to me that someone on the outer circles of the elite world, with ambitions to be at the center, could look at their prospects and see that the outsider's success could be their route to power and influence, faster and more assuredly than the 'inside track'.
It's the same story everywhere throughout history where norms start to break down - they break down because the current system doesn't satisfy everybody, and an opportunity comes up where the outer elite believe they can get more of what they want, and if it takes breaking a few rules that's just fine.