None of the Above

I watched the debate between Spike Cohen and Dave Smith on Locals last night.

The title is a reference to this.

After thinking more about it, the less intrigued I am about either of the potential candidates.

Much like the Krystol-Horton “debate” at the Soho Forum, the more I heard, the less impressed I was.

To the participants — Spike, don’t wish for an Anachro-Capitalist society. I understand that, likely, there’s a lot less of my life ahead of me. (I worked through Y2K; I’m wondering if I’ll be around to see Y2K38) I think you could articulate a way to minimize the weight of the state on most people’s lives.

Dave, please find a book by someone with whom you disagree, read it, and write a brief summary of the arguments the author presented. Yes, there’s bad things the US did in South and Central America places in the past. Noted. It’s not why there’s tens of thousands of Haitians trying to cross into Texas. But that you floated out something from a very-biased take on history doesn’t add anything to your argument.

I find myself unimpressed with the options presented. None of the above.


Both of these guys are frequent guests on Kennedy, something which I often view.

Part of what one of the things that’s argued about the LP Mieses Caucus is an attempt to push ideas at lower levels to get libertarians to take advantage of the things that are coming up in the “alternative” media outlets.

I understand and enjoy the format. I really don’t think it lends itself to presentation of any coherent idea about policy.

Landing that fifteen-second clip that gets repeatedly shared on Twitter/Facebook/whatever, doesn’t explain what changes you would make to the existing morass that is the modern state. What will you do to move people from under the boot of the state? Next year. Not thirty years down the road. What are you going to do to bring people towards a system based on freedom?