I take issue with a lot of what Lindsey says. Primarily, Lindsey complains:
What counts today isn’t engaging the other side with reasoned arguments; it’s building a rabid fan base by demonizing the other side...He then proceeds to demonize the tea party movement, social conservatives, and anyone who isn't 100% with him with phrases like:
raving, anti-intellectual populism, ... a brutish nationalism, as expressed in anti-immigrant xenophobia ... dogmatic religiosity, as expressed in homophobia, creationism, and extremism on beginning- and end-of-life issues... mass opinion on the right has veered off into feverish self-delusion. Witness the “birther” phenomenon ...This is quite disappointing and not particularly helpful. Not only is Lindsey picking the worst elements, as well as mischaracterizations, of tea partiers and of conservatives and applying it to everyone, but he basically ostracizes anyone who supports enforcement of immigration laws or opposes abortion on demand. It will be tough to build a libertarian majority with an attitude like this, as decades of failure have proven.
As I said once before, instead of sticking a finger in the eye of those with some policy disagreements, but similar principles, Lindsey and his colleagues at Cato should reach out to the Tea Party Movement and persuade them, and help provide the intellectual rigor he thinks they lack.
The other two pieces are exceptionally well done, and provide the "reasoned arguments" the discourse needs. Goldberg, especially, writes what I would have said, had I both the time and his eloquence.
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