Comments on: Old Minority

By: Gordianus

Gordianus — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 00:47:47 +0000

Daniel, I’ll answer your question directly. Go to the AEI dinner post and look carefully at the attendees. These people aren’t concerned about Mexican trucks because they don’t drive!

I mean look at those rictus smiles and boneless hands. Can you imagine any of them tooling down some highway in Oklahoma? Apart from the women, could they even fix a flat?

By: DarrenG

DarrenG — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 23:53:59 +0000

The “bulk of the movement” hasn’t been on the same page on border security and immigration for quite a while, I think. Witness the internal crapstorm that was the Bush immigration plan…

As for public safety, that may be true of bread ‘n butter law enforcement issues (although there’s still those pesky libertarians…), but this rarely extends completely to civil regulatory authorities, even ones that don’t directly involve the bogeyman of trial lawyers.

Arguments like Gardner’s above do cry out for a satire of knee-jerk free traders as a literal cargo cult, but I fear I’m not up to the task after 5pm on a Friday.

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 23:29:20 +0000

Perhaps I phrased it badly. I get why there are some people on the right who have no problem with any of this, but what never makes sense is why the bulk of the movement, which is ostensibly interested in border security, controlling mass immigration and public safety, goes along without much protest. I mean, they’re allowing Obama to take up the high ground of national sovereignty, public safety and border security. I can imagine a few more comprehensive embarrassments for the right, but this is right up there.

By: DarrenG

DarrenG — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 23:21:40 +0000

It’s not much of a mystery. The plutocrat wing of the party has long been very clear that they’re not only indifferent to illegal immigration and consumer safety, they’re actively hostile towards government regulation in these areas as a threat to laissez faire capitalism.