...that a libertarian like me could have such a change of heart. I don't blame them; it's quite a metamorphosis. (One reader of this blog went so far as to tell me that I was never a real libertarian to begin with. That was news to me.) But like any evolution, it's a murky process and difficult to identify the turning points. Stephen Jay Gould, the famous Harvard biologist, explained that it's human nature to search for clear beginnings. A rabid Red Sox fan, Gould often used the Abner Doubleday creation myth as an example. He explained that baseball actually evolved from earlier American and English games but that a desire developed for a clearer and simpler explanation for the origin of what came to be thought of as the National Pastime. And thus eventually followed the legend of Abner Doubleday and the creation of baseball.
Nicholas Kristof has a good piece in the New York Times today in which he discusses the ways in which government plays a constructive role in society through fire and police departments, health care, and education. (Does anyone believe that public schools crowd out the private sector? Is the University of Illinois at Chicago a threat to the University of Chicago, or is it just a "public option?") It's a good article for any libertarian to read or anyone trying to understand how a libertarian could ultimately come to the conclusion that government can and does play a positive role in the lives of Americans.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/opinion/03kristof.html
My own thinking has evolved to a point where I'd rather focus on what could really work to improve life in America rather than cling to a libertarian ideology of how the world should work.
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