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For taunt-seekers
March 5th, 2012 Posted in Debating Libertarians Gently So Gene Healy Doesn't Get His Feelings Hurt, Policy and PoliticsGod, now I have to go back and read a bunch of crap I wrote ten years ago to see if I still agree with it.
I don’t know much about this Cato business. I do of course know Koch. I know people there well enough to find laughable the notion that they are somehow opposed to liberty, or that they could ever imagine Cato is essential to some secret partisan or corporate agenda and must therefore be taken over.
And like everyone, I know about Cato. I know many people smarter than me who work there, and I appreciate very much their efforts for decades to make mainstream many valuable ideas that once would have been relegated to the fringe. I don’t agree with all of them, and I think libertarianism, to be an intellectually cohesive philosophy, needs critique and work. Fortunately, I’ve always found the people I know who work for Cato to welcome the kind of spirited debate that tends to make idea-generating organizations healthier.
But I suppose right now the point is to circle the wagons, craft a narrative of conspiracy, and paint whatever side one is not on as intransigent and small-minded. None of which will have any bearing on the final legal decisions, but all of which is to the great delight of those who despise liberty and would love to see Cato torn down.
on 
Why have the Kochs tried to pack the Cato board with Koch employees, former Koch employees and associates?
Lame. I’ve seen that charge against you in a couple of places now. The Kochs may be in the wrong regarding Cato – I don’t know enough about it – but casting you as a conservative Trojan Horse is laughable.
ABC,
I imagine they are casting about for people they trust to uphold the rule of law, in the face of what they see as a violation of the bylaws. Naturally one goes with people one knows well in such instances, just as I’m sure Ed Crane would prefer his associates.
Abel,
I went back through some of those old essays, and realized just how hard Jerry Taylor had to work to cast me as a “Republican blogger” opposed to libertarian ideas. I don’t know him, but I do know something now about his character, for whatever that’s worth.
[...] Woodlief responds in part here: [...]
I began following this story today as I received a call for help from Cato via Facebook. I’m a conservative with libertarian streaks.
The most compelling argument for this disinterested observer is the Koch’s concern that Cato turn into Ford, Pew, and others which took hard left hand turns once the founders were out of the picture. Not knowing any of this stuff was going on, I recently began perceiving a shift to the left by Cato (based solely on Facebook posts).
Apart from ideological debate, it seems to me that the Koch’s have a shareholder contract designed specifically to thwart outsiders from taking over. You may not like it, but you didn’t start this organization, they did. Any real libertarian would not be trying to take that which does not belong to them.
Odd that a Liberatarian organization would be talking about upholding the law, when intellectual Libertarians do not believe in law.