Monday, November 29, 2010
Wonkery: Tyler Cowen updates his view of Obamacare
Libertarian economist and longtime blogger Tyler Cowen updates his various opinions about Obamacare, including its likelihood of success. Worth reading, along with at least a few of the comments.
5 Comments:
By 
JPMcT, at
Mon Nov 29, 05:47:00 PM:
Typical liberal dunce: I had the best of intentions, so I cannot be held accountable for the worst of consequences.
Perhaps there would have been more anticipation of such consequences had there been more deliberation.
...idiots.
By Dawnfire82, at
Mon Nov 29, 06:27:00 PM:
That simply read like a list a things he was wrong about, and the general tone of the comments was snotty and unhelpful.
For instance: "[Government health care] can't be done. Strangely, only in the USA. Works perfectly well everywhere else."
Which is *absurdly* false.
"A world war would solve most of our problems..."
And so on.
And he can't see how legal challenges to the individual mandate aren't "non-starters?" Howard fucking Dean admitted that it was probably unconstitutional.
Also, "The fact that mandate enforcement could be passed to the state level..." There is no such fact. IN fact, that kind of thing (requiring states to execute federal regulations) has been expressly declared unconstitutional under the Anti-Commandeering Doctrine (thank you Justice O'Connor).
Still more: "The Republicans still don't have a good alternative plan or compromise to offer, should a chance for renegotiation arise."
This is also false, as some of the comments there pointed out.
Really, really unimpressed. And I don't believe for a moment that this guy is 'libertarian.'
For instance, from his Wiki page, "Cowen argued that libertarians "should embrace a world with growing wealth, growing positive liberty, and yes, growing government."
'Positive liberty' linked to 'growing government?' Embrace it?
Libertarian my ass. Sounds like this guys fancies himself an intellectual and so declares himself to be 'libertarian' because the 'progressives' annoy him, 'liberal' is passe, he doesn't want to be associated with knuckle-dragging 'conservatives,' and libertarian sounds vaguely anti-establishment and has a reference to 'liberty' in it.
By 
, at
Mon Nov 29, 09:36:00 PM:
Thanks for the link, and the note on looking at the comments.
I thought this was really silly:
"9. The Republicans still don't have a good alternative plan or compromise to offer, should a chance for renegotiation arise."
Hello?
Seems quite a few comments nailed the blogger on this one.
On another note, I just left a few comments on a pro-Palin post at one of my favorite Conservative blogs - and felt the wrath of the devotees labeling me with "PDS".
Sorry, I just didn't think her Facebook offering was brilliant. But what do I know? I guess I grow increasingly weary of the hype. But then I wonder if blogs and comment really matter.
I often search for insight, news, etc., I am missing. I am a news junkie, and find it all fascinating.
But tell me if I am wrong, is it Conservative to not be able to constructively question the offering of the Hockey Mom? Without being called some ugly name?
Seems like the fashion has reached a boiling point - or is getting nervous.
By astonerii, at
Tue Nov 30, 12:22:00 AM:
I was going to comment, but DawnFire82 pretty much sums it all up.
He is a liberal "progressive" libtard that has swollowed whole cloth the entire liberal "progressive" argument and not even noticed that there is and was a Conservative argument.
By , at
Wed Dec 01, 01:22:00 AM:
I read Tyler everyday and enjoy his blog because of his eclectic links and interests. However, I don't consider him a true libertarian, he just pretends to be one. He obviously hates Republicans and has never said a nice thing about conservativism. (Republicans and conservatives are two different things.)
Politically, I think he's a wimp--i.e. a liberal, but he would never admit it. Liberaltarian is probably a correct description of his political views.
BTW, TigerHawk, I loved your libertarian hawk label. Another variation is "global libertarian". I believe in fighting for liberty across the globe. I love seeing despots being pulled out of spiderholes.
