[Lnc-business] The Challenge of Populism

[david.demarest at lp.org]

After exhausting the sports and editorial pages in the Omaha World 
Herald this morning while digesting my oatmeal, I gave up reading the 
cereal box for entertainment and picked up the latest quarterly Cato's 
Letter (Winter 2018, Volume 16, Number 1). The lead story 'The Challenge 
of Populism' immediately caught my eye. The article captured the 
discussion by Peruvian novelist and 2010 Nobel laureate in literature 
Mario Vargas Llosa and his son Alvaro Vargas Llosa during Cato's Joseph 
K. McLaughlin Lecture Series in November 2017. I wondered how populism 
might relate to ongoing concerns about the direction of the Libertarian 
Party.

The Lecturers contend that communism, as the major threat to democracy 
and liberty in the past, is being replaced rapidly by a populist appeal 
to nationalism and xenophobic blaming of 'others' for a country's 
problems. Communism as an ideology failed to deliver on its promises. 
Populism, however, presents a more difficult challenge because it is 
neither an ideology nor a system of principles that can be refuted with 
rationality. The lecturers allege that the popularity of populism is 
fueled by the free-lunch fiction that "sacrifice" is not necessary to 
solve a country's problems.

The article has much value regarding the evils of populism. My only 
objection is the misuse of the word 'sacrifice' that evokes an image of 
value-agnostic altruistic self-sacrifice for the good of others demanded 
by institutional leaders, at the point of a gun in the case of 
government, as a thinly disguised smoke screen for self-aggrandizement 
of leaders who rely on our willing self-sacrifice. Rather than the 
lecturers' version of populist fiction that sacrifice is not necessary 
for prosperity, I believe the lecturers could have more accurately 
described populist attempts to delude their listeners as a promise of 
prosperity without the necessity of embracing the rigors of the free 
market.

Fortunately, most Libertarians know better, as epitomized by our past 
Libertarian Party 'earned-lunch' standard of 'TANSTAAFL' (There Ain't No 
Such Thing As A Free Lunch), popularized by Robert Heinlein and Milton 
Friedman. However, are there other concerns about elements of populism 
the might be relevant to the direction that the Libertarian Party is 
headed?

Is the Libertarian Party gradually drifting in the direction of 
populism, characterized by unwarranted glorifying of statist nationalist 
symbols of adventurist protectionism, propagandizing of our children's 
intellectual maturation, and smothering our freedom with misguided laws; 
compounded by the degradation of our principles and dilution of our 
message to fool voters; and, finally, xenophobic purging of any who 
might offend voters by challenging people to think outside the box for 
themselves, reject populism, and exercise free speech in the pursuit of 
freedom?

Perhaps the nationalist and xenophobic threats of populism are indeed 
something to be wary of in our LNC deliberations and initiatives going 
forward as we seek to differentiate the Libertarian Party from the other 
two major parties that have no moral compass beyond getting elected.