Presidential election, 2016

[Warren Dew]

(01-10-2017, 08:02 AM)Odin Wrote:

(01-09-2017, 03:36 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: What Eric really objects to is classical liberalism, which does mean he and I are almost diametrically opposed.  I think he's purposely obfuscating the differences between classical liberalism and neoliberalism because he actually approves of those parts of neoliberalism that aren't part of classical liberalism.

Eric seems to conflate mainstream conservative neo-classical Monetarists like Friedman with the Austrian School wackjobs.

I think he conflates everyone on the right and center; it's more than just monetarists and the Austrian school.

For example, I figured out what I probably said that he interpreted as Reagan introducing me to classical liberalism.  It was probably a statement to the effect that Reagan's success caused me to believe that supply side policies worked.

The thing is, supply side policies are neither monetarist nor Austrian school.  They're a form of fiscal intervention, not monetary intervention; the most common forms are in fact fundamentally Keynesian, albeit not neokeynesian.  And Austrians, of course, think any form of government intervention is a bad idea.

So it's easy to have been introduced to classical liberalism when I was 13, but not credit supply side policies until I was 24, and not actually understand how supply side policies work until 40 or so, and regard Austrian economics as a curiosity until I figured out what they were actually saying at 50 or so.  But Eric can't grok that, because he can't bring himself to understand that they are all different things.

Which is a pity, because if Eric did understand them, even if he didn't change his political views, he'd still be able to make more interesting arguments against each of them.