Radicals for Capitalism by Brian Doherty

Rads isn’t mentioned, but its a fun little three minute block about an important libertarian issue, civil liberties in the age of terror. Will air sometime in the Glenn Beck Show hour—it airs three times, 7 pm est/9 pm est/midnight est. Adjust for your time zone.

The Wall Street Journal ran an op-ed  by me Saturday on what the right could learn from Ayn Rand, one of the heroines of Rads.

I’ll be on the radio on the Michael Duffy Show on Australia’s ABC National Radio today at 3 pm pacific time, debating with Kay Hymowitz regarding her review of Rads in Commentary. Here’s my response to her from Reason’s web site.

Austrian economist Joseph Salerno in the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics is dissatisfied, to say the least, with my book’s handling of certain controversial questions regarding the career paths and mainstream success of Austrian economists.

He takes issue point by point with various claims and opinions of Peter Boettke, whom I quote at length on the topic. Amidst all of Salerno’s insisting I did the reader a grave disservice and failed in my duties as a historian in not quoting or grappling at length with the viewpoint of those who disagree with Boettke on certain points, he had a compliment or two in there, one right in the first sentence:

The outstanding merit of Brian Doherty’s book is that it contains a treasure trove of valuable information regarding the events, personalities, periodicals and organizations whose complex interplay influenced the intellectual and institutional development of the modern American libertarian movement.

Now that I have the blurb quote out of the way….

A bit of defense of the book (and there’s certainly a lot in Salerno’s review to get defensive about!). First, it is really a review of three pages of the book. In taking that tack, it’s misleading about the full picture of how the book handles Austrian economics and economists, and the intersection between Austrian economics and libertarianism (and remember, the latter, not the former, is the book’s topic).

For one example, you’ll have a much better understanding of the meaning of Boettke’s off-the-cuff comments about Rothbard’s vision of the connection between Austrian economics and libertarian politics if you grapple with parts of the book beyond those three pages. A fuller understanding of Rothbard’s career and thought, which the book as a whole gives even if those three pages do not, shows that it is perfectly fair to conclude that Rothbard imparted to many a young libertarian or Austrian economist the idea that a libertarian ought to be an Austrian, and that an Austrian ought to be a libertarian.

I didn’t see it as my duty in this journalist’s popular history to come to a authorial conclusion about every controversy; in most cases, I don’t have a conclusion that I consider settled and dispositive. I tried to be fair, given my space constraints, judgments as to relative importance, and undoubtedly my own beliefs and/or prejudices, about vital matters of important controversy in the movement. Salerno thinks I failed in regards to Austrianism in the academy, and makes a fair case for that belief. I will note that, as he himself notes, my book provides the information needed to come to an alternate perspective on Boettke’s comments, even if I failed to, neglected to, or simply didn’t spell out that perspective in the form of a presented alternate case where I quoted Boettke’s opinions.

There are certainly many ongoing controversies and questions about Austrianism and the academy, not all of which were thoroughly covered in my book, which focused mostly on the tradition’s intersection with the libertarian political movement. While I still obviously considered Boettke’s comments to be valuable and insightful given his role as a long-time insider in and student of the tradition’s operation in America (and had an overarching view based on my personal experiences and readings as an activist and watcher of the libt. movement in which Boettke’s views seemed to make sense–this was not a matter of my blindly believing Boettke with no awareness of alternate perspectives), Salerno’s critical viewpoint on Boettke’s perspective is an important contribution to that debate, and everyone interested in the topic should read it.

Boettke’s response to Salerno, and an interesting comment thread.

The legendary Commentary magazine finally takes on Rads–in a review essay from its Sept. issue linking it with my old boss and good pal Brink Lindsey’s new book The Age of Abundance. I’ll be taking on Kay Hymowitz’s critiques of libertarianism in an upcoming essay on Reason’s web site.

Also, I got an hour to talk about my book with the Cato Institute’s Will Wilkinson on Bloggingheads.tv. The hour is divided into titles sections for those without the full hour to spare. Find the time!

I am hoping to update, and if WordPress is kind and actually functions properly, reorganize the links list in the blogroll soon.

So, uh I remembered to note this over on reason’s Hit and Run blog but not here–I’ll be appearing at midnight pacific Aug. 1 (that is, the beginning of Wednesday) on KOA-AM, 850 on the AM dial, in Denver, Rick Barber Show, listen live here. Talking about Rads and Ron Paul.

I’ll be appearing tomorrow morning, Tuesday July 24, to talk about RADS on the Don Wade and Roma Morning Show, airing on WLS 890 AM in Chicago area, at 8:40 am Central (local) time. You can listen live.

YouTube, that wonder of capitalism, has a bunch of video segments of me talking about RADS to a Clark County Libertarian Party meeting back in May. See here,  here, and here, for a start. I had to stand through the whole thing, unexpectedly, so I didn’t really get to consult my notes. It was a little weird, but worked out OK, I think.

I don’t think it’s open to the public if you aren’t already signed up, but I’m giving two RADS-derived talks at Cato University this week as well.

And an interesting blog review just showed up as well, from Nico Dornemann.

I hope this week to get a chance to update all the permalinks so that all the extant reviews, interviews, excerpts, and video are up there for all of eternity, if man is still alive, if woman shall survive. But I have two speeches to perfect.

One of the characters in RADS, Ron Paul, has been getting a fair amount of ink lately for his presidential run. Good show, Rep. Paul.

While not strictly a Rads spinoff, Heinlein did play a part in libertarian intellectual history, and thus in Rads, and I celebrated his centennial in this past Sunday’s LA Times.

Both very nice. First in today’s Chicago Sun-Times, by Joseph Bast of the Heartland Institute; and another from the web site of the Mackinac Institute.

While everything may fall through, I’m told my talk at FreedomFest on Friday will be filmed by C-SPAN for possible airing on their C-SPAN2 Book Tv operation. Will keep you posted.

Mark Skousen’s FreedomFest’s are always big heaping servings of libertarian fun, and I’ve been a proud participant in two past years, speaking once on Robert Nozick and then on Burning Man.

This year I will of course be speaking of Radicals for Capitalism (in a solo talk Friday at 11 a.m.) and then about Reason magazine (with editor-in-chief Nick Gillespie and a surprise guest, at 2 pm Saturday).

It occurs at the Bally’s/Paris Resort in Las Vegas, starting Thursday July 5 and running through Saturday July 7. Here’s all the info.  Dozens of speakers, tons of fun, hope to see you there.

Lots of promo news today, covering the waterfront of media; an op-ed spun off of Rads is in today’s NY Sun, about the links between New York City and libertarian luminaries.

Also, I’m scheduled to appear on CNBC today at 11:45 am est/8:45 am pacific talking about immigration and they just might flash the cover of the book, so they say. [UPDATE: Nope, that won't be happening. As often in the fast-paced world of cable news, they had to cancel/postpone it....I'll let you know if it's rescheduled.]

Also, I’m on the radio in the Monterey/Salinas California area, KION-AM, 1460 on your a.m. dial, at 7:10 am pacific today talking about one of my book’s characters who is now running for president, Ron Paul.