Fair Tax Boortz to Give Paul A Fair Chance

Its been a while since I’ve given any serious attention to "libertarian" radio talk show host Neal Boortz. Despite his claim that he’s a libertarian, he has a number of very troubling views on things that I find to not paint libertarianism in an accurate, let alone good, light. In fact, many of his views are plainly not libertarian. The biggest among these is that he a foaming-at-the-mouth warmonger. Despite the core principle of libertarianism being the rejection of the initiation of force, he has no problem advocating the use of military might to hunt down and kill people he suspects might someday do someone harm. This "pre-emptive strike" philosophy has far reaching and disturbing implications.

I was reading his "Neal’s Nuze" page from yesterday – basically, his show notes for the things he will be talking about on the air that day. Not suprisingly, Neal has not been on the Ron Paul bandwagon for, also not surprisingly, Paul’s anti-war position. For Boortz, Paul’s dedication to reducing the size, scope, and power of the federal government, to cutting spending, to passing the Fair Tax, to promoting school choice, to liberalizing gun laws, to ending the failed War on Drugs, and on and on… all libertarian positions, all positions that Boortz himself are in agreement with, gets thrown out the window because of Paul’s lack of willingness to bomb the shit out of dark-skinned non-Christians.

Here is how Boortz explains it:

Sometimes you have to make a difficult decision not on the basis of what's the worse that could happen if you DO act, but on what the worst possible scenario would be if you DIDN'T.

This statement alone is frightening in its implications. After Boortz details all of his beliefs about free markets in health care, education, ending the war on drugs, etc. He makes this statement of principle. But this begs one question: why does this "pre-emptive action" principle only apply to killing Muslims? Why couldn’t it apply to drug users? Or gun owners? For example, why is it not justified for the government to actively pursue and eliminate illegal drugs, or completely abolish private ownership of guns, since, in either of these cases, the worst possible scenario of NON-action could be people getting killed in a spectacular fashion. Why should my neighbor be allowed to own a gun, since he may use it incorrectly, or irresponsibly, and kill me or my child? Why not make the speed limit 5 miles an hour since "allowing" people to drive faster could lead to many, many deaths. Under Boortz’s philosophy, its hard to make out a case that ANYTHING that is otherwise non-violent should be legal, because one can always imagine possibilities that lead to the need for pre-emptive action, thus making non-action a grave moral failing. In short, Boortz’ philosophy is contradictory and nonsensical.

It’s tragic to see Boortz sacrificing the opportunity to advance liberty in the political realm on a lot of fronts because of one issue. I understand that many people have their hot-button, deal breaker issues. Hell, I have them myself. But his rabid insistance on this one issue position makes me wonder… if Ron Paul got the nomination, and was up against Hillary Clinton, whose credentials as a bloodthirsty warmonger are well established, would he vote for her?

The irony here is that Boortz likes to charge libertarians (party types, anyway) of being intolerant of those who do not hoe the ideological line. Yet, Boortz himself is will to throw aside supporting a candidate that he agrees with on about 97% of all other issues – including his beloved "Fair Tax" – for the sake of one issue. Who’s intolerant, Neal?

Well, at least he’s willing now to give Paul a fair shot, instead of dismissing him out of hand, which is nice to see.