David McElroy

In his 1925 book, “Mein Kampf,” Adolph Hitler explained what he famously called “the big lie.” He said that if you tell a lie that’s big enough, people will believe it, because they have trouble believing someone “could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously.” Even though he wrote 86 years ago, that’s the heart of the playbook of modern politics.

The latest example is an attack launched by some progressive left liberal sites on Rick Perry. Nobody could accuse me of being a Perry sympathizer, but I’m a big fan of the truth. The accusation from PoliticusUSA and DailyKos is nothing but the Big Lie. Here’s the lede on the DailyKos story:

“It seems that the GOP’s present white savior, Rick Perry, has a BIG porno problem. Back in 1995, when his bouffant hairdo was barely all the rage, Rick Perry invested thousands of dollars into Movie Gallery, Inc, a porn distributor company. It was the largest distributor of porn movies, and was even opposed by the conservative American Family Association….”

That sounds pretty dramatic and clear-cut. It would be pretty hypocritical of conservative Christian-talking Perry, wouldn’t it? The problem is that it’s misleading at best. Movie Gallery wasn’t a “porn distributor company.” It was a huge Alabama-based company that became the second largest movie rental chain in the country. It was Blockbuster‘s biggest competitor, back when movie rental chains still mattered.

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What’s the difference between a libertarian and an anarchist? About 10 years.

It’s an old joke — and there are variations of it — but there’s some truth to it, because it’s a story that I’ve heard a number of times. In fact, it’s my story, too.

Most of us who’ve completely give up on the state started out in one of the mainstream political parties and then converted to the Libertarian Party, because we concluded that smaller government made sense and that there should be no distinction between economic and personal liberty. Republicans talk a good game about economic freedom, but they want to control your personal life. Democrats mostly talk a good game about personal (social) freedom, but they want to control your economic life. We see the contradiction of either of those positions, so we begin advocating the libertarian ideal of small government and freedom in all areas. For many of us, though, there’s a further step.

If you oppose government control on philosophical grounds, you soon run up against the issue of whether any form of the state can be morally justified. For many of us, we’ve reluctantly had to come to the conclusion that the state is immoral. Not just a “big state.” It applies to any state that claims the power to rule over the people and property that happens to fall within a certain geographical area — unless those people are there by their own choice and if they have other realistic choices.

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The good news for unemployed people is that Barack Obama is about to do his best imitation of Bill “I Feel Your Pain” Clinton and start concentrating on giving them jobs. How? Well, that’s not so clear. They’re making it up as they go along. The bad news is that the mainstream economists who the administration listens to are just as confused as they are about how to “create jobs.”

The Obama administration said Wednesday that the president will make a speech shortly after Labor Day outlining what he’s planning to do about creating jobs. It would probably help if he would call someone at the Mises Institute for a few minutes to get an explanation about why government can only destroy jobs, not create them. Since that’s not going to happen, let’s take a look at the beliefs of the sort of neo-Keynesians who he will be listening to in formulating his plan.

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