There are many strains of libertarianism, everything from Randians to liberaltarians, from minarchists to anarcho-capitalists.
I’m guessing the one thing they all have in common is a distrust of politicians and government.
Simply stated, we libertarians have noticed that slippery slopes are…well…slippery. When government gets a bit more power, they eventually wind up with a lot more power.
And that power then gets misused. Public Choice 101.
And this is why there is reflexive hostility to proposals for the Federal Reserve to adopt a digital currency.
Some of our friends on the left think such suspicion is absurd, or even downright crazy.
In her Washington Post column, Catherine Rampell accuses Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis of being “looney” and “paranoid” because he recently spoke against the idea.
DeSantis can’t help but pivot from tangible, kitchen-table economic issues to bizarre culture-war concerns. And that’s where we get into looney-tunes territory. In a speech this past weekend in Pennsylvania, DeSantis suggested that the real reason to fear the Fed is that central bankers…”want the Fed to control a digital dollar,” he said. “Guess what’ll happen? They’re going to try to impose an ESG agenda through that. You go and use too much gas, they’re going to stop it. They’re not going to honor the transaction because you’ve already bought more than what they think. You wanna go buy a rifle, they’re going to say no, you have too many, too many of those, you can’t do it.” …DeSantis…appears to be invoking conspiracy theories that the left wants to eliminate physical cash… The Fed would then use that surveillance to control everyone’s lives, specifically to undermine the Second Amendment. …this is all so paranoid and untethered to reality that it’s almost like financial fan fiction.
It appears, however, that Ms. Rampell is the one untethered to reality.
She’s apparently unaware that many prominent voices on the left explicitly argue in favor of eliminating cash.
She’s also apparently unaware that politicians on the left already have tried to use the financial system to restrict the buying and selling of firearms.
Maybe I’m a bit old-fashioned, but it seems like bad journalism to accuse DeSantis of conspiracy-mongering when five minutes of basic research would show he was addressing a very real issue.
P.S. What happened in Canada also was not “financial fan fiction.”
[…] on cash” is misguided, I have a seven-part series (here, here, here, here, here, here, and here) explaining why it is dangerous to eliminate currency and rely solely on government-provided […]
[…] don’t always agree with Ms. Rampell, but I think this analysis is […]
[…] kudos to DeSantis for opposing a central bank digital currency. Governments would have vast new powers to abuse if cash was […]
[…] don’t always agree with Ms. Rampell, but I think this analysis is […]
[…] disagreed with many of her columns in the Washington Post, but Catherine Rampell deserves credit for honesty […]
Unlike anarco-communist libertarian impersonators, I actually vote LP and support the NMLP
Yah, we were also paranoid and untethered to reality when we believed gay rights was a slippery slope to trans, pedo, and every other weird thing they brought in through the same door.
Amen, Mr. Mitchell, AMEN.
Have a Blessed Easter, good sir.
Kevin Susquehanna County, PA
Sent from my Behemoth Dell 690
[…] The War Against Cash, Part VII — International Liberty […]
“The Fed would then use that surveillance to control everyone’s lives, specifically to undermine the Second Amendment. …this is all so paranoid and untethered to reality that it’s almost like financial fan fiction.”The Fed would then use that surveillance to control everyone’s lives, specifically to undermine the Second Amendment. …this is all so paranoid and untethered to reality that it’s almost like financial fan fiction.”
I support mandatory gun and ammunition insurance that would enable insurance companies (not the government) to price the risk of harm of particular weapons in the hands of particular individuals. A.I. can continually search the public data bases and adjust risk as may be statistically appropriate and without any political or government interference.
My medical information is kept from the government and my social media information should be as well.
Oh, you mean like this
“Credit card purchases of firearms in the US can now be tracked and purchases deemed suspicious can even be shared with law enforcement, according to a new measure approved by an organization that sets parameters for business transactions.
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) voted in favor of creating a merchant code for firearms stores, according to Reuters.”
We know it’s going to happen, but I don’t think we can stop it. All we can do is prepare. Have you read Lionel Shriver’s The Mandibles ? Prescient.