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Robert Scheer and Libertarian Journalist Matt Welch Discuss Reason in
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Posted on Sep 16, 2016
Matt Welch. (Gage Skidmore(https://www.flickr.com/photos/gageskidmore/)
/ CC BY-SA 2.0(https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/) )
In this weeks
episode(http://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/shows/scheer-intelligence/matt-welc
h-reason-and-the-libertarian) of KCRWs Scheer Intelligence, Truthdig
Editor in Chief Robert Scheer speaks with journalist and libertarian Matt
Welch about what it means to be a libertarian, how the Libertarian Party has
grown during the 2016 presidential campaign and where libertarian values and
progressive values overlap.
Welch discusses why Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson
continues to poll well as the election nears, a time when the popularity of
third party candidates tends to recede, and how he believes the government
continues to use any type of crisis to justify expanding its power.
Welch is the editor at-large of the monthly libertarian magazine
Reason(http://reason.com) , co-author of The Declaration of Independents:
How Libertarian Politics Can Fix Whats Wrong with
America(https://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&index=blended&keywords=978-16103910
09&link_code=qs&tag=kcco04-20) and author of McCain: The Myth of the
Maverick(https://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&index=blended&keywords=978-0230603
967&link_code=qs&tag=kcco04-20) .
Adapted from KCRW by Alexander Reed
Kelly(http://www.truthdig.com/alexander_kelly)
Robert Scheer: Hello, this is Robert Scheer with another edition of Scheer
Intelligence, where the intelligence comes from guests. In this case its a
fellow I still think of as a young guy, although youre getting [inaudible]
Matt Welch, who I met when I spoke at his college, at the University of
California, Santa Barbara many years ago, at the end of the 60s. He had a
good adversarial mind, and then he went off to Prague where he teamed up
with a bunch of editors from their very good school, [inaudible] and they
formed an English language paper in Prague called Prognosis. Young guys and
women out there. Putting out this paper was very successful, and then they
came back and did all sorts of things in journalism and showed up in all
sorts of interesting places on the internet.
In the case of Matt Welch, and the reason I wanted to have him on this show
today, is because he defined himself as a young Libertarian and he ended up
being the editor in chief of the leading Libertarian publication, Reason
Magazine. He did that for a long time, 10 years. Prior to that, I should
mention he was at the LA Times on the editorial page for a couple of years.
From, I guess it was 2008 until quite recently he was the editor in chief,
and hes now an editor at large. As everybody should know, except the mass
media doesnt give it enough coverage, we have some independent candidates
running aside from the Republican and the Democratic party of Trump and
Clinton.
We have Jill Stein on the Green Party side and on the Libertarian side, we
have others but the leading ones are these four. Gary Johnson who was the
governor of New Mexico. Jill Stein is getting about five percent in the
polls now, Gary Johnson is doing quite a bit better, in some polls he goes
over ten percent but I gather hes averaging around seven percent. Not there
yet at the fifteen percent needed to qualify for the presidential debates
but nonetheless both these folks can be spoilers, can have an impact and so
I thought it was time to turn to my favorite Libertarian. Matt Welch, Id
ask you first of all, why Libertarian? Whats it all about in this day and
age? How do you differ, and what do you think of your candidate?
Matt Welch: First of all, Bob, thank you for that generous introduction and
I just want to point out that that newspaper in Prague would not have
happened without you helping us all out and drumming up support for us,
which all of us are forever eternally grateful for. Part of my
Libertarianism with the weird and unusual path toward it, comes actually
from Central Europe when we were out there. I was out there for eight years,
mostly in Prague and Budapest. I presumed that, as the Cold War was
finishing in America, Cold War politics would finish as well and people
would break up their silly old blocks and rethink a lot of original
assumptions.
I was under the thrall of people like [inaudible] ardent anti-Communists who
thought that it made sense to not have the state hold the primary role in a
factory and not to spend a lot of time telling people what they could and
couldnt listen to or do and all this kind of stuff. At the same time you
should be able to sit on Charles Bridge and swig wine from the bottle and
maybe smoke hash and play guitar. That seemed to me like normal politics and
when I came back home to America, I just sort of assumed that thered be a
place for that and I discovered ... I think I came back within a day of the
Lewinsky scandal dropping back in 1998, and nothing like that existed.
It took a while [before] I was willing to have my weird politics defined as
Libertarian but
pretty much, thats where it is. The Libertarian party and
sort of small-l libertarian wing are represented by reason and other people
[who] all sort of proceed from the old tiny notion of that [what] governs
best
governs least and lets just decide on ... the minimum that we need
to do, that we agree that government should or could do it isnt going to be
done otherwise. But otherwise lets allow people to pursue happiness as they
see fit, as spelt out in the Declaration of Independence.
In a modern context thats just crazy to half the people about half the time
and [at] the same time it makes all the sense in the world to half the
people about half the time depending on the audience. Its very interesting
to know that Gary Johnson right now is actually pretty consistently at nine
percent ... Usually third parties at this point in the race will have
receded a great deal because people freak out and think about the Supreme
Court and flock to their original tribes, but neither Jill Stein or Gary
Johnson are seeing much erosion in support, which I think speaks to how
deservedly unpopular in my view both major party candidates [are]. Just how
decreasingly those political affiliations are holding sway among people,
particularly young people, the millennials.
Theres never been a generation that has been less interested in joining
anything, let alone political parties. Theres been some pollsIBD poll in
particularwhere Gary Johnson has occasionally topped both other candidates
among eighteen to twenty-four year olds. He always gets really great support
among the youngest voters out there,, which I think speaks to something
interesting for the future of American politics.
RS: Well, with your help Im hoping to get Gary Johnson for one of these
podcasts, but let me broaden it to the question of why be a Libertarian? I
want to confess my own prejudice here. I did a couple of shows with you and
Im probably the person on the left whos most open to Libertarian thinking
because I do believe in the original vision of the founders, that the
government that governs best is the one that governs least. I believe in a
very strong notion of individual freedom and I am very worried about the
overpowering federal state. My problem with the Libertarians is over the
word, consistency.
I like the Libertarians when they condemn crony capitalism, when they
actually argue for a fair tax structure, when they want to get money out of
politics. I like the Libertarians when they dont want to go marching off to
all of these wars that destroy citizen control with secrecy and foreign
adventures and so forth. Then, I look at what passes for the Libertarian
wing of the Republican party and all too many of the favor crony capitalism
and favor foreign adventure. Does it make you uncomfortable?
MW: Im not sure that I would agree with that characterization just in terms
of people like Rand Paul and Justin Amash, the post Tea party wave of new
Libertarianish Republicans. Thomas Massie is another one, Mike Lee is
another one, although hes maybe
less hardcore than other guys. Those guys
are pretty anti-interventionist, pretty pro-civil liberties, anti-NSA.
During the run up to what was supposed to the US intervention into Syria in
August of 2013, that opposition was led or co-led by that wing, by Rand Paul
and those lots.
I do agree that the usual traditional Republican talking point, that is when
they dont hold power and dont hold the White House, of being limited
government among people who are more just sort of conservative has been
suffused with that exact same hypocrisy. Thats one of the reasons why
reason has long existed because were infuriated by that. Theres a precious
few people whove called that out and some of those people are some of the
biggest critics of Donald Trump, people like Jeff Flake, senator from
Arizona, who was tangling with him over the weekend.
I think what is more interesting in terms of the characteristics of the
Republican version of Libertarians is that if youre an elected Republican
and a Libertarian, that means youre anti-abortion and pro-life. Rand Paul
introduced the Life Begins At Conception Act. The Libertarian party in stark
contrast has from its inception been pro-choice. They fight about it every
year, every four years at the Libertarian party convention and the
pro-choice side always wins. Gary Johnson and William Weld were both
pro-choice blue state Republican moderate governors.
RS: Youre
[saying] the presidential candidate and vice presidential
candidate of the Libertarian party, are pro-choice.
MW: Correct. That is the dominant strain within certainly the Libertarian
party and among people who self identify as libertarians in general, that is
true. If youre an elected Republican Libertarian youre going to be against
abortion, if youre just a Libertarian regardless of politics, chances are
youre going to [be] pro-choice. Its one of the [oddities] of the tribal
politics that we have. You cant get elected if you dont act in the major
two parties, which is again another reason why people I think gravitate more
toward third partiesor just being independent of it all, anyway.
RS: Meaning you couldnt win a Republican primary in most places if youre
not against choice.
MW: Yeah, and the same is true now of Democrats. The Democrats retook the
House in 2006 in part by broadening their tent to include some pro-life
members but thats over. As far as I know, there really arent any
anti-abortion Democrats in Congress anymore. Its just part of the thing.
The [slotting] of us into these ideological blocks means that the litmus
tests are stronger [than] ever
if youre going to hold on to these
identities.
However the dominant trend in American politics and the subject of a book
Nick Gillespie and I wrote back in 2011, is that forty five percent
[inaudible] of Americans now, if you ask them, How do you self identify? A
Democrat, Republican, Independent? What is it? Forty five percent say
independent. Back in 1970 that number was like nineteen percent. It is
growing and its ineffable and once people self identify that way theyre
much more open to any number of ideas and enthusiasms and coalitions than
they were before. Theyre much more hostile toward these weird
amalgamations, these rituals that you have to agree with in order to remain
part of those tribes.
RS: The book youre referring to is called, The Declaration Of
Independence, How Libertarian Politics Can Fix Whats Wrong With America.
Its by Reason TV editor Nick Gillespie and Matt Welch, it was in 2011.
Actually you wrote quite a provocative book in 2008 called McCain, The Myth
of A Maverick. You called him out and had some real problems over that one
or initiated a lot of debate. [inaudible] because were going to run out of
time, but I happen to think the Libertarian message is very important in
this election on two points. Those points are either going to go green or
are going to go Libertarian. Were not going to get progress from the
Republicans or Democrats and that has to do with regime change and foreign
intervention. I think Hillary Clinton and Donald [Trump] are arguing over
words rather than real meaning.
They both have a very tough idea of foreign intervention and American
exceptionalism. The other is the issue that Bernie Sanders raised so
effectively on the Democratic side, which is been long forgotten now by the
Democrats, which is the question of what you would call crony capitalism and
he would probably call economic justice and fairness. That has to do with a
rigged economic system, in which the rich get richer and everybody else gets
hurt. I do want to say something in favor of Ron Paul and his son Rand Paul
that they have been very consistent.
Ron Paul was one of only four votes in the Congress and the House against
The Commodity Futures Modernization Act, which I thought was great. Not the
act but his vote against it because thats the one that enabled all these
junk schemes to be sold and he was against doing away with Glass-Steagall
[Act], and Rand Paul has been very good. They also in terms of foreign
policy were very good on privacy and against the National Security State and
the heavy classification. Is that the kind of candidate Gary Johnson is?
MW: Yes, hes running explicitly to be against foreign interventionismhe
brings it up on every single occasion that he talks. He believes that even
if everybodys morals or heart was in the right place on X intervention but
it did not make us safer, it added to a sense of blowback out there,
complicated the world, created instability. That as you rightly point out is
a viewpoint that is not being represented in this election. Hillary Clinton
is the most hawkish Democrat we have for the most part at this point. Now
that Joe Lieberman has floated off into independent heaven or whatever the
hell he is. That is something. Imagine this ... In 2006, 07, 08 remember
the runaway executive branch of government and all of the Bushes wars. You
brought a book about the five lies. Five Biggest Lies About Iraq.
That was what the left was talking about broadly speaking in 06, 07 and
08 and were about now ready to elect someone who wants to throw Edward
Snowden in jail, who still describes Libya as smart power at its best. Its
really kind of out of [step] with American public opinion if you look at it.
Trump is a weirder character, therere some anti-war Libertarians whove
decided to see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear about
his foreign policy ... . He won South Carolina while criticizing the Bush
family on war, which is a very interesting political development. At the
same time, he tells just crazy stories about dipping bullets into pigs
blood to shoot Muslims and lets just take their oil in Iraq and just
nonsense like that.
The intervention skepticism, the realism as we used to call it in foreign
policy circles, which really doesnt have a home anymore is only being
championed at this point by Libertarian Andy Green, Jill Stein and Gary
Johnson. Youre right to point that out and its interesting to know that I
think they are much more aligned with where American public opinion is. Its
only so long, thats one of the results of having this rising independence,
you can no longer get [by] with, for decades being completely out of [step]
with the dominant opinions held by the base of your political party.
They will rise up and find a way to smite you and always surprise the
political pundits in that process. At this point it happens very two years.
Bernie Sanders came out of nowhere. What is all this talk? [inaudible] they
call it. My God, where did that come from? Hes a socialist. It surprises
people but thats because we now have tools to work around the system.
Thats all heartening, whats disheartening is that we have two major party
candidates who are pretty bad. Bad to terrible on foreign policy and it
doesnt seem like its going to get better.
RS: Before we drop the foreign policy, lets not give Trump a bye on ... Not
that you were but you cant be for a more rational non-interventionist
foreign policy when you want to go to war with Mexico, which hes basically
talking about. When you demonize foreign workers, after all, it used to be a
mainstay of the Republican party to believe that people being able to come
here and work and get a pass to the citizenship, that was actually a
Republican plank and the Democrats opposed it because they had an
old-fashion view of closed society. I think again, if the big issue in terms
of foreign policy is the government that governs best is the governs least,
you cant have this wild interventionism of any kind, with picking fights
with people, but let me switch because were running out of time, to the
question of crony capitalism.
That one I think is a little stickier for you because in terms of ... Lets
go back to the origins of Libertarian thought. I remember when I was a
college student, at City College in New York, we had all kinds of Marxist
enclaves but we had Libertarian, we had followers of Ayn Rand and Mises and
Von Hayek and so forth. The idea basically was some kind of Adam Smiths
notion of a free economy. We dont live in anything like that, that you will
agree on, right?
MW: Yeah, we live broadly speaking in West-adopted rules and notions two
hundred and fifty years ago that worked out pretty well for everybody but
no, we dont live in any kind of free market Valhalla and no one ever really
has.
RS: Well, no but the basic idea of a free market is one in which no one can
control pricing and in which theres real competition and so forth. Then
instead we have concentration of wealth of an extraordinary degree and
concentration of power and particularly political power. Just the story as
were recording this today that came out of the Washington Post about how
Bill Clinton gets, and its just one of the many funds he tipped into, got
eighteen million dollars from some private college network that he was
consulting with and this crossover and both parties of money and power and
the irony for the Democrats [inaudible] united but for the last couple of
election cycles theyve had candidates that are more effective in getting
money from the fat cats and so forth. People have a right to ask, are the
libertarians going to be consistent on calling for a free market, a free
society and one that controls this concentrated power?
MW: Well the question becomes, how? The crony capitalism as a line of
Libertarian critique has been a robust one. It was Libertarians and their
allies including many people on the left who went after the Export-Import
bank, for a long, long [time] and continue to do so, [inaudible], the bank
of Boeing so that we can spend our taxpayer money subsidizing Boeings loans
so that countries in Africa can buy their jets. It is the worst of this kind
of behavior. The Libertarians and the progressive left depart, and its an
ongoing conversation, is that the Libertarian insight is that, the more you
regulate industry acts, the more you will actually get crony capitalism
because the people who are highest profile, the most powerful companies in
industry
will say, Sweet, I can just now write the rules of competition
or influence rules of competition in a way that new entrants cannot.
People of the left often times say, Well, you just want the rich people to
get richer. Its actually no, I want them to go bankrupt when they lose. I
dont want to subsidize their losses. Lets not forget that both the Tea
party movement and Occupy Wall Street, had some commonalities. Those
commonalities and some common enemies and many of those had to do with the
bailouts that began in the fall of 2008 under George Bush and continued
under Barack Obama, where we socialized private sector gambles. Thats just
the wrong way to do it. We have bankruptcy for a reason, we have failure for
a reason and we shouldnt lose our nerve in moments of crisis like that.
Therere some genuine disagreements there, I can just tell you that in sort
of the broader Libertarian network that I belong to and am fluent with. I
know, Ive met David Koch twice. I know of the work of Charles Koch. David
Koch sits in the board of the Reason Foundation.
They will tell you that they were turned around about crony capitalism by a
book by Tim Carney of the Washington Examiner about this, and they wrote,
Charles Koch one of those guys [who] wrote a piece for the Washington Post
in March saying, Here is where I agree with Bernie Sanders. It was all
about that. The real disagreement is, do you go for solutions that involve
equality of outcomes or equality of opportunities and then what is the role
here of ... Where do you say the government should get out and where do you
say it should get in?
RS: Im going to answer this question for you now as your old teacher that
you never listened to, the issue is not ensuring an equal outcome, the issue
is stopping the mafia from robbing money from the rest of us. Its to stop
people who can use the government and the laws to benefit them so they can
steal from everyone else. The reason why Ron Paul was wise and one of the
great figures of recent Libertarian politics, the reason why Ron Paul was
wise to vote against The Commodity Futures Modernization Act that Bill
Clinton signed into law as a lame duck president and unfortunately Bernie
Sanders voted for it because it was part of an omnibus bill and a lot of
people voted for it. Four people who voted against it, they were generally
Libertarians led by Ron Paul and if though that meant regulation of
Commodity Futures, thats what it was.
The Commodity Futures Modernization Act said that these newfangled gimmicks,
these collateralized data obligations and credit to force swaps and
everything would have to be regulated by the old rules and Clinton wiped
away that regulation and thats how we got the big banking meltdown. Were
talking about honest rules of the road, transparency, accountability. If
somebody believes in the Adam Smiths notion of a free market, you dont
want any plays to be able to rig the rules. That was Adams Smiths wisdom,
right? You dont want a few giant political entities, corporations to be
able to rig the rules so some people can steal with impunity. The great
banking meltdown that happened in this country, was Wall Street was allowed
to legally steal and destroy the savings of so many people.
MW: I think that were in broad agreement here Bob. Think about the symbol
of the tax code, who benefits from complexity in the tax code out there
besides accountants and lawyers? Its people who can afford accountants and
lawyers. If the rules are simple and fair and understandable and there isnt
a curve out for X and a curve out for Y and a subsidy for this and a pull
away from that, suddenly you dont have to have all of this firepower and
you cant rig the game so that you dont ever pay taxes, whereas someone who
cant afford your lawyer and cant afford your accountant is paying at a
much higher rate. Its the complexity of the system which is the enemy and
its one reason why Washington loves to add complexity and thats a
bipartisan thing and it always has been.
That is the enemy
and I believe in Libertarian thought and certainly on
this particular Libertarian party ticket, Gary Johnson and Bill Weld, they
get that and write about that all of the time. Gary Johnson is always
talking about how he scores a seventy three or a seventy four on [inaudible]
when he plugs in Bernie Sanders name and a lot of that has to do with
saying, yes the system is rigged by the powerful at the expense of the
powerless so lets go after that together in a consistent way. I think
Washington Republicans
have too often interpreted that as, Were the
party of business. Instead of, Were the party of free markets. There is
a difference. The party of free markets lets businesses fail and doesnt
bend over backwards to give billions of dollars away to the owners of sports
franchises to build their stadiums and all these kind of things.
RS: Well, youre absolutely correct and
if in fact instead of the Bush
bailout, which is by the way is exactly what Obama did when came in. Obama
had blasted the Bush bailout and then when he became president he instituted
the same thing, save the too-big-to-fail banks, pass money onto Goldman
Sachs though the AIG bailout. One after another and the reality is, there
was no consequence, they didnt suffer. At this point however people who
listen this podcast are probably saying, Scheer youve given this guy, the
editor Matt Welch of Reason Magazine, this Libertarian. Youre giving him a
pass here, you should take the Koch brothers and wrap it around his neck and
strangle him. Let me disappoint people even further by saying something in
defense of the Koch brothers now. There was a conference, not that long ago
where the Koch brothers, one of them anyway, put on a conference and one of
them gave a speech specifically attacking crony capitalism and calling for
consistency on this. I dont know if you recall this?
MW: Im aware of that and I would add to it that at that same conference,
which Im never invited to these things but I know people are. A friend of
mine put on a presentation and heavy Republican donors were at this
conference, put on a presentation about how American militarism and military
spending and foreign intervention [are some] of the biggest problems in
American public life.
RS: Well, its the most extreme form of crony capitalism because if youre
in bed with Boeing, I remember Old Scoop Jackson, the great Democrat, they
call him the senator from Boeing from the State of Washington and ...
MW: One of your best ... Im going to interrupt you because your listeners
deserve to know one of the best of the many great Bob Scheer profiles over
the years was his profile of Scoop Jackson in which he took incredible and
accurate extrapolation from the fact that Scoop Jackson ate the same type
of sandwich everyday. Bob thats [inaudible].
RS: Okay. I do want to make a point here and I going to have to wrap this
up. I want people to think about this, the need for independent politics
because my view is, the Republicans and the Democrats and Im not telling
you anything that shouldnt be obvious to everybody, are going to sell out.
It doesnt matter whether they claim to be for small government, whether
they claim to be for small people or the little people, theyre going to
sell out. Theyre going to sell out to the same big money interest and its
an irony in this election that were getting clarity on the issues that
Bernie Sanders tried to raise, were getting it from Jill Stein and were
getting it from Gary Johnson, the Libertarian Candidate.
Were getting it from the Green Party and were getting it from the
Libertarian party. The fact is for all of the great drama, the great
difference between Trump and Hillary, the great talk about the lesser evil,
the great fear mongering, the fact of the matter is part of it, Hillary
Clinton and Donald Trump are going to serve the same fat cat crony
capitalists interests. Theyre going to engage in the same kind of
belligerent foreign policy that feeds the military industrial complex. Is
that too harsh a view for you to accept?
MW: No. That is sadly become the reality and all you have to do is just look
at, even Trump [inaudible] blank slide in foreign policy, he doesnt really
know whats going on, he doesnt speak about it with any fluency. That was
also true to a lesser extent of George W. Bush but at the same time he was
promising a more humble foreign policy and all that, but what happened?
There was a crisis and there always is a crisis, thats the thing. In
foreign policy, in domestic policy theres always a crisis. When that crisis
comes, Washington is ready to step in and reassert itself and say, Hey
look. Well weve been looking on this problem for a long time and heres
what you need to do. What you need to do at every step is always to give
the government power and give those insiders more of their usual leverage.
Thats what happened to Bushs foreign policy after 9/11.
Its what happened to Obamas economic policy after 08. Its just the thing
that happens and theres nothing in the character of either of these two
candidates to suggest that they would break from that tradition. Right now
Washington is scrambling around on the very low chance that Donald Trump
wins to make sure that for every kind of weird random person that he pulls
into his cabinet, that theres a Sen. Tom Cotton from Arkansas [inaudible].
Hes Bill Crystals protégé, he spoke at the convention, theyre going to
make sure in case Trump wins that their people are still near all of that
and it is our job as independent citizens to be skeptical of their claims
and to call them out on it from any and every direction and not just listen
to [inaudible] tribalist thinking.
RS: Well, thank you Matt Welch. Thats got to have to do it for this edition
of Scheer Intelligence. My producers have been Joshua Scheer and Rebecca
Moonie. Mario [inaudible] and Katt [inaudible] are the technicians.
Sebastian [inaudible] right here at USC where theyve kindly given us a
studio to do these discussions here, and see you next week with another
edition, and maybe, Matt, youll help us get Gary Johnson on so we can
[hear] right from the candidate himself.
MW: I will see him tomorrow, make the ask.
RS: Okay, take care.
MW: Thanks, Bob.
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