Murray and Politics

Murray Rothbard, Mr. Libertarian, loved politics. Of course, he never voted nor sent a dime (voluntarily) to any pol, but he enjoyed watching the process, and rooting for one guy or another. He loved Ron Paul and championed other antiwar figures like Gene McCarthy and George McGovern, supported Pat Buchanan, especially when he was under attack, liked Ross Perot for his proposed national referenda, and once cheered on George H.W. Bush. He thought that the longtime Rockefeller servitor was running the first even-handed Middle-East policy since JFK. That is, George I was not, like LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Clinton, George II (or Mitt I), totally biased to one side. But keep in mind that Murray was not a politician, and, like Mencken, disdained democracy and agreed that elections were "advance auctions of stolen goods."  He certainly did not think that the votes of the boobeoisie conferred legitimacy on the killing, stealing, torturing, spying, caging, and other signature activities of the US government.

Murray, as usual, was having fun. See, for example, this piece on NY politics. One other point, as that piece also shows,  Murray knew everything. On election eve, you could ask him about any congressional or senatorial or gubernatorial race and he knew the candidates, the issues, the special interests, ethnic questions, and who was likely to win. I was with him once on election night. With his eyeglasses pushed up on his head, and his trademark yellow legal pad filled with notes, he laughed and laughed at the whole spectacle of buncombe.