My Debate With Bernie: A Non-Starter?

Below is a suggestion from my friend Dr. Michael Edelstein, to my ex high school buddy and former fellow track team member, Senator Bernie Sanders, that he and I have a debate. This is followed up with a (non) response from Team Bernie; not from the Man himself. Somehow, I not sure why I believe this, don’t ask me for my reasons, I don’t think this debate will occur.

A while back Bob Murphy challenged Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman to a debate, and raised pledges for something like $100,000, to be donated to Krugman’s favorite charity if he agreed to engage. You’ll never guess! No, that debate never took place either. I don’t think Bernie would debate me even if I borrowed a leaf from Bob in this regard (please don’t offer me any such pledges, but, if you want to write Bernie, see e mail address below, I won’t stop you). I wonder why these sorts of people are shy about public debates with Austro libertarians such as me and Bob??? It is probably because the socialism – capitalism debate has been settled, once and for all, with the former winning hands down. Do you think?

From Dr. Michael Edelstein
Dear Senator Sanders:
I urge you to debate Walter Block, your old Madison High School fellow track team member, and now one of the leaders of the libertarian movement.
His credentials:
Walter E. Block is Harold E. Wirth Endowed Chair and Professor of Economics, College of Business, Loyola University New Orleans, and senior fellow at the Mises Institute. He earned his PhD in economics at Columbia University in 1972. He has taught at Rutgers, SUNY Stony Brook, Baruch CUNY, Holy Cross and the University of Central Arkansas. He is the author of almost 500 refereed articles in professional journals, two dozen books, and thousands of op eds. He lectures widely on college campuses, delivers seminars around the world and appears regularly on television and radio shows. He is the Schlarbaum Laureate, Mises Institute, 2011; and has won the Loyola University Research Award (2005, 2008) and the Mises Institute’s Rothbard Medal of Freedom, 2005; and the Dux Academicus award, Loyola University, 2007.

Prof. Block counts among his friends Ron Paul and Murray Rothbard. He was converted to libertarianism by Ayn Rand. Block is old enough to have once met Ludwig von Mises, and shaken his hand. Block has never washed that hand since. So, if you shake his hand (it’s pretty dirty, but what the heck) you channel Mises.

Block is a leading Austrian School economist and an international leader of the freedom movement. His earliest work Defending the Undefendable (first edition Fleet 1976, latest edition Mises 2008, translated in 12 languages) is now, more than 30 years later, still regarded as a classic of libertarianism. This collection of essays, which argues in behalf of societal villains as economic scapegoats based on the principles of nonaggression, forces its reader to think and to rethink his initial knee-jerk emotional responses, and to gain a new and far sounder appreciation of economic theory and of the virtues and operations of the free market economy. Block’s writing was inspired by Henry Hazlitt, the author of the most widely read economics text Economics in One Lesson. Block’s latest book is: Yes to Ron Paul and Liberty.

Block has been a fixture in the libertarian movement for some four Decades. He actually met Ludwig von Mises and F.A. Hayek, and was friends with, and mentored by, Murray Rothbard. His contributions to academic libertarianism and to Austrian economics have been prodigious. Block’s writings continue to challenge the conventional wisdom (or ignorance) of how economics works and will retain its freshness for decades to come. His public speaking style has been described as a combination of that of Woody Allen, Lenny Bruce and Murray Rothbard

Dr. Block has written over 500 articles for peer reviewed refereed journals, some two dozen books, and literally thousands of op eds for magazines and newspapers. Block appears widely on radio and television. He is a contributor to such scholarly journals as The Review of Austrian Economics, Journal of Libertarian Studies, The Journal of Labor Economics, and the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. He is currently Harold E. Wirth Eminent Scholar Endowed Chair and Professor of Economics, College of Business Administration, at Loyola University New Orleans.
Top Ten Contemporary Academics Helping The Political Right (#8)
http://www.poletical.com/academics-helping-the-right.php

Possible topics:
Economics, environment (species extinction, global warming, running out of resources, pollution, environmental racism, garbage removal); labor economics (minimum wage, unemployment, unions, racial and sexual discrimination; glass ceiling, male-female wage and income gap); libertarianism; free enterprise; foreign policy; drug legalization; markets in used body parts; free trade; domestic welfare, international welfare (foreign aid); housing (rent control, urban planning, zoning, public housing); socialism; capitalism; egalitarianism; gun control; punishment theory, death penalty; privatization (roads, oceans, parks, libraries, schools); gay marriage; immigration; private property rights; monopoly and anti trust; abortion (pro choice, pro life, evictionism); Friedrich Hayek; Milton Friedman; Adam Smith; Ron Paul (I wrote an entire book about him); Ayn Rand; Ludwig von Mises; tough libertarian questions, challenges; my life as a libertarian; my life as an Austrian economist, an Austro- libertarian analysis of: pretty much anything; fractional reserve versus 100% reserve banking; gun control. Money, the fed, banking, the gold standard, Austrian business cycle theory. Why libertarians, and everyone else, should have voted for Trump/ Gary Johnson in, the election of November 2016

Thank you for considering the invitation.

Warm regards, Michael

Michael R. Edelstein, Ph.D.
Clinical Psychologist
415-673-2848 (24/7)
htttp://ThreeMinuteTherapy.com

Author of Three Minute Therapy
Features help for anxiety, depression,
relationships, panic attacks and addiction

Bernie’s “reply”:

Begin forwarded message:

From: BernieSanders.com
Subject: Re: Request
Date: June 18, 2017 at 4:37:07 PM PDT
To: Michael Edelstein

Michael,

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2:05 pm on June 25, 2017