The Libertarian Test

I scored 17, which is a "soft core libertarian." Wow! To call me even that is a stretch. I have some quibbles with the test, however. In typical libertarian fashion, this test sees everything as binary with the poles being pro-regulation and anti-regulation.

For instance, "Do you think that zoning laws are too strict?"

I have to answer yes and no. When they are oriented towards improper means, then they are too strict, for instance in the way that they keep work areas, commerce areas and housing areas apart. If we want to get rid of massive ribbons of highways (I will anticipate the foaming of pro-automobile libertarians and point out that these highways are almost always funded with tax dollars and that our current low prices of petrol are subsidized), we will have to explore city planning that encourages people to live closer to their work. It works great in many places.

When zoning laws allow for nouveau riche to buy and tear down a Julia Morgan house to build a monstrous starter castle that clashes with the whole neighborhood (this happened in Palo Alto a few years back), then I would say that the laws are too weak.

This illustrates the essential problem of the libertarian mind. It cannot take a stand on matters of quality, brushing them aside with staunch defenses of individual preferences. Of course this reeks of aesthetic relativism, which is the kissing cousin of moral relativism.

In fairness, the libertarians like to claim that government (that bogeyman they fear more than anything) cannot possibly make a claim to moral or aesthetic high ground, which, in a liberal democracy, is probably a fair point. With a one-man, one-vote system, official taste boils down to either majority taste or taste that the majority has been tricked into buying into. So, to keep some diversity of ideas alive, if one has to have a liberal democracy, one probably needs to have some libertarian flavor to it.

I suppose that is where my 17 score comes from.

The problem is that liberal democracy must rest on a common culture and a common religion or else it degenerates into a lost world of "values" and pluralism. When deeply held and contradictory "values" are enshrined as law, law becomes meaningless and arbitrary. This is exactly where we are headed.

When law becomes meaningless and arbitrary, tyranny arises and dictatorship is the inevitable end. I have to admit that I am pessimistic about our ability to resolve the deep contradictions that polarize our culture (I am speaking about the West in general, not the United States in particular). As a result, I am convinced that we need to prepare ourselves for dictatorship. The question then is what kind of dictator do we want to back.

If we do not decide what sort of dictator we want, that decision will be made by those who have decided and have started to plan. With Puritanism as the strongest single force animating the American body politic, Catholics should worry. A secular Puritan dictator, a Ralph Nadir in a fancy uniform is the spectre that looms for us unless we get behind a different dictator.

The best way to get behind the right dictator is not in the realm of politics. That realm is lost until we get the culture in order. And if we get the culture in order, we might be able to salvage a dictatorless state. Note that I say "might." We should still keep in mind the fact that we may need to get behind our own dictator.

Now all of this might sound grim, but it doesn't have to be. A dictator is admittedly a stop-gap solution. A good dictator is one who is not followed by another dictator, as dictatorship is an energy-consuming sort of government. What I would hope to have, in the case that dictatorship is inevitable, is a Francisco Franco y Bahamonde.

Franco was faced with a Spain absolutely wrecked by Commies and Anarchists. Priests and nuns were being executed simply for being priests and nuns. Churches were ransacked, and an impending Stalinism was on the horizon (as soon as the Stalinists could kill all the Trotskyites and Anarchists). The government was either unable or unwilling to govern. Murder and mayhem were the rule.

So Franco did the honorable thing, and became the dictator Spain urgently needed. He stabilized institutions and saw to it that the economy moved along, albeit slowly. Certainly Spain was culturally a bit dusty (as I have said before, I would prefer cultural dust to a land where every wild idea, no matter how evil (Patricia Ireland, Michel Foucault, etc.) is given its day). However, in contrast to what was going on in Eastern Europe or Africa, the average man in Franco's Spain was able to go about average business as a matter of course.

Eisenhower wanted to know what Franco had in mind for Spain, so by way of a diplomat, he asked him. Franco replied that he wanted to restore the monarchy, to have a constitutional government, and to have a professional army that was subservient to the civilian government. While King Juan Carlos has allowed far too much liberalization (that will probably require another Franco in a generation or two), that is exactly what Spain has.

Note that Franco was not trying to create some Franco y Bahamonde dynasty, nor was he up for a kleptocracy along the lines of Marcos. He was simply a paramedic who kept his country from dying. And that is the proper role of a dictator. Stablize, govern firmly and fairly, and let the culture flower once the patient is stable, law is the rule rather than the exception, and the elements that threaten to destabilize the country have been neutralized (which does not necessarily mean people are killed, imprisoned or the other litany of horrors that sentimental democrats moan about - they can be bought off with good results or given compromise positions that will forever keep their radicalism in check).

A dusty dictator is the kind we will want. We must avoid the ones who see themselves as great reformers or who have grand visions and utopias. A good dusty dictator realizes that his thumb might be a bit heavy, but errs on the side of caution. A bad dictator is one who sees glories and the ultimate perfection of man. The dusty dictator sees the inherent flaws in man and does the best job of keeping those flaws somewhat in check, but understands that his efforts will necessarily be crude. The dusty dictator discourages wild political ideas, but the good and fair running of the bureacracy. A little censorship here and there is OK. What a DD is looking for is for society to be in the habit of non-reflexive government, of sober consideration, of a disdain for new ideas and experimentation. A free press stirs up sentiments and should be curbed (but not completely crushed) under a DD-type government.

With these habits instilled, democracy can be allowed to gradually come back, first in the local level, with town councils and industrial syndicates. Then the syndicates and town councils should elect members of parliament. Eventually a restricted representative government should be given a bit of a go. The Constitution without the Amendments (keep the abolition of slavery, but get rid of every other one, particularly the ones that expand the vote) comes to mind.

But all of this will come to naught without good habits instilled under the DD.

So, here are my criteria for a good Dusty Dictator:

1. He must be a serious and pious Catholic, although a painful experience in the past in which he strayed from the Church and was brought back might be good for humility.
2. He must be thoroughly aware of the Social Teachings of the Church, but must not confuse his own rendering of them for the teachings themselves. He should read the Rule of St. Benedict at least weekly.
3. He must be willing to submit to the guidance and authority of the Pope, his bishop, and his priest.
4. He must entertain no schemes to rapidly build the economy, he must be suspicious of Grand Public Works and radical land reform. He should be primarily an isolationist in external affairs and shun notions of empire building.
5. He must surround himself with advisors who agree on 1 through 4, but disagree on all else. They should be armed.
6. He must cultivate a distrust of sycophants and flatterers (ah, there's the hard one - number three will come in useful here).
7. He must respect his office. Nothing turns a leader into a tyrant faster than pretensions of equality, for in disdaining the respect due his own office, he ultimately disdains respect for all offices. To help him in this, he should refer to all of his citizens as "my children."
8. His exit strategy must not involve direct relatives.
9. He should establish two competing police forces (I am convinced that the Caribinieri and Polizia keep each other from excessive interference in Italian daily affairs).
10. He should follow the Lateran treaty and turn education and family courts over to the Church entirely.
11. He should live comfortably, with ample means for retirement, should he determine to go that way. Envy and resentment create feelings of entitlement, which in a dictator cause oppression.

Note that I do not in all seriousness propose myself for the job. Not that I don't want it. I do. In a heartbeat. But there is far too much of the Mussolini in me. I would trade the dust for a polished helmet, the slow growth for experimental schemes. I would be the sort to dynamite Mt. Rushmore to build a bigger sculpture of my leering mug, which would contain some sort of vital public works to preserve it for posterity.

The Italian National Wedding Cake would serve as the outhouse to the Duce Keilholtz Monument. My police would have the best plumes, the brightest brass bands, the biggest and blackest horses. Every day would be parade day, and I would look at borders as insolent challenges, awaiting my crack corps of elite troops. I would have a finger in everything, with architects' drawings requiring my approval, music scores scrutinized for bad counterpoint, giant public bonfires of Margaret Atwood books and Van Clibern records, chefs required to wear military insignia, the whole nine yards. Accordion music, gypsy brass bands and yodelling would be broadcast from loudspeakers mounted on cars for the edification of the benighted public.

And the speeches. Endless tirades, long readings from the Aeneid, reflections on the nature of the state, Ezra Pound poetry, all broadcast over all radio stations as well as over loudspeakers mounted atop power poles.

There would be grand train stations, magnificent concert halls, amazing museums. Public money would go to fund fantastic Cathedrals (I might be an aspiring Comic Opera Tyrant, but I am a Catholic aspiring Comic Opera Tyrant after all).

I would recognize that I would end my days shot and hung from a telegraph pole, but would see that as nothing more nor less than the price of duty.

So, no, I am not running for the job. Or I am, but cannot in good conscience endorse myself. So I try to work on the cultural aspects, writing to defend the unborn, the poor, the wholesome pleasures of family and table, museum and concert hall. I work to make art and music and vote for the candidates least likely to will the death of the unborn, the least likely to bomb innocent Serbian Christians in a goofball knee-jerk reaction to a complex problem, the candidate most likely to stop Mohammedan expansion. But I am always looking for the right candidate for Dusty Dictator.

Posted by erik at March 9, 2004 1:30 AM | TrackBack