DISQUS

Jack L. Moffett I’m not referring to ads, although those are annoying. I’m talking about Flash intros. This post was inspired by the critique in my class Tuesday night, in which my students were presenting the designs for their on-line portfolios.

GoriGirl I wonder what the gender split would be on both of the GDP questions. It's obvious which way one would expect the sexes to split, but by how much (if at all) would be an interesting question. Oh well, no data on that one.

John Thacker

friendships and honest conversations between liberals and libertarians are much more numerous than between libertarians and conservatives, at least for people under, say 40. Of course, that's just my outsider impression, and maybe it's skewed by my personal perspective.

Well, partially it's that young, educated people generally on the Right are more likely to be libertarians, or at least libertarianish conservatives, than conservatives. But at the same time, the similar sorts of people (who get along socially) are more likely to be libertarianish liberals as well. The "blogging elite" liberals don't tend to be big fans of "Buy American," and tend to be at least open to ideas like Ed Glaeser's. But they'll call themselves liberals or progressive just like some of the really anti-libertarian left.

It's certainly helpful to try to open up any sort of eyes to libertarian arguments. Just recognize that, unfortunately, political considerations will always be paramount. President Obama so far has been open and nice and everything, but his Administration has been pretty disappointing for libertarians, including on issues like rendition and state secret claims that civil libertarian liberals and libertarians were hoping for action on. (To me, closing Guantanamo but sending prisoners either overseas OR to Fort Leavenworth or ADX Florence doesn't reduce torture at all. Supermax prisons are worse than waterboarding.)

Will Wilkinson This question was reserved for libertarians. We're crunching the Magic Button numbers. But, basically, almost all liberals would push the button that ended the drug war and gave the U.S. Canadian health care, almost no conservatives would, and a little more than half of libertarians would.

Will Wilkinson It's not that Obama's an authoritarian so much as he's completely establishment -- a living embodiment of elite consensus. Ron Paul really was an outsider, not even welcome in his own party debates. and I'd say the efforts of Paul's supporters were useful in getting a message that would have otherwise gone unheard to a broader audience.

Jack So I can't speak for Will. But I imagine the position is something like: Yes, there should be coercive limits to liberty that restrict speech. But such coercion should take the form of social ostracism, voluntary boycotts etc. The reason for this is not that state restrictions are inherently unacceptable but that giving the state the authority to determine what is or is not hate speech dramatically increases the probability that the state will engage in wrongful coercion.