I know I complained a few days ago about how the MSM reported Bush’s being 4 pounds overweight as if it was really big news. But try contrasting that with the way Castro’s health is reported…
Today, Reuters said that
Cuban President Fidel Castro is walking, talking and being briefed, according to a cryptic statement published Saturday in the Communist Party daily, Granma, a day before the “Maximum Leader’s” 80th birthday.
“Someone who visited the comandante a few hours ago to brief him on certain matters … said he witnessed how the head of the revolution, after receiving a little physical therapy, walked in the room and later, sitting in a chair, engaged in an animated conversation,” Granma said.
Here’s a guy who’s so sick that he temporarily ceded power to his brother, and yet
His health is being treated as a state secret and there has been no information as to where he is being treated, who is visiting him or any detail on his health
So, maybe our leaders are over-scrutinized at times, but I’d rather have that than have them under-scrutinized like Fidel. It shows that we’re really the ones in power, and it shows that our freedom is safe.
I don’t always agree with David Boaz, but he has an interesting point in his recent post “Finding your inner libertarian” In this post, Boaz comments on an editorial in the Washington Post entitled “Hands Off Hedge Funds - sometimes libertarians deserve to win an argument”
Boaz writes,
Gee, thanks. I’m glad libertarian arguments against over-regulation made sense to the editorial writer in this case. But I’m disappointed in the suggestion that this is a rare occasion.
Indeed, I’ll bet the editorial writer agrees with most of the basic ideas that libertarians advocate: private property, markets, the rule of law, limited constitutional government, religious toleration, equality under the law, a society based on merit and contract not status, free speech, free trade, individual rights, peace. In the West we live in a liberal world, and in the United States we call liberalism “libertarianism”. (When Americans say “liberalism,” they mean the welfare state.) The Post’s disagreements with libertarianism are really less rare than the headline suggests; they involve how often and how much national policy should deviate from the basic principles we agree on.
I’m a small “l” libertarian myself, and really don’t understand why so many people view libertarianism as on the fringes. I know some of the “liberal” (in the true sense of the word) ideas may have seemed a bit radical when this nation was founded, but over 200 years later, I would think the ideas had settled in a bit more with the citizenry.
Seriously, though…I think Boaz is right. If more people truly look at the issues and not the fact that they’re aligning themselves with those “crazy libertarians”–I believe most people agree with the basic ideas of liberty and freedom from government intrusion.