Stuff You Should Read - 11/24/08

• A Libertarian Defense of Social Conservatism
  Social conservatism is taking a beating lately. Not only did it lose in the recent elections, it is being blamed for the Republican losses. If only the religious right would get off the Republican Party’s back, the GOP could win like it is supposed to again. I beg to differ.

• Balkanized Party
  Before the Republican Party even begins to think about curing what ails it, members have to recognize the fact that the party is Balkanized.

• The New Deal Didn’t Always Work, Either
  MANY people are looking back to the Great Depression and the New Deal for answers to our problems. But while we can learn important lessons from this period, they’re not always the ones taught in school.

• November 22, 1963
  I doubt that most Americans will recall that, 45 years ago, on November 22, 1963, the President of the United States, John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.Clearly, part of the reason is that a lot of Americans have been born since then, but the other part of the reason is that, according to a newly released study, most Americans simply have not been successfully taught American history or civics since the 1960s. They have no real knowledge, facts, dates, events, to call upon.

• Halperin at Politico/USC conf.: ‘extreme pro-Obama’ press bias
  Media bias was more intense in the 2008 election than in any other national campaign in recent history, Time magazine’s Mark Halperin said Friday at the Politico/USC conference on the 2008 election.

• Obama’s Shock Doctrine
  Paging Naomi Klein. In her book The Shock Doctrine, the left-wing polemicist claimed that right-wing governments — which she defined very broadly — take advantage of crises, or “shocks,” to implement their dastardly policies of free trade, privatization, and tax cuts. Well, one government has now announced its intention to take advantage of an economic crisis to implement “things you could not do before.” And since this government no doubt includes a lot of people who have read Naomi Klein, she may very well be able to take credit for giving them the idea.

• Geithner choice is ‘more of the same’ — was Paulson’s bailout cohort
  If news accounts are true, and Presidet-Elect Barack Obama has indeed decided on Timothy F. Geithner to be his Treasury Secretary nominee, it represents a giant step away from Obama’s promise of “change you can believe in.”

• What Went Wrong?
  Well, it wasn’t conservatism.

• Don’t Get Depressed, It’s Not 1929
  Why all those Great Depression analogies are wrong.