The Free View-- weblog of a presidential candidate: Choices: The metric of Freedom

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June 11, 2003

Choices: The metric of Freedom

R. Lee Wrights, editor and writer for Liberty4All (and an editor of the excellent Rational Review News Digest), wrote a commentary recently which gets at the heart of one of the keys of the philosophy of freedom: choices. I've been working on an article on this same issue, though I've been thinking of it in terms of "decisions" instead of "choices". Same concept, really -- just a different measuring unit in that realm. I often find myself using the "decisions factor" when explaining to people why liberty is important, and why it's under threat.

I'm not going to get into my version of explaining this point now, because I want to develop it fully. I had most of it recorded on my digital voice recorder, which I use quite a lot to catch my thoughts, but it went missing about a couple weeks ago, and I've about resigned myself to it being lost for good. Along with about an hour-plus of various commentary bits, ideas, and to-do items. I'm surprised I lost it -- it had become pretty much inseparable from me, like my car keys or my glasses, but I guess it slipped away (fell out of my shirt pocket, I suspect) while I was out running errands or something.

Anyway, my "Decisions, Decisions" article is ripe for the writing...I just have to carve out some time for it. In the meantime, R. Lee's "Choices" covers a number of the same ideas. I'll probably approach it a little differently, but I like what he has to say. That's true for most of R.'s articles that I read. He puts a calm and reasoned face on his pieces generally -- writing more to convert the curious than to preach to the choir, which is what all libertarians need to seek to do. Because when prepared and delivered in a calm and rational manner, most libertarian arguments and solutions make sense to a lot of people, I've found.

Posted by Lance Brown at June 11, 2003 11:59 PM | TrackBack

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