People occasionally accuse me of being a sensible liberal, or likely to lose my liberal blogger badge. This is pretty warming, since I don’t really think of myself as a liberal; I think of myself as an anarchocapitalist hampered in his desire for untrammeled freedom by the practicalities of realpolitik. I.e., if I could push a button and remove all government from the world, I wouldn’t do it. I think that, unpaired with some serious education about enlightened self-interest, the results would be very bad. In the interim, I tend to lean towards the left, because I think the left is somewhat more likely to preserve the freedoms I care the most about without imposing the restrictions I find most distasteful.
However, now and again I feel obliged to say something really contrarian, so here goes. I am utterly, 100% serious about this:
James Lileks is the conservative Michael Moore.
2 Comments
Except that Lileks’ best material is usually apolitical, and a lot of the rest is cultural commentary that doesn’t seem particularly conservative to me.
I agree that his best material is apolitical, but since 9/11 I don’t think he’s been producing much of his best material. I don’t know if you read the Bleat or not. That’s where most of his effort seems to be going, and it’s often political.
In part, though, I’m referring to the place they hold in the hearts of blogdom. Lilek’s a patron saint to the warbloggers, which is understandable. He shares the core beliefs and writes about them exceedingly well. It’s a real journalist who agrees; very seductive. Same goes for Moore on the other side. And both of them piss everyone else way the hell off.