“There are a hundred problems with Biden,” says LewRockwell.com columnist and blogger, Anthony Gregory, “but his opposition to making English the official language is not, in any event, at the top of the list.”
Gregory is making reference to an earlier report by IPR which highlighted the LP’s criticism of Democratic VP nominee Joe Biden on grounds many libertarians consider specious at best.
Gregory also points out that Biden’s opposition to giving gun manufacturers special protection from lawsuits — for which the LP criticized him — is shared by Ron Paul.
Gregory also highlights what he considers to be the hypocrisy of Barr criticizing Biden for supporting McCain-Feingold when the Barr campaign tried to use that unlibertarian legislation to “force their way into a church’s private debate,” as Gregory puts it. “Thank goodness, for the sake of free association and religious liberty, this time the federal judge was more respectful of constitutional boundaries than the LP candidate’s team.”
This is not the first time that the LP’s presidential ticket and leadership has drawn the scorn and mockery of LRC columnists, the most widely read libertarian bloggers on the Web. Previously, National Chairman Bill Redpath has been castigated for his unlibertarian position on gun rights and assertion that until the recent Heller decision, no such rights existed.
George, I’m not using “waste” in the sense of “duplication”, but rather in the sense of “spending money that doesn’t rightfully belong to you.”
Avoiding “waste” or duplication is not a value or principle of libertarianism.
Anthony Gregory’s arguments are right on the money, as usual.
However, I do have one minor caveat, depending on what “official language” means. I can see an excellent libertarian argument for requiring that all dealings with the state be conducted in only one language, since it’s a clear waste of taxpayer money to hire interpreters, print forms in multiple languages, etc.
Overall, though, I agree that this is a very minor issue, and an odd choice for a list of Biden’s biggest flaws.