13 June

There's no question the great political experiment of the past 50 or more years, is libertarianism. The idea that governments get in the way, and we need to do everything to 'free' individuals from them. All the anti-bureaucracy, small government, pro-private sector rhetoric that wins elections comes from this. The problem is, it's complete bullshit. Not one country has ever been run on libertarian ideas. The countries that make the most noise about being libertarian, like the US, have governments that are larger and spend more than countries who embrace the role of the State. It's literally grown ups doing that teenage rebellion thing of claiming that they're repressed, while living in the comforts of home. In reality the outcome is that libertarians just tweak governments to favour themselves, they never really get rid of government, in fact as above - they make it bigger. Because their ideas are fantasies, driven by a refusal to grow up. It matters, because these same ideas created the pandemic, and have killed over 10 million people so far.