On Reason, Hoppe, And Baboons

We are extremely fortunate that LRC today features Hans-Hermann Hoppe, the foremost libertarian philosopher of our time, in an article titled “Political Economy of Monarchy and Democracy.” Hoppe makes it clear that private ownership of the means of coercion, which is monarchy, is far superior to public ownership, which is democracy. He proves, through basic economic theory, how monarchs have a longer time horizon than democrats, because monarchs own the state and hand it down to their heirs, while democrats are mere short-term caretakers, who invariably loot and scoot. The Hoppe article, which compresses in a nutshell the basic arguments of his path-breaking book Democracy: The God That Failed, is available here. I strongly suggest you sit back and carefully read this article. After that, you might find this editorial in Mint most interesting, for it talks about the “fiscal mess” in the USSA, the great champion of democracy, where a long line of loot-and-scoot caretakers have bankrupted the state.

Hoppe’s article, in these trying times, illustrates how Reason, the foremost tool of thinking man, can come to our assistance as we grope for a way out of our own predicaments, brought on us by unlimited socialist democracy.

Today, Rahul Gandhi is reportedly waging a war of words with the Shiv Sena, arguing the same old line that I rubbished yesterday: “Mumbai belongs to all Indians.” This is further rank opportunism and hypocrisy, this time from the “ crown prince” of the CONgress.

Let us not forget that a CONgress government in Maharashtra passed the infamous order reserving taxi permits for local Marathis. So, Rahul Gandhi, too, is just “playing politics.” This is the lowest point to which our democracy has ever fallen. There is nothing called “Reason” in the chatter of these politicians, from all parties.

Of course, our politicians are expected to be nothing more than the “representatives of the people” – and these people are all illiterates. In the architecture of the Total Chacha State, policy advice employing Reason is expected to come from career civil servants – the baboons of the IAS. I was therefore quite amused to see the Barkha Dutt show on UndieTV this Sunday, shot in the LSE in London, on the occasion of the launch of a new book by NK Singh, an IAS man who has promoted himself into the Rajya Sabha. The title of the book was what amused me the most: Not By Reason Alone.

If not reason, what does this baboon expect to use to guide the nation’s collective destiny? Will he depend on mystic revelation? On intuition? On instincts and gut-feel? Will he consult astrologers?

I myself was on the Barkha Dutt show a decade or so back, with a clutch of IAS baboons. I recounted on prime time television how the IAS Academy then had employed a Marxist-Ricardian (follower of Piero Sraffa) as their professor of Economics. The baboons were not amused. Nor was Dutt. I was never invited to the show again. Ha ha.

So much for the IAS Academy, where Reason is supposed to be employed to train our elite administrators. Do read about Haileybury, where civil servants of the Honourable East India Company Service (HEICS) were trained, and their brilliant faculty of classical liberal political economists, recounted in detail in Philip Mason’s Men Who Ruled India. That is why they were MEN, not baboons.

Anyway, Not By Reason Alone was launched in London by a galaxy of baboons, including the biggest baboon of them all, montek, the central planner. Also dancing in attendance was Mukesh Ambani, the expansion of whose business empire has nothing to do with either Reason or Enterprise, but more to do with keeping baboons happy, which he was doing very well on the LSE stage. He is a towering example of what étatism does to businessmen. Peter, Lord Bauer, also of the LSE, said étatism led to the “politicization of economic life.” This applies completely to the Ambanis, the Tatas, the Birlas, Bajaj et. al. Their only “enterprise” lies in managing baboons.

Perhaps NK Singh, montek, Ambani and the rest should now consult the Oracle of Delphi, and ask the question: How long will the Indian people tolerate this nonsense? Not much longer, I think. But that is my gut-feel, not Reason. I feel it in my bones that there is going to be a huge political upheaval in India soon. And perhaps in the USSA too.

Read Hoppe. His is the voice of Reason.