Ron Paul -- the prophet we ignored
Right on the War on Drugs, right on the war in Iraq, right on the dangers of the Federal Reserve -- his libertarian positions from 2008 on government, the economy and foreign policy look smart today.
On March 24, 2024, Ron Paul appeared with Tucker Carlson on the Tucker Carlson Network, which gave the prophetic libertarian from Pittsburgh (and now Texas) a huge and well-deserved audience. Here’s the transcript.
As part of my career-long mission to insert libertarian ideas and people into the daily newspapers I worked for, I interviewed Ron Paul by phone several times during my career.
I also spent a hour or so with him in 2007 when he came to Pittsburgh to visit his boyhood home.
When the multi-term libertarian Republican congressman from Texas was running for president in 2008 he received something he never got before — major media coverage and a chance to appear on the presidential TV debate stage.
Here’s a column I wrote about the debate in which he pissed off all the career war mongers in Washington and earned praise from pundit Andrew Sullivan for being the only candidate who truly believed everything he said.
As I wrote:
Paul doesn't pretend to be a modern Republican but an old-fashioned libertarian one who puts the Constitution and freedom before politics and party. He and everyone else on Earth know he's not going to be running against Hillary next fall. And because of the trouble he's causing his philosophically lost and troubled party, he'll be lucky if he's allowed to appear in future debates.
As Sullivan wrote, the GOP's "apparatchiks" are scared of Dr. Paul. "We have a real phenomenon here, because someone has to stand up for what conservatism once stood for. Whether you agree with him or not he already has elevated the debates by injecting into them a legitimate, if now suppressed, strain of conservatism that is actually deeper in this country than the neoconservative aggression that now captures the party elite and has trapped the U.S. in the Iraq nightmare."
Paul's unwavering pronouncements against unconstitutional foreign wars and for less government and more freedom at home sound quaint, alien or hopelessly naive in the Era of Big Government.
But as he proved last week in South Carolina, Paul's brave, modest mission to be a subversive, principled, libertarian presence among the career flip-floppers, pragmatists and statists at the Republican debates is working -- maybe too well for his own good.
Q&A: Ron Paul Before He Became Famous --Two interviews in one
January, 2008
As he heads into the New Hampshire Republican primary after capturing 10 percent of the vote in the Iowa caucuses, Ron Paul is no longer the mystery he was when he began his run for president.
The 10-term Republican congressman from the Gulf Coast of Texas has become a star of the Internet, attracting an army of mostly young, energetic, fiercely loyal 'Paulistas' and shocking the political establishment by raising more than $20 million in contributions, mainly via the Web.
A medical doctor who's delivered 4,000 babies, Paul has been able to espouse his libertarian ideas about personal freedom, constitutionally limited government, non-intervention overseas and sound money during the presidential debates and in countless interviews in the mainstream media.
Conservative pundits, elements of the GOP and the Fox News Channel have tried to marginalize him or brand him as a 'kook.' But Paul, 72, has been praised by commentators on the right such as Pat Buchanan and super-blogger Andrew Sullivan for standing 'up for what conservatism once stood for' and challenging the party elite that has 'trapped the U.S. in the Iraq nightmare.'
The following Q&A is assembled from two interviews with Paul, one from late 2000 and one in April, 2007, shortly after he announced he said would run for president.
Q: Why are you running for president -- and why now?
A: I'm responding to a lot of requests from supporters that I do this. I have agreed that the message of a constitutionally limited government is very deserving. We happen to believe that that the freedom movement is at a place now where the numbers are growing by leaps and bounds and that we can run a credible race in the campaign.
Q: How do you define your politics?
A: In a philosophic sense, I describe myself as strict constitutionalist. I believe the Constitution is a very libertarian document, and therefore I identify with classical liberal or libertarian ideas. I do not volunteer the definition of "conservative," and certainly not "liberal," in today's circumstances.
Q: For those who don't know the difference between a 'classical liberal' and (the late) liberal New York Democrat Daniel Patrick Moynihan, can you tell us the difference?
A: Well, the classical liberal, or the libertarian, or the constitutionalist, believes that government is designed to protect our liberties and to allow people to solve their own problems. It is not designed to regulate the economy, nor our personal lives.
Under the classical liberal viewpoint, government was there to restrain force and to allow people to use their own creative energy to solve their problems. Today, the modern liberal -- and many conservatives -- believes government has a much bigger role in telling us what to do, how to live and involvement in our personal lives, as well as regulating the economy.
Q: Who are your favorite classical liberals?
A: In the economic sense, and for the 20th century, my favorite is Ludwig von Mises, because he has done the best job in explaining how a free-market economy can work if we allow it to work.
Of course, I also like John Locke. And of course, the one who in a very simplistic way influenced a lot of the modern day libertarians was Frederic Bastiat. He wrote the book "The Law," which simplifies the whole debate so succinctly.
It's easy for everybody to read and understand, the principle being that government should never do anything that you, yourself, can't do. And if it's illegal for you to steal from your neighbor, it should never be permissible for you to send the government to steal from your neighbor in order for you to have some material benefit.
Q: What kind of Republican are you?
A: I call myself a constitutional Republican. Some others call me a libertarian Republican., which is OK too, because I believe the Founders were very libertarian. They wanted a very limited government and they emphasized individual liberty.
In many ways to me that's a traditional Republican, because there was a time when Republicans stood for smaller government and actually they stood for nonintervention overseas. They argued always against the Democrats starting wars. They argued in the past for sound money and civil liberties. It's just that they've lost their way and Republicans and Democrats are pretty much the same these days.
Q: In what ways do you most differ from the other Republican candidates?
A: I would say in two areas. One is in foreign policy, because they have all gone along with Bush and the policy in the Middle East. I was opposed to the war in Iraq a long time before it was started, arguing that we were moving in that direction and that we should not. I have taken a very, very strong position against the war, that we ought to end it and that we ought to come home.
The other area is something that is for most people very esoteric but to me very, very fundamental and very important and that is sound money.
We should never have given the federal government -- through the Federal Reserve System -- the power to create money out of thin air, because it inevitably causes a great deal of economic harm and at the same time it gives license to governments to spend money they don't have and then delay the payment by just printing up the money and penalizing the poor people and middle-class with high inflation rates.
Q: What is your basic campaign pitch -- in 20 or 30 seconds?
A: We should have a constitutional president -- somebody who believes sincerely in the oath of office and that is to limit the size and scope of government. Which means if he is dedicated to that viewpoint, he will start shrinking the size of government, not expanding it. I think that message will resound with many, many Republicans.
Q: The ultimate but realistic goal that you have is to do what? Obviously, you'd like to become president, but --
A: The goal is to win. Then I guess if you can't win, you want to do the very best that you can and have an impact. But it's very annoying to people if you start off by saying, 'I can't win. Why am I doing this?' Then again, being unrealistic doesn't make a whole lot of sense, either.
I was absolutely convinced at first that I could never be a congressman running on this platform. Yet I surprised myself and won that first time and then continually won re-election with bigger margins, so I'm convinced the message is very, very strong. But the special interests are very, very powerful as well.
Q: How do you get yourself elected so easily in Texas? How can you attract voters without violating your principles?
A: Well, my platform is just what we're talking about. People ought to cherish their liberties and they ought to have somebody that will fight for them and try to convince them that they're going to be better off; that's what America's all about.
I think they respond to this. I'm in an agricultural district and I get 65 percent of their vote. All the farm organizations, especially in this last election, campaigned heavily against me, and yet every farmer knows that I do not vote for subsidies and I tell them so.
And yet I want to make sure the government leaves them alone in every other area, too.
I think when I talk to them they respond much better than most politicians think. Some politicians in Washington are sympathetic to my views, but they say, "Hey, you know, you're not going to get re-elected, or I couldn't get elected if I took those positions." Of course, my goal has been to stick to those principles, vote that way and prove that it's a positive philosophy, and so far we've been able to do that.
Q: What would happen if you tried to run on the platform back here in Pittsburgh, where you grew up?
A: I am so confident and such a believer in the freedom philosophy, that I believe that I could win, whether it was a Republican district, a Democrat district or a borderline district. I just think that you have to present it in slightly different ways.
I live in a Bible Belt and none of them started off agreeing with me on the War on Drugs. Yet I was able to convince them. Now they tell me all the time -- "The war on drugs is stupid." I had to explain that. I didn't go out and campaign on that, deliberately. But if I were to run in San Francisco, I may be talking about the ridiculousness of the drug war.
I think you just have to have confidence in the philosophy, that it applies to everybody - as individuals. Whether you're a liberal or conservative or moderate or whatever, there's something in there that's very attractive.
Q: Since you ran for president in 1988, have you become more or less optimistic about America's future, in terms of what we're talking about - individual freedom, free markets, limited government?
A: Overall, I'm more optimistic. There are more people who would agree with these views that I'm expressing now outside of Washington than there were when I was in Washington or running in '88. Washington is not reflecting that yet. Washington's the same old place - and it's going to get worse before it gets better. But overall, I think the country is much better off and there are much more people thinking this way. I'm encouraged.
Q: Do you think you will have a problem getting your message out in the media -- and not getting sidetracked from talking about what you want to talk about or emphasize?
A: Yes I do. I think the media will do everything in the world to try to keep us from getting a message out that might challenge the conventional wisdom, because obviously the large majority of the major media outlets going up to the war promoted the war and still support the war, as do the leaders in both parties, so they are not much interested in hearing that message. But the message can be sent out through the Internet and when the debates occur.
Q: Do Republican voters really want someone like you -- someone who really wants to cut the size and power of government and maximize individual freedoms?
A: I don't think all Republicans do, because they keep electing the wrong kind. But I think the grassroots -- those who go to conventions and those who write the platforms -- do.
I was just studying the Iowa state Republican platform, and, boy, it's hardcore. And Texas has a platform that's really hardcore. But they are not the money people. The money people in the Republican Party come from the drug industry and the military industrial complex.
So yes, that's our competition and they have a lot of money and a lot of clout and frequently they own media outlets, too. It's a struggle, but I am convinced we are on the right side of the issue and we are also in an era where something has to be done, because more and more people every day are starting to realize that we can't continue to just expand our entitlement system and never draw back from our foreign commitments and think that we can have a viable currency and a viable economy. I think it's becoming quite clear that our economy is suffering from this.
Q: So the idea that you are a marginal candidate with no chance because you are marginal is not as true today as it certainly once was?
A: I think that's absolutely true.
The rest of my encounters with Ron Paul
For good measure, here are three Sunday columns and a Q&A on the financial crisis of 2008 that I I wrote for the Pittsburgh Tribune Review in 2007 and 2008.
April, 2007 — Ron Paul runs again
April 8, 2007
The last time Pittsburgh native son Ron Paul ran for the White House, he came in third behind George Bush I and Michael Dukakis.
Not a bad showing for the 1953 Dormont High School grad who grew up in Green Tree, became a doctor and has been elected to the U.S. House of Representatives nine times since 1978 as a libertarian Republican in a mostly rural district on the Texas Gulf Coast.
Unfortunately, when Dr. Paul ran for president in 1988 it was atop the Libertarian Party ticket, which is why his vote total -- 431,750 -- was about 48.5 million behind Bush I's.
For the 2008 election, Paul isn't taking the obscure third-party route. Last month he announced -- on C-SPAN -- that he's officially in the hunt for the Republican nomination.
Paul, 71, is not your typical modern Republican. "I call myself a constitutional Republican," he said Wednesday. "Some others call me a libertarian Republican, which is OK, too, because I believe the Founders were very libertarian.
"They wanted a very limited government and they emphasized individual liberty. In many ways to me that's a traditional Republican, because there was a time when Republicans stood for smaller government and actually stood for nonintervention overseas."
Paul is in the race for real. He'll take part in the first GOP debate May 3 at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. He's already visited New Hampshire and Arizona and will hit Iowa and Nevada this week. His campaign is plugged into the Internet and well on its way to raising its first million.
Most of the eight other announced Republican presidential wannabes have lots more money and name recognition. But Paul has one big advantage over all of them: He's pure on policy and not a flip-flopper.
He's been a consistent exponent of limited constitutional government, low taxes, free markets and a return to the gold standard. He's steadfastly been against the war in Iraq and the war on drugs.
He voted against the Patriot Act. And on immigration he's for strong borders and against both amnesty and welfare for illegal aliens. Having delivered more than 4,000 babies, he's always been pro-life and pro-family.
Paul has faithfully voted his libertarian principles. As his campaign site, ronpaul2008.com , boasts, he's never voted for a tax raise or an unbalanced budget and never voted to restrict gun ownership, raise congressional pay or increase the power of the executive branch.
Sadly, none of his fine qualities matter because, even as a Republican, Paul is a marginal candidate with a near-zero shot of becoming president.
Paul is realistic about his chances. But he also knows miracles happen in politics.
Thirty years ago, he was absolutely convinced he could never become a congressman running on a platform of maximum freedom and minimum government. "Yet I surprised myself and won that and then continually won re-election with bigger margins, so I'm convinced the message is very, very strong."
Today's alternative media make it much easier for candidates like Paul to get their esoteric messages out. But marginal candidates by definition are trapped in a cruel Catch-22: Because they are marginal, they are ignored by the major media -- so they stay marginal.
But Paul's been around long enough to know winning isn't everything. As he says, "If you can't win, you want to do the very best that you can and have an impact."
Let's hope he does.
***
May, 2007 — Principled Paul debates 9/11 with neocon Rudy Giuliani
May 20, 2007
Good for Andrew Sullivan.
The conservative super-blogger who writes the Daily Dish has not joined the right-wing pundits who want to kick libertarian Rep. Ron Paul out of the GOP presidential debates -- or out of the Republican Party altogether.
In fact, Sullivan is openly praising the nine-term Texas congressman, medical doctor and Pittsburgh native and urging him to stay in the race.
Sullivan contends, rightly, that Paul has been the best thing about the GOP's otherwise ideologically predictable TV debates so far -- mainly because Paul is the only one on stage who truly believes in individual liberty and actually believes everything he says.
It was Paul's exchange with Rudy Giuliani on Tuesday in South Carolina over the causes of 9/11 that enraged conservative pundits.
Paul, who voted against the war in Iraq and wants troops brought home ASAP, merely said what any CIA agent or regular Time magazine reader knows to be 96 percent true: The attacks of 9/11 were "blowback" from 50 years of America's vile interventionist foreign policy in the Middle East.
Throwing a fit, Giuliani called Paul's notion an "absurd explanation" and demanded that Paul withdraw the statement that America had "invited" 9/11. (For the record, and not that anyone noticed or cared at Fox News, Paul never used the word "invited." Fox News questioner Wendell Goler did.)
Giuliani's explanation for 9/11 was the familiar Father Bush fairy tale: Fundamentalist Islamist terrorists attacked us because they hate our freedoms, our wealth, our immoral culture and our failure to publicly stone Paris Hilton to death.
In part because of his tough, albeit childish, response, Giuliani was declared Tuesday night's big winner by many in the mainstream and conservative media. Paul was subsequently called a crackpot, a member of the left-wing "I hate America" crowd and a relic of 1930s isolationism.
Paul doesn't pretend to be a modern Republican but an old-fashioned libertarian one who puts the Constitution and freedom before politics and party. He and everyone else on Earth know he's not going to be running against Hillary next fall. And because of the trouble he's causing his philosophically lost and troubled party, he'll be lucky if he's allowed to appear in future debates.
As Sullivan wrote, the GOP's "apparatchiks" are scared of Dr. Paul. "We have a real phenomenon here, because someone has to stand up for what conservatism once stood for. Whether you agree with him or not ... he has already elevated the debates by injecting into them a legitimate, if now suppressed, strain of conservatism that is actually deeper in this country than the neoconservative aggression that now captures the party elite and has trapped the U.S. in the Iraq nightmare."
Paul's unwavering pronouncements against unconstitutional foreign wars and for less government and more freedom at home sound quaint, alien or hopelessly naive in the Era of Big Government.
But as he proved last week in South Carolina, Paul's brave, modest mission to be a subversive, principled, libertarian presence among the career flip-floppers, pragmatists and statists at the Republican debates is working -- maybe too well for his own good.
December, 2007 — Ron Paul's glorious drive for freedom
Dec. 30, 2007
It won't matter how high Ron Paul finishes in the Iowa caucuses this Thursday or in the New Hampshire primary Jan. 8 or anywhere else.
He's already won his prize.
Despite the fact that his ideas are exactly what America needs, the Pittsburgh-raised libertarian and 10-term Texas congressman isn't going to become the Republican presidential nominee.
In Iowa, he's been averaging about 6 percent in polls, though a Dec. 20-23 poll by the American Research Group shows him hitting double digits for the first time at 10 percent. In New Hampshire, he's been hovering around 7 percent or 8 percent.
The actual vote totals may turn out higher. But he and everyone else who hasn't lost his grip on political reality has always known that America's future doesn't include a President Ron Paul, Dormont High School Class of '53.
Yet Paul -- arguably the closest thing to a libertarian America's voters have seen since Grover Cleveland -- has already succeeded beyond his and any liberty-lover's wildest dreams.
In April, shortly after he announced he'd run for president, Paul told the Trib that his goal -- besides winning, of course -- was to make an impact on the race and to spread his ideas about maximizing freedom, limiting the federal government and practicing nonintervention overseas.
Though his presence at the debates has shown what a bunch of unprincipled, flip-flopping, war-loving, faux conservatives Messrs. Romney, Giuliani, Huckabee and McCain are, Paul's political impact on the primaries has been minimal -- so far.
The "Paulistas" who are fomenting and funding "The Ron Paul Revolution" in the virtual streets of the Internet complain that the mainstream media have ignored Paul. But it's not true.
He could be the most widely publicized libertarian politician in U.S. history. He and his "radical" ideas have been publicized, praised or treated with respect by everyone from the constitutionally impaired Tim Russert to Jay Leno, Stephen Colbert and Tucker Carlson.
Carlson -- perhaps Paul's biggest fan on TV -- recently traveled the campaign trail with Paul in Nevada and wrote about it for The New Republic.
Carlson observed the same humble, charisma-free candidate I saw late last June when Paul came to Pittsburgh to visit his old house in Green Tree as part of a "Today" show series on "Candidate's Cribs." Paul, as debate-watchers know, is the anti-Mitt Romney. But Carlson notes, correctly, that Paul's seriousness and lack of political slickness is a large part of his appeal.
"His fans don't read his awkwardness as a social phobia, but as a sign of authenticity. Paul never outshines his message, which is unchanging: Let adults make their own choices; liberty works. For a unified theory of everything, it's pretty simple. And Paul sincerely believes it."
Paul has shocked the political establishment by attracting a zealous Web-connected army of young people and raising $20 million, almost exclusively over the Internet.
He isn't going to become president and he isn't going to convert the sleeping masses, the liberal media or even his own lost party to the tenets of libertarianism.
But sometimes winning the election isn't what matters in the long run. Ideas do.
Remember Barry Goldwater⢠His crushing defeat in 1964 reinvigorated conservatism and spawned the Reagan Revolution. In a country still cruising down the road to socialism, Ron Paul's success in selling freedom is a sign of hope.
***
December, 2008 — The Ron Paul solution to the financial breakdown
Dec. 27, 2008
You can't pin any blame for the country's financial meltdown on Congressman Ron Paul.
The libertarian Texas Republican and former Pittsburgher has been warning for two decades about the unhappy -- and inevitable -- economic consequences of a loose monetary policy, fiscal irresponsibility and too much meddling in the marketplace by the federal government.
Not surprisingly, Rep. Paul says he is "positively opposed" to what he calls the Bush administration's "slipshod" $700 billion bailout plan.
As Paul warned the House of Representatives Wednesday, "Our economy faces a bleak future, particularly if the latest $700 billion bailout plan ends up passing. We risk committing the same errors that prolonged the misery of the Great Depression, namely keeping prices from falling."
I talked to Paul by phone from Washington early Thursday evening as the Beltway political powers were still meeting and trying to agree on how to fix the problem:
Q: I suspect we won't hear you cheering about the bailout -- or "The Rescue" -- as they are trying to call it?
A: No way. I think that it's just going to bring more problems. You can't stop a problem of too much spending and too much deficits and too much monetary inflation with more of it. So I'm positively opposed to the bailout and believe it will just delay the correction that is required. We need to correct the imbalances and if you interfere, you just delay it and make it more difficult and make the problems worse for ourselves.
Q: Did you see President Bush's 15-minute speech on the economic crisis Thursday night?
A: I did see part of it.
Q: Do you think he is telling the story as straight as he should be or is he glossing over some things?
A: Well, I'm sure he's glossing over. I imagine he believes what he's saying. But you know I was just on the (House) floor and a couple other members came over and showed me some articles and letters they've received. One was from a banker who's involved with 1,500 banks in the South. He was positively opposed to the bailout. He said, "Why punish all of us when just a few people have really messed up?" Someone else came along with a chart that showed that credit has not frozen up and that there's as much credit available in the last couple weeks as there was in the last six months. So that means the (bailout supporters) are working on some propaganda to sort of frighten members of Congress into voting for it. If you don't vote for it, and there's a problem, then you're going to be blamed for it.
Q: Is this truly a national crisis⢠So many of national crises really are regionalized or localized problems.
A: I think of it as a crisis. I've been talking about it for a long time and have said we will have a financial disruption and an attack on the dollar. But I think the way they are talking is that if you don't pass it this weekend then by Monday the market might go down 10,000 points. I think it's not that type of crisis, but I think it's very significant that if we continue our ways we'll eventually destroy the dollar. Yet what they are doing is bringing that on because they are doing the wrong thing.
Q: You pin most of the blame for this crisis on government.
A: Oh yeah. More specifically, the Federal Reserve. (It's) responsible for the booms and the busts. You can't have this type of a boom cycle without a Federal Reserve and a central bank and it can be bounded with other parts of the government. Legislation might push an excessive amount of money into certain areas in addition to the easy-money system, and that's what I think happened. There were these affirmative action programs where banks were literally encouraged or told they had to make bad loans. The Community Reinvestment Act tells them they can be fined a lot of money for denying loans that are risky. It's sort of ironic.
And if one looks at the total problem of inflation, in which prices go up because of the increases in the money supply, certain areas go up much faster than others. So medical care and education and houses went up much faster but then there has to be corrections. They get out of whack and these prices have to come down. So we see the correction and the sooner you get the prices down, the better it is for everybody.
Q: From what I understand the major problem goes back to housing, housing, housing. Home prices were inflated and now the bubble has burst and you argue that prices should be allowed to fall to whatever their real level should be and not be propped up by a federal bailout.
A: That's right, and I accuse (Federal Reserve Chairman Ben) Bernanke of being a price-fixer. He wants to buy these illiquid assets and keep the price up and they may be worthless. So they want you to limit your thinking to the immediate problem -- the downturn in the housing market. But they don't want to talk about who caused the upturn and the excesses in the housing market -- and that was government. They don't talk about the cause. They just say, "We're here now. What are we going to do about it?" In medicine, you can't really treat a disease very well if you don't know the exact cause.
Q: The $700 billion figure. If you multiply roughly 3 million homes in foreclosure by $100,000 -- assuming they are underwater on their mortgages by an average of $100,000 -- that's "only" $300 billion.
A: So where's all this money going, huh?
Q: Yes.
A: Propping up derivatives; that's the scam. It's the so-called "illiquid assets." I think that's a misnomer. I think it's "worthless assets" that are being bought up so some of these big guys don't get wiped out.
Q: You say a $700 billion bailout is only a temporary fix.
A: Yeah, it is. If you come to the conclusion that you have to liquidate debt, the faster you get it over with the sooner the economy goes back to work. So they're propping up the prices artificially on houses and at the same time they are saying, "How can we stimulate housing growth?" Well, there are too many houses. You want the supply and demand of houses to adjust, so you let the prices of houses come down and let the houses get in the hands of people who really want them and can afford them and you quit building houses for a while.
So, yeah, you have a booming economy when you deceive the people and you stimulate the economy with easy credit. But you've got to make up for it eventually, and that's the part that nobody likes. We have prevented any attempt at correction essentially over the past 20 years. So we have a bigger bubble than ever before, which means we'll have a bigger correction than ever before. So the only question is, should it be a short, tough correction or a very long, tough correction?
Q: What is your solution for avoiding this kind of sudden national emergency?
A: You need to allow a liquidation of debt, which means bankruptcies. You should treat it like Lehman Brothers -- let them go broke and the good assets will be bought up. But you should restore confidence and encourage business activity. It isn't a lack of regulation that was the problem, it was the lack of the market being allowed to work.
We don't need more Sarbanes-Oxley (financial reporting) regulations like those that came out of Enron. But we should assure the markets that we are going to live within our means. I think the federal budget ought to be balanced. You could do that rather quickly by changing our foreign policy. But people aren't quite willing to give up the welfare-warfare state. But if you did that, things could come back very quickly.
***
Excellent piece. Need more political writing like this, and more thoughtful politicians and journalists. Bet neither Ted Cruz or AOC ever heard of Bastiat or even Von Mises