The company you keep
I thought, innocent child that I am, that some of the things I’d seen libertarians talking about in their stranger moments were simply aberrations, individual quirks. For instance, the whole “Lincoln was a despot” idea that’s getting a lot of press in libertarian circles. That had to be somebody’s pet peeve. There can’t be a whole anti-Lincoln movement out there.
Wanna bet? The anti-Lincoln essays are just the most publicly recognized output of the Neoconfederate movement, as reported by Mac Diva on Blogcritics. And Neoconfederates aren’t just providing copy for libertarians. They’re lobbying legislators, and when cornered they play dirty.
But did you really doubt that?
All it took was for the libertarians to swallow States’ Rights as enthusiastically as they have, and the Neoconfederates perked right up. “Wonder if they’ll swallow this?” Short answer: yup.
If you lie down with dogs, you’re gonna get up with fleas. If you start off as a conservative and go farther right than that, you have to be damn careful or you’ll end up in some truly despicable company: the Holocaust deniers, the Identity Christians, and now the Neoconfederates.