While composing a response to William “Bill” Vallicella’s recent posts on presuppositionalism (starting with “The Holocaust Argument for the Existence of God”), his Substack post, “Notes on David Mamet,” arrived in my inbox. In that post, Bill takes issue with what this distinguished playwright and self-described conservative said about government and taxes.
I will evaluate, not the dramatist’s claims, but Bill’s dismissal of them. Bill shows no awareness of, let alone respect for, the well-developed case that has been made for a philosophical position (with which non-philosopher Mamet loosely identified himself in an interview).
That is, I’m interested in whether Bill fairly represented, not Mamet, but the view that Bill, the self-described conservative, excoriates as “absurd.”
I stipulate that I’m ripping out of context (a context available to interested readers who take the link above) these sentences of his:
Conservatives . . . . are not anarchists because they accept the moral legitimacy of the State. Conservatives are law and order types, but there can be no law and order without a coercive state of [sic] apparatus that forces people to do what they are often uninclined to do. Conservatives believe in a strong national defense. They want the nation’s borders to be secure. All of this requires local, state, and Federal government. Conservatives are not libertarians because they understand that culture matters and that not every question is an economic one.
The last implication is, apparently, that for libertarians, either culture doesn’t matter, or every question is an economic one (or both). As someone who read and befriended Murray Rothbard 40 years ago, I never met a libertarian who held either belief. Whom did Bill have in mind?
The conservatives whom I’m sure Bill and I admire have cared a great deal about justice. Thoughtful conservatives, when confronted with argument and evidence that suggests that the way they go about establishing law and order, a strong national defense, and secure borders has offended justice—that is, that the policies they sincerely intended to secure those goods are unjust—don’t retort, “So what!” Rather, they examine the libertarian’s premises to see whether they’re (a) true or false and/or (b) linked validly or not in support of his conclusion. Bill neither did this nor pointed his readers to those who have.
Continue reading “Who needs government? A response to Bill Vallicella’s comment on David Mamet”