I almost feel sorry for the guy giving the answers. I don't get it, actually - who is the questioner? Tom Woods? Why can he get away with that level of aggression?
 

Back in high school my friends and I built a potato cannon using some supplies from a beauty shop (hairspray). While I don't think it was a WMD, the mouse in a Snapple bottle that we shot out of it probably disagrees. Poor mouse, sorry PETA.
 

Ok, now I got it. Grayson. sorry. nasty day at work today...
 

Grayson hammered Alvarez, as he should. Barney Frank and Mr. Watt went after Thomas Woods on petty notions.

Barney Frank -- the man who once screamed at a college student for asking a simple question -- goes off on Thomas Woods for simply claiming academic and professional economists are bought and paid for.

Mr. Watt -- clearly some sort of Fed apologist -- decidedly takes somewhere around 3 minutes of my life away so he can ask Thomas Woods a loaded question and demand a simple answer.

You have to love this type of excitement monty...
 

Dr. Murphy, have you decided to pick a side on the audit of the fed? I know your colleague Tom Woods supports the audit of the fed.
 

The full hearing is available here:

http://www.c-span.org/Watch/Media/2009/09/25/HP/A/23601/House+Financial+Services+Cmte+Hearing+on+Regulatory+Overhaul.aspx
 

Academic and professional economists ARE bought and paid for (many don't know it, probably because the pay is so low).

Saying this is akin to denying the Holocaust. Your argument will NOT be granted the dignity of recognition. Benjamin Netanyahu will tell you should be ashamed. Or Barney Frank will.
 

Priceless: How The Federal Reserve Bought The Economics Profession
 

Alan Grayson was awesome, too:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXmNpdYpfnk&feature=player_embedded#t=22

for you, Seth :)
 

Hi Bob (and other readers of Free Advice),

OT: Long time reader, first time poster. In my studies of microeconomics (2nd year undergraduate) we have finally reached the "Market Failures" topic. This week is on externalities. I want to know what the an-cap response is to this common argument for the necessity of the state. Can you (or anybody else here) provide me with some information/counter-arguments so I can stump my lecturer (or at least make him pause) and thus look super badass(!) in front of my fellow students? Hints and tips from anybody would be most welcome.

Thanks,
Kurt
 

Just finished watching the full thing. Does anyone have any idea what was going on with that person who was sitting behind Tom Woods that was in baseball cap and shades and the Congressmen were warning would be removed if he continued doing whatever he was doing.

Hearing is here

Its at roughly the 2 hour 40 minute mark.
 

Kurt,

Going to be pretty hard to give you the information you require in a comment here, but Bob Murphy wrote a great and easy to read short book called "Chaos Theory." Might want to check that out.

Chaos Theory
 

Kurt, you might also want to read up/listen to Walter Block. Firm believer of there being no 'Market Failure' only 'Government Failure'.

Go to Mises.org and go to 'literature' or 'media' to get free content of his.
 

The Blackadder Says:

The congressman in this video comes across as a total ass.
 

In my haste I listed the same video as in the post. What a day it's been!

Blackadder--yes, he did come across as a total ass. Good for him!!! I think the Federal Reserve's people have been doing that themselves for far, far too long. It's about time someone pushed back.
 

This YouTube channel has many videos: http://www.youtube.com/user/marcaeld
Scroll down, look on left under 'recent activity'.
 

"Can you (or anybody else here) provide me with some information/counter-arguments so I can stump my lecturer (or at least make him pause) and thus look super badass(!) in front of my fellow students?"

The epitome of ancap "education" -- feeding someone a few simplistic soundbites ("taxation is theft") that they can shout at someone so they will look "badassed."
 

The Blackadder Says:

yes, he did come across as a total ass. Good for him!!! I think the Federal Reserve's people have been doing that themselves for far, far too long. It's about time someone pushed back.

This is the justification for most of the bad behavior in the world.
 

Honestly, I'm always a disappointed when Fed representatives appear before this committee. As much as I respect Dr. Paul, he tends to ask convoluted questions which would be difficult to answer even if the person being questioned wanted to answer in good faith. Both Paul and Grayson seemed to be trying to build a case against the existence of the Fed rather than building a case for an audit of the Fed. This is clearly putting the cart before the horse. They should have focused on attacking Alvarez' justification for keeping Fed operations secret rather than asking whether the Fed manipulates gold prices and the stock market.

When Alvarez argued that "some people" would misinterpret the Fed's actions if they were made public, someone should have jumped in and forced him to defend that position. I'm pretty sure what Alvarez was saying is the average American is too stupid to understand what the Fed does and if Fed actions are made public the ignorant masses will just get in the way of the Fed doing what it wants to do. But rather than call him out on this, Paul and Grayson just plowed ahead with their prepared rants about gold and the stock market.

I guess I'm in the minority, but this was just another missed opportunity if you ask me.
 

Caveman,

Dr. Paul asks convoluted questions because it is his opportunity to speak, and if he asks a short question then the Fed guy gets to just assume away the question and take the remainder of Dr. Paul's time to do it.

Is this the right strategy? I don't know. Since the audience isn't the people sitting there, I don't think, it is hard to say.
 

Anonymous, you say that it is "The epitome of ancap "education" [to feed]someone a few simplistic soundbites ("taxation is theft") that they can shout at someone so they will look "badassed."

Ancaps are not unique in this - almost all ideologies seem to result in this kind of behavior in their less sophisticated followers.

As a general rule, though, it should be discouraged - it would be much better if those who do not feel comfortable with the mainstream ideology do their readings and educate themselves.

The beauty of Austrian economics/ancap is that once you grasped the general principles, it is very easy to deduce almost every general argument.

To Kurt: if you have not yet come across the argument of why there is no such thing, you better read up on the theory before trying to look 'badass'.
Rothbard wrote a brilliant eight page paper on the topic...
 

Maybe this is just me, and I mean no disrespect to Paul and Woods. But I really cringed during Dr Wood's testimony, especially the questions by Dr Paul.

For lack of a better word, it just looked like Dr Woods was trying to flirt with Paul. To be honest the first congressman to challenge Woods seemed to have about.
 

I think everybody needs to cut Kurt some slack. He is trying to read up on the literature so he will have some good arguments. I think the "bad*ss (!!)" comment was obviously for humor; like girls are going to swoon in the back and frat guys are going to say, "Whoa let's not mess with this guy. He just blew up Pigou; we might be next!"

Anyway Kurt I can't find Rothbard's piece on this, but I bet Walter Block cites good stuff here [.pdf] on the issue.
 

Thanks Bob and co. for the reading material, much appreciated. I think I might leave the subtle jokes for Bob next time though... ;-)

E noho ra!
 

Murray Rothbard's" Towards a Reconstruction of Utility and Welfare Economics"

Can't find the short paper, either.
 

Kiwis...
 

For what it's worth a week late, I found Rothbard's "Toward a Reconstruction
of Utility and Welfare Economics" here.