Study: Most Liberal States Are Least Free

[bytor2112]

The freest states in the country are New Hampshire, Colorado, and South Dakota, which together achieve a virtual tie for first place. All three states feature low taxes and government spending -- and middling levels of regulation and paternalism.

I love Colorado...:)Newsmax.com - Study: Most Liberal States Are Least Free

[FunkyTown]

Just remember the slant of NewsMax:

NewsMax.com - SourceWatch

In addition, I'd like to point out this line: The company generates sales from politically-oriented merchandise (clothing, posters, books) showcasing stars of the Republican Party.

It's not the most independent news agency in the world.

[bytor2112]

Just remember the slant of NewsMax:

NewsMax.com - SourceWatch

In addition, I'd like to point out this line: The company generates sales from politically-oriented merchandise (clothing, posters, books) showcasing stars of the Republican Party.

It's not the most independent news agency in the world.

Very true. However, the study was done by George Mason University and reported on by Newsmax.

[FunkyTown]

Very true. However, the study was done by George Mason University and reported on by Newsmax.

Again, though, that source is suspect:

George Mason University is a Virginia-based University, situated close to Washington, D.C. It is notable for hosting over 40 libertarian research centers and affiliates including the Institute for Humane Studies and the Mercatus Center.

In particular, when we go to Sourcewatch, we see this:

It became a "magnet for right-wing money" [1] during the 1990s. From 1992 through 1994, 12 libertarian foundations invested a combined total of $8.55 million in various academic programs and institutes of George Mason University. It was this funding that help establish (and continues to support) the University's unrivalled set of libertarian "study centers", which aim to recruit and support young, free-market-oriented students - typically through paid-for "study trips", seminars, and placements.

The Mercatus Center is currently the main focus of right-wing and libertarian funding. Between 1999 and 2001, the Mercatus Center was the third largest recipient of conservative foundation money (a position previously held by the Institue of Humane Studies).

They can provide source for the libertarian foundations if you go to Sourcewatch. There's just too much agenda there to believe that it's independent.

[bytor2112]

Again, though, that source is suspect:

George Mason University is a Virginia-based University, situated close to Washington, D.C. It is notable for hosting over 40 libertarian research centers and affiliates including the Institute for Humane Studies and the Mercatus Center.

In particular, when we go to Sourcewatch, we see this:

It became a "magnet for right-wing money" [1] during the 1990s. From 1992 through 1994, 12 libertarian foundations invested a combined total of $8.55 million in various academic programs and institutes of George Mason University. It was this funding that help establish (and continues to support) the University's unrivalled set of libertarian "study centers", which aim to recruit and support young, free-market-oriented students - typically through paid-for "study trips", seminars, and placements.

The Mercatus Center is currently the main focus of right-wing and libertarian funding. Between 1999 and 2001, the Mercatus Center was the third largest recipient of conservative foundation money (a position previously held by the Institue of Humane Studies).

They can provide source for the libertarian foundations if you go to Sourcewatch. There's just too much agenda there to believe that it's independent.

Right wing, conservative, libertarian.......doesn't make it wrong. Less government intervention= more freedom.....IMO.

[FunkyTown]

Remember, however, that government interventionism isn't necessarily a bad thing. Just as a few examples:

1) Would you agree with a completely open border, where anyone from any nationality could come and live? Preventing that reduces freedom - Not just for people outside the border, but internally as well. After all, there are laws for bringing in someone being married as well.

2) Would you agree with removing age of consent laws? Not just for marriage, but for contracts as well? After all, one could argue that you're removing the right to choose from those who are prevented.

Those are, obviously, very weighted examples. However, they are examples of when limitations are placed upon others that we agree should be limitations.

[beefche]

I admit that I skimmed the article, but was there a definition of free?

[bytor2112]

Remember, however, that government interventionism isn't necessarily a bad thing. Just as a few examples:

1) Would you agree with a completely open border, where anyone from any nationality could come and live? Preventing that reduces freedom - Not just for people outside the border, but internally as well. After all, there are laws for bringing in someone being married as well.

2) Would you agree with removing age of consent laws? Not just for marriage, but for contracts as well? After all, one could argue that you're removing the right to choose from those who are prevented.

Those are, obviously, very weighted examples. However, they are examples of when limitations are placed upon others that we agree should be limitations.

I'm not anti-government. I am for limited government. I want the government to do a few things very well.

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

[bytor2112]

I admit that I skimmed the article, but was there a definition of free?

The study touts that it improves on prior attempts to score economic freedom for American states in three primary ways: (1) it includes measures of social and personal freedoms such as peaceable citizens’ rights to educate their own children, own and carry firearms, and be free from unreasonable search and seizure; (2) it includes far more variables, even on economic policies alone, than prior studies, and there are no missing data on any variable; and (3) it uses new, more accurate measurements of key variables, particularly state fiscal policies.

“We develop and justify our ratings and aggregation procedure on explicitly normative criteria, defining individual freedom as the ability to dispose of one’s own life, liberty, and justly acquired property however one sees fit, so long as one does not coercively infringe on another individual’s ability to do the same,” note the authors.

[a-train]

Remember, however, that government i

nterventionism isn't necessarily a bad thing. Just as a few examples:

1) Would you agree with a completely open border, where anyone from any nationality could come and live? Preventing that reduces freedom - Not just for people outside the border, but internally as well. After all, there are laws for bringing in someone being married as well.

2) Would you agree with removing age of consent laws? Not just for marriage, but for contracts as well? After all, one could argue that you're removing the right to choose from those who are prevented.

Those are, obviously, very weighted examples. However, they are examples of when limitations are placed upon others that we agree should be limitations.

To be specific, the term "interventionism" refers to positive action by government either in economic or in foreign affairs. Examples would include a government purchase of stocks motivated by the desire to keep the price of those stocks up, or a military invasion of a foreign country to prevent the dictator from engaging in discriminatory practices within his own borders.

The legal structure (whether very open or highly restricted) for immigration would not be interventionism under this definition. If however, government sent military forces into Mexico and assisted Mexican fugitives in evading Mexican authorities and in coming to the U.S., this would be interventionism.

Economic interventionism is the most common form in modern democracies. A central bank, given monopoly power over the money supply by government, uses that power to intervene in economic activites on a macro scale. The main tools it uses include open market operations, required reserve ratio adjustments, and discount rate adjustments. These activities are not simply legislation or even the executive efforts to enforce the law, they are proactive efforts to intervene in economic activity.

Additionally however, since the late 19th Century, fiscal policy (taxes) has been accepted by most democracies as something more than just revenue production, but the means to further intervene in not only economic activity, but to engage in social programming efforts. This is of course a more subtle form of interventionism in that it takes place under the guise of traditionally accepted non-interventionist government practices.

Such interventionism was long practiced in monarchical systems. The liberal movement to destroy monarchy included the complaint against "arbitrary government". The notion thereof was that leaders would set laws in hopes that they would persuade the people in a certain way. If the public is persuaded differently, they simply change the laws. Thus, under this paradigm, law was not an instrument of justice, but an instrument of persuasion or even coercion. Certainly the classical liberals such as Thomas Payne felt it was the latter.

The example I gave earlier of the Casinos in Kansas City pushing the smoking ban but gaining an exception is a great example of interventionist legislation. Through the law, cronies are awarded a monopoly and economic competition is stifled by this intervention.

Suppose a law was passed that heavily restricted immigration, but gave exception to a special group, this could be considered interventionism. But insomuch as the policies are not designed to award winners and losers via political favoritism, but to actually set appropriate rules that protect all the same, they do not constitute interventionism.

-a-train

[MarginOfError]

The formula developed for this analysis is bogus. It's preconditioned to meet a conservative/libertarian point of view. The outcome measure is by definition higher under fewer gun control restrictions, etc. Thus, the outcome of the research is driven by the author's subjective interpretation of 'free'. This research essentially amounts to the researcher's (or the group's) opinion of which states are the most free.

Also of interest, the study doesn't include factors such as quality of education, cost of education, crime rates, etc.

I also find it interesting that two of the three states mentioned as being in the top three are struggling desperately to fund their public education systems. Colorado has struggled since the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (an abominable idea) made it impossible to increase property taxes to help fund schools; New Hampshire has long struggled as it has no sales nor income tax, and the property taxes are already pretty high, making it impossible to raise rates without committing political suicide. I guess freedom really isn't free.

[Moksha]

Oops, title writer forgot to leave out important words like some of the liberal states. Of course the story would not be the same if they had been included.

Couldn't find this study on the Mercatus Center website. Was this commissioned by some group that did not want it to be examined?

[jadams_4040]

I love Colorado...:)Newsmax.com - Study: Most Liberal States Are Least Free

Thats ridiculas.

[bytor2112]

Thats ridiculas.

No.....I really do love Colorado.

[bytor2112]

Thats ridiculas.

No.....I really do love Colorado.

[a-train]

The saying that a state is the most "liberal" and at the same time the least "free" seems paradoxical. If it really is the most liberal, then it should be the most free.

God's views are liberal:

Our heavenly Father is more liberal in His views, and boundless in His mercies and blessings, than we are ready to believe or receive; and, at the same time, is more terrible to the workers of iniquity, more awful in the executions of His punishments, and more ready to detect every false way, than we are apt to suppose Him to be.

- Joseph Smith (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith page 257.)

-a-train

Edited May 8, 2009 by a-train

[FunkyTown]

I love Colorado as well. And I agree with A-Train's assessment of God.

I was pointing out that the study was a biased study made in a biased university by someone who was brought in to the university specifically because of his bias.

Not truly independent.