William F. Buckley is considered one of the greatest conservatives in modern United States history. In many cases, that can be an apt description, but in other cases, that just isn’t true.
Buckley became famous for lambasting governments for repeated interventions into the free market. He also became a prominent figure in American politics for advocating limited government, championing the ideas from the likes of Milton Friedman and Thomas Sowell, and essentially conceding that the government fails in many regards.
For some reason, in the 1990s, Buckley went full statist and believed that there should be a public service mandate for American youth.
He wrote a book titled “Gratitude: Reflections on What We Owe to Our Country.” It adopted the JFK premise of “not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.
The main proposals of the book was to force young people to work for the government (not the military), whether it was national park or aiding election officials. It was a disappointing time for the conservative movement – incidentally, it coincided with the tragic rise of right-wing shock jobs like Rush Limbaugh.
To discuss the book, the legendary economist Milton Friedman was invited onto “Firing Line.” Suffice to say, Friedman annihilated Buckley.
Here is the clip:
I can’t believe that Mr. Buckley actually said that we live in a democracy. Didn’t he even read the Constitution, where it clearly states that we live in a republic? By the time this got to minute 10, I almost felt that Mr. Buckley was an imbecile. He could barely define words correctly, like “voluntary.” The only people who “give back” are those who have previously stolen from others; the correct term is “give.” Private charity is considered by Buckley to be national service? This is one thing wrong with charity: Government got involved directly.