Milton Friedman: The Untold Story

Too bad Uncle Miltie didn't wind up as just another nobody; his crackpot economic ideas have destroyed entire countries and plague this country to the present day. No matter they have been discredited and debunked, our politicians in both political parties subscribe to this nutballery.

It appears he was peddling bullshit as early as right after the second world war:

The purpose of the FEE — and libertarianism, as it was originally created — was to supplement big business lobbying with a pseudo-intellectual, pseudo-economics rationale to back up its policy and legislative attacks on labor and government regulations.

This background is important in the Milton Friedman story because Friedman is a founder of libertarianism, and because the corrupt lobbying deal he was busted playing a part in was arranged through the Foundation for Economic Education.

False, whitewashed history is as much a part of the Milton Friedman mythology as it is the libertarian movement’s own airbrushed history about its origins; the 1950 Buchanan Committee hearings expose both as creations of big business lobby groups whose purpose is to deceive and defraud the public and legislators in order to advance the cause of corporate America.

To think this crackpot was EVER given any kind of forum, let alone won the Nobel Prize in 1976, which is mentioned near the end of this column, just boggles the mind.

Friedman was an evil, evil man.

Update February 2014: Sorry about leaving the link out. Corrected it.