June 19, 2010

Alterman on McArdle: Direct Hit or Cheap Shot?

A guru (or gurette) speaks: Revere my teachings. Don't look at how I climbed up to this pedestal.

I occasionally raise an eyebrow at some of my fellow libertarians' relationships with government. NB: I don't claim to be a vestal virgin in that regard.

Still, my occasional reading of Megan McArdle has left me with the impression that she comes from a meritocratic family. Apparently, though, her father made his money by being a lobbyist for the construction industry after being an NYC regulator. Which hasn't much to do with his daughter: I'm not overly exercised that she moved back to her parents when her job disappeared together with the Internet Bubble.

However, if Daddy's lobbying connections got her her job at the post-9/11 cleanup, that bears notice. (Note that the link appears to make that accusation, but only insituates it: ...exactly the sort of job that those "personal contacts" can help you get in the "byzantine" world of construction in NYC.)

I did notice that "libertarian" McArdle moved to...Washington DC. And there met her husband, whose libertarian idealism is also questioned in the link. Whatever the facts of the case may be, this is pretty good rhetoric: ...the deeply hypocritical world of free-market shills who make their money playing the murky world where big government and big business overlap.

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