Libertarians: they're everywhere

I was surprised to see two libertarians featured so glowingly in this morning's Sunday Star Times.

Author Mario Vargas Llosa was profiled -- in a piece picked up from The Guardian no less, and online here -- supporting free markets, Margaret Thatcher and the war in Iraq, and saying that subsequent to his 1977 novel Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter,

his politics had decisively shifted. He says: "In my generation, it was impossible when you were young not to be very close to the left - the left seemed the way of justice, equality, the best way to fight against imperialism, colonialism, and then many things happened. I went to Cuba many times in the 60s and I started to have doubts, I became a bit critical." Having been a disciple of Sartre he went back and "reread everything, and I discovered that Camus [a staunch anti-communist] was right, not Sartre. I reread the thinkers who defended and promoted the culture of freedom. Then I was in Britain during Mrs Thatcher's revolution and I became very enthusiastic with the branch of liberalism which is libertarian, so this is what I am." A photo of him with Thatcher sits on a bookshelf.

The second libertarian to appear in the Star was local musician Bruce Lynch, who is -- or at least was, I haven't checked recently -- a Libz member, and who appeared supporting Neil Finn's view on the Prime Minister and local music that made headlines earlier in the week, that she "has hit the wrong note by taking credit for local music industry success."

No pop star, despite a stint touring and recording with Cat Stevens, Lynch works behind the scenes. He spent four years making the music for the Power Rangers TV series and is currently working on string arrangements for a new Anika Moa album.

Lynch is sceptical about the value of government schemes.

"(Politicians) put lots of money in and pump themselves up and we really haven't made much of a dent. We just create another class of people dependent on welfare."

Lynch's comments echo those of Finn in this month's Real Groove magazine: "I think there is a tendency in New Zealand at the moment, because of NZ on Air dishing out large sums of money, for people to have unreal expectations for what New Zealand music can achieve overseas or is actually achieving," he said.

"There's a perception that is somewhat hype generated at the moment that all this music's going out and making a big splash, and it's really not."

Finn's views don't represent everyone in the industry, but they are far from rare.

Lynch said there was a danger in creating too much expectation. "We've got schools for popular music, schools for engineers - we've got all those people out there with skills that nobody wants."

Libertarians: they're everywhere, and they invariably make an awful lot of sense. :-)