One of our authors is doing a reading and signing at the Barnes & Noble Bookstore on the Promenade in Santa Monica at 7:30pm (tomorrow) July 8, 2004. I thought the event might interest you.

SLP editorial director James Walsh has written "LIberty in Troubled Times: A Libertarian Guide to Laws, Society, Freedom in a Terrorized World." It's just out this month--and we're getting him set up with reading and events at bookstores on the West Coast. The main point of the book is that old notions of liberal-vs.-conservative and Democrat-vs.-Republican have become useless. The real political debate in the U.S. is between statism and libertarianism.

Statism believes in collective response to social issues, influenced only when necessary by individual needs; libertarianism believes in individual response, influence only when necessary by collective needs. This is the debate that will shape the coming decades.

"Liberty in Troubled Times" does more than just rant about post-9/11 government miscues. Walsh starts by taking a look at what "liberty" means in the United States--and how it's been interpreted since the country's founding. Then, from that perspective, he looks at what's happened since 9/11. He'd critical of some reaction--parts of the Partriot Act, some Justice Department prosecutions. But he avoids the ad hominem attacks that many critics use.

Walsh also talks about the loose use of the words "civil liberties" and "libertarian." Many people today claim they're libertarians--but have a weak notion of what that means.

His final point is that it's tough to be a consistent libertarian...but that it's the best hope for continuing the American Experiment.