Do you remember the pride that swelled in your chest as you watched the "shock and awe" fall on Baghdad in 2003? Do you remember the dismissive statement you would always tell yourself when people brought up the fact that no WMD's were found? Do you remember putting the Bush/Cheney bumper sticker on your car as if it represented your favorite football team? Do you remember staying up late at night watching the republican debates hoping that John McCain would just drop dead so Romney could win? I do.
I was, by all accounts, a nationalist. This was the way I was raised. I grew up saying the "Pledge of Allegiance" with pride, not knowing I was reciting the words of a self avowed socialist. Patriotism felt good. It felt like I was somehow a better person because America was great. Honestly, I think I was sick. In September 2008 all of that started to change.
With the financial collapse I started to have questions. Economics had always interested me, so I decided to pick up a book called, "The Housing Boom and Bust" By Thomas Sowell. I started to realize that government wasn't always so benevolent. I read biographies on the founding fathers which helped me to see things in a different perspective. Eventually, I experienced a paradigm shift. I think it happened when I searched "Austrian Economics" on Youtube. I found a video of a guy named Peter Schiff predicting the economic crisis years before it ever happened. I watched in amazement as respected economists laughed at him and told him he was crazy. Those 20 minutes on Youtube have changed my life.
Since that day I have read thousands of pages on Austrian Economics and libertarian logic. Before my thoughts were always based on other people's opinions and other people's fears or desires. Austrian Economics and praxeology has taught me to think for myself. I can see things more clearly now. This is why Schiff and every other Austrian Economist was able to predict the housing bubble. This is a key point. It is very rare, especially in politics, to hear any original thought or idea. It is almost always the talking point of some one with an agenda. Most people are sheep wandering from flock to flock, never having any inclination to not be a sheep. I took the "red pill." It is refreshing and extremely frustrating. I am amazed at how little people use the gift between there ears for anything of significance.
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