I Need Advice, and Fast

The Mises Institute’s Mises University summer program, my favorite week of the year, starts in a matter of days. As with last year, alongside my formal responsibilities is an optional “Evening with Tom Woods.” I have been given no special instructions as to what I should do during this evening.

To be sure, this is a flattering reflection of the confidence the event organizers must have in me. At the same time, it makes the event all the more challenging. When someone gives me a topic, I run with it. When I have to come up with my own, I’m always second-guessing myself. Here’s what I wound up doing last year:

Any suggestions for this year’s “evening”? I am toying with something other than a standard speech. I’d love to get some audience participation going, but something other than a typical Q&A.

UPDATE: For example, at a student conference I went to last month, there was a session in which students were invited to volunteer to subject themselves to audience questions for about three minutes, with the idea being that we ought to help people become better communicators of our ideas. Everyone loved this. What about this idea, perhaps with modifications?

Do you guys have any ideas?

http://www.facebook.com/fred.hewitt.3 Fred Hewitt

Why do only 20% of Americans believe that the government does not have their consent? Is this an interesting topic or what? An interactive session?
Dan

Have people in the audience respond to typical statists arguments and then you critique their response so they become better debaters.
J.E.F.

I think you should do the variety hour. The last variety show I saw was 4 years ago at the Bohemian Grove. Chris Buckley (William F’s son) was the host and in between the other entertainment he pretended he was running for President. At one point he took some questions from the audience. Henry Kissinger asked if he would add Viagra to his prescription drugs benefit. Ken Fisher complained he only made a billion dollars last year and wondered what could be done to help him. Chris Mathews said something stupid. You could entertain some seemingly outragious suggestions from your Austrian audience. Whatever you do people will like it, so don’t worry.
http://www.facebook.com/gilbert.si.1 Gilbert Si

ask the audience’s opinion on what individual liberties mean to them? or what is the real role of goverment & who comprises it? do any of them still feel that they live in a free country? how dangerous is it for congress to have a private entity controlling the people’s monies? what is a republic vs what is a democracy?
Mr. M.

I don’t think the ‘audience participation’ thing is a winner. Folks wish to hear you and your thoughts. Basic q and a at the end is fine, but if it’s some forced audience ‘interactive’ thing, then I’m skeptical. You read GN’s site – why not explain why things like Liberty Classroom and Khan Academy are the next paradigm for education? There are economic, social, intellectual, educational and possibly other factors that relate. How these new sites will obliterate the already cracked edifice of accreditation could lead down an interesting idea path for your speech.
http://TheInterventionistParadox.wordpress.com/ Bharat

This.
apivetta

Abortion rates will decrease in an anarcho-capitalist society. They will compare favorably to abortion rates under a Catholic monarchy (take that, Ferrara!) or a pre-Roe v. Wade constitutional republic. Discuss.
drew

Wow! Just… wow.
J.T.P. Quinn

Well, if you want to do Q&A…do you have any working papers your working on or new books? Perhaps topics you couldn’t fit into a book like Rollback or the PIG to American History? Perhaps you think you’ve solved some controversy in libertarian ethics. An idea you want to bounce off someone, put it out there and see how people respond. Something new. I’ll be attending, btw. Can’t wait to see you there.
Russ

Use Austrian economics to explain how govt. intervention causes current crisis. I.e. how min price, import quotas on sugar and corn subsidies cause the obesity epidemic by raising the price of sugar and causing companies to turn high fructose corn syrup… There were a couple of studies showing a correlation between hfcs and higher obesity and diabetes rates.
Do this with healthcare, education, food, housing, employment, etc..

Essentially explain Mises’ ‘A Critique of Interventionism’ and specifically apply it to today. You could have some subjects prepared but also have the audience pick subjects and they can help show how govt intervention causes the problem.
http://www.facebook.com/bob.dobson.526 Bob Dobson

How about Entrepreneurialism. Government vs private. There are a lot out there who think the government created everything. Or the history of the middle class. Here in Bradford, MA, looking at pictures from the early 1800′s, just about every house that is here now was there then. haha
http://www.libertariannews.org/ Michael Suede

Give a lecture on the economics of prostitution, where you explain that men don’t actually pay for sex, but rather, they pay the woman to leave afterwards. In all seriousness, something smutty and gritty makes for an interesting lecture.

There’s a lot that can be said about prostitution, ranging from disease rates between regulated and unregulated brothels, why women chose to work for pimps, the role of prostitution laws in creating black market sex slavery, how laws have impacted prostitution throughout history, comparisons between countries that permit it either tacitly, explicitly, or ban it, etc.. etc.. etc..
Sal

Its hard to give suggestions to you Mr. Woods not because I’m trying to “toot” your horn; but your simply a wonderful and compelling speaker.
BD

14th amendment. Or reconstruction legislation. Act of 1871?
Anonymous

Yes but you mean a citizen state, not bicameral parliament or representative democracy.
I believe your system uses courts and government, whose adjudicators are selected by sortition.
Although I agree, attaining it through mass volunteerism would be absolutely necessary, as opposed to a state driven initiative. That part isn’t so clear to me; maybe a little idealistic even.
Ergo, we need to discuss the nuts and bolts of a real-world transition from current-day proportional representation/representative democracy to the one you are describing. -Especially one that doesn’t meet with violence (highly improbable)
Anonymous

‘Voluntarism’
Anonymous

“Would you rather have only the problems that are inherent in the document, or the problems that arise from breaching its constraints?”
Interesting. Am I being unrealistic if I say that the problems that arise from breaching its constraints, are inherent glitches in the document itself?
Conversely, constitutions don’t work forever might be a realistic conclusion.
Summation: Insurrection is a permanent and necessary antidote to the state.
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Anonymous

Hmmm, Let’s try ~~doing this~~
Nick

It would be topical to discuss the history of how the Supreme Court and the mainstream legal profession have mutilated the constitution.
timbercruiser

How about how education has been taken over by the state and how it can be taken back by individuals.
Shayne

You could mention how are public pool got closed down in the middle of an obesity epidemic because federal regulation requirements for handicap accessible lifts. The lifts are ridiculously expensive due to the nonexistent demand before the law was passed.
Luke Sunderland

I doubt you could get much audience participation out of it, but something about how Christianity has often acted as a check on state power would be nice.
BD

…or, if Bob is there, you could do an extended version of an interview with a zombie
Clay

Like Orville and Wilbur Wright used to switch sides during an argument you should see if you can defend Keynesianism and other popular positions. Then refute yourself.
Anonymous

“Progressivism: Ignoring conflict where it is, and finding it where it is not”
Zaq

Fill in the history of Austrian economics from Aquinas to Menger.
Jessica

Sit-down conversational Q&A, where the students can pick your brain about anything, but other students can jump in on the conversation. If there’s a lack of questions (which I doubt there will be, but still), you could toss out a topic for the students to discuss. I would give a whole lot for an opportunity like this.
chase

maybe explain why the mises institute should not be renamed the rothbard institute. mises seemed to have a fondness for government that the institute lacks.
Chris

what would the constitution or our guiding set of laws have to contain (if anything) in order to avoid the obvious deep faults that the existing one has been shown to stumble into from the onset ? (did the founding fathers ever address this issue as they began to see it unravel)
PS EXCELLENT speech last year, Tom: as far as I’m concerned, you could just repeat that
guest anarchocapitalist

The thing that stops people from being more active and involved liberty is they usually don’t know what to do. I suggest your topic should be about “withdraw your consent”, i.e. how and what it means for people to withdraw their consent.
pretysa@domain.com

Well one thing that I’ve always wondered about but never really figured out was the media. Why does it always try to contain all thoughts and opinions in a box? Why do they demonize any anti-establishment ideas? What purpose does that serve? We always hear the the ‘gatekeepers’ of information will not allow ‘unnapproved’ ideas to be spread. But Why? I don’t think anybody has answered that yet. And so why isnt there a free market when it comes to the mainstream media? If more people wanted an anti-state, pro-freedom message broadcast, then wouldn’t it make more sense for the big news networks to broadcast it? Maybe somebody know what’s going on?
Jay L.

I hope I’m not too late, but one topic I find interesting is looking back at various government interventions in history, finding instances when libertarians objected to the interventions on certain grounds and opponents labeled them as “crazy” or “paranoid” for their concerns, and then showing how the predictions of the libertarians came true (e.g., government grew bigger, bureaucracies extended their reach, economic progress was stifled, etc.). Such historical examples are helpful to keep in mind when confronting contemporary accusations of libertarian paranoia.
Jordan Sheppherd

I would suggest talking about the ins and outs of convincing people of our side of things. For example, a common mistake people sometimes make (including me) is to harangue someone for an opposing view, and lose sight of the fact that any discussion with anyone on these issues should be to present such a clear and precise case for liberty, that the conclusions become self-evident and light a fire under that person; or at the very least get them to seriously reconsider their positions.

The other part of the talk could be about the importance of identifying who we should attempt to persuade, and those who are a total waste of time. Again, if the purpose of any discussion is to show the other person how our view of liberty is correct, a single second spent on someone who is obviously a blockhead is a second that could be spent making an impact on someone who is open to change.

These two things provide a much stronger blueprint or roadmap for change than going through the same old arguments that people have hashed to death, and said a hundred different ways. This subject goes to the heart of our fight – how do I take what I know and make a difference. I think the answer is that you do it everyday in the way you live, and in your interactions with those around you. This subject could illuminate how those interactions can be made to be as effective to our purpose as possible. Sorry for the long post
tisha branham

I think you should just keep it audience engaged. If they know you, they know what you know. Have them pick your brain for the info they want.
JohnD

Eh, students are like babies. Indestructible.

And yes, I am a student (but not at MisesU, unfortunately).
http://www.facebook.com/bob.dobson.526 Bob Dobson

Tom, I have a question that I wonder if it would make a good topic. Does capitalism require constant growth and does it require that some remain poor and a ladder of wealth? I don’t think it necessitates some being poor but I’m sure you can understand the the reason for the question.