And I think he does a great job advancing little-l philosophy. The race for the purest Libertarian fills the most comical pages of Brian Dougherty's Radicals for Capitalism: only the purest is allowed to stay in the room.

You don't have to be "pure," just not so diluted. Reynolds is to real libertarians what a light beer is to San Miguel. There are superficial similarities until you realize the difference in depth and complexity.

Sean Hannity has claimed "We're pretty libertarian on this show," and witness the emergence of "libertarian Democrats." It only goes to show the term is losing all meaning. It has to have clear definitions. It has to mean something.

I still support the Iraq War -- excuse me, I mean "The Debacle in Iraq" -- so it's pretty clear from reading Gene Healy and David Boaz last week that I'm not invited to the party.

It's a matter of why you supported the Iraq War. Do you believe in pre-emptive wars and nation-building? I felt Saddam was still a threat to the U.S. and have mixed feelings only because of how we handled the aftermath. By and large, we *were* welcomed as liberators. We just didn't know what to do once we toppled his government.

A libertarian can justify the action because Saddam had previously kidnapped Americans and was continually violating the cease-fire. If Saddam had not done those, then I couldn't have justified toppling him. But Ron Paul was right: we should have dropped all the political pretenses and had Congress formally declare war. If anything, it would have prevented the Kerryism of "I voted as a last resort, I didn't think we'd actually do it!"

Of course, all this would be irrelevant if Bush Sr. hadn't been a UN-heeding pansy, and Bubba was worse. There's nothing in libertarianism that says you can't retaliate in full force when your citizens are kidnapped, e.g. Jefferson's response to the Barbary pirates.

I still believe in the importance of Deepak Lal's Liberal International Economic Order and will support blood and treasure to preserve it.

Which isn't quite what Lal is talking about. The state can protect people, but the extent of what you're talking about is giving far too much credit to the state for protecting people. The danger is that people start relying on military protection of land and sea trade routes, much like Americans rely on police instead of themselves.

"I dream of an America where millions of happily married gay couples have closets full of assault weapons."

That's his own individual opinion, you see. The real libertarian way puts it more generally. I forget how Jefferson put it so wonderfully succinctly, but this is an expanded version: "I dream of an America where people have their unalienable rights to life, liberty and property: essentially, the freedom to do what they want -- including but not limited to forming legally enforceable contracts with homosexual partners, or owning whatever weapons they so desire -- so long as they do not infringe on the unalienable rights of others."