The Palmer Periscope

Palmer backs off

In the comments to this thread on Tom Palmer's smearblog, some guy "Yuri" posted, and Palmer said it was "Mr. Kinsella of Dallas who writes for LewRockwell.com", something like this, since this guy was posting from some server in Dallas. I posted a correction to this idiot that I live in Houston; and now he has deleted both his accusation and my post correcting him. Good thing. I have half a mind to post the embarrassing picture of Palmer that I have until now refrained from publicizing out of a sense of decency that that scumbag lacks. Don't push me, Palmer.

Tom Palmer Does Amsterdam

ha, funny post on Daily Apology:

Tom Palmer Does Amsterdam    

I just heard an interesting story about Tom Palmer. Apparently he was in Amsterdam recently for the Reason conference, and someone snapped a picture which is going around which shows Palmer splayed drunk on the floor in a quasi-sexy pose with a goofy look on his face. I won't post it here--it's too embarrassing for poor Tom.

                    

Hmm, if someone -- hypothetically -- had sent that pic to me, would it be wrong to post it? Inquiring minds want to know!

Palmer thinks I'm "Special"!

Okay, so P-dog posts a thing about Bush's executive order; I posted something about it here, and now we have Palmer's retort:

I just got an email informing me that one particularly thick person has commented on my disparaging comments on the Bush Administration’s issuance of a meaningless non-order non-protecting property rights and has complained that

One such wag complained that Bush issued his decree “merely because he says so”. And he also whined that a mere “Executive Order isn’t much protection from arbitrary exercises of power. Hunh? What is wrong with the decree being because “Bush says so”? How could it be otherwise. And the complaint reeks of the libertarian centralist notion that only protection from the Supreme Federal Courts is good enough; that judges are somehow exalted and different from other federal employees. I guess Bush should have made the Order applicable to the States, contrary to the Constitution and federalism (which is a code word for racism for libertarian centralists).

Hmmmm….”how could it be otherwise?” Is our liberty dependent merely on the arbitrary will of the holders of power?

"Is" it? Sure, it seems like it is. Does he mean, "should" it be? Well, I happen to be a proud anarcho-capitalist (unlike Palmer, apparently), and also happen to believe the US Constitution is the failure it is, and therefore do not put trust or faith in its ability to "defend our rights". So no, I don't think it "should" be, but it is, to a degree, in today's system. He goes on:

Here are two options that a a serious advocate of liberty might recognize as authentically representing liberty:

1 Restrictions on power could be a requirement of the Constitution.

2. Restrictions on power could be a result of the division of powers. (See above.)

What Palmer is too obtuse to recognize is my implicit point that if you rely on the federal government to protect your rights, you have to hope and rely on the "arbitrary will of the holders of power." To get items 1 or 2 above you have to have politicians at some point put it into effect. But guess what--it's their arbitrary will. It's some politicians saying we have certain rights "because they say so."

And so what if you have a paper government document that pretends that it is limited by these structures? You have to depend on the courts, and the other branches of government, to agree to abide by these structures.

My point is that, yes, what Bush did is not enough--but what else is the guy in charge of the executive branch supposed to do, other than voluntarily try not to violate liberty? He is not the judiciary branch, and he is not the legislature. So while his executive order is not much, why is he to be criticized for not doing the job of the courts and the Congress? In this case, he actually moved in the right direction. Why sneer at this?

The option that “the ruler decided for today not to take our land” is not consistent with authentic liberty.

Who said it was? I just object to a sneering dismissal of the executive branch's voluntary decision to respect property rights. The problem with Palmer's comments is that he singles out Executive action here; his disparaging comments imply that if we had the "right" magic words written on paper in the Constitution, then we'd have "authentic liberty." I guess if the rulers decide today to put down some limits on paper that purport to hamper their ability to take our land, this is consistent with authentic liberty; but if the ruler decides today to not take our land, this is not consistent with authentic liberty.

Being “protected” by someone who can withdraw that protection on a whim is no protection at all. It certainly isn’t liberty.

Hey, I don't think it's good enough at all. I don't trust the executive branch, nor the other two branches. But this is no reason to complain about the actions of one of the branches in which it voluntarily decides to restrain itself. What else is it supposed to do--violate separation of powers and tell the other branches what to do? What?

“What is wrong with the decree being because ‘Bush says so’?” What is wrong with the decree “merely because he said so” is that we are dependent on his changeable will. That is a defining characteristic of unfreedom.

And one thing we are against, is, um, unfreedom.

Look, I don't disagree with this. Of course it's bad that the state can change its mind (I have in fact criticized this aspect of legislation as a way of making laws here)--whether it be the legislature, executive, or judiciary that can just change the rules on us. But of course if you have an executive branch that decides to choke back a bit on its depradations of liberty, why is this a bad thing? And isn't any decision any agency or government agent ever makes "just because he says so"? Sure if would be better if he were limited somehow; but if he is not, is he doing something wrong when he nevertheless respects rights?

***

As someone wrote me, "The Palmerite position on Kelo, on the Civil War, etc. etc. is always that the end justifies the means, that procedural restrictions are less important than improving somebody's liberty that very moment. Now he turns all rule-utilitarian on you. A total reversal."

P-dog on Gay Marriage

Your boy Palmer is not happy with recent attempts to ban gay marriage at the federal level. Palmer notes that the amendment does not merely restrain “runaway judges”--it also "forbid[s] legislatures from allowing gay marriages, as well".

In other words, he doesn't like the feds telling the states what to do. I.e., he is adopting a federalism or states'-rights approach. Yet he must be a bit uncomfortable saying so, because of his adoption of the libertarian-centralist line (arguing the 14th amendment did and should allow the feds to "supervise" the states, see comment at February  3, 2005 12:18 AM), and his previous criticism ( comment at July  3, 2005 09:59 PM) of "states' rights" as basically being a code-word for racism. Perhaps that is why the word "state" is conspicuously missing before the word "legislatures" above. Ha ha ha! He says the amendment prevents "legislatures" -- as if it might apply to any old legislature--say, Guam's or Russia's. Legislatures in general. He does not want to go on record as opposing the gay marriage amendment on the grounds that the feds are dictating terms to state legislatures, since he is in favor of the feds dictating terms to state legislatures! Ha ha ha.

I've recently posted my views on gay mizzarriage;  it seems to me that those who favor a "muscular" federal supervision of the states have no grounds to whine when the feds do something they don't like. Sure, Palmer and his ilk can say, "no no, we only support eroding federalism for purposes of allowing the feds to stop really bad things the states are doing, honest injun!, but we really don't want the feds to take advantage of their increased powers or the eroded limits on them when they make bad policy. When the feds make good policy, they should make the states comply; but when the feds make bad policy, we are not in favor of them spreading the error to the states."

Reminds me of one of my favorite Mises quotes: "No socialist author ever gave a thought to the possibility that the abstract entity which he wants to vest with unlimited power—whether it is called humanity, society, nation, state, or government—could act in a way of which he himself disapproves."

Holocaust Palmer v. Muslim Cartoon Palmer

Palmer today:

The cartoon images of Muhammed may have been offensive. They may have been shocking to some. Perhaps publishing them was in bad taste. Maybe it was even a sin. But no one should be harmed for publishing them, nor should the Danish government either punish the publishers or apologize for their publication.

Palmer a year ago:

The ban on the swastika, images of Hitler, and other emblems of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party was imposed after the defeat of the Third Reich. And quite rightly, in my opinion, for it wasn’t merely a matter of “free speech,” but of preventing a brutal criminal conspiracy that had murdered millions from regrouping and taking back power. Banning it in, say, Canada or the U.S. would have been unjustified, as there was little chance that such people would organize to take over power here. (Ditto for restraining the speech of “holocaust deniers,” who should be allowed to peddle their crackpot views, which are about as plausible as denying the occurence of World War II.) But in the countries of Europe that had suffered through National Socialism, the ban was justified, on libertarian grounds, viz. a form of self-defense against known criminals.

Res ipsa loquitur.

Oldie but Goodie: Raimondo v. Palmer

Hilarious interchange between the heroic and funny Justin Raimondo and the execrable Tom Palmer.

Palmer on Friends of Freedom

[Cross-posted on The Daily Apology]

Well well well. This is interesting. Our boy Tom Palmer praises some "inspiring friends of freedom," including "Paata Sheshelidze and Gia Jandieri of the New School of Economics of the Republic of Georgia..."

I agree with Tom and thank him for promoting Paata, who is indeed a great libertarian. But a bit surprising, since the group he praises--Paata Sheshelidze and the New School of Economics--has published and promoted the work of those P-dog elsewhere condemns as racists, morons, and impediments to the cause of liberty, such as Hoppe and myself. I speak of the heroic "Library of Liberty" series published by the New School of Economics in cooperation with Friedrich Naumann Foundation, which contains Georgian translations of essays by various free market oriented writers. For example, Book I: Basics of Liberalism, published in February 2004, contains Georgian translations of classic essays by Mill, Bastiat, Mises, Ropke, Acton, Hayek, and of course, that great libertarian hero, and Palmer's bete noire, Lew Rockwell. Book II: Liberalism and Power (September 2004) has chapters by Tucker, Spencer, Oppenheimer, Nock, Hayek, Mises, Rothbard, and--gasp!--another pebble in Palmer's shoe--the great modern libertarian theorist Hans-Hermann Hoppe.

Book III. Liberty and Property, was published just last month (October 2005), and I believe Book IV. Liberty and Intellectuals will be published shortly. Book III contains works by Locke, Bastiat, Mises, Rothbard, Demsetz, James Buchanan, Palmer's buddy (and mine! :) Tibor Machan, David Theroux, Richard Stroup, James Dorn, and--heavens to betsy--Hoppe, as well as yours truly. (Full lists below.)

All this, of course, just makes makes Tommy boy's relentless, dishonest, monomaniacal attacks on Hoppe, Rockwell et al. look like the ridiculous, unfair bleating that it is. Poor Tom. I guess everyone but him is blind to the Misesian Menace. Not enough people are infused with his sense of Dimwit-Serioso High Libertarian Purpose, goshdarnit.

I bet it just drives P-dog nuts when he traipses around the world and keeps running into libertarians who love Hoppe and Rockwell. Heh hehh hehh. I apologize for taking a bit too much gleeful satisfaction in this thought.

Update: see page 8 of the Atlas Economic Research Foundation's Summer 2005 newsletter, reporting on the New School of Economics of the Republic of Georgia, and noting:

The idea of organizing a free-market think tank in the Republic of Georgia was born in Auburn, Alabama, USA in August of 2001. At that time the two future founders of New Economic School – Georgia (NESG), Paata Sheshelidze and Gia Jandieri were visiting the Mises Institute, which inspired them to create an institute in Georgia that facilitates change by educating people.

[...] Since 2001, NESG has strengthened itself by building partnerships with like minded institutions around the world including Mises Institute, Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation, Atlas Foundation, and Foundation for Economic Education (all based in the US US), Hayek Institute (Austria), Fraser Institute (Canada), Naumann Foundation (Germany) etc.

Oh, wow, the NESG has close ties to the Mises Institute--and was even "inspired by" them. Poor Tom.

Tom Palmer's Outrageous, Brazen, and Shocking Lies Exposed

Tom Palmer's Outrageous, Brazen, and Shocking Lies Exposed

Posted by Tex MacRae for Jeremy Sapienza, originally posted on anti-state.com's blog, Project for the New Anarchist Century

I'm sitting here at about 9:30pm, Thursday night -- with my jaw on the floor. I have pretty much always thought Tom G. Palmer of the Cato Institute was a bit of a weirdo, a bit obsessed with attacking people like Lew Rockwell and Justin Raimondo, and bit sensitive about his homosexuality, among other things. I have heard from other people about how he is "evil," (haha, thought I, just silly hyperbole!) and the "libertarian hit man" back in the Kochtopus days of the 1970s, and a "character assassin," but it didn't really sink in until just now, just a few minutes ago...just when his unadulterated unapologetic lies oozed across my exposed tongue, leaving a sick taste in the back of my throat.

Look, when I write some of the things I write, I expect criticism. At least the "look at us, we're girls and libertarians!" pundits at Liberty Belles (not including their dumb, lying readers)  made an attempt using my actual quotes to "expose" me as a monster while also allowing me to post on their blog without my comments being deleted or even edited. They even linked to posts I made in response on the Anti-State.com forum directly from their blog. That's honesty.

In contrast, check out Tom Palmer's blog post. I was originally going to ignore him like I did last time, but too many people begged me to respond and also his post was just too ignorant to let stand. Here is my original post to his comments section:

Clearly I am a conduit by which Palmer can attack Lew and Justin when there happens to be nothing good to get them on. I don't have anything at all to do with all these old queens and their decades-old, bitter bitch feuds. Palmer knows nearly nothing at all about me, or what I believe, or the millions of other words I have written. Here's just a bit of clarification:

1) I am not a Lew Rockwell columnist. I used to send stuff in to Lew back when I was a kid, but that was about FIVE years ago now. Doesn't exactly qualify me as staff. Hell, I started anti-state.com in 2001 because I just wasn't a match for that site, and I didn't really like being on the same page as retards like Gary North and other dingbat South-lovers. Whatever, at least now it's a good reason to finally ask that I be removed from the columnist roster and have my archive page deleted.

I have nothing to do with Confederate worship, slavery-apologies (I even call Thomas Jefferson "slave rapist" and have many threads on ASC about how the South was a third world backwater because of slavery). I am not a racist -- even by Palmer's outrageously loose definition of the word. I despise religion in all its forms (even statism). Most of the people at ASC, along with me, criticize the likes of Hoppe on the grounds that he's trying to justify his racism with economics. [Protests about this accusation make me add this parenthetical saying that it's really Hoppe's views on immigration (which happen to generally coincide with race?) that should be criticized. There.] I have consistently advocated for immigration for all people to all areas of the world on the basis that if certain skin colors and cultures are not borne by the market, they deserve to go the way of cassette tapes. Pretty much everything you could criticize LRC writers for you could not pin on me. All I ask is that you get the facts straight and at least KNOW your enemy (you may realize he's not very much of an enemy at all).[Added on ASC: No offense to Lew, whose own writings I can rarely find fault with; I just don't like the writings a lot of the other people on his site.]

2) I'm not sure if this is intentional, but Palmer makes it seem like I am the one who complained that he "smeared" me. I am not at all, that was Justin, and I actually complained about that to HIM. A quote is not a smear. He [Justin, I meant] just made things worse.

3) The enemy of my state is not a friend of mine, and nowhere have I EVER said this. But there are thousands of words on the ASC forum showing how they are NOT my friends. If a quote deep in an old thread is pertinent enough to quote as the substance of an expose, certainly the critic can take the time to find out what I really think about the subject as a whole, and the reasons I think this way. But nobody ever took that time -- accuracy gets in the way of a good vendetta. Palmer and the Randroids at SoloHQ (they were by far worse than Palmer) simply made up things about me and ignored literally everthing else I ever wrote on the subject.

There is probably a lot more I am leaving out that needs addressing, but a good look should be taken at the comment thread on my blog post, where I clarify a lot of my position (and other ASCers make complimentary comments).

The good stuff starts on the second page. I'm currenty "Celia" (with the blue wig) but I have added "Jeremy" under my profile so that you can more easily follow.

For more, check out Joel Wilcox's Soldiers Are the State, and its corresponding comment thread. And then also my post "Iraq Was Better Under Saddam" where I respond to critics on another blog.

I hope this helps fix your understanding of my views. If you're gonna hate me, hate me for the right reasons.

Guess what? This never saw the light of day on Tom Palmer's blog. At about 9:30, I checked to see if he had approved my comment, but instead I saw this:

UPDATE: I just had a chance to settle in to my hotel room in Portland, Oregon when I checked my email and found one insisting that Mr. Sapienza isn't a columnist for lewrockwell.com. Sure enough, his name cannot be found on the list. I'll respond to some of the comments later, but I did have the foresight to take a screenshot of the list of "Columnists and Commentators" before posting the column above. Here it is. And just in case Mr. Sapienza gets dropped from the masthead of the antiwar.com and sent down the memory hole, here's a screenshot of the antiwar.com masthead taken at the same time the material above was posted. Had the neo-conservative warhawks set out to do it deliberately, it would have been an astonishing accomplishment for them to have invented personas more likely to discredit the cause of non-intervention and peace than Justin Raimondo and Jeremy Sapienza.

Uh-huh, what the fuck, indeed. Excuse me, he "found an email" insisting that "Mr. Sapienza" isn't a columnist for LRC!? I said that, my own self, with my own contact information. In a comment on his blog, not in an email. And then he not-so-slyly suggests that, like the truly disgusting Bob Wallace (attacked right here on ASC's forum 17 days before Palmer's post), Lew purged me after Palmer "exposed" me. As I said above, I requested that my name be removed from the columnist list and that my archive page be deleted, but that it was okay to keep my articles up. I had been wanting to do this for a while anyhow since it's the first thing that comes up in a google search for my name (screen shot because google will probably remove it since it doesn't exist anymore) and frankly, half of that shit is embarassing since it was written when I was much younger and less knowledgeable, and it's just very old stuff that I would rather remain just as an archive, not an active representation of my beliefs.

And that's it. Not even a private response to my post. Merely a ghost of just the first few words of what I actually said, mutated in the mind of a psychopath and regurgitated onto his blog as the gospel truth. It's one thing to vehemently disagree and debate. It's a whole other to bury any evidence of the rationality or even humanity of your opponent so that he can always be shown as insane and unreasonable. I have been buried under a mountain of Palmer's burning hatred for Justin Raimondo and Lew Rockwell.

What's so shocking to me is that there was pretty much 100% chance that I was gonna make this blog post exposing his liar ass and spreading it as far as I could. So -- why lie, Tom? I have never done anything to you. You're a fucking asshole who runs over anyone even if they are inconveniently innocent of having ever crossed your vile path. You can say what you like about my opinions, but I am not a vicious, brazen liar who hates for the hell of it. How disgusting, you pig.

Tom Palmer libertarian CATO

Palmer on Hoppe, Coase, and Wealth-Maximization

In a recent post I noted that around 15 years ago, Palmer published two law review articles (Intellectual Property: A Non-Posnerian Law and Economics Approach and Are Patents and Copyrights Morally Justified? The Philosophy of Property Rights and Ideal Objects) arguing against patent and copyright and also critiquing the wealth-maximization "law and economics" approach of Richard Posner. In the first article cited he criticizes "A jurisprudence that claims to be based on “law and economics” but that would constructively assign or rearrange rights as part of a strategy to achieve some pre-determined outcome (maximization of utility or of wealth, for example) .... "  Notice that Palmer characterizes Posner's wealth-maximization framework as one that would lead to the rearranging of property rights to try to maximize wealth.

Now Posner is of course a Coasean. And in fact others such as Rothbard, Walter Block (2, 3), Gary North, and Hoppe (2) have made a similar observation about implications of Coase's views (see also the views of Roy Cordato (2); Timothy Terrell's and Sebastian Storfner's summaries of Austrian critiques of Coase). Some of them note that the Coase Theorem could be interpreted as a recommendation that courts assign property rights so as to maximize wealth--in fact this is exactly what uber-Coasian Posner recommends, at least according to Palmer.

What is interesting is that in Palmer's campaign to smear Hoppe by repeatedly distorting Hoppe's views, he also has attacked Hoppe several times (1, 2) for interpreting Coase the way Palmer interprets Posner. He says Hoppe's and Rothbard's reading of Coase as meaning that "that courts assign property rights to contesting parties in such a way that 'wealth' or the 'value of production' is maximized" is an "absurd parody of an interpretation" and a "bizarre misstatement" of Coase. Palmer goes on:

Hoppe once attacked another panelist at a conference who had discussed the Coase Theorem by accusing the panelist (and Coase) of arguing that judges should be empowered to confiscate and rearrange property whenever the judge determined that the new distribution would be efficient. Now Coase has never said that and that’s not a part of or even an implication (at least, not without a number of questionable additional premises) of the Coase Theorem.

So, let me get this straight: Palmer's interpretation of Coasian wealth-maximizer Posner is reasonable, while Rothbard and Hoppe's interpretation of Coasian wealth-maximizer Coase is absurd and bizarre...? Of course a given interpretation of Coase is open to reasonable criticism, but is Palmer's attack here--given his history of blatant distortions of Hoppe's views, repeated even after being exposed, and given his similar views on one of the chief Coasians--a reasonable one, or merely evidence of his desperate attempts to smear Hoppe?

For links to other libertarian critics of Coase, see this post.

Palmer on Patents

Palmer's recent comments about patents are interesting in view of his previous publications about intellectual property.

First, around 15 years ago, Palmer published two law review articles (Intellectual Property: A Non-Posnerian Law And Economics Approach and Are Patents And Copyrights Morally Justified? The Philosophy Of Property Rights And Ideal Objects) arguing against patent and copyright and also critiquing the wealth-maximization "law and economics" approach of Richard Posner. Note that he opposed patents on principled grounds, and rejected the wealth-maximization approach. E.g., as he noted in the first article (p. 303),

A jurisprudence that claims to be based on “law and economics” but that would constructively assign or rearrange rights as part of a strategy to achieve some pre-determined outcome (maximization of utility or of wealth, for example) overlooks the analogy between the spontaneous order of the market and the spontaneous order of a legal system.

I.e., according to Palmer, Posner's wealth-maximization framework would lead to the rearranging of property rights to try to maximize wealth. Something he presumably opposes.

Anyhoo, back in 2003 some of Cato's scholars (Doug Bandow and Michael Krauss) came out in favor of restrictions on free trade based on the notion that reimportation of drugs would allow consumers to avoid some of the monopoly price charged due to the US patent system. Cato's adjunct scholar (and utilitarian) Richard Epstein has also argued in favor of patents, especially in the field of pharmaceuticals, and on this ground also opposed reimportation.  Thus, as I have noted previously, support for intellectual property rights leads once again to the undermining of genuine private property rights, such as the right to trade. 

This call for restrictions on free trade caused an outcry in the libertarian community, prompting Ed Crane and Roger Pilon to meekly disavow Bandow's and Epstein's protectionism. Interesting, this piece apparently endorses "the need for drug patents to encourage R&D"--this apparent endorsement of a utilitarian, wealth-maximization approach to policy seems to conflict with Pilon's principled, deontological, non-utilitarian, rights-based libertarianism--as shown in his 1979 Georgia Law Review article "Ordering Rights Consistently: Or What We Do and Do Not Have Rights To" and his 1979 University of Chicago Ph.D. dissertation, "A Theory of Rights: Toward Limited Government."

In recent posts Palmer appears to bend over backward to soften his previous principled anti-patent stance so that he does not conflict with other pro-patent Catoites--apparently now including Krauss, Bandow, Epstein, Crane, and Pilon. Writes Palmer:

I've been critical of the patent system in the past. Mr. Brady has given me a quiz about whether I conform to his vision of right-thought or have drifted further into thought crime[,] as he defines it. I am not a fan of the patent system and think we could generally live well without it. (I've posted a few articles on my web site indicating why.) The one exception to that general hostility to patents, as I have suggested elsewhere, is the system of patents for chemicals, notably pharmaceuticals. Because chemical compounds are relatively easy to reverse-engineer and can be successfully marketed independently of their role in a larger product (unlike, say, innovations in jet engine design, which often are only valuable as part of a kind of engine), patents may indeed generate incentives for innovation that greatly improve human welfare. That's an argument for them. Since the innovation has the characterstics of public goods (costly to exclude and non-rivalrous in consumption, the latter being the relevant feature here), a good profit maximization strategy ought to be price discrimination, by which those who can pay more do so and others pay less.

Re the "public goods comment--note in the "Non-Posnerian" above piece Palmer's sensible criticisms (pp. 284-85) of the coherence of the very notion of public goods.  As for the "suggested elsewhere" comment, he must be referring to this post, where he writes:

Pharmaceuticals and chemicals offer undoubtedly the best cases for patent protection on utilitarian grounds. In my Hamline Law Review article ..., p. 301, I quoted from a study by Edwin Mansfield from the American Economic Review in which he pointed out that "patent protection was judged to be essential for the development or introduction of one-third or more of the inventions during 1981-1983 in only 2 industries -- pharmaceuticals and chemicals." That seems not to have changed. The reason is pretty easy to understand: reverse-engineering in the case of chemicals (which broadly includes pharmaceuticals) is quite easy. In the case of pharmaceuticals, at least, R&D costs are very high and would still be high even without some of the very costly efficacy tests imposed by the Food and Drug Administration. Furthermore, the benefits of new pharmaceuticals are enormous. If one were to make a case for patent law, that's the strongest industry for which to make it.

Palmer has elsewhere rejected the wealth-maximization approach, so what does it matter that pharmaceuticals is the "best case" that can be made under this approach? Why does he say the case of patents for pharmaceuticals is "one exception to" his previous "general hostility to patents," when this case is utilitarian and wealth-maximization based, an approach he has rejected (and presumably he still maintains that even under the wealth-maximization approach the case fails).

Note how snippy he is to Mark Brady's questions to him about patents--"Mr. Brady has given me a quiz about whether I conform to his vision of right-thought or have drifted further into thought crime[,] as he defines it." It is as if Palmer is annoyed that in response to his seemingly pro-patent comments, his previous principled and anti-patent writings are being waved in his face. Given so many of his colleagues' utilitarian endorsement of patents, is Palmer now embarrassed by his previous opposition to both? Is he trying to say that he is still principled, and anti-patent, but that the dominant pro-patent, utilitarian approach of prominent Catoites is "respectable"--or that he has (sort of?) softened his "hostility" to this approach? It wouldn't be the first time Palmer's views have "evolved".