For the first time ever, libertarians win something
George Mason University, the libertarian mecca often sung in the pages of Reason, advances to the Final Four after edging out University of Connecticut, 86-84, in overtime. You could tell by all those three-pointers that this was a team organized on the wisdom of distributed decision-making rather than central control.
Or maybe not. Anyway, Reason interviews GMU prof Tyler Cowen here and Nobel Laureate Vernon Smith here. A biography of the original George Mason, the most prominent of the anti-federalists and an opponent of the Constitution's slavery compromises, here.
A bittersweet victory for Mike Alissi, former Reason publisher, now a mysterious Adnan Khashoggi-type fixer for the Reason Foundation, and a U Conn alumnus. The battle between his alma mater and America's libertarian oasis briefly set Alissi's Vulcan and human halves at war.
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YES!!! I haven’t gotten this excited about a basketball game since I was 12. What a great libertarian victory! I’m sure this is going to boost Mason’s applicant pool.
Cheering for the Patriots is more than just about basketball. This is about freedom vs. government. Well… at least it’s something to get excited about! Go Patriots!!!
GMU’s webpage is hosed at the moment.
Must be a lot of interest.
Great game. Even Mrs. Guy watched it.
I guess groin punching isn’t bad karma, after all – whoulda thunk? Excuse me for a moment, folks…
Wow, this game, the UConn UW game Friday and the LSU Texas game yesterday. What a weekend!!
Wait, isn’t cheering for a team to win in an organized activity, all because of some group affiliation, the sort of thing that REAL libertarians avoid? 🙂
I used to jog from a friends house and go around the circle that used to be the entire campus of GMU. It was about a half a mile around IIRC. They were building the fieldhouse as the first construction outside that circle the last time I ran around it. It is truly amazing how what once was a little commuter college for NoVa has turned into a quality institution on many fronts. It certainly gives me hope for the future of American academia that a school can rise so quickly to near the tops of certain fields if it is providing a quality education. Now it appears they can field quality athletic teams as well.
A Harvard Law prof wrote after the Summners debacle that Harvard was the GM of higher education, we just don’t know who the Toyota and Honda will be. Perhaps, schools like GMU will be the Toyota to Harvad and Yale’s GM.
As someone with a bachelor’s from the University of Michigan and an MA and PhD from George Mason, I’m the position of having both my alma mater’s basketball teams possibly winning national tourneys. Michigan is in the final four of the NIT.
Tim, it’s Tyler Cowen, not Cown.
Yeah, and guess what more important? LSU is in the Final Four.
LOUISIANA, BABY! Go Tigers!
same boat/ CT native rooting for the home team (though i definitely do not go to uconn) and also a big marginal revolution fan who has read a lot of good stuff about gmu
unfortunately/fortunately i thought the game was later and was doing a lab report the whole time
Patriots all the way from here on out though!
http://www.slate.com/id/2138548/?nav=navoa
This is double-good news for me since Uconn beat my shcool’s team.
I had to laugh at the Slate article on ‘corruption’ in mid-major basket programs cited above when it ended with “Just stop telling me that Cinderella’s heart is pure.” Of course Cinderella’s heart isn’t pure; she’s a social climber who wants to marry a prince, not the nice fellow down the street.
I hope George Mason cashes in on its 15 minutes of fame. Virginia’s state supported colleges are not supported all that richly, I’m happy to say, and the likes of U.Va., William & Mary and Virginia Tech not only eat first at the state trough but also depend increasingly on private support. If GMU is ever going to play with the big dogs, academically as well as athletically, it must also attract private money. Say what you will about corrupt collegiate sports programs, this sort of public exposure can help.
how many of the players went to an IHS event? Or know what IHS is? Or Public Choice economics? I’d say the same is true of 95% of GMU students.
Glad to see them beat UConn, but libertarian victory my ass.
Lighten up, Francis.
To Hades with all of you. My statist Gators will ensure the continuing loss-loss record of libertarians everywhere by crushing George Mason through the use of inside force and the denial of civil liberties. Sorry, but there are limits to my love of freedom 🙂
After wanting Florida to win it all, my second wish is for an all-SEC final. But that’s just gravy.
Incidentally, I don’t know about y’all, but my pre-tournament bracket picks are now entirely wrong.
It shoulda been SUNY Albany.
They coulda been a contender.
They coulda been somebody.
Anybody ever seen a Libertarian basketball game? It’s 5 games of one-one-one.
“Incidentally, I don’t know about y’all, but my pre-tournament bracket picks are now entirely wrong.”
Heh, me too. With UConn out I now have zero final four teams correct this year. Oh well, Go Patriots!
Great headline.
Go Patriots. Would have loved to have seen Brandon Roy (he seems friendly, humble, courteous, and brave enough to be a libertarian)and my Huskies cutting down the nets, but for some lousy-tax-collector-type officiating and berating by King George Calhoun, that won’t happen.
GMU playing with heart. Hope they can rip little Billy’s boys hearts out next Saturday
Incidentally, I don’t know about y’all, but my pre-tournament bracket picks are now entirely wrong.
It looks like this is a year where misery has lots of company. Not a single Final Four pick of mine made it, yet Yahoo! still has my bracket in the 50th percentile overall. The leaderboard has one freak who managed to get all four, but no one else who did so. Still, the GM story’s a good one – I found myself rooting for them yesterday even though I had UConn going all the way, and had forgotten about the libertarian angle.
I don’t see how rooting for Mason, which is, after all, just another cog in the Government Edublob, is libertarian. I was pulling for any private school – Bradley, BC, even Gonzaga and that commie, Morrison – anybody! – to make it through to the final round. My last standard-bearer was Villanova, which had two things going for it. First, they are a Big East school, hence a conference-mate for my one-and-done Marquette Warriors. Second, my Dad played guard for the Wildcats in the first tourney. I’ve got a sister who is also a `Nova grad.
It still bothers me to hear pro-capitalism lectures from the likes of Walter Williams while he {LMF}* earns his daily bread at the point of a gun!{/LMF}
Kevin
* Libertarian Macho Flash