Cato's Crane Profiled: He'd Vote for Paul, Except He Doesn't Vote

The Cato Institute's founder and president Ed Crane (for whom I worked at Cato 1991-94) is profiled admiringly in the Examiner.

He whips out some of his favorite lines ("I always knew it was important, from a Libertarian standpoint, to be tolerant of alternative lifestyles, but until I went to that [first LP] convention, I had no idea just how many alternatives there were"), and surveys the presidential field with disdain.

In a shocker to those deeply enmeshed in the cosmo-paleo wars, Crane admits that, were he a voter, he'd vote for Ron Paul. But perhaps more importantly, breaking a very common American politico-cultural taboo, he admits he doesn't and won't vote.

The writer, Patty Reinert, is pretty observant, as she chooses a final line, from Competitive Enterprise Institute's Fred Smith, that will resonate with those who know Crane's sense of humor:

"Ed and I were in a diet contest once," Smith said. "I won, but as I was gloating and telling him I won, Ed let me know he had just gotten another million-dollar contributor."

For more on the history of Crane and Cato, see my book Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement.