I have to thank David Brooks for his editorial in the New York TImes for this work that re-assures me that my libertarian philosophy is not a point of view that can only mean chaos. When I tell people I am against drug laws the normal reaction is that I am for a drug crazed chaotic society. I think Wilson's argument shows that there are built in as well as taught self regulating actors within us that hold us back from chaos and in general make us civil. Laws may codify but not modify accepted behavior so that a law against murder will get almost complete compliance while in many parts doing some weed won't. His work takes you beyond the economic equation that some assume we make where behavior is always calculation of risk (punishment) versus reward (pleasure). I don't do dope. It's a matter of self preservation which is the basis of my conservative lifestyle, if not thought.
Wilson's title is also appropriate for this NTBTF blog since what we are against is Wall Street's loss of Moral Sense as described by Greg Smith's "Why I am Leaving Goldman Sachs." When a sense of fair dealing is broken in society, it sows the seeds of revolution.
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