First, a little bit of history: as recently as last Christmas, I was a member of the
Liberal Democrats. I can’t remember why I joined them, and I can’t remember why I left – which strongly implies that I put very little thought into either – but that’s a story for
another time.
As a member, I was part of a group within the party that wanted to pull it in a more classically liberal direction: a smaller state, lower taxes and greater personal freedom. The idea of a party committed to greater personal freedom, but not greater economic freedom, always struck me as equal parts ridiculous and confused. If the Lib Dems exist to find a balance between liberty and equality, we thought we needed to prove that the correct balance was 100 percent liberty.
We were loathed for it, too, not least of which because we made the Orange Book MPs look positively mainstream and centrist by comparison.
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