TheAgitator.com
Cato and Fannie May
Monday, September 22nd, 2008Cato haters might take note of George Will’s latest column:
In the 1994 elections, Republicans ended 40 years of Democratic control of the House of Representatives. So in 1995, a vice president of Fannie Mae wrote a letter to Ed Crane, president of the Cato Institute, saying that Fannie Mae intended to give that libertarian, free-market think tank a $100,000 grant.
[...]
Fannie Mae, attempting to ingratiate itself with conservatives, approached Cato with cash, thereby proving that it understands libertarianism no better than it understands subprime mortgages. When Crane responded that Cato never accepts government funding, he received a starchy letter from Fannie Mae hotly denying that it was in any way a government entity.
Crane of course called bullshit, and still refused the grant.
Worth keeping in mind when people make the unfounded accusation that Cato sells its soul to corporations, or some such nonsense. I can say in my five years there that I never saw a single instance where fundraising altered or changed what position a Cato scholar took on a particular issue. And I don’t work for Cato anymore, so I don’t really have to say nice things about them.
Against the backdrop of all the bad news for libertarian ideals over the past several days, that really brought a smile to my face. Thanks, Radley.
BTW,
That’s setting a pretty low bar of understanding! ;-)
Does anyone really make that claim outside of far-left socialists and a few “paleo-libertarians”?
“I can say in my five years there that I never saw a single instance where fundraising altered or changed what position a Cato scholar took on a particular issue.”
With all due respect to those analysts, that’s not how cognitive biases and analytic flaws manifest themselves. Only rarely are analysts in any area (government, business, policy, or science) actually asked to change an analysis to suit a particular end goal. Instead, even the best analysts base their work on subtle mental maps and assumptions. A liberal, conservative, or libertarian by definition goes into their work with a mindset influenced by their experiences, education, and biases. This mindset colors everything they do, no matter how hard they try to remain impartial. Even subject matter experts with decades of experience have this problem, sometimes made worse because of that very expertise.
Mind you, I am not saying that a mindset is automatically a bad thing. We need these mindsets to even function throughout the day. A truly logical Mr. Spock type would be paralyzed by indecision, spending hours evaluating the pros and cons of every small choice. I’m saying that noting who pays what bills does make a difference, and that is not an insult to any individual to point these out. I’m sure measures are already taken to mitigate these issues, but there is no way that any organization with an agenda (regardless of what that agenda is, and they all have one) can completely mitigate the effects of individual and organizational bias
Here are some great books on the topic (You and/or your former colleagues may be already be familiar with them):
Psychology of Analysis
and
Thinkers Tool Kit
and many others. Someday I’d like to start studying analytic methods in more detail. I think it’s fascinating how we think and perceive the world around us.
Does anyone really make that claim outside of far-left socialists and a few “paleo-libertarians”?
In my experience, yes. People I know. Family members. Lots of Democrats and even Some Republicans.
Any outfit that makes such a point of proclaiming their independent corporate status the way Fannie/Freddie did in their NPR ads cannot possibly be an independent corporation.
Sure, but rejecting money from Fannie Mae didn’t exactly take huge balls to do. Cato has done many good things, but has been infiltrated by beltway wimps who would rather be respected than right.
Cato can refuse all the government funding it wants. It is still has a statist philosophy, arguing the merits of the Constitution at every turn. Just like all good statists, they would like the Constitution to be interpreted to their subjective tastes. And in a classic win-win situation, they have their loyal membership backing them whether statism advances or declines.
That being said, Cato publishes some entertaining articles on economics — no small feat.
Terrorific nailed it.
Sorry, I’m struggling to understand how refusing money from a government entity is proof that the Institute isn’t beholden to corporate interests…
I mean, if I claimed that I love the Chicago Cubs and showed you my White Sox hat, you might boggle at the initial claim.
There are too many libertarians out there that will only accept their form of libertarianism, and will see any variation from that as heresy. Cato or Reason prints something they don’t like, and it’s because they are false libertarians. I don’t agree with everything they write, but that does not negate the majority of the articles that are on the money. I’m not directing this at any previous posts since we seem to agree that Cato does much more good than bad. I’m just directing this towards the Haters.
[...] Balko links Fannie Mae trying to get fucky with the Cato Institute, and you know that that’s not just another isolated incident. Any government [...]
“A truly logical Mr. Spock type would be paralyzed by indecision, spending hours evaluating the pros and cons of every small choice.” Sounds to me kinda like “If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thru’ narrow chinks of his cavern.”
— William Blake
Perception is everything IMHO
There are too many libertarians out there that will only accept their form of libertarianism, and will see any variation from that as heresy. Cato or Reason prints something they don’t like, and it’s because they are false libertarians.
I would simply say unprincipled.
Sam,
There are two separate things at play there: The example of Cato not accepting government funding and Radley’s experience of Cato not changing its positions based on who donated.
The first point is that Fannie thought it could ingratiate itself by throwing some money in Cato’s direction. If Cato were willing to shill for whomever provided funding, as the anti-Cato trolls assert, then Cato would have taken the money and presumably written some nice things about what a great partnership of government and business these GSEs are. But Cato doesn’t shill and, having established a principle of not taking money from government, it stuck to that and turned away the sizable contribution, even in the face of Fannie’s fig leaf of independence.
The second is Radley’s experience that none of the people who funded Cato got a quid pro quo in Cato’s work. No one got a deal like “GE stands to make a lot of money selling power plants to countries receiving foreign aid for development. If Cato can see its way to endorse foreign aid, it might find a nice donation in the mail.”
…
BTW, chance, I agree that most bias comes from more subtle sources, like the assumptions one starts out with or the examples one considers relevant. But, I think Radley was addressing unsubtle people who claim that Cato is essentially paid off to write nice things it doesn’t believe about its donors. And there are plenty of people who make that claim, especially people commenting on blog sites.
Unprincipled, yes, and needing to make payroll. Must have a large subscribership to make payroll, thus, must tailor one’s message to appeal to a broad audience. First principles usually go out the window at that point.
Anarcho-capitalism does not equal libertarianism.
One of the biggest problems with libertarians is their sectarian in-fighting.
“What, you favor a minimalist State!?!?! You filth son of whore pig!!!! Die!!!!!”
I’m sorry, but if you favor the initiation of force, there’s really not much else to it.