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In a review of the new anthology The Best American Comics Criticism , Senior Editor Brian Doherty surveys a new world in which both the specialty press, the standard literary and news press, political magazines, and books from big New York publishers all accept comics as a legitimate part of our larger cultural discussion.

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New at Reason: Brian Doherty on the Past and Future of Comic Books

Realizing a dream I’ve had since I was 11 years old, I get published today in The Comics Journal –or at least its web site. It’s a contribution to a roundtable of commentary on Ben Schwartz’s new book Best American Comics Criticism (a book containing an essay by me, one that originally appeared right here at Reason magazine) in which I argue that the exigencies of late 20th century comics fandom created a unified scene of all-comics obsessives the likes of which the newer, more respectable world of comics and graphic novels seems to be killing off–a scene I’m going to miss.

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Reason Writers Around Town: Brian Doherty at The Comics Journal on Best American Comics Criticism

There’s a lot you can say in this country that will get most respectable voices leaping forward to mock and deride you as a dangerous lunatic–like, for example, believing that people should have the right to choose who they deal with on their property as businessmen. However, as Robert Kaplan’s latest warm, hairy rub up against the leg of Henry yes that’s right Kissinger in the September Atlantic shows, advocating blowing up people with nuclear weapons because you just don’t trust those obviously extremely dangerous bastards, is one of those things that’s it’s always OK to say in America

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The Tantalizing, Sober, Respectable Joys Of Nuking Iran

Recent discussions about libertarian philosophy and intellectual property got me thinking about Andrew Galambos, the not-very-well-remembered Southern California based libertarian lecturer active in the 1960s and 1970s (and original libertarian inspiration to former LP candidate and best-selling author Harry Browne .) Galambos famously had a vision of intellectual property so strict his followers didn’t feel it just to ever discuss his ideas openly. But one Galambos ally, Jan Snelson, continued lecturing in the Galambosian spirit and his vision of the Galambos libertarian vision is now available to sample or purchase on MP3 via the “V-50″ website . It makes me want to take a moment like a character in a 1920s Gernsbackian SF utopia story to marvel and explain to everyone these amazing resources of this Magic World of Tomorrow when I remember the difference even between now and the 10 years ago when I was in the midst of researching my book Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement in terms of what information about the dark recesses of libertarian movement history are readily accessible in raw form to anyone anywhere

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Hearing the Wisdom of Galambos, Even if You Don’t Own It

Recent discussions about libertarian philosophy and intellectual property got me thinking about Andrew Galambos, the not-very-well-remembered Southern California based libertarian lecturer active in the 1960s and 1970s (and original libertarian inspiration to former LP candidate and best-selling author Harry Browne .) Galambos famously had a vision of intellectual property so strict his followers didn’t feel it just to ever discuss his ideas openly.

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Hearing the Wisdom of Galambos, Even if You Don’t Own It

Radley Balko wrote about M.I.A.’s disturbing video for “Born Free” featuring a violent government crackdown on redheads in Reason magazine’s August-September issue. At Gonzo Times , they note the strange link between the Sri Lankan pop controversialist and the American economic and philosophical controversialist, libertarian Murray Rothbard, with this quote from page 201-202 of his Ethics of Liberty : Suppose a society which fervently considers all redheads to be agents of the Devil and therefore to be executed wherever found. Let us further assume that only a small number of redheads exist in any generation – so few as to be statistically insignificant

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The M.I.A.-Rothbard Pro-Redhead Axis

Guatamalan libertarian educator and institution builder Manuel Ayau has died. George Mason University economist Don Boudreaux eulogizes him , and earlier celebrated his achievements on the occasion of his 80th birthday, most significantly the Universidad Francisco Marroquin. Boudreux on that school: In January 1972 the Universidad Francisco Marroquín (UFM) opened its halls to students

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Manuel Ayau, R.I.P.

Reason ’s August-September cover story explored different answers to the question “Where Do Libertarians Belong?” From the beginnings of the self-conscious libertarian movement in America in the late 1940s, writes Senior Editor Brian Doherty, the overriding imperative was educating the public in the ideas of libertarianism, and thereby making more libertarians. And as Doherty explains, in the face of a political and policy world where the rigorous application of libertarian ideas is seen as outragous, that is still the most important libertarian task. View this article.

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New at Reason: Brian Doherty on Where Libertarians Really Belong

The August issue of Esquire , with Bill Clinton on the cover, is designated “The Impossible Issue,” with lots of articles and epigrams scattered throughout about things that are actually, or seen as, impossible.

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Esquire magazine: “It’s Impossible to Dislike Ron Paul”