You’re becoming a nay-sayer. This is the second voucher type scheme that you’ve argued against and you are still pro-conscription on student unionism.

– Sinclair Davidson, 23 July 2009

A constantly negative person isn’t much fun to be around. But being a policy nay-sayer is, for a classical liberal activist, part of the job description. There are endless suggestions for more government spending and regulation, and so there must also be endless criticisms of those proposals.

Most classical liberals join in the nay-saying. But perhaps where I differ from the others is that, as I argued in my big government conservatism article a few years ago, I believe that pressures for big government come from within centre-right politics, as well as the usual suspects of left-wing ideas, interest group rent-seeking, and politicians’ vote-buying.
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