There’s a social event going on, and she’s excited to be there. All the people she knows have filled their tables, though, leaving her to find a chair at a table full of strangers. With strangers, you never know how the conversation will go. She knows she shares religious and most likely sexual mores with everybody in the room, but politics? The percentage of Democrats, liberals, and progressives in this crowd probably approaches 99%. Any conversation could go wrong.
She finds a table, and slowly the conversation builds. As the subjects trend into dangerous political waters, as they always do, she remembers to keep her mouth shut. She thinks not twice, but perhaps ten times before offering any comments or asking any questions. She starts to wish that the dinner and social hour were over already, that it was time for the loud music leaving no audio room for anything more than shouted one-liners that might be only half understood.
Suddenly, one of her companions at the table mentions a familiar name. “Did you say Walter Williams?” she asks.
“Why yes, I did!”
She holds her breath. Could it be? Cautiously, she probes further. “Ludwig von Mises?”
The hoped-for response comes. “Murray Rothbard!”
Both of them grin excitedly now. The masks are gone, the pretense is dropped, the danger is finally passed. No more the fear, the anxiety. They can speak openly now, heedless of the ears around them. The names come fast and furious–Matt Gillespie, John Stossel, Friedrich Hayek, Walter Block, Ayn Rand, Rose Wilder, Frederic Bastiat, Ron Paul, Geoff Neale, Robert Heinlein, Milton Friedman–as they trade information and find agreement on so many things.
For one brief, shining moment, the Lone Libertarian is alone no more. She has a companion, a real person who actually shares all of her views. It is brief, but its impact is lasting, leaving hope for more to come.