John Edwards = David Duke??

This is a deeply silly piece of writing. Slate asked its contributors to disclose the candidate for whom they’re voting and offer some reasons. Here’s the response from Steven Landsburg, the economic writer:

If George Bush had chosen the racist David Duke as a running mate, I’d have voted against him, almost without regard to any other issue. Instead, John Kerry chose the xenophobe John Edwards as a running mate. I will therefore vote against John Kerry.

Duke thinks it’s imperative to protect white jobs from black competition. Edwards thinks it’s imperative to protect American jobs from foreign competition. There’s not a dime’s worth of moral difference there. While Duke would discriminate on the arbitrary basis of skin color, Edwards would discriminate on the arbitrary basis of birthplace. Either way, bigotry is bigotry, and appeals to base instincts should always be repudiated.

Bush’s reckless spending and disregard for the truth had me almost ready to vote for Kerry—until Kerry picked his running mate. When the real David Duke ran against a corrupt felon for governor of Lousiana, the bumper stickers read, “Vote for the crook. It’s important.” Well, I’m voting for the reckless spendthrift. It’s important again.

I can’t figure out if this is serious or some kind of parody of a libertarian homo economicus. Does Landsburg also think it’s morally wrong to feed one’s own children in preference to the children of strangers? Is taking my own wife out to dinner rather than my neighbor’s discriminating on the arbitrary basis of marital-relation-to-me?