Fact-free attack on me, RGF

I love engaging in the battle of ideas. That’s why I got into the think tank/public policy business in the first place. Unfortunately, the ideological opponents of the Rio Grande Foundation don’t always bother with pesky things like facts and data. I understand, after all, when the facts and data aren’t on your side, it makes sense to just spew anger and ad hominem.

Case in point, this hilarious letter to the editor from today’s Albuquerque Journal:

THE QUESTION IS, why does the Journal give repeated ink to Paul Gessing, “Put Rail Runner Out of Its Misery Sooner, Not Later,” for his attack on all things that serve the public good? You could just as easily print a short letter from him with a byline: Here he goes again trying to fit his square peg of ideology into a round hole, because Gessing always comes to the same Libertarian conclusion whether it be education, roads, water, etc. Things that serve the public are run bad, too expensive, corrupt or out of control. His math and examples of financing and utility are always so distorted as to not make any sense except to his cult followers. …

In fact, the Rail Runner should be expanded quickly from El Paso to Denver and eventually from Mexico City to Canada. We could cut out some of the expensive war bases in New Mexico and fund it easily, but you won’t hear that from the Journal or from its favorite son, Paul Gessing.
BEN ACO
Albuquerque

Notice the absence of any specific reasoning or argument. Lots of jealousy and anger, though. Of course, the writer further displays his ignorance by ignoring the Rio Grande Foundation’s advocacy of spending on the Paseo/I-25 interchange, but that would involve actual research and facts.

Rather than wondering why the Journal runs the Rio Grande Foundation’s research and writing, I’m wondering why people who bring no facts or data to the table expect New Mexico’s most widely-read newspaper to publish their work.