Guess what time it is: make fun of Murray Rothbard time.

Here is yet another quote from celebrated libertarian "philosopher" Murray Rothbard:

SO: WHY TALK ABOUT RACE AT ALL? If, then, the Race Question is really a problem for statists and not for paleos, why should we talk about the race matter at all? Why should it be a political concern for us; why not leave the issue entirely to the scientists?

Two reasons we have already mentioned; to celebrate the victory of freedom of inquiry and of truth for its own sake; and a bullet through the heart of the egalitarian-socialist project. But there is a third reason as well: as a powerful defense of the results of the free market. If and when we as populists and libertarians abolish the welfare state in all of its aspects, and property rights and the free market shall be triumphant once more, many individuals and groups will predictably not like the end result. In that case, those ethnic and other groups who might be concentrated in lower-income or less prestigious occupations, guided by their socialistic mentors, will predictably raise the cry that free-market capitalism is evil and "discriminatory" and that therefore collectivism is needed to redress the balance. In that case, the intelligence argument will become useful to defend the market economy and the free society from ignorant or self-serving attacks. In short; racialist science is properly not an act of aggression or a cover for oppression of one group over another, but, on the contrary, an operation in defense of private property against assaults by aggressors.

TL; DR version: scientific racism disproves the need for economic egalitarianism and justifies inequality. Therefore, it is useful as a weapon against the welfare state project.

Fine, you can object that this was written in 1944, almost every philosopher at that time had this kind of problem, and it seems separable from the rest of his thought. Presentism should be discouraged. After all, we don't completely discount the statistical views of RA Fisher (unless you're a very strict Bayesian) just because he was a supporter of eugenics and denied the possibility of smoking causing cancer. However, one salient difference is that we do not use his works that go anywhere near his eugenic ideas or his crazy denial of the link between smoking and cancer. We use his math and that is all. With Rothbard, these ideas are harder to extricate.

Oh, wait, that was written in 1994. Less than 20 years ago. So he's just a racist.