As regular readers of this blog will probably remember, I criticized Walter Block’s boss at Loyola University back in February for not defending Walter’s academic freedom.

This is not to say that I will always defend Walter Block. In my reply to a comment by Steve Horwitz, I wrote:

If you want to argue, Steve, that Walter often says dumb things, you will get no argument from me. If you also want to argue that he should have said these things differently, then, again, you will get no argument from me. Finally, if you want to argue that Walter unnecessarily provokes people and, in doing so, sets the libertarian cause back, again I will not take the other side.

Even if I had not known Walter, I would have defended his academic freedom. But what made it easier to defend Walter is the various times over the years when his humor, his generosity, and his sweetness have shone through. They do so in this video. It’s almost half an hour and, normally, for videos that long, I highlight particular parts that I like. But I liked the whole thing. Walter is a great story teller.

I will give one highlight: the first part is about being around Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, and their circle. Because of some bad experiences I had with a local Objectivist circle in Winnipeg (and a number of the people in the New York circle, coincidentally, were from Winnipeg) when I was 19, I appreciated his comments about their very strange and nasty behavior.

Without further ado, here, with permission, is Walter.