Happy Birthday Mitlon.

If you're looking for the father of the 20th century libertarian renaissance, start your paternity tests with Uncle Milty. Certainly fingers should point in the direction of Mises, Hayek, and other such luminaries. Murray Rothbard and Ayn Rand were both making sizeable waves as Friedman was wading into the pool. But Friedman really deserves the brass ring for creating both academic and popular support for the idea of reducing government controls and increasing individual freedom.

Mises and Hayek got the ball rolling after World War II, but Keynes and his cronies had all the loot and influence. The libertarian economic position was muffled and marginalized. Something had to shake it loose. That something was Friedman, who helped create a massively influential free-market academic network based at the University of Chicago.