Vice President J.D. Vice President Vance met the Catholics on April 20th, the day before the latter’s death. The meeting with Enfeld Pope was short and did not touch on their differences in opinion about the treatment of immigrants. Earlier this year, Francis declared that a massive deportation would “undermine the dignity of many men and women” (“JD Vance was the last time to meet Pope Francis,” Wall Street Journal, April 21, 2025). It is hard to not share the late Pope’s concerns about this, but the larger image is more interesting.
The Pope is known as the man on the left who advocates “social justice,” but JD Vance supports the “right” everywhere. It is clear how two individuals can belong to the same church. Is that an irreconcilable difference? Casuistry was undoubtedly unable to pull some rabbits from the Pope’s tiara or the Vice President’s Maga hat. Furthermore, interestingly, the two advances can harmonize their differences by calling them both against in the classic liberal political economy – they knew something about it.
As classical liberal (and libertarian) theorists explain, the concept of social justice has only clarity in an authoritarian social system in which political rulers assign rewards and punishments to individuals in society. In a voluntary order, permissions cannot do that. Rewards and punishments are compressed into the major impersonal factors that suck as someone who better meets the demands of unknown people in large markets. Other impersonal factors such as luck, accidents, and laws of physics also play a role.
To see this, we can consult with what I believe in our time is the three major classical liberal or libatala’s chain of thought. (1) Friedrich Hayek provided an argument against social justice for what I just explained: see his mirage of social justice, originally his laws, legislation, and freedom. (2) Anthony, analcoliberal or analconservative service economist and political philosopher of Jasai, arrives at a similar conclusion based on the voluntary rules of Condi and his environment. (3) James Buchanan and the Faculty of Constitutional Politics and Economics will rehabilitate the state through unanimous consent (i.e. individual veto). In this theory of contract, justice is unanimously accepted and certainly lies in rules that do not exist in the concept of justice that is hindered by political authority. The summary is on the reasons for the rules, Jeffrey Brennan and James Buchanan. (Note that, for Buchanan, opposition to arbitrary volitional “social justice” does not prevent the state from being unable to provide sub-type of income insurance.)
If that’s correct, we can say that (late) Pope and J.D. Vance believe in social justice, that is, they assign rewards and punishments in political powers, but Vance uses Oher’s words more than “social justice.” The Pope believes that such authorities should be the poor at the expense of the rich around the world. JD Vance believes he is someone he thinks American political power holders understand. Many of his tyrades would have been approved by Francis if he did not add “Americans” to his pay group (“JD Vance declares “American First” because the Republic adopts economic populism,” Financial Times, July 18, 2014):
“We’re done, women and gentlemen, catering towards Wall Street. We’re committed to the working man,” he said. “We have imported foreign labor. We are going to fight for American citizens and their good work and their good wages.” “We need leaders who are not in the pockets of big corporations, but we are worried about leaders who are not selling out to multinationals, just like workers, unions and non-unions, but are unions facing American companies and the American industry,” he added.
In Argentina, the Pope was known by many as the “Peronist Pope” after Juan Domingo Peron. Notes from the Financial Times (Michael Stott, “Was Francis the First Peronist Pope?” April 23, 2025):
“Peron once said that the doctrine of Peronism was the social doctrine of the Church,” said Ignacio Zuleta, author of Francis’s study entitled Pope Peronist. Both the church and the Peronist emphasized the fight against social justice and poverty, advocating conservative social practices.
Francis Style or Alabance “social justice” is an example of a larger ideology. The two men are bush collectivists. That is, it is both collective and political choices rather than personal and private choices. They simply support the different collective choices made by different people with rewards and punishments for society as a whole. Make sure Vance doesn’t oppose Francis. [which] As with our main goals, we pursue simple profits [and] “Les 10 Marquantes Frases du Papefrançois: ”Saint Pierre n’Avait Pas de Compte in Bank”, Le Monde, April 20, 2025)
*************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
The featured image in this post imagines Pope Francis and J.D. Vance arrive together at the pearly gate (the rug caused by the dents in the space-time continuum is a rug). Before St. Peter assigns a contemplative seat in heaven, the Pope is smiling and naive, while Vance is simple and angry. After that, I believe in “social justice,” but the criteria for assigning rewards and punishments differ.
Of course, there is no rarity in heaven (by definition), so readers of this blog should understand that place allocation must be merely a ritual without practical consen.
Jd Vance and The Pope Meet, Chatgpt and Pierre Lemieux from Econlog
