thomas sowell: anarcho-capitalist?

I'm a big fan of Thomas Sowell's work, but sadly he has been using his gifts over the past few years to defend the awful Bush administration, no matter how awful it gets. Today, however, Sowell turns in an excellent column on privatizing bridges:

A company that has to get the money to build and maintain bridges or other infrastructure through the voluntary actions of people in the financial markets, instead of being able to extract money from the taxpayers, is going to find financiers a lot more finicky about what is being done with their money. People who are putting their own money on the line are going to want to have their own experts taking a look under the bridges they finance, to see where there are rust, cracks or crumbling supports.

When people know that the lawsuits that are sure to follow after a bridge collapses are going to drain millions of dollars of their own money -- not the taxpayers' money -- that keeps the mind focussed.

Those who like to think of the government as the public interest personified may be horrified at the idea of turning a governmental function over to private enterprise.

If only Sowell would turn his critical eye to the Bushies instead of defending the War Party at all costs!