I was very pleased to find a 1994 hardcover edition of Hayek's "The Road to Serfdom" at the Half Price Books website for less than $10.
I had intended to give this book a full read and post a review of what I found interesting.
However, I haven't even made it to Chapter 1 and I've got to post some things.
I can tell I'm going to need to break up "what I find interesting" into chapter-by-chapter posts, so here is "chapter 0" :-)

I love the very first words in the book. He dedicates it to: THE SOCIALISTS OF ALL PARTIES.
How in your face is that? He's saying "I know there at-heart socialists in all political parties - even those that have no declared socialist agenda."
He wrote this in 1944. His target was a British audience - a people that were still fighting a war with people that put the words NATIONAL SOCIALIST right in their name.
In the USA, then, like now, the Republican party had a liberal faction (run out of the northeast states!), and a conservative faction.
Roosevelt's New Deal, the Obamacare of its time, was recent history. Senator Taft was fighting to repeal it. Thomas Dewey was supportive of it, arguing the only real problems were "inefficiencies" he would correct. The Republican party, then as now eager to win an election at all costs rather than stand on principles would soon nominate Dewey to run against Truman. While campaigning, Dewey made very sure not to say anything that might be viewed as controversial. Sound familiar?

Milton Friedman writes the introduction.
He discusses how things were around the time of writing. He talks about something called the "Control of Engagements Order."
This was a British central planning policy that gave the government the power to ASSIGN OCCUPATIONS to unemployed individuals.
"You don't have a job? Well, we need brick layers. Congratulations. You're a bricklayer. You don't want to be a bricklayer? Then you're under arrest!"
This policy was SUPPOSED to be temporary. The politicians promised it would disappear in 1948.
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commo...
1948 arrived, and you KNOW what happened...
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commo...
And then 1949...
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commo...
The order is annulled even though a representative of the opposition party in Parliament was making the argument:
"...the Government had no intention that that Act should come to an end"
"It is an essential basis for the organisation of economic planning and control, and therefore we shall place a revised and permanent version of that Act on the Statute Book if we are returned to power."

A "temporary measure", one that runs counter to the principles of the society, is put in place for the good of the country, but don't worry. It will expire at a certain time.
Rather than expire, it is extended, extended some more, and then the argument is made that we cannot get rid of it because it is so essential.
Thankfully, it is killed off. So we see a victory over widely intrusive socialist policy is indeed possible.

Milton Friedman says everyone back at the time of writing was very concerned about Socialism's advance, and it curiously suffered this setback, which was not due to organised resistance.
How did this come about? It was two-fold.
a) The people were used to freedom and rebelled at the notion that the Government was going to tell them what their profession was to be.
b) The Government couldn't even manage what they said they would. They bit off more than they could chew. Centrally plan an entire economy? They couldn't even centrally plan Labor.

Remind you of anything? It reminds me of Obamacare.
People are soon going to be forced to confront this in 2014 when employers start dropping them out of their current healthcare plans, and they are thrust into the Obamacare exchanges.
They're going to be shocked at how inefficient and inferior these exchanges are. The govt only has 7 more months to start them, and they've all but admitted they're not going to make it. I see an opportunity - provided we avoid talking about how "inefficiency" needs to be improved, and simply remind people of how much better off everyone was before the law ever existed.