Libertariansim is the Marxism of the Right

[Chosen]

Marxism of the Right PDF (http://www.amconmag.com/pdfissue.html?Id=AmConservative-2005mar14&page=17)

By Robert Locke


Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics often find an attractive political philosophy in libertarianism, the idea that individual freedom should be the sole rule of ethics and government. Libertarianism offers its believers a clear conscience to do things society presently restrains, like make more money, have more sex, or take more drugs. It promises a consistent formula for ethics, a rigorous framework for policy analysis, a foundation in American history, and the application of capitalist efficiencies to the whole of society. But while it contains substantial grains of truth, as a whole it is a seductive mistake.

There are many varieties of libertarianism, from natural-law libertarianism (the least crazy) to anarcho-capitalism (the most), and some varieties avoid some of the criticisms below. But many are still subject to most of them, and some of the more successful varieties—I recently heard a respected pundit insist that classical liberalism is libertarianism—enter a gray area where it is not really clear that they are libertarians at all. But because 95 percent of the libertarianism one encounters at cocktail parties, on editorial pages, and on Capitol Hill is a kind of commonplace “street” libertarianism, I decline to allow libertarians the sophistical trick of using a vulgar libertarianism to agitate for what they want by defending a refined version of their doctrine when challenged philosophically. We’ve seen Marxists pull that before.

This is no surprise, as libertarianism is basically the Marxism of the Right. If Marxism is the delusion that one can run society purely on altruism and collectivism, then libertarianism is the mirror-image delusion that one can run it purely on selfishness and individualism. Society in fact requires both individualism and collectivism, both selfishness and altruism, to function. Like Marxism, libertarianism offers the fraudulent intellectual security of a complete a priori account of the political good without the effort of empirical investigation. Like Marxism, it aspires, overtly or covertly, to reduce social life to economics. And like Marxism, it has its historical myths and a genius for making its followers feel like an elect unbound by the moral rules of their society.

The most fundamental problem with libertarianism is very simple: freedom, though a good thing, is simply not the only good thing in life. Simple physical security, which even a prisoner can possess, is not freedom, but one cannot live without it. Prosperity is connected to freedom, in that it makes us free to consume, but it is not the same thing, in that one can be rich but as unfree as a Victorian tycoon’s wife. A family is in fact one of the least free things imaginable, as the emotional satisfactions of it derive from relations that we are either born into without choice or, once they are chosen, entail obligations that we cannot walk away from with ease or justice. But security, prosperity, and family are in fact the bulk of happiness for most real people and the principal issues that concern governments.

Libertarians try to get around this fact that freedom is not the only good thing by trying to reduce all other goods to it through the concept of choice, claiming that everything that is good is so because we choose to partake of it. Therefore freedom, by giving us choice, supposedly embraces all other goods. But this violates common sense by denying that anything is good by nature, independently of whether we choose it. Nourishing foods are good for us by nature, not because we choose to eat them. Taken to its logical conclusion, the reduction of the good to the freely chosen means there are no inherently good or bad choices at all, but that a man who chose to spend his life playing tiddlywinks has lived as worthy a life as a Washington or a Churchill.

Furthermore, the reduction of all goods to individual choices presupposes that all goods are individual. But some, like national security, clean air, or a healthy culture, are inherently collective. It may be possible to privatize some, but only some, and the efforts can be comically inefficient. Do you really want to trace every pollutant in the air back to the factory that emitted it and sue?

Libertarians rightly concede that one’s freedom must end at the point at which it starts to impinge upon another person’s, but they radically underestimate how easily this happens. So even if the libertarian principle of “an it harm none, do as thou wilt,” is true, it does not license the behavior libertarians claim. Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.

Libertarians in real life rarely live up to their own theory but tend to indulge in the pleasant parts while declining to live up to the difficult portions. They flout the drug laws but continue to collect government benefits they consider illegitimate. This is not just an accidental failing of libertarianism’s believers but an intrinsic temptation of the doctrine that sets it up to fail whenever tried, just like Marxism.

Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free? What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners? What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society? What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways? What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?

In each of these cases, less freedom today is the price of more tomorrow. Total freedom today would just be a way of running down accumulated social capital and storing up problems for the future. So even if libertarianism is true in some ultimate sense, this does not prove that the libertarian policy choice is the right one today on any particular question.

Furthermore, if limiting freedom today may prolong it tomorrow, then limiting freedom tomorrow may prolong it the day after and so on, so the right amount of freedom may in fact be limited freedom in perpetuity. But if limited freedom is the right choice, then libertarianism, which makes freedom an absolute, is simply wrong. If all we want is limited freedom, then mere liberalism will do, or even better, a Burkean conservatism that reveres traditional liberties. There is no need to embrace outright libertarianism just because we want a healthy portion of freedom, and the alternative to libertarianism is not the USSR, it is America’s traditional liberties.

Libertarianism’s abstract and absolutist view of freedom leads to bizarre conclusions. Like slavery, libertarianism would have to allow one to sell oneself into it. (It has been possible at certain times in history to do just that by assuming debts one could not repay.) And libertarianism degenerates into outright idiocy when confronted with the problem of children, whom it treats like adults, supporting the abolition of compulsory education and all child-specific laws, like those against child labor and child sex. It likewise cannot handle the insane and the senile.

Libertarians argue that radical permissiveness, like legalizing drugs, would not shred a libertarian society because drug users who caused trouble would be disciplined by the threat of losing their jobs or homes if current laws that make it difficult to fire or evict people were abolished. They claim a “natural order” of reasonable behavior would emerge. But there is no actual empirical proof that this would happen. Furthermore, this means libertarianism is an all-or-nothing proposition: if society continues to protect people from the consequences of their actions in any way, libertarianism regarding specific freedoms is illegitimate. And since society does so protect people, libertarianism is an illegitimate moral position until the Great Libertarian Revolution has occurred.

And is society really wrong to protect people against the negative consequences of some of their free choices? While it is obviously fair to let people enjoy the benefits of their wise choices and suffer the costs of their stupid ones, decent societies set limits on both these outcomes. People are allowed to become millionaires, but they are taxed. They are allowed to go broke, but they are not then forced to starve. They are deprived of the most extreme benefits of freedom in order to spare us the most extreme costs. The libertopian alternative would be perhaps a more glittering society, but also a crueler one.

Empirically, most people don’t actually want absolute freedom, which is why democracies don’t elect libertarian governments. Irony of ironies, people don’t choose absolute freedom. But this refutes libertarianism by its own premise, as libertarianism defines the good as the freely chosen, yet people do not choose it. Paradoxically, people exercise their freedom not to be libertarians.

The political corollary of this is that since no electorate will support libertarianism, a libertarian government could never be achieved democratically but would have to be imposed by some kind of authoritarian state, which rather puts the lie to libertarians’ claim that under any other philosophy, busybodies who claim to know what’s best for other people impose their values on the rest of us. Libertarianism itself is based on the conviction that it is the one true political philosophy and all others are false. It entails imposing a certain kind of society, with all its attendant pluses and minuses, which the inhabitants thereof will not be free to opt out of except by leaving.

And if libertarians ever do acquire power, we may expect a farrago of bizarre policies. Many support abolition of government-issued money in favor of that minted by private banks. But this has already been tried, in various epochs, and doesn’t lead to any wonderful paradise of freedom but only to an explosion of fraud and currency debasement followed by the concentration of financial power in those few banks that survive the inevitable shaking-out. Many other libertarian schemes similarly founder on the empirical record.

A major reason for this is that libertarianism has a naïve view of economics that seems to have stopped paying attention to the actual history of capitalism around 1880. There is not the space here to refute simplistic laissez faire, but note for now that the second-richest nation in the world, Japan, has one of the most regulated economies, while nations in which government has essentially lost control over economic life, like Russia, are hardly economic paradises. Legitimate criticism of over-regulation does not entail going to the opposite extreme.

Libertarian naïveté extends to politics. They often confuse the absence of government impingement upon freedom with freedom as such. But without a sufficiently strong state, individual freedom falls prey to other more powerful individuals. A weak state and a freedom-respecting state are not the same thing, as shown by many a chaotic Third-World tyranny.

Libertarians are also naïve about the range and perversity of human desires they propose to unleash. They can imagine nothing more threatening than a bit of Sunday-afternoon sadomasochism, followed by some recreational drug use and work on Monday. They assume that if people are given freedom, they will gravitate towards essentially bourgeois lives, but this takes for granted things like the deferral of gratification that were pounded into them as children without their being free to refuse. They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock. Society is dependent upon inculcated self-restraint if it is not to slide into barbarism, and libertarians attack this self-restraint. Ironically, this often results in internal restraints being replaced by the external restraints of police and prison, resulting in less freedom, not more.

This contempt for self-restraint is emblematic of a deeper problem: libertarianism has a lot to say about freedom but little about learning to handle it. Freedom without judgment is dangerous at best, useless at worst. Yet libertarianism is philosophically incapable of evolving a theory of how to use freedom well because of its root dogma that all free choices are equal, which it cannot abandon except at the cost of admitting that there are other goods than freedom. Conservatives should know better.

[Nate]

Ron Paul is both a libertarian and a conservative. They are not competing ideologies they are complimentary. Stop sowing the seeds of division. You are doing nothing but damaging the movement.

[Truth Warrior]

Robert who? :D

[Old Ducker]

That's an interesting read, but is flawed. Libertarianism is a political philosophy. It has nothing to say about metaphysics, epistemology or ethics so why should it be judged by those standards?

Can anyone provide an alternative political ideology that is more likely to set in place the mechanisms to provide liberty, community and prosperity?

Didn't think so...

[Truth Warrior]

Do You Consider Yourself a Libertarian? (http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/liberal-post-interview.html)

[tremendoustie]

It is true, we must fight immorality in all its facets. The first form of immorality we must fight is the inclination to initiate force and violence against those who have not done so to others -- a sin the author seems to turn a blind eye towards.

Would the author take a gun over to his neighbor's and threaten to shoot him if he does not stop watching porn? I imagine he would consider this immoral -- he should instead reason with his neighbor, and pray for him. Why then does he feel free to hire thugs with guns to do the same?

Also the author confuses the desire to not do things by force, with the desire to not do them at all. People should be fed if they are poor -- I should feed them. I should not, however, take a gun over to my neighbor's, and mug him in order to pay for it.

[pcosmar]

Sounds like the writer knows neither Marxism nor Liberty.
Mostly sounds like an Apologist for authoritarianism.

[Bruno]

That's an interesting read, but is flawed. Libertarianism is a political philosophy. It has nothing to say about metaphysics, epistemology or ethics so why should it be judged by those standards?

Can anyone provide an alternative political ideology that is more likely to set in place the mechanisms to provide liberty, community and prosperity?

Didn't think so...

Welcome to the RP Forums, Old Ducker! :)

[idiom]

I think it makes a sensible argument about objectivism.

Objectivism, especially pure randian stuff, is formulated specificly to counter marxism, especially Leninism.

libertarianism is not usually as strong as objectivism, and Ron Paul has pretty mild libertarianism. He advocates a roll back of the federal government, but not is dissolution, and he is pretty happy for states to have quite large governments as people will just move in our as they see fit.

[Conza88]

I think it makes a sensible argument about objectivism.

Objectivism, especially pure randian stuff, is formulated specificly to counter marxism, especially Leninism.

libertarianism is not usually as strong as objectivism, and Ron Paul has pretty mild libertarianism. He advocates a roll back of the federal government, but not is dissolution, and he is pretty happy for states to have quite large governments as people will just move in our as they see fit.

Doesn't mean it's his end game, just want he advocates publicly. Using the constitution as helpful rhetoric. (As he has said himself *before he ran in 06, in Prague)

The article uses the false left / right paradigm.

Try again author.

[Liberty Star]

Sounds like the writer knows neither Marxism nor Liberty.
Mostly sounds like an Apologist for authoritarianism.


Yea.

[idiom]

Authoritarian/Individualist is a false paradigm?

[Todd]

Ron Paul is both a libertarian and a conservative. They are not competing ideologies they are complimentary. Stop sowing the seeds of division. You are doing nothing but damaging the movement.

That's the way I see it. I've always thought the two were compliments. Even when I strayed a bit from the libertarian aspects in my youth.

[LibertyEagle]

That's the way I see it. I've always thought the two were compliments. Even when I strayed a bit from the libertarian aspects in my youth.

I see them as complementary too. Although I think the reason for this thread is because of all the incessant bashing of traditional conservatives and constitutionalists by a few people.

[Deborah K]

The article makes no mention of libertarianism's true philosophy: Freedom to do what you want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else.

You follow that one rule, no matter what the venue, and there's nothing left to discuss.

[LibertyEagle]

The article makes no mention of libertarianism's true philosophy: Freedom to do what you want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else.

You follow that one rule, no matter what the venue, and there's nothing left to discuss.

Very true. Unfortunately, libertarianism appears to have the same issue as conservatism, in that there are people in both that don't follow the inherent principles.

[Truth Warrior]

This Robert Locke? Leo Strauss? Another stooge for the Trotskyite neocons? :p :rolleyes:

Robert Locke is a former editor for FrontPage Magazine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FrontPage_Magazine). A conservative (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatism)American (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States)nationalist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalism), he is critical of liberals (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism), libertarians (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism), and some "compassionate conservatives" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compassionate_conservatism), including George W. Bush (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush). He is an admirer of conservative (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatism) scholar Leo Strauss (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Strauss) (although, as a self-proclaimed agnostic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism), he is critical of Strauss' atheism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism)), architect Robert A.M. Stern (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_A.M._Stern), and photorealist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photorealism) painter Richard Estes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Estes). Many of his writings are archived at FrontPage Magazine (http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/authors.asp?ID=6).

Locke has attended both Columbia University (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbia_University) and University of Chicago (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Chicago); he maintains membership in a conservative alumni organization of the former. He currently resides in New York City (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City), New York (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Locke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Locke)

[Conza88]

Authoritarian/Individualist is a false paradigm?

International Socialism / National Socialism (left / right) = false paradigm.

[Zuras]

The article makes no mention of libertarianism's true philosophy: Freedom to do what you want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else.

You follow that one rule, no matter what the venue, and there's nothing left to discuss.

Still lots to debate/discuss, mostly in the semantics of terms. How inclusive the term "hurting" is, for instance. Just a modern example: Same sex marriage argument it harms children by (mentally/emotionally).

How inclusive is "anyone"? Is an embryo "one"? Is someone not a legal citizen of the state/nation they currently reside "one"?

These are not simple issues in ideology or otherwise.

[LibertyEagle]

This Robert Locke? Leo Strauss? Another stooge for the Trotskyite neocons? :p :rolleyes:



I wouldn't be talking if I were you, since you have a habit of quoting Fabian Socialists. ;)

[Truth Warrior]

I wouldn't be talking if I were you, since you have a habit of quoting Fabian Socialists. ;) Silly. :p If I were you, I'd slit my wrists.

[AuH20]

Very true. Unfortunately, libertarianism appears to have the same issue as conservatism, in that there are people in both that don't follow the inherent principles.

Libertarians are sure of only one thing. They don't like the "rules" society has saddled them with. We'd still be living in the Dark Ages if the libertarian model became the primary form of government. Its basically a reflexive, dead-end ideology with a few good ideas sprinkled here and there. So on one extreme, we have the zany libertarians, completely obsessed with shaking off their perceived societal shackles, and on the other end, the plutocrat corporate cons, who worship at the altar of GDP. And I'm far too depressed to describe the the most ruthless enemies, namely the collectivists and social engineers.

[LibertyEagle]

Silly. :p If I were you, I'd slit my wrists.

I don't doubt that you would, TW, as that would stop me from exposing your little game. ;)

[Truth Warrior]

I don't doubt that you would, TW, as that would stop me from exposing your little game. ;) Help! Help! The paranoids are plotting against me. :D

[LibertyEagle]

personally, i very highly encourage and recommend to any and all that don't want to read my threads and posts, to just simply ignore me, please!!!

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/profile.php?do=ignorelist

you're not my target audience, you won't be missed, since you add nothing of significant value to my conversations anyway. ;)

win/win, everybody's happy!

Thanks! :)


who is your target audience?

none of your business.

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?p=1862866&highlight=audience#post1862866
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http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j4/liberty_08/TruthWarrior-Imnothereforthemovemen.jpg
http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j4/liberty_08/TruthWarriordissingRonPaul-1.jpg

;)

[Truth Warrior]

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?p=1862866&highlight=audience#post1862866
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;) And it's STILL not. :rolleyes: MYOB!

[fedup100]

And it's STILL not. :rolleyes: MYOB!

Hope you don't slide in the mud on the way to the latrine from your 10x10 cabin and slash a major vein on that tractor.

If you can call the medic's, make sure you quiz them as to their political leanings before you allow a conservative christian to treat your wounds. For the sake of the forum, you should volunteer to slice off that offending finger that keeps hitting the "A" key. :rolleyes:

[heavenlyboy34]

Help! Help! The paranoids are plotting against me. :D

lolz!!! :D;)

[pcosmar]

Help! Help! The paranoids are plotting against me. :D

Irony

[danberkeley]

What a hit piece. I decided to stop reading after reading this:
"Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics often find an attractive political philosophy in libertarianism, the idea that individual freedom should be the sole rule of ethics and government."

Btw, I'm surprised TW hasnt been banned. :D

[Chosen]

hope you don't slide in the mud on the way to the latrine from your 10x10 cabin and slash a major vein on that tractor.

If you can call the medic's, make sure you quiz them as to their political leanings before you allow a conservative christian to treat your wounds. I can only pray you loose the finger that keeps hitting the "a" key. :rolleyes:
lol

[danberkeley]

Furthermore, the reduction of all goods to individual choices presupposes that all goods are individual. But some, like national security, clean air, or a healthy culture, are inherently collective. It may be possible to privatize some, but only some, and the efforts can be comically inefficient. Do you really want to trace every pollutant in the air back to the factory that emitted it and sue?

National security? Disneyland does a pretty good job at protecting its customers and so do Las Vegas casinos. I feel safer walking around in a casino full drunks and gamblers than I do on a street in North Las Vegas.

Clean air? It was the government that stopped protecting property rights in the 1800s and let the factories polute the air. Fail.

Healthy culture? Wtf is that? Is that why DC is full of corruption?


Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.
Live in a culture? Anyway, so what? Besides, you can move somewhere else.


What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free?

**facepalm** That would a violation of rights. Besides, if the "society" wanted to stay free, it wouldnt need to be FORCED to protect its freedom.


What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners?

**facepalm** Protecting economic freedom by restricting economic freedom?


What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society?

This is the biggest slap in the face yet.


What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways?

The author is has pbviously never been to LRC.


What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?

**facepalm** Vote? There would be no state.


America’s traditional liberties

Like murdering people in other countries?


And libertarianism degenerates into outright idiocy when confronted with the problem of children, whom it treats like adults, supporting the abolition of compulsory education and all child-specific laws, like those against child labor and child sex.

So having strangers force children into a building and be forced to do whatever another stranger commands is better than parents forcing their children to work? Oh, and what about the sexual molestation that goes on in government schools?

[danberkeley]

Libertarians argue that radical permissiveness, like legalizing drugs, would not shred a libertarian society because drug users who caused trouble would be disciplined by the threat of losing their jobs or homes if current laws that make it difficult to fire or evict people were abolished.

So why hasnt the War on Drugs solved the problem?


People are allowed to become millionaires, but they are taxed. They are allowed to go broke, but they are not then forced to starve.

Was this written before the Wall Street bailouts?


Empirically, most people don’t actually want absolute freedom, which is why democracies don’t elect libertarian governments.

Electing a libertarian government?


Many support abolition of government-issued money in favor of that minted by private banks. But this has already been tried, in various epochs, and doesn’t lead to any wonderful paradise of freedom but only to an explosion of fraud and currency debasement followed by the concentration of financial power in those few banks that survive the inevitable shaking-out.

**facepalm** Yes. Massive debasement of gold coins.


A major reason for this is that libertarianism has a naïve view of economics that seems to have stopped paying attention to the actual history of capitalism around 1880.

Yes. The minarchy allowing the polluters to pollute without regard to property rights is capitalism. :rolleyes:


There is not the space here to refute simplistic laissez faire, but note for now that the second-richest nation in the world, Japan, has one of the most regulated economies, while nations in which government has essentially lost control over economic life, like Russia, are hardly economic paradises.

This is ridiculous. The socialist USA is falling apart, the capitalist China is booming. His argument is flawed (o rly?)


But without a sufficiently strong state, individual freedom falls prey to other more powerful individuals.

And look at where our minarchy has led us to.


A weak state and a freedom-respecting state are not the same thing, as shown by many a chaotic Third-World tyranny.

As opposed to chaotic first-world tyranny?


They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock.

As if this doesnt exist under the current State. :rolleyes:

[anaconda]

Robert who? :D

My thoughts exactly.

Criticizing Libertarianism because it enables people to make bad personal choices completely misses the point. I don't know where this guy is coming up with his assumptions.

[Freedom 4 all]

Still lots to debate/discuss, mostly in the semantics of terms. How inclusive the term "hurting" is, for instance. Just a modern example: Same sex marriage argument it harms children by (mentally/emotionally).

How inclusive is "anyone"? Is an embryo "one"? Is someone not a legal citizen of the state/nation they currently reside "one"?

These are not simple issues in ideology or otherwise.

I can get on board with the whole abortion thing but if you seriously think gay marriage hurts anyone else you are out of your mind. Plenty of straight homes are abusive and negletful and plenty of gay homes are loving and nourishing. It's bald faced prejudice to say thatgay marriage hurts children.

[Freedom 4 all]

I have very little sypathy for the uberauthoritarians who have taken over this thread recently. You guys are just bitter your tired ideas got destroyed last election. In the 2008 cycle I bet you guys were laughing at RP and worshiping your neocon Retardlican heroes.

[Truth Warrior]

Hope you don't slide in the mud on the way to the latrine from your 10x10 cabin and slash a major vein on that tractor.

If you can call the medic's, make sure you quiz them as to their political leanings before you allow a conservative christian to treat your wounds. I can only pray you loose the finger that keeps hitting the "A" key. :rolleyes: We'll sort this all out in one of your FEMA camps. :p

BTW, how much less government are you allowed to believe in? However much the collective consensus of your shepherds allow you to say? :D

[Truth Warrior]

My thoughts exactly.

Criticizing Libertarianism because it enables people to make bad personal choices completely misses the point. I don't know where this guy is coming up with his assumptions. ;)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Locke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Locke)

Sure no agenda there. :rolleyes: :D

[acptulsa]

So, both are just the extreme ends of the old, tired rigidly straight line that is American political thought? And we are just as off the wall as the socialists (and, of course, such mainstream pols as Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank aren't socialists at all, despite the ongoing slow nationalization of the banks). The only thing is, liberty built a backwater colony into a superpower, and socialism in its extreme form (totalitarian communism) took one of the most powerful nations of Europe and drove it into the ground.

But, of course, this factoid doesn't fit the author's agenda, so it gets omitted.

[Truth Warrior]

Yeah right, LIBERTY built the GLOBAL EMPIRE in only 220 years. :p :rolleyes:

http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i304/Truth_Warrior/us_vs_world.gif

[acptulsa]

Yeah right, LIBERTY built the GLOBAL EMPIRE in only 220 years.

I said superpower, not center of a global empire. And it didn't take 220 years. So, when you twist my words, do you get orange juice or what? If you don't, kindly lay off of the twisting. Thank you so much.

[Truth Warrior]

I said superpower, not center of a global empire. And it didn't take 220 years. So, when you twist my words, do you get orange juice or what? If you don't, kindly lay off of the twisting. Thank you so much.

I said GLOBAL EMPIRE and I meant GLOBAL EMPIRE. DUH! Get over yourself. :p

[acptulsa]

I said GLOBAL EMPIRE and I meant GLOBAL EMPIRE. DUH! Get over yourself. :p

So, you admit you were setting up a straw man. Fine. Use someone else's straw. Not mine.

Interesting subject. I think I'll stop participating in your second hijack of this good thread--just as soon as I ask you why you want to distract us from this subject...?

[Truth Warrior]

So, you admit you were setting up a straw man. Fine. Use someone else's straw. Not mine. No, I admit that your TPS roots are showing. :p

[acptulsa]

No, I admit that your TPS roots are showing. :p

Ad hominem, straw man and a further attempt to distract from the subject.

Enough of that.

So, they try to both entrap us in the left/right false paradigm that they would have us believe is the whole sum total of American political thought, and at the same time paint us as extreme by placing us far to one end of it. Then they use the fact that a straight line has two ends to put us in the same boat as our sworn mortal enemies.

Cute trick--if we let them get away with it.

[Truth Warrior]

Ad hominem, straw man and a further attempt to distract from the subject.

Enough of that.

So, they try to both entrap us in the left/right false paradigm that they would have us believe is the whole sum total of American political thought, and at the same time paint us as extreme by placing us far to one end of it. Then they use the fact that a straight line has two ends to put us in the same boat as our sworn mortal enemies.

Cute trick--if we let them get away with it. Yep, some of us however have abandoned the bogus left/right paradigm dichotomy altogether and are capable of operating and functioning in all three of the spatial dimensions simultaneously through time. :eek: :D

[acptulsa]

Yep, some of us however have abandoned the bogus left/right paradigm dichotomy and are capable of operating and functioning in all three of the spatial dimensions simultaneously. :eek: :D

That's all well and good on a theoretical level, but we're not getting any medals for it unless we find a way to turn our little talent into a real benefit for the nation and the people. Time for us to pull our heads out of our theoretical asses and find a way to use our mental tools to press this agenda of liberty forward in the really really world.

And while it may pay us in this process to butt heads some, I really think we need to pull together. I do think that's a wiser course than tearing each other to shreds. And that goes not just for us, but for anyone (no matter how misguided otherwise) who values liberty.

[Truth Warrior]

That's all well and good on a theoretical level, but we're not getting any medals for it unless we find a way to turn our little talent into a real benefit for the nation and the people. Time for us to pull our heads out of our theoretical asses and find a way to use our mental tools to press this agenda of liberty forward in the really really world.

And while it may pay us in this process to butt heads some, I really think we need to pull together. I do think that's a wiser course than tearing each other to shreds. And that goes not just for us, but for anyone (no matter how misguided otherwise) who values liberty. Liberty is freedom bestowed by unnecessary permission.<IMHO> ;)



"Freedom, Peace and Prosperity" -- Ron Paul

[Kraig]

Marxism of the Right [url=http://www.amconmag.com/pdfissue.html?Id=AmConservative-2005mar14&page=17]PDF[/url
Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free? What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners? What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society? What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways? What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?

Use force to enslave it's citizens in order that they remain free? Isn't that a contradiction? You would have already destroyed the set goal you are claiming to save. Unless you want to be realistic about it and say draft SOME citizens so that OTHERS may remain free. He just replaced the words "war slave" with "draft" and hoped no one noticed. Draft is a pretty handy word in that regard.

The same applies to all of his above questions, they are all contradictions. If you value these things because of the comfort and security they may provide, at least come out and say it, don't advocate it as a cause for "freedom" when the required actions are the complete opposite.

At the end of the day what this guy is advocating is sacrificing individuals for the sake of everyone else, and it's obvious. 'Moderate' collectivism is still 100% collectivism.

[LibertyEagle]

AcpTulsa, TW dodged your question, as usual, but I think the answer is here.

http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j4/liberty_08/TruthWarrior-Imnothereforthemovemen.jpg

[AuH20]

Use force to enslave it's citizens in order that they remain free? Isn't that a contradiction? You would have already destroyed the set goal you are claiming to save. Unless you want to be realistic about it and say draft SOME citizens so that OTHERS may remain free. He just replaced the words "war slave" with "draft" and hoped no one noticed. Draft is a pretty handy word in that regard.

The same applies to all of his above questions, they are all contradictions. If you value these things because of the comfort and security they may provide, at least come out and say it, don't advocate it as a cause for "freedom" when the required actions are the complete opposite.

At the end of the day what this guy is advocating is sacrificing individuals for the sake of everyone else, and it's obvious. 'Moderate' collectivism is still 100% collectivism.

A military draft runs countercurrent to the ideals we want to espouse. Any military committment should be one made voluntarily by the individual.

[Truth Warrior]

I've seen NOTHING here to change that conclusion. "Just more fiddling, while Rome burns."

[LibertyEagle]

I've seen NOTHING here to change that conclusion.
Wow, that's pretty telling. You've been a forum member since 12/07. In all this time, you've seen NOTHING on this website that caused you to want to participate in reclaiming liberty in this country? Note that the presidential campaign occurred during that timeframe too.

"Just fiddling, while Rome burns."
How's that fiddle? Are you enjoying yourself?

[acptulsa]

Are you enjoying yourself?

He's nothing if not a dedicated fiddler.

[Truth Warrior]

Are you enjoying yourself? None of YOUR business. MYOB! Your "movement" awaits.

[acptulsa]

None of YOUR business. MYOB! Your "movement" awaits.

And here we have fiddle stroke 17,277. Got plenty of rosin, I see--or maybe not. They seem a bit discordinant this morning...

The owner of this private property says what appears here is her business, TW. If you don't like it, start your own site, invade some other forum--mainly, do something (besides fiddle and whine).

[LibertyEagle]

None of YOUR business. MYOB! Your "movement" awaits.

Are you saying that you're just a big 'ol Troll, TW?

[Truth Warrior]

And here we have fiddle stroke 17,277. Got plenty of rosin, I see--or maybe not. They seem a bit discordinant this morning...

The owner of this private property says what appears here is her business, TW. If you don't like it, start your own site, invade some other forum--mainly, do something besides fiddle and whine.

None of YOUR business. MYOB! Your "movement" awaits.

[acptulsa]

None of YOUR business. MYOB! Your "movement" awaits.

Why are you repeating this? It wasn't worth the effort you put into typing it the first time <IMHO>.

[Young Paleocon]

I don't understand the point of this thread, is it to be provocative? Get us discussing ideas or just to annoy?

[Truth Warrior]

Why are you repeating this? It wasn't worth the effort you put into typing it the first time <IMHO>. Sorry, I just forgot for a moment there, who I was dealing with ALSO. :rolleyes: ( not really ) If explanation is required the humor is lost.

[LibertyEagle]

I don't understand the point of this thread, is it to be provocative? Get us discussing ideas or just to annoy?

Not sure. But, even if it is to be provocative, I can't see how it's any different from the countless threads and posts slamming conservatives, constitutionalists, or frankly anyone who believes a government should exist in any size or form.

[acptulsa]

I don't understand the point of this thread, is it to be provocative? Get us discussing ideas or just to annoy?

If we turn a blind eye to their attempts to discredit us, we can't counter them.

[Young Paleocon]

Not sure. But, even if it is to be provocative, I can't see how it's any different from the countless threads and posts slamming conservatives, constitutionalists, or frankly anyone who believes a government should exist in any size or form.

Yea i'm not sure why thats done either. I thought one thing we all had in common was that we understood federalism and original intent. How far you want to take it past limited government is up for debate, but we need to get there first.

[johnrocks]

I would not get too upset by someone who is such a huge fan of Leo Straus, the "Father of neo conservatism".
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=E1F7620E-B83A-4D01-869E-15391DEE2F02

I lost my breakfast at the first paragraph...."Strauss is an ambiguous, sometimes even troubling, figure, but he is essential to the conservative revival of our time and he offers the intellectual depth we are so desperately in need of".

[Truth Warrior]

I would not get too upset by someone who is such a huge fan of Leo Straus, the "Father of neo conservatism".
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=E1F7620E-B83A-4D01-869E-15391DEE2F02

I lost my breakfast at the first paragraph...."Strauss is an ambiguous, sometimes even troubling, figure, but he is essential to the conservative revival of our time and he offers the intellectual depth we are so desperately in need of". Thank you. :)

[AuH20]

Yea i'm not sure why thats done either. I thought one thing we all had in common was that we understood federalism and original intent. How far you want to take it past limited government is up for debate, but we need to get there first.

Paleoconservatives and constitutionalists agree with hardcore libertarians to a POINT. I think thats what the author was trying to illustrate. Despite my harsh criticism of their more "specious" ideas, I consider libertarians to be allies in this struggle to reclaim the limited government the Founding Fathers outlined. So given the titanic fight we have ahead of us, I believe this fraternal sniping to be minutia at the end of the day. We both need each other.

[acptulsa]

I consider a lot of this fraternal sniping to be minutia at the end of the day. We both need each other, when is all is said and done.

And our opponents consider this minutia as an opportunity to divide us so they can win. We must not forget that.

[LibertyEagle]

Yea i'm not sure why thats done either. I thought one thing we all had in common was that we understood federalism and original intent. How far you want to take it past limited government is up for debate, but we need to get there first.
Yup. Totally agree.


Paleoconservatives and constitutionalists agree with hardcore libertarians to a POINT. I think thats what the author was trying to illustrate. Despite my harsh criticism of their more "specious" ideas, I consider libertarians to be allies in this struggle to reclaim the limited government the Founding Fathers outlined. So given the titanic fight we have ahead of us, I believe this fraternal sniping to be minutia at the end of the day. We both need each other.
Problem is, some apparently don't see it this way.

[Truth Warrior]

What are you waiting for? Unanimity? Consensus? Permission? Not bloody likely to EVER happen in the "big tent".<IMHO>

[AuH20]

What are you waiting for? Unanimity? Consensus? Permission?

A sign. ;)

[johnrocks]

Thank you. :)

YW although reading that article hopefully is the worse thing that will happen today, anything worse would involve one of my organs.:D

[Pericles]

And our opponents consider this minutia as an opportunity to divide us so they can win. We must not forget that.

It comes down to defining the purpose of government (especially at the federal level). If we take the purpose as securing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as the starting point, the question for libertarians is how those conflicts between the three are resolved. Securing those rights assumes there is some mechanism in place to enforce those rights.

If we define one limit as the free market will provide all of those necessities, and the other as permitted role of the federal government are those outlined in the Constitution, we have a working framework that provides an objective - return to the intent of the Constitution, and once there, we can define what further limits to government are needed. If you can't even get to an intermediate step, what is the point of complaining about not being able to reach the end of the journey?

[LibertyEagle]

It comes down to defining the purpose of government (especially at the federal level). If we take the purpose as securing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as the starting point, the question for libertarians is how those conflicts between the three are resolved. Securing those rights assumes there is some mechanism in place to enforce those rights.

If we define one limit as the free market will provide all of those necessities, and the other as permitted role of the federal government are those outlined in the Constitution, we have a working framework that provides an objective - return to the intent of the Constitution, and once there, we can define what further limits to government are needed. If you can't even get to an intermediate step, what is the point of complaining about not being able to reach the end of the journey?

You nailed it.

[acptulsa]

If you can't even get to an intermediate step, what is the point of complaining about not being able to reach the end of the journey?

With certain self-alleged anarchists on this forum, the point sure seems to be to cause dissention in our ranks. Whether this is because they don't really want to reach the intermediate point, or because they just want to see the bloodshed when we fail to prevent the pitchforks from coming out, who knows? But there it is.

[Truth Warrior]

YW although reading that article hopefully is the worse thing that will happen today, anything worse would involve one of my organs.:D
If you eat a live frog first thing every morning, nothing worse is likely to happen to you for the rest of the day. ;)

:D

Have a good one. :)

[Pericles]

This board has posters who would not recognize the truth if it jumped up and bit them in the ass.

[Conza88]

If you can't even get to an intermediate step, what is the point of complaining about not being able to reach the end of the journey?


You nailed it.


With certain self-alleged anarchists on this forum, the point sure seems to be to cause dissention in our ranks. Whether this is because they don't really want to reach the intermediate point, or because they just want to see the bloodshed when we fail to prevent the pitchforks from coming out, who knows? But there it is.

Read the whole thing. So here's an excerpt.

Do You Hate the State? by Murray N. Rothbard (http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard75.html)


Taking the concept of radical vs. conservative in our new sense, let us analyze the now famous "abolitionism" vs. "gradualism" debate. The latter jab comes in the August issue of Reason (a magazine every fiber of whose being exudes "conservatism"), in which editor Bob Poole asks Milton Friedman where he stands on this debate. Freidman takes the opportunity of denouncing the "intellectual cowardice" of failing to set forth "feasible" methods of getting "from here to there." Poole and Friedman have between them managed to obfuscate the true issues. There is not a single abolitionist who would not grab a feasible method, or a gradual gain, if it came his way. The difference is that the abolitionist always holds high the banner of his ultimate goal, never hides his basic principles, and wishes to get to his goal as fast as humanly possible. Hence, while the abolitionist will accept a gradual step in the right direction if that is all that he can achieve, he always accepts it grudgingly, as merely a first step toward a goal which he always keeps blazingly clear. The abolitionist is a "button pusher" who would blister his thumb pushing a button that would abolish the State immediately, if such a button existed. But the abolitionist also knows that alas, such a button does not exist, and that he will take a bit of the loaf if necessary – while always preferring the whole loaf if he can achieve it.

It should be noted here that many of Milton’s most famous "gradual" programs such as the voucher plan, the negative income tax, the withholding tax, fiat paper money – are gradual (or even not so gradual) steps in the wrong direction, away from liberty, and hence the militance of much libertarian opposition to these schemes.

His button-pushing position stems from the abolitionist’s deep and abiding hatred of the State and its vast engine of crime and oppression. With such an integrated world-view, the radical libertarian could never dream of confronting either a magic button or any real-life problem with some arid cost-benefit calculation. He knows that the State must be diminished as fast and as completely as possible. Period.

And that is why the radical libertarian is not only an abolitionist, but also refuses to think in such terms as a Four Year Plan for some sort of stately and measured procedure for reducing the State. The radical – whether he be anarchist or laissez-faire – cannot think in such terms as, e.g.: Well, the first year, we’ll cut the income tax by 2%, abolish the ICC, and cut the minimum wage; the second year we’ll abolish the minimum wage, cut the income tax by another 2%, and reduce welfare payments by 3%, etc. The radical cannot think in such terms, because the radical regards the State as our mortal enemy, which must be hacked away at wherever and whenever we can. To the radical libertarian, we must take any and every opportunity to chop away at the State, whether it’s to reduce or abolish a tax, a budget appropriation, or a regulatory power. And the radical libertarian is insatiable in this appetite until the State has been abolished, or – for minarchists – dwindled down to a tiny, laissez-faire role.

Many people have wondered: Why should there be any important political disputes between anarcho-capitalists and minarchists now? In this world of statism, where there is so much common ground, why can’t the two groups work in complete harmony until we shall have reached a Cobdenite world, after which we can air our disagreements? Why quarrel over courts, etc. now? The answer to this excellent question is that we could and would march hand-in-hand in this way if the minarchists were radicals, as they were from the birth of classical liberalism down to the 1940s. Give us back the antistatist radicals, and harmony would indeed reign triumphant within the movement.

[Pericles]

Are you telling me that you refuse to support abolishing the federal department of education until we return to the gold standard as part of the deal?

[acptulsa]

Are you telling me that you refuse to support abolishing the federal department of education until we return to the gold standard as part of the deal?

I don't believe Conza was talking about himself. But, yes, there are those who think this way...

[Truth Warrior]

http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i304/Truth_Warrior/Striketheroot.gif

[Truth Warrior]

A sign. ;) Or a shepherd. :rolleyes:

;) :)

[Theocrat]

Read the whole thing. So here's an excerpt.

Do You Hate the State? by Murray N. Rothbard (http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard75.html)


Taking the concept of radical vs. conservative in our new sense, let us analyze the now famous "abolitionism" vs. "gradualism" debate. The latter jab comes in the August issue of Reason (a magazine every fiber of whose being exudes "conservatism"), in which editor Bob Poole asks Milton Friedman where he stands on this debate. Freidman takes the opportunity of denouncing the "intellectual cowardice" of failing to set forth "feasible" methods of getting "from here to there." Poole and Friedman have between them managed to obfuscate the true issues. There is not a single abolitionist who would not grab a feasible method, or a gradual gain, if it came his way. The difference is that the abolitionist always holds high the banner of his ultimate goal, never hides his basic principles, and wishes to get to his goal as fast as humanly possible. Hence, while the abolitionist will accept a gradual step in the right direction if that is all that he can achieve, he always accepts it grudgingly, as merely a first step toward a goal which he always keeps blazingly clear. The abolitionist is a "button pusher" who would blister his thumb pushing a button that would abolish the State immediately, if such a button existed. But the abolitionist also knows that alas, such a button does not exist, and that he will take a bit of the loaf if necessary – while always preferring the whole loaf if he can achieve it.

It should be noted here that many of Milton’s most famous "gradual" programs such as the voucher plan, the negative income tax, the withholding tax, fiat paper money – are gradual (or even not so gradual) steps in the wrong direction, away from liberty, and hence the militance of much libertarian opposition to these schemes.

His button-pushing position stems from the abolitionist’s deep and abiding hatred of the State and its vast engine of crime and oppression. With such an integrated world-view, the radical libertarian could never dream of confronting either a magic button or any real-life problem with some arid cost-benefit calculation. He knows that the State must be diminished as fast and as completely as possible. Period.

And that is why the radical libertarian is not only an abolitionist, but also refuses to think in such terms as a Four Year Plan for some sort of stately and measured procedure for reducing the State. The radical – whether he be anarchist or laissez-faire – cannot think in such terms as, e.g.: Well, the first year, we’ll cut the income tax by 2%, abolish the ICC, and cut the minimum wage; the second year we’ll abolish the minimum wage, cut the income tax by another 2%, and reduce welfare payments by 3%, etc. The radical cannot think in such terms, because the radical regards the State as our mortal enemy, which must be hacked away at wherever and whenever we can. To the radical libertarian, we must take any and every opportunity to chop away at the State, whether it’s to reduce or abolish a tax, a budget appropriation, or a regulatory power. And the radical libertarian is insatiable in this appetite until the State has been abolished, or – for minarchists – dwindled down to a tiny, laissez-faire role.

Many people have wondered: Why should there be any important political disputes between anarcho-capitalists and minarchists now? In this world of statism, where there is so much common ground, why can’t the two groups work in complete harmony until we shall have reached a Cobdenite world, after which we can air our disagreements? Why quarrel over courts, etc. now? The answer to this excellent question is that we could and would march hand-in-hand in this way if the minarchists were radicals, as they were from the birth of classical liberalism down to the 1940s. Give us back the antistatist radicals, and harmony would indeed reign triumphant within the movement.

Though I agree that many of our taxes and government programs should be abolished totally, we need to keep in mind that people are still dependent upon the system. For that reason, wisdom and compassion dictate that we should have transitions in our plans to abolish the welfare State, for instance. It takes time to educate and allow people to mature away from the "milk of the State." This is just how human nature is.

If we decide to strip away everything at once, there is going to be chaos, confusion, and crime in our communities. People will be frantic because they won't know what to do. It's like a person who has been taking a prescription for years, but then suddenly the physician takes the medication away from them. The patient will not be able to handle it, and he could even die as a result. The wise thing for the physician is to wean the patient off, until either the patient is dependent from the drug or taking dosages of a better medicine. The same applies to our government. In this case, we should get the government back to its moderate and legitimate level of duty under the Constitution, where rights can be protected from civil evildoers, as our Founders envisioned.

[Uncle Emanuel Watkins]

Ron Paul is both a libertarian and a conservative. They are not competing ideologies they are complimentary. Stop sowing the seeds of division. You are doing nothing but damaging the movement.

In the end, a revolution is made up of lots of different parties made up with lots of differing ideologies. To the contrary, an American movement is made up of all Americans because to be an American is to have in ones soul a truth which is self-evident and a natural right which is unalienable. A revolution is a bipartisan conflict between people because they have in their minds differing legal-precedents; while, an American movement is partisan in people because they have in their souls and their hearts a transcendental (narrowed) goal based on a common Civil-Purpose.

[Truth Warrior]

This board has posters who would not recognize the truth if it jumped up and bit them in the ass. In general, this place often reminds me of the "revolutionary liberation committee" meeting scene in the movie, "Life of Brian". :( :D

[LibertyEagle]

Or a shepherd. :rolleyes:

;) :)

I think this sums it up.
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showpost.php?p=1793765&postcount=30

[acptulsa]

In general, this place often reminds me of the "revolutionary liberation committee" meeting scene in the movie, "Life of Brian". :( :D

And which character is playing you?

[heavenlyboy34]

In general, this place often reminds me of the "revolutionary liberation committee" meeting scene in the movie, "Life of Brian". :( :D

lolz!! ;) ...:(

[Theocrat]

Marxism of the Right PDF (http://www.amconmag.com/pdfissue.html?Id=AmConservative-2005mar14&page=17)

By Robert Locke


Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics often find an attractive political philosophy in libertarianism, the idea that individual freedom should be the sole rule of ethics and government. Libertarianism offers its believers a clear conscience to do things society presently restrains, like make more money, have more sex, or take more drugs. It promises a consistent formula for ethics, a rigorous framework for policy analysis, a foundation in American history, and the application of capitalist efficiencies to the whole of society. But while it contains substantial grains of truth, as a whole it is a seductive mistake.

There are many varieties of libertarianism, from natural-law libertarianism (the least crazy) to anarcho-capitalism (the most), and some varieties avoid some of the criticisms below. But many are still subject to most of them, and some of the more successful varieties—I recently heard a respected pundit insist that classical liberalism is libertarianism—enter a gray area where it is not really clear that they are libertarians at all. But because 95 percent of the libertarianism one encounters at cocktail parties, on editorial pages, and on Capitol Hill is a kind of commonplace “street” libertarianism, I decline to allow libertarians the sophistical trick of using a vulgar libertarianism to agitate for what they want by defending a refined version of their doctrine when challenged philosophically. We’ve seen Marxists pull that before.

This is no surprise, as libertarianism is basically the Marxism of the Right. If Marxism is the delusion that one can run society purely on altruism and collectivism, then libertarianism is the mirror-image delusion that one can run it purely on selfishness and individualism. Society in fact requires both individualism and collectivism, both selfishness and altruism, to function. Like Marxism, libertarianism offers the fraudulent intellectual security of a complete a priori account of the political good without the effort of empirical investigation. Like Marxism, it aspires, overtly or covertly, to reduce social life to economics. And like Marxism, it has its historical myths and a genius for making its followers feel like an elect unbound by the moral rules of their society.

The most fundamental problem with libertarianism is very simple: freedom, though a good thing, is simply not the only good thing in life. Simple physical security, which even a prisoner can possess, is not freedom, but one cannot live without it. Prosperity is connected to freedom, in that it makes us free to consume, but it is not the same thing, in that one can be rich but as unfree as a Victorian tycoon’s wife. A family is in fact one of the least free things imaginable, as the emotional satisfactions of it derive from relations that we are either born into without choice or, once they are chosen, entail obligations that we cannot walk away from with ease or justice. But security, prosperity, and family are in fact the bulk of happiness for most real people and the principal issues that concern governments.

Libertarians try to get around this fact that freedom is not the only good thing by trying to reduce all other goods to it through the concept of choice, claiming that everything that is good is so because we choose to partake of it. Therefore freedom, by giving us choice, supposedly embraces all other goods. But this violates common sense by denying that anything is good by nature, independently of whether we choose it. Nourishing foods are good for us by nature, not because we choose to eat them. Taken to its logical conclusion, the reduction of the good to the freely chosen means there are no inherently good or bad choices at all, but that a man who chose to spend his life playing tiddlywinks has lived as worthy a life as a Washington or a Churchill.

Furthermore, the reduction of all goods to individual choices presupposes that all goods are individual. But some, like national security, clean air, or a healthy culture, are inherently collective. It may be possible to privatize some, but only some, and the efforts can be comically inefficient. Do you really want to trace every pollutant in the air back to the factory that emitted it and sue?

Libertarians rightly concede that one’s freedom must end at the point at which it starts to impinge upon another person’s, but they radically underestimate how easily this happens. So even if the libertarian principle of “an it harm none, do as thou wilt,” is true, it does not license the behavior libertarians claim. Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.

Libertarians in real life rarely live up to their own theory but tend to indulge in the pleasant parts while declining to live up to the difficult portions. They flout the drug laws but continue to collect government benefits they consider illegitimate. This is not just an accidental failing of libertarianism’s believers but an intrinsic temptation of the doctrine that sets it up to fail whenever tried, just like Marxism.

Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free? What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners? What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society? What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways? What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?

In each of these cases, less freedom today is the price of more tomorrow. Total freedom today would just be a way of running down accumulated social capital and storing up problems for the future. So even if libertarianism is true in some ultimate sense, this does not prove that the libertarian policy choice is the right one today on any particular question.

Furthermore, if limiting freedom today may prolong it tomorrow, then limiting freedom tomorrow may prolong it the day after and so on, so the right amount of freedom may in fact be limited freedom in perpetuity. But if limited freedom is the right choice, then libertarianism, which makes freedom an absolute, is simply wrong. If all we want is limited freedom, then mere liberalism will do, or even better, a Burkean conservatism that reveres traditional liberties. There is no need to embrace outright libertarianism just because we want a healthy portion of freedom, and the alternative to libertarianism is not the USSR, it is America’s traditional liberties.

Libertarianism’s abstract and absolutist view of freedom leads to bizarre conclusions. Like slavery, libertarianism would have to allow one to sell oneself into it. (It has been possible at certain times in history to do just that by assuming debts one could not repay.) And libertarianism degenerates into outright idiocy when confronted with the problem of children, whom it treats like adults, supporting the abolition of compulsory education and all child-specific laws, like those against child labor and child sex. It likewise cannot handle the insane and the senile.

Libertarians argue that radical permissiveness, like legalizing drugs, would not shred a libertarian society because drug users who caused trouble would be disciplined by the threat of losing their jobs or homes if current laws that make it difficult to fire or evict people were abolished. They claim a “natural order” of reasonable behavior would emerge. But there is no actual empirical proof that this would happen. Furthermore, this means libertarianism is an all-or-nothing proposition: if society continues to protect people from the consequences of their actions in any way, libertarianism regarding specific freedoms is illegitimate. And since society does so protect people, libertarianism is an illegitimate moral position until the Great Libertarian Revolution has occurred.

And is society really wrong to protect people against the negative consequences of some of their free choices? While it is obviously fair to let people enjoy the benefits of their wise choices and suffer the costs of their stupid ones, decent societies set limits on both these outcomes. People are allowed to become millionaires, but they are taxed. They are allowed to go broke, but they are not then forced to starve. They are deprived of the most extreme benefits of freedom in order to spare us the most extreme costs. The libertopian alternative would be perhaps a more glittering society, but also a crueler one.

Empirically, most people don’t actually want absolute freedom, which is why democracies don’t elect libertarian governments. Irony of ironies, people don’t choose absolute freedom. But this refutes libertarianism by its own premise, as libertarianism defines the good as the freely chosen, yet people do not choose it. Paradoxically, people exercise their freedom not to be libertarians.

The political corollary of this is that since no electorate will support libertarianism, a libertarian government could never be achieved democratically but would have to be imposed by some kind of authoritarian state, which rather puts the lie to libertarians’ claim that under any other philosophy, busybodies who claim to know what’s best for other people impose their values on the rest of us. Libertarianism itself is based on the conviction that it is the one true political philosophy and all others are false. It entails imposing a certain kind of society, with all its attendant pluses and minuses, which the inhabitants thereof will not be free to opt out of except by leaving.

And if libertarians ever do acquire power, we may expect a farrago of bizarre policies. Many support abolition of government-issued money in favor of that minted by private banks. But this has already been tried, in various epochs, and doesn’t lead to any wonderful paradise of freedom but only to an explosion of fraud and currency debasement followed by the concentration of financial power in those few banks that survive the inevitable shaking-out. Many other libertarian schemes similarly founder on the empirical record.

A major reason for this is that libertarianism has a naïve view of economics that seems to have stopped paying attention to the actual history of capitalism around 1880. There is not the space here to refute simplistic laissez faire, but note for now that the second-richest nation in the world, Japan, has one of the most regulated economies, while nations in which government has essentially lost control over economic life, like Russia, are hardly economic paradises. Legitimate criticism of over-regulation does not entail going to the opposite extreme.

Libertarian naïveté extends to politics. They often confuse the absence of government impingement upon freedom with freedom as such. But without a sufficiently strong state, individual freedom falls prey to other more powerful individuals. A weak state and a freedom-respecting state are not the same thing, as shown by many a chaotic Third-World tyranny.

Libertarians are also naïve about the range and perversity of human desires they propose to unleash. They can imagine nothing more threatening than a bit of Sunday-afternoon sadomasochism, followed by some recreational drug use and work on Monday. They assume that if people are given freedom, they will gravitate towards essentially bourgeois lives, but this takes for granted things like the deferral of gratification that were pounded into them as children without their being free to refuse. They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock. Society is dependent upon inculcated self-restraint if it is not to slide into barbarism, and libertarians attack this self-restraint. Ironically, this often results in internal restraints being replaced by the external restraints of police and prison, resulting in less freedom, not more.

This contempt for self-restraint is emblematic of a deeper problem: libertarianism has a lot to say about freedom but little about learning to handle it. Freedom without judgment is dangerous at best, useless at worst. Yet libertarianism is philosophically incapable of evolving a theory of how to use freedom well because of its root dogma that all free choices are equal, which it cannot abandon except at the cost of admitting that there are other goods than freedom. Conservatives should know better.

It's a great article, except for one major problem. Everywhere the word "libertarian" and "libertarianism" occur, the author should have substituted the words "libertine" and "libertinism," respectively.

[Truth Warrior]

And which character is playing you? None, I revolted in '72.

[Young Paleocon]

None, I revolted in '72.

Did you secede your property? Do you live in Truth Warritania

[acptulsa]

None, I revolted in '72.

And yet here you are. Still revolting.

Revolting against the revolution, even. Props for being hard core.

I remember which of the characters in that scene represents you here. Just don't remember the name...

[Conza88]

Are you telling me that you refuse to support abolishing the federal department of education until we return to the gold standard as part of the deal?

Sorry but are you that fcken dense? Or are you being satirical? How on earth did you come to that conclusion?

What part of:


The radical cannot think in such terms, because the radical regards the State as our mortal enemy, which must be hacked away at wherever and whenever we can. To the radical libertarian, we must take any and every opportunity to chop away at the State, whether it’s to reduce or abolish a tax, a budget appropriation, or a regulatory power. And the radical libertarian is insatiable in this appetite until the State has been abolished, or – for minarchists – dwindled down to a tiny, laissez-faire role.

Did you not understand?


I don't believe Conza was talking about himself. But, yes, there are those who think this way...

:rolleyes:

[constituent]

In all this time, you've seen NOTHING on this website that caused you to want to participate in reclaiming liberty in this country?

Personally, I don't see too many people advocating "liberty in this country." As for "reclaiming" it, I would have to ask when there ever was liberty in this country.

[acptulsa]

As for "reclaiming" it, I would have to ask when there ever was liberty in this country.

Oh, if you were the right color and either rich enough or far enough west, there was plenty of liberty in this nation. And now, we're still better off than ninety-plus percent of the world.

Most of the people we would wish to reach with our message know how to count their blessings. If we're to reach them, we should learn to acknowledge that...

[constituent]

Are you telling me that you refuse to support abolishing the federal department of education until we return to the gold standard as part of the deal?

Who is abolishing the doe or returning to the "gold standard?"

[constituent]

Most of the people we would wish to reach with our message know how to count their blessings. If we're to reach them, we should learn to acknowledge that...

Counting their blessings or navel gazing, I'm not sure which.

[danberkeley]

Though I agree that many of our taxes and government programs should be abolished totally, we need to keep in mind that people are still dependent upon the system. For that reason, wisdom and compassion dictate that we should have transitions in our plans to abolish the welfare State, for instance. It takes time to educate and allow people to mature away from the "milk of the State." This is just how human nature is.

Although I agree with the first part, in that we need a transition, it is contradictory to say that the State itself needs to educate people so as to mature away from the "milk of the State".


If we decide to strip away everything at once, there is going to be chaos, confusion, and crime in our communities. People will be frantic because they won't know what to do. It's like a person who has been taking a prescription for years, but then suddenly the physician takes the medication away from them. The patient will not be able to handle it, and he could even die as a result. The wise thing for the physician is to wean the patient off, until either the patient is dependent from the drug or taking dosages of a better medicine. The same applies to our government. In this case, we should get the government back to its moderate and legitimate level of duty under the Constitution, where rights can be protected from civil evildoers, as our Founders envisioned.

You had me until the end. What if the evildoers are the government itself as they are now?

[Truth Warrior]

And yet here you are. Still revolting.

Revolting against the revolution, even. Props for being hard core.

I remember which of the characters in that scene represents you here. Just don't remember the name...

Keep what ever bogus spin ya need going, that let's you sleep through the night. :rolleyes:

Who cares? :p

[acptulsa]

Who is abolishing the doe, or returning to the "gold standard?"

It was an example. And the DOE is the Department of Energy. The Department of Education is the ED.

It has gotten so bad you can't tell the departments apart without a program. A dyslexic can't even have a hope of keeping up...

[johnrocks]

The way I see Libertarianism is, it's both our best friend and our worse enemy when dealing with government and human nature. I'm an individualism yet we are composed of so many levels/types of Libertarians, some are so unrealistic that they have an "all or nothing" attitude. Wouldn't it make sense to organize in areas where we are in agreement instead of fight each other because of the few areas we may disagree? That only keeps us insignificant and keeps other,more pragmatic people from joining our movement,imho.

[danberkeley]

I don't understand the point of this thread, is it to be provocative? Get us discussing ideas or just to annoy?

To keeps us on our toes. :cool:


Oh, if you were the right color and either rich enough or far enough west, there was plenty of liberty in this nation. And now, we're still better off than ninety-plus percent of the world.

Most of the people we would wish to reach with our message know how to count their blessings. If we're to reach them, we should learn to acknowledge that...

Seems the orientals (Chinese) are moving in the opposite direction we are, that is, towards liberty. The West is losing the battle.

[acptulsa]

Keep what ever spin ya need going that let's you sleep through the night. :rolleyes:

Who cares? :p

Let us you isn't exactly proper English. And one doesn't create spin by touching the top. One eliminates it.

[LibertyEagle]

Keep what ever bogus spin ya need going, that let's you sleep through the night. :rolleyes:

Who cares? :p

What's bogus about what he said?

[Truth Warrior]

I think this sums it up.
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showpost.php?p=1793765&postcount=30 Of course you do, that's a HUGE part of your problems. When your "movement" stops, please let someone know. Others will probably take action from that point.

[acptulsa]

Seems the orientals (Chinese) are moving in the opposite direction we are, that is, towards liberty. The West is losing the battle.

You just tapped my vein, so to speak. I realized back before perestroyka that the Soviet Union was moving toward liberty, and that meant it was moving a different direction than we were...

Made me mad. Still mad.

[constituent]

It was an example.

An example of what?

[Truth Warrior]

What's bogus about what he said? You're the EXPERT, you figure it out.

[acptulsa]

An example of what?

It was a simile designed to illustrate the futility of 'shooting the moon'. It was an example of 'all or nothing' activism that almost invariably fails to ignite a wider movement, and therefore fails. Nothing more concrete than that.

[Truth Warrior]

Let us you isn't exactly proper English. And one doesn't create spin by touching the top. One eliminates it. Up to you, I don't control you.

[acptulsa]

Up to you, I don't control you.

What does this have to do with who was spinning, and who was unraveling the other's spin?


You're the EXPERT, you figure it out.

And this, kiddies, is how you put over 17,000 posts on a message board and still have no one who knows what the hell you're talking about.

[Truth Warrior]

Did you secede your property? Do you live in Truth Warritania I seceded me. And no.

[Kraig]

Maybe we should use force to draft people to fight for our "movement"? Then we can finally make that TW do something besides post articles. :rolleyes:

[LibertyEagle]

You're the EXPERT, you figure it out.


That ISN'T what I ASKED you. :rolleyes:


I asked a question. You may be able to tell that by the little "?" at the end of the sentence.


Must have just hit a nerve on somebody. :p

:D

[LibertyEagle]

Maybe we should use force to draft people to fight for our "movement"? Then we can finally make that TW do something besides post articles. :rolleyes:

There's a big difference between someone being a part of the movement vs. someone working night and day to rip it apart.

[Truth Warrior]

Maybe we should use force to draft people to fight for our "movement"? Then we can finally make that TW do something besides post articles. :rolleyes: That tactic seemed to work out very well for the USSR. :D

[danberkeley]

:D

OMFGz!!!! This must be the first time LE has used a ":D".

[constituent]

It was a simile designed to illustrate the futility of 'shooting the moon'. It was an example of 'all or nothing' activism that almost invariably fails to ignite a wider movement, and therefore fails. Nothing more concrete than that.

No I got that, but I do not believe that was the intent of the poster. I believe he was trying to imply that by supporting (whatever social construct he has in his head), one of those might be a viable alternative (lol, or even an option for that matter) in the future or a realistic expectation...

[LibertyEagle]

OMFGz!!!! This must be the first time LE has used a ":D".

Hardly. :p:D

[Truth Warrior]

There's a big difference between someone being a part of the movement vs. someone working night and day to rip it apart. Just wait until and if the Feds get a hold on it. :rolleyes: :D Correction: Make that the GOP. :D

[LibertyEagle]

Just wait until and if the Feds get a hold on it. :rolleyes: :D

No doubt. But, until that point you appear like you'd be happy if Ron Paul and all the rest of us, just sat on our asses and didn't do a damn thing to attempt to rectify the situation and are doing everything within your limited power to cause as much division as you possibly can to ensure that.

[Brian4Liberty]

The article in the OP is a hit piece. Despite a few lame caveats about there being a variety of libertarian types, the article really attacks anarchists, painting all libertarians (and by association, Ron Paul Republicans) with that brush.

The intent is to support big government Republicans against the current tide of Ron Paul leaning Republican philosophy (small government, no bailouts, follow the Constitution, question the Fed, etc.).

[Truth Warrior]

No doubt. But, until that point you appear like you'd be happy if Ron Paul and all the rest of us, just sat on our asses and didn't do a damn thing to attempt to rectify the situation and are doing everything within your limited power to cause as much division as you possibly can to ensure that. You don't need my help. I figured you could just do it all by yourselves. How many is it now?

Go get 'em Tigers. Rah! :D

[acptulsa]

You don't need my help. I figured you could just do it all by yourselves. How many is it now?

Go get 'em Tigers. Rah! :D

Translation: I won't lead. I won't follow. And I won't get the *%#$ out of the way.

[Truth Warrior]

Translation: I won't lead. I won't follow. And I won't get the *%#$ out of the way.True! True! I'm in no one's way. ( One less vote that you don't have to worry anything about, canceling one of yours out. ) ;) :D

[danberkeley]

Goddamnit, TW!!! Freeing yourself is not enough!!! You must freedomize everyone else!!!!! Okay, komrade? :D

[acptulsa]

True! True! I'm in no one's way. ( One less vote that you don't have to worry anything about, canceling one of yours out. ) ;) :D

Perhaps. But you surely do know how to derail an excellent discussion and sink it in a cesspool of inanity.

And obviously proud of this utterly useless skill to boot.

[LibertyEagle]

TW,

It's not the fact that you don't vote, or anything else that you believe. It's the fact that you continually insult others who do not believe exactly like you, mock those engaged in activism, and appear to revel in causing as much division as you possibly can.

[sirachman]

To OP: ..no

[Kraig]

Wow you guys are really over reacting. TW doesn't hurt anything, if anything he helps people think about things they normally wouldn't.

Do you really thing in the year 2050, when we are all stuck in a decaying society with a global government, we think back and say "GODAMNIT, WE WOULD ALL BE FREE IF IT WASN'T FOR THAT DAMN TRUTH WARRIOR ON TEH FORUMZ". :rolleyes:

[acptulsa]

Do you really thing in the year 2050, when we are all stuck in a decaying society with a global government, we think back and say "GODAMNIT, WE WOULD ALL BE FREE IF IT WASN'T FOR THAT DAMN TRUTH WARRIOR ON TEH FORUMZ". :rolleyes:

Only in his wettest dreams.

[Kraig]

...right.

[Truth Warrior]

Perhaps. But you surely do know how to derail an excellent discussion and sink it in a cesspool of inanity.

And obviously proud of this utterly useless skill to boot.

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/profile.php?do=ignorelist (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/profile.php?do=ignorelist) Be my guest. :)

[Truth Warrior]

Goddamnit, TW!!! Freeing yourself is not enough!!! You must freedomize everyone else!!!!! Okay, komrade? :D Way beyond my humble abilities. ;)

:D

[acptulsa]

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/profile.php?do=ignorelist (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/profile.php?do=ignorelist) Be my guest. :)

This is your defense for trying to be the revolution's wet blanket? That it is possible to ignore you? Whatever.

Be sure not to leave the world a better place than you found it, now...

[Truth Warrior]

TW,

It's not the fact that you don't vote, or anything else that you believe. It's the fact that you continually insult others who do not believe exactly like you, mock those engaged in activism, and appear to revel in causing as much division as you possibly can. And that is stopping who from doing what exactly? Who ya gonna blame next, UEW? Aratus?

[Met Income]

http://www.amconmag.com/article/2005/mar/14/00017/

Marxism of the Right PDF

By Robert Locke

Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics often find an attractive political philosophy in libertarianism, the idea that individual freedom should be the sole rule of ethics and government. Libertarianism offers its believers a clear conscience to do things society presently restrains, like make more money, have more sex, or take more drugs. It promises a consistent formula for ethics, a rigorous framework for policy analysis, a foundation in American history, and the application of capitalist efficiencies to the whole of society. But while it contains substantial grains of truth, as a whole it is a seductive mistake.
There are many varieties of libertarianism, from natural-law libertarianism (the least crazy) to anarcho-capitalism (the most), and some varieties avoid some of the criticisms below. But many are still subject to most of them, and some of the more successful varieties—I recently heard a respected pundit insist that classical liberalism is libertarianism—enter a gray area where it is not really clear that they are libertarians at all. But because 95 percent of the libertarianism one encounters at cocktail parties, on editorial pages, and on Capitol Hill is a kind of commonplace “street” libertarianism, I decline to allow libertarians the sophistical trick of using a vulgar libertarianism to agitate for what they want by defending a refined version of their doctrine when challenged philosophically. We’ve seen Marxists pull that before.
This is no surprise, as libertarianism is basically the Marxism of the Right. If Marxism is the delusion that one can run society purely on altruism and collectivism, then libertarianism is the mirror-image delusion that one can run it purely on selfishness and individualism. Society in fact requires both individualism and collectivism, both selfishness and altruism, to function. Like Marxism, libertarianism offers the fraudulent intellectual security of a complete a priori account of the political good without the effort of empirical investigation. Like Marxism, it aspires, overtly or covertly, to reduce social life to economics. And like Marxism, it has its historical myths and a genius for making its followers feel like an elect unbound by the moral rules of their society.
The most fundamental problem with libertarianism is very simple: freedom, though a good thing, is simply not the only good thing in life. Simple physical security, which even a prisoner can possess, is not freedom, but one cannot live without it. Prosperity is connected to freedom, in that it makes us free to consume, but it is not the same thing, in that one can be rich but as unfree as a Victorian tycoon’s wife. A family is in fact one of the least free things imaginable, as the emotional satisfactions of it derive from relations that we are either born into without choice or, once they are chosen, entail obligations that we cannot walk away from with ease or justice. But security, prosperity, and family are in fact the bulk of happiness for most real people and the principal issues that concern governments.
Libertarians try to get around this fact that freedom is not the only good thing by trying to reduce all other goods to it through the concept of choice, claiming that everything that is good is so because we choose to partake of it. Therefore freedom, by giving us choice, supposedly embraces all other goods. But this violates common sense by denying that anything is good by nature, independently of whether we choose it. Nourishing foods are good for us by nature, not because we choose to eat them. Taken to its logical conclusion, the reduction of the good to the freely chosen means there are no inherently good or bad choices at all, but that a man who chose to spend his life playing tiddlywinks has lived as worthy a life as a Washington or a Churchill.
Furthermore, the reduction of all goods to individual choices presupposes that all goods are individual. But some, like national security, clean air, or a healthy culture, are inherently collective. It may be possible to privatize some, but only some, and the efforts can be comically inefficient. Do you really want to trace every pollutant in the air back to the factory that emitted it and sue?
Libertarians rightly concede that one’s freedom must end at the point at which it starts to impinge upon another person’s, but they radically underestimate how easily this happens. So even if the libertarian principle of “an it harm none, do as thou wilt,” is true, it does not license the behavior libertarians claim. Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.
Libertarians in real life rarely live up to their own theory but tend to indulge in the pleasant parts while declining to live up to the difficult portions. They flout the drug laws but continue to collect government benefits they consider illegitimate. This is not just an accidental failing of libertarianism’s believers but an intrinsic temptation of the doctrine that sets it up to fail whenever tried, just like Marxism.
Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free? What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners? What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society? What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways? What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?
In each of these cases, less freedom today is the price of more tomorrow. Total freedom today would just be a way of running down accumulated social capital and storing up problems for the future. So even if libertarianism is true in some ultimate sense, this does not prove that the libertarian policy choice is the right one today on any particular question.
Furthermore, if limiting freedom today may prolong it tomorrow, then limiting freedom tomorrow may prolong it the day after and so on, so the right amount of freedom may in fact be limited freedom in perpetuity. But if limited freedom is the right choice, then libertarianism, which makes freedom an absolute, is simply wrong. If all we want is limited freedom, then mere liberalism will do, or even better, a Burkean conservatism that reveres traditional liberties. There is no need to embrace outright libertarianism just because we want a healthy portion of freedom, and the alternative to libertarianism is not the USSR, it is America’s traditional liberties.
Libertarianism’s abstract and absolutist view of freedom leads to bizarre conclusions. Like slavery, libertarianism would have to allow one to sell oneself into it. (It has been possible at certain times in history to do just that by assuming debts one could not repay.) And libertarianism degenerates into outright idiocy when confronted with the problem of children, whom it treats like adults, supporting the abolition of compulsory education and all child-specific laws, like those against child labor and child sex. It likewise cannot handle the insane and the senile.
Libertarians argue that radical permissiveness, like legalizing drugs, would not shred a libertarian society because drug users who caused trouble would be disciplined by the threat of losing their jobs or homes if current laws that make it difficult to fire or evict people were abolished. They claim a “natural order” of reasonable behavior would emerge. But there is no actual empirical proof that this would happen. Furthermore, this means libertarianism is an all-or-nothing proposition: if society continues to protect people from the consequences of their actions in any way, libertarianism regarding specific freedoms is illegitimate. And since society does so protect people, libertarianism is an illegitimate moral position until the Great Libertarian Revolution has occurred.
And is society really wrong to protect people against the negative consequences of some of their free choices? While it is obviously fair to let people enjoy the benefits of their wise choices and suffer the costs of their stupid ones, decent societies set limits on both these outcomes. People are allowed to become millionaires, but they are taxed. They are allowed to go broke, but they are not then forced to starve. They are deprived of the most extreme benefits of freedom in order to spare us the most extreme costs. The libertopian alternative would be perhaps a more glittering society, but also a crueler one.
Empirically, most people don’t actually want absolute freedom, which is why democracies don’t elect libertarian governments. Irony of ironies, people don’t choose absolute freedom. But this refutes libertarianism by its own premise, as libertarianism defines the good as the freely chosen, yet people do not choose it. Paradoxically, people exercise their freedom not to be libertarians.
The political corollary of this is that since no electorate will support libertarianism, a libertarian government could never be achieved democratically but would have to be imposed by some kind of authoritarian state, which rather puts the lie to libertarians’ claim that under any other philosophy, busybodies who claim to know what’s best for other people impose their values on the rest of us. Libertarianism itself is based on the conviction that it is the one true political philosophy and all others are false. It entails imposing a certain kind of society, with all its attendant pluses and minuses, which the inhabitants thereof will not be free to opt out of except by leaving.
And if libertarians ever do acquire power, we may expect a farrago of bizarre policies. Many support abolition of government-issued money in favor of that minted by private banks. But this has already been tried, in various epochs, and doesn’t lead to any wonderful paradise of freedom but only to an explosion of fraud and currency debasement followed by the concentration of financial power in those few banks that survive the inevitable shaking-out. Many other libertarian schemes similarly founder on the empirical record.
A major reason for this is that libertarianism has a naïve view of economics that seems to have stopped paying attention to the actual history of capitalism around 1880. There is not the space here to refute simplistic laissez faire, but note for now that the second-richest nation in the world, Japan, has one of the most regulated economies, while nations in which government has essentially lost control over economic life, like Russia, are hardly economic paradises. Legitimate criticism of over-regulation does not entail going to the opposite extreme.
Libertarian naïveté extends to politics. They often confuse the absence of government impingement upon freedom with freedom as such. But without a sufficiently strong state, individual freedom falls prey to other more powerful individuals. A weak state and a freedom-respecting state are not the same thing, as shown by many a chaotic Third-World tyranny.
Libertarians are also naïve about the range and perversity of human desires they propose to unleash. They can imagine nothing more threatening than a bit of Sunday-afternoon sadomasochism, followed by some recreational drug use and work on Monday. They assume that if people are given freedom, they will gravitate towards essentially bourgeois lives, but this takes for granted things like the deferral of gratification that were pounded into them as children without their being free to refuse. They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock. Society is dependent upon inculcated self-restraint if it is not to slide into barbarism, and libertarians attack this self-restraint. Ironically, this often results in internal restraints being replaced by the external restraints of police and prison, resulting in less freedom, not more.
This contempt for self-restraint is emblematic of a deeper problem: libertarianism has a lot to say about freedom but little about learning to handle it. Freedom without judgment is dangerous at best, useless at worst. Yet libertarianism is philosophically incapable of evolving a theory of how to use freedom well because of its root dogma that all free choices are equal, which it cannot abandon except at the cost of admitting that there are other goods than freedom. Conservatives should know better.

[acptulsa]

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=182923

Plugging the name of the article's author into the forum search engine before posting is a quick and handy precaution.

[Truth Warrior]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Locke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Locke)

NEOCON!!! :p

[Danke]

Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics often find an attractive political philosophy in libertarianism, the idea that individual freedom should be the sole rule of ethics and government.

I consider myself to be mostly Libertarian, but that description doesn't fit me.


Neither are attainable, but Marxism as a goal is horrendous in its consequences. Libertarianism as a goal is glorious in its consequences.

[Truth Warrior]

I consider myself to be mostly Libertarian, but that description doesn't fit me.


Neither are attainable, but Marxism as a goal is horrendous in its consequences. Libertarianism as a goal is glorious in its consequences.

What's your opinion of the NAP? ;)

http://common-law.net/nap.html (http://common-law.net/nap.html)

[Met Income]

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=182923

Plugging the name of the article's author into the forum search engine before posting is a quick and handy precaution.

My fault. Please delete this, if necessary.

[Truth Warrior]

My fault. Please delete this, if necessary. No prob!<IMHO> You are forgiven. ;) :)

[heavenlyboy34]

Marxism as a goal is horrendous in its consequences. Libertarianism as a goal is glorious in its consequences.

qft!! :):D Now we just have to convince the "conservatives" of this. :eek:;):cool:

[Truth Warrior]

qft!! :):D Now we just have to convince the "conservatives" of this. :eek:;):cool:

"The problem with American conservatism is that it hates the left more than the state, loves the past more than liberty, feels a greater attachment to nationalism than to the idea of self-determination, believes brute force is the answer to all social problems, and thinks it is better to impose truth rather than risk losing one soul to heresy. It has never understood the idea of freedom as a self-ordering principle of society. It has never seen the state as the enemy of what conservatives purport to favor. It has always looked to presidential power as the saving grace of what is right and true about America." -- Lew Rockwell

[LibertyEagle]

qft!! :):D Now we just have to convince the "conservatives" of this. :eek:;):cool:

First, why don't you convince yourself. Since you are an Anarchist. :eek: ;) :cool:

Anarchy does not equal Libertarianism.

[Truth Warrior]

First, why don't you convince yourself. Since you are an Anarchist. :eek: ;) :cool:

Anarchy does not equal Libertarianism.

1. One who advocates maximizing individual rights and minimizing the role of the state.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/libertarian (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/libertarian)

[LibertyEagle]

FAIL.

Anarchy is the total absence of the state. That is not what Libertarians believe in.

[heavenlyboy34]

First, why don't you convince yourself. Since you are an Anarchist. :eek: ;) :cool:

Anarchy does not equal Libertarianism.

I'm already convinced. (that is, libertarian philosophy should prevail if the mediocre *imaginary* system of aggression against individuals called "the State" is allowed to exist at all) Happy Wednesday, LE. :) ~hug~

[heavenlyboy34]

FAIL.

Anarchy is the total absence of the state. That is not what Libertarians believe in.

Depends on which "libertarian" you ask, it seems.;):)

[LibertyEagle]

I'm already convinced.

Apparently not.

[jmlfod87]

First, why don't you convince yourself. Since you are an Anarchist. :eek: ;) :cool:

Anarchy does not equal Libertarianism.


Anarchy (or anarcho-capitalism) is the pinnacle of libertarianism. This explains why all of Ron Paul's closest friends (ie Lew Rockwell) or anarchists.

Robert Locke's arguments are inherently flawed because he states that privatization in some fields would lead to iinefficiency. That is a complete fallacy and reveals his ignorance of fundamental economic principles.

He is clearly a Hobbesian advocate of the Leviathan. He believes without strict state controls people will become evil. He simply deosn't understand that the drug abusers will not last long in an anarchic society because they would not have a state to throw them welfare checks when they lose their jobs.

[LibertyEagle]

Depends on which "libertarian" you ask, it seems.;):)

Same goes for conservatives. ;):)

[Auntie Republicrat]

I find it sickening when many stinking 'conservatives' try to claim they are 'libertarian'..

..You will note many 'conservatives' are near-constantly bitching..while my dictionary defines 'conservative' as ~ 'people who favor the staus quo!'..

.."CONSERVATIVES" SOUND STOOOOOOOOPID TO ME: i.e. ..always bitching about 'the way things are'..yet my dictionary, not stinking rush limbaaaaaa and glenn bicker, tells me they want to keep things the same!!) (sounds like the stinking 'conservatives' merely like to bitch!) ;)

[Truth Warrior]

Libertarians ( capital "L" ) tend to believe in the oxymoronic LP ( GOP lite ). :p :rolleyes: To the GOP they're anarchists.<IMHO>

Smaller government!!!! :eek:

[acptulsa]

I find it sickening when many stinking 'conservatives' try to claim they are 'libertarian'..

..You will note many 'conservatives' are near-constantly bitching..while my dictionary defines 'conservative' as ~ 'people who favor the staus quo!'..

.."CONSERVATIVES" SOUND STOOOOOOOOPID TO ME: i.e. ..always bitching about 'the way things are'..yet my dictionary, not stinking rush limbaaaaaa and glenn bicker, tells me they want to keep things the same!!) (sounds like the stinking 'conservatives' merely like to bitch!) ;)

Good job. Now, which groups of us are you going to try to drive a wedge betwixt next?

[heavenlyboy34]

Libertarians ( capital "L" ) tend to believe in the oxymoronic LP. :p :rolleyes:

I lol'ed ;):D

[heavenlyboy34]

I find it sickening when many stinking 'conservatives' try to claim they are 'libertarian'..

..You will note many 'conservatives' are near-constantly bitching..while my dictionary defines 'conservative' as ~ 'people who favor the staus quo!'..

.."CONSERVATIVES" SOUND STOOOOOOOOPID TO ME: i.e. ..always bitching about 'the way things are'..yet my dictionary, not stinking rush limbaaaaaa and glenn bicker, tells me they want to keep things the same!!) (sounds like the stinking 'conservatives' merely like to bitch!) ;)

Yep, that's pretty much how it works. ;):p

[LibertyEagle]

Anarchy (or anarcho-capitalism) is the pinnacle of libertarianism. This explains why all of Ron Paul's closest friends (ie Lew Rockwell) or anarchists.

ABSOLUTE and TOTAL BULLSHIT!

Look, I could care less what particular flavor of libertarianism you subscribe to or whether you are a libertarian at all, but this constant bashing of traditional conservatives and others who have supported Ron Paul for many years and who also love liberty, is getting way past the point of DISGUSTING. What's the goal anyway? Is it to finish driving everyone away from this movement who is not a card carrying Libertarian? Or in some cases, is it to attempt to destroy the movement altogether? Then what to do with those anarchists and others who don't vote at all? Do we burn them at the stake too?

Ron Paul has identified himself as the most conservative member of Congress, as a Christian, a libertarian, a Constitutionalist and a Republican.

DEAL WITH IT.

[Truth Warrior]

Statement of Purpose: Voluntaryists are advocates of non-political, non-violent strategies to achieve a free society. We reject electoral politics, in theory and in practice, as incompatible with libertarian principles. Governments must cloak their actions in an aura of moral legitimacy in order to sustain their power, and political methods invariably strengthen that legitimacy. Voluntaryists seek instead to delegitimize the State through education, and we advocate withdrawal of the cooperation and tacit consent on which State power ultimately depends.

http://www.voluntaryist.com/ (http://www.voluntaryist.com/)

[LibertyEagle]

So basically, you're trying to steer people away from what Ron Paul is trying to accomplish through the Young Americans for Liberty and the Campaign for Liberty.

[Truth Warrior]

Ron Paul: What you give up on is a tyrannical approach to solving a social and medical problem. We endorse the idea of voluntarism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntarism_(politics)), self-responsibility, family, friends, and churches to solve problems, rather than saying that some monolithic government is going to make you take care of yourself and be a better person. It's a preposterous notion, it never worked, it never will. The government can't make you a better person, it can't make you follow good habits. Why don't they put you on a diet, you're a little overweight...

The Morton Downey Jr. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton_Downey,_Jr.) Show, July 4, 1988

[Truth Warrior]

So basically, you're trying to steer people away from what Ron Paul is trying to accomplish through the Young Americans for Liberty and the Campaign for Liberty.

"Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try." -- Yoda

[LibertyEagle]

Ron Paul: What you give up on is a tyrannical approach to solving a social and medical problem. We endorse the idea of [/SIZE][/B]voluntarism, self-responsibility, family, friends, and churches to solve problems, rather than saying that some monolithic government is going to make you take care of yourself and be a better person. It's a preposterous notion, it never worked, it never will. The government can't make you a better person, it can't make you follow good habits. Why don't they put you on a diet, you're a little overweight...

The [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton_Downey,_Jr."]Morton Downey Jr. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntarism_(politics)) Show, July 4, 1988


Yes, Ron has always believed in a limited Constitutional government. That is not the same as NO government at all. Keep in mind that at the time that he appeared on that show, that he was running for office. ;)

“I have many friends in the libertarian movement who look down on those of us who get involved in political activity,” he acknowledged, but “eventually, if you want to bring about changes … what you have to do is participate in political action.” -- Ron Paul

[acptulsa]

Damn. Just damn.

Why am I reminded of the couple who began fighting over whether they should use the second New York City exit or the third just as soon as they left their driveway in Oakland?

[Truth Warrior]

Yes, Ron has always believed in a limited Constitutional government. That is not the same as NO government at all. Keep in mind that at the time that he appeared on that show, that he was running for office. ;)

“I have many friends in the libertarian movement who look down on those of us who get involved in political activity,” he acknowledged, but “eventually, if you want to bring about changes … what you have to do is participate in political action.” -- Ron Paul

Ron Paul: What you give up on is a tyrannical approach to solving a social and medical problem. We endorse the idea of voluntarism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntarism_(politics)), self-responsibility, family, friends, and churches to solve problems, rather than saying that some monolithic government is going to make you take care of yourself and be a better person. It's a preposterous notion, it never worked, it never will. The government can't make you a better person, it can't make you follow good habits. Why don't they put you on a diet, you're a little overweight...

The Morton Downey Jr. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton_Downey,_Jr.) Show, July 4, 1988
voluntarism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntarism_(politics)) ( click it! ;) )

[BuddyRey]

No offense to the OP, but this article = a steaming pile of bull$h!t obfuscatory statist apologetics, IMHO.

[LibertyEagle]

Yes, yes, TW. Personal responsibility, self government, etc. have long been basic principles of traditional conservatism. ;)

[acptulsa]

TW, you're giving me deja vu all over again, to misquote Yogi Berra. You've gone back into spambot mode.

Now, would you please, with or without the help of Lew Rockwell, Thomas Jefferson or whomever, tell me how having this discussion while living in this nation today (as it sits halfway down the road to socialism) is not more premature than soiling your drawers at the first touch of your wife's breast? Thank you.

[Truth Warrior]

TW, you're giving me deja vu all over again, to misquote Yogi Berra. You've gone back into spambot mode.

Now, would you please, with or without the help of Lew Rockwell, Thomas Jefferson or whomever, tell me how having this discussion while living in this nation today (as it sits halfway down the road to socialism) is not more premature than soiling your drawers at the first touch of your wife's breast? Thank you. Nah, I see NO REASON to merely reinvent the wheel, especially since I can't do it ANY better.<IMHO> :(

You'll need to talk to "Truth Teacher" for that. ;) :D

I might suggest: Butler Shaffer (http://www.lewrockwell.com/shaffer/shaffer-arch.html) since we only agree about 99.9% of the time. ;)

[mconder]

then libertarianism is the mirror-image delusion that one can run it purely on selfishness

but society does run purely on selfishness, it's just that some people like to use state power to steal what they want from the rest of us in the name of helping the poor or protetcing us from ourselves. I would put the writer of this article in that category. In the end, there are only two classes...the producers and the looters.

[Truth Warrior]

Yes, yes, TW. Personal responsibility, self government, etc. have long been basic principles of traditional conservatism. ;) I agree with Lew and Murray, etc., on that. :(

And the dictionary: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/conservative :D

[jmlfod87]

ABSOLUTE and TOTAL BULLSHIT!

Look, I could care less what particular flavor of libertarianism you subscribe to or whether you are a libertarian at all, but this constant bashing of traditional conservatives and others who have supported Ron Paul for many years and who also love liberty, is getting way past the point of DISGUSTING. What's the goal anyway? Is it to finish driving everyone away from this movement who is not a card carrying Libertarian? Or in some cases, is it to attempt to destroy the movement altogether? Then what to do with those anarchists and others who don't vote at all? Do we burn them at the stake too?

Ron Paul has identified himself as the most conservative member of Congress, as a Christian, a libertarian, a Constitutionalist and a Republican.

DEAL WITH IT.


Excuse me, what did I say that you deem to be 'bullshit'?


I don't recall bashing anyone. I'm merely stating facts. Ron Paul's best friend(Lew Rockwell) is self professed anarchist. Ron Paul cites Austrian economists (many of whom are anarchists) when arguing fiscal policy. Ron Paul has NEVER endorsed any government program in his political career.

Does that make him conservative? Yes. Does that make him libertarian? Yes. Does that make him a constitutionalist? Yes. You can be all those things at once. Its the classical liberal ideology of limited government and free market economics. No one is saying conservatives aren't welcome, just quit bashing us ultra-conservative libertarian/anarchists.

[Truth Warrior]

but society does run purely on selfishness, it's just that some people like to use state power to steal what they want from the rest of us in the name of helping the poor or protetcing us from ourselves. I would put the writer of this article in that category. In the end, there are only two classes...the producers and the looters.

"Society are people." -- Frank Chodorov

[mconder]

Libertarians rightly concede that one’s freedom must end at the point at which it starts to impinge upon another person’s, but they radically underestimate how easily this happens. So even if the libertarian principle of “an it harm none, do as thou wilt,” is true, it does not license the behavior libertarians claim. Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.

...and this is he genius of the founders keeping the states sovereign and giving them power to rule in these areas. If Utah banned porn out right, it gave people the ability to make another choice. If the U.S. or World government makes all these choices, as I am sure the author who like to see, then there is truly no choice at all. I do not like gambling and all the social ills that come with it, so I choose not to live in Nevada. So far, it's working out pretty good for me and the Nevadans.

[danberkeley]

FAIL.

Anarchy is the total absence of the state. That is not what Libertarians believe in.

What would you say are the differences between big-L libertarians and small-L liberetarians?

[jmlfod87]

But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.

He can choose to not have pornography in house. He can choose to take his children to a school that does not endorse pornography. He can choose to work in an office that does not endorse pornography. He can choose to go to a church that does not endorse pornography. He can choose to go to church-sponsored events that do not endorse pornography.

The religious right seem to think if something is legalized people are going to be smearing it into your face or something. Its absurd. Many different cultures can live in the same geographic area (in fact its called multi-culturalism). If there are so many people living in a society that don't appreciate pornography and the "vulgra culture" it creates, they can establish their own culture and have their own social gatherings without having the vulgar culture of pornography seep in.

[ChaosControl]

He makes some points but for the most part he shows that he doesn't even understand what libertarianism even is.

Of course there are good things other than just freedom and of course something isn't only good because you choose it. I don't even know where he came up with that.

Also, most libertarians aren't anarchists, so even libertarians recognize there should be a little government to have some order to prevent chaos. All in order to prevent the powerful from preying on the weak. The idea is to maximize liberty.

He commented on how libertarianism isn't elected and that it'd have to be forced on society, perhaps through a revolution. So what is wrong with mandating a specific type of government over another? It seems he would desire a true direct democracy by the way he wrote, tyranny of the majority and all that. You have to restrain government, so what if that is against the will of the people. One "freedom" people do not have is the "freedom" to put into place a government that will be authoritarian in nature and deny people freedoms. If one has to force a government into place that'd be limited and deny people the ability to vote away others liberties, then so be it.

[acptulsa]

What would you say are the differences between big-L libertarians and small-L liberetarians?

Mainly, a card. Beyond that, they are both such individualists that I would never go there. I don't see why we're so hung up on labels anyway.

In fact, I firmly believe that we are far better off rejecting labels completely. Obamabots love the damned things, and the less we use them the more people will find our discourse much less exclusive and much more enjoyable than theirs. While the socialists are busy sticking everyone they encounter in little boxes, we can be reassuring them that they really are individuals and celebrating their uniqueness. Now who wins their hearts and minds?

For God's sake, here we are drawing a line in the sand between anarchy and minarchy and fighting over it while the nation wanders off across the tracks to the socialist side of town. And, of course, the libertarians are "you said you were watching the child" and the anarchists are "you can't make me". Well, strange bedfellows, do we want a stimulating discussion or do we want our freaking liberties?

Seperate the libertarians by big and little l's. Fight over who gets to line up on the left and who gets to line up on the right. Yeah, we're making the average Joe want to join our fight. And the difference between this and tptb splitting us between 'pro life' and 'pro choice' and using it to set us at each others' throats is...? They're still laughing all the way to the bank.


He makes some points but for the most part he shows that he doesn't even understand what libertarianism even is.

Thank you for brilliantly cutting to the core of the matter. Well done. So, we spit on our bedfellows for being strange and they redefine what we believe and what we are in any way they choose because we're too busy bickering to stop them. Great.

[/rant]

[danberkeley]

Also, most libertarians aren't anarchists, so even libertarians recognize there should be a little government to have some order to prevent chaos.

I suppose there is very chaos when everyone is a slave under threat of the gun.



All in order to prevent the powerful from preying on the weak. The idea is to maximize liberty.

Because the State does not prey on the weak.


He commented on how libertarianism isn't elected and that it'd have to be forced on society, perhaps through a revolution. So what is wrong with mandating a specific type of government over another?

How exactly do you go about "forcing" libertarianism onto society?

[ChaosControl]

I suppose there is very chaos when everyone is a slave under threat of the gun.




Because the State does not prey on the weak.



How exactly do you go about "forcing" libertarianism onto society?

The state does prey on the weak, which is why you don't allow it to become too powerful. Power should never be too concentrated, whether it is in the government or an individual.

Well the constitution, if followed, does in a way force limited government on the people. If properly followed people could NOT vote themselves benefits, such as more food stamp funding or something like that. It is ultimately about restricting government, you're denying people the "freedom" to be authoritarians.

[acptulsa]

I suppose there is very chaos when everyone is a slave under threat of the gun.

I assume you mean, 'very little'. Well, when everyone is under the threat of foreign guns, there is actually quite a lot. Which is why I'm glad the Constitution allows the federal government to, among a very few other things, provide for the common defense.



Because the State does not prey on the weak.

You debating ChaosControl or Scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz?


How exactly do you go about "forcing" libertarianism onto society?

Read up on the French Revolution. Now, you tell me something. Are all governments exactly equal? Or is there something more noble about Switzerland's government than Zimbabwe's?

Edit: Should have left it to you, CC. I like your answers better... :o

[danberkeley]

Mainly, a card. ...

:confused:


I don't see why we're so hung up on labels anyway.

Labels serve a useful purpose. Mainly, to make thing clearer.


For God's sake, here we are drawing a line in the sand between anarchy and minarchy and fighting over it while the nation wanders off across the tracks to the socialist side of town.

Yup. I think it's because we've all rejected a full-blown state.

[danberkeley]

I assume you mean, 'very little'.

Yes. My bad.


Well, when everyone is under the threat of foreign guns, there is actually quite a lot. Which is why I'm glad the Constitution allows the federal government to, among a very few other things, provide for the common defense.

Should we not have private security companies?



Read up on the French Revolution. Now, you tell me something. Are all governments exactly equal? Or is there something more noble about Switzerland's government than Zimbabwe's?

Name me a current government that hasn't violated the non-aggression axiom.

[acptulsa]

:confused:

The term capital-l Libertarian is generally reserved for members of the Libertarian Party.

Now you answer me one, danberkeley. If our opponents are numerous, organized and rich with resources, how the hell are we going to individually defeat them? I don't give a damn how numerous we are. Divided we will fall, divided we will fail, divided we will be conquered. I don't care how far back in history you go, you will find confirmation of my assertion. Hell, just peruse the history of the Libertarian Party and the libertarian movement in this country and you'll see more examples than I can mention from memory--though I'm old enough to remember quite a few (Ruwart vs. Barr ring any bells?). Put that in your anti-collectivist pipe and smoke it.

[ChaosControl]

I don't know why there is fighting within the movement. Shouldn't the kinks be worked out after we are successful? If we just fight and become divided on issues of less importance then we lose the fight for the greater success making all these smaller quarrels absolutely pointless.

[acptulsa]

I don't know why there is fighting within the movement. Shouldn't the kinks be worked out after we are successful? If we just fight and become divided on issues of less importance then we lose the fight for the greater success making all these smaller quarrels absolutely pointless.

The Big Picture in as fine a nutshell as I've ever seen put around it. Thank you.

[Truth Warrior]

Collectivism (http://www.lewrockwell.com/shaffer/shaffer70.html)
It begins in your neighborhood, says Butler Shaffer.

[LibertyEagle]

I don't know why there is fighting within the movement. Shouldn't the kinks be worked out after we are successful? If we just fight and become divided on issues of less importance then we lose the fight for the greater success making all these smaller quarrels absolutely pointless.

Which is exactly why some are doing it.

[acptulsa]

Collectivism (http://www.lewrockwell.com/shaffer/shaffer70.html)
It begins in your neighborhood, says Butler Shaffer.

What has this got to do with the current discussion? Are you saying that you're so intellectually malleable that you're afraid to work with us a bit instead of antagonizing us constantly for fear you'll suddenly become addicted to the collective?

[Truth Warrior]

What has this got to do with the current discussion? Are you saying that you're so intellectually malleable that you're afraid to work with us a bit instead of antagonizing us constantly for fear you'll suddenly become addicted to the collective? You apparently just missed my answer to you a few pages back .................. conveniently. :( ( Thread post # 170 )

[danberkeley]

Now you answer me one, danberkeley. If our opponents are numerous, organized and rich with resources, how the hell are we going to individually defeat them?

Getting together.


Put that in your anti-collectivist pipe and smoke it.

G. Edward Griffin - Collectivism & Individualism
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6276223916862531753


Which is exactly why some are doing it.

It just happens that LE is the most hostile and most divisive member of RPF. :rolleyes:

[acptulsa]

Getting together.

Good plan. Strange bedfellows really are better than fighting alone.


It just happens that LE is the most hostile and most divisive member of RPF. :rolleyes:

Uh huh. Sorry, but I prefer the kindergarten teacher who refuses to let the class devolve into chaos to the one who just wants all the kids to like her. I've never seen LE get onto someone who didn't deserve it to some degree.

All this minarchy/anarchy debate is fine and good, but it does get divisive at times and it is distracting to people who are trying desperately to help move the nation in the right direction. Now, what can we do to elevate the comity in our discourse? Is it as simple as stopping to remind ourselves--often--that without these strange bedfellows each of us gets to try to storm the gates of the castle alone? Will that be enough, or will we be back to back-biting tomorrow?

How many days ago was it that some of us were being highly productive and effective in fighting this goofiness in Missouri? Two? Is that, or is that not, more productive than this? And if we have lost that much effectiveness in that short an amount of time, why? Is it a concerted effort from without to divide us? Is it us? What?


G. Edward Griffin - Collectivism & Individualism
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6276223916862531753

This doesn't help! Think for yourselves, don't just cut and paste! Cutting and pasting in answer to every question is as ridiculous on the face of it as passing 'one size fits all' laws!! If none of us can do this alone then is this worth doing at all and if it is, how do we get together on it?!

[Truth Warrior]

"When one gets in bed with government, one must expect the diseases it spreads." -- Ron Paul



"Freedom, Peace and Prosperity" -- Ron Paul

[danberkeley]

Uh huh. Sorry, but I prefer the kindergarten teacher who refuses to let the class devolve into chaos to the one who just wants all the kids to like her. I've never seen LE get onto someone who didn't deserve it to some degree.

lol.


All this minarchy/anarchy debate is fine and good, but it does get divisive at times and it is distracting to people who are trying desperately to help move the nation in the right direction.

Simply being on here means your preaching to the choir. I you want to grow the movement, sign off RPF and get off the computer and walk outside.

[acptulsa]

"When one gets in bed with government, one must expect the diseases it spreads." -- Ron Paul



"Freedom, Peace and Prosperity" -- Ron Paul

Well thank God the man, one, knows how to use a condom, and two, has more courage and backbone than some of us!!

[danberkeley]

This doesn't help! Think for yourselves, don't just cut and paste! Cutting and pasting in answer to every question is as ridiculous on the face of it as passing 'one size fits all' laws!!

I rather enojy the TW approach.

[acptulsa]

Simply being on here means your preaching to the choir. I you want to grow the movement, sign off RPF and get off the computer and walk outside.

Very preachy for someone who doesn't know me from Adam. Sorry you don't consider what I do here helpful.

[Truth Warrior]

I rather enojy the TW approach. Thank you! :) ;) ( Me too! :D )

[danberkeley]

Very preachy for someone who doesn't know me from Adam. Sorry you don't consider what I do here helpful.

Let's try this one more time. Everyone on this forum is already a memeber of the liberty movement. Therefore, if you want to grow this movement, then you will have to go outside and work. Thus, it is not possible to grow the movement by being on this forum. Btw, who is Adam?

[acptulsa]

You apparently just missed my answer to you a few pages back .................. conveniently. :( ( Thread post # 170 )

So you're the one who taught Biden and Palin how to not answer a question.


Let's try this one more time. Everyone on this forum is already a memeber of the liberty movement. Therefore, if you want to grow this movement, then you will have to go outside and work. Thus, it is not possible to grow the movement by being on this forum. Btw, who is Adam?

Very well. Now you keep everyone from turning on each other while I'm wandering about on this beautiful day preaching the gospel in the wilderness. Can I count on you?

Thought not.

Unless you're a prof there on the bay, I've been preaching this stuff since before you were born. Now excuse me if I try to keep the most promising movement in the right direction I've ever seen from being splintered in the same way I've seen every movement in the right direction splintered for four decades. Thank you.

[Todd]

They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock.


How's collectivism working out for ya with those things. :p

[LibertyEagle]

Let's try this one more time. Everyone on this forum is already a memeber of the liberty movement. Therefore, if you want to grow this movement, then you will have to go outside and work. Thus, it is not possible to grow the movement by being on this forum. Btw, who is Adam?

What you don't seem to understand is that some here are not interested in this movement at all and apparently would like nothing more than to tear it apart.

[Truth Warrior]

So you're the one who taught Biden and Palin how to not answer a question.

No, I basically learned that from YOU among SEVERAL others here. :D

Along with contextomy. :p :rolleyes: :(

( THREAD POST # 170 ) ;)

[danberkeley]

Very well. Now you keep everyone from turning on each other while I'm wandering about on this beautiful day preaching the gospel in the wilderness. Can I count on you?

Thought not.

I'm not the one who turn this thread from a discussion/debate about the article and its relevant issues to an attack on individual members of this forum.

[Truth Warrior]

What you don't seem to understand is that some here are not interested in this movement at all and apparently would like nothing more than to tear it apart.

Like the Missouri police chiefs ( and MAYBE even the Texas ones TOO )? ;)

[danberkeley]

What you don't seem to understand is that some here are not interested in this movement at all and apparently would like nothing more than to tear it apart.

Sure. And you dont seem to understand that you ARE the most hostile member on RPF. At least Josh_LA makes us laugh.

[danberkeley]

LE, how old are you? I'm 22 so please forgive me if I have an amateurish attitude.

(side note: i'm betting on 19 and 55)

[LibertyEagle]

Sure. And you dont seem to understand that you ARE the most hostile member on RPF. At least Josh_LA makes us laugh.

If you're talking about the fact that I won't sit here and allow a select few people to continually insult long-standing supporters of Ron Paul and of liberty, you're damn straight!

This continual pitting of libertarians against traditional conservatives, Christians against other faiths, anarcho-capitalists against those who believe in a limited constitutional government, is doing nothing other than destroying us from within. The goal appears to be to keep us infighting, which appears to fall right within the plan, as these few people have made it clear that they do not support this movement.

Most of us realize we have differences of opinion, but know we have to work together if we're ever going to be successful at any level. Others, appear to want to rip any chance of that apart.

[acptulsa]

Let's try this one more time. Everyone on this forum is already a memeber of the liberty movement. Therefore...

Back the truck up. I'll grant you that everyone here is an individual. Therefore, your collectivism is out the window. Isn't it?

[Xenophage]

I think it makes a sensible argument about objectivism.

Objectivism, especially pure randian stuff, is formulated specificly to counter marxism, especially Leninism.

libertarianism is not usually as strong as objectivism, and Ron Paul has pretty mild libertarianism. He advocates a roll back of the federal government, but not is dissolution, and he is pretty happy for states to have quite large governments as people will just move in our as they see fit.

No, no, and no. Sensible? He completely missed the point. Besides, I didn't see him mention Objectivism even once. Objectivists aren't anarcho-capitalists. The only way one could see "sense" in that gibberish is by falling prey to the same misunderstandings.

No right or wrong choices? Objectivism is pretty clear morally! Libertarianism is not a complete ethical philosophy, and hasn't got a lot to say about what's right or wrong for someone - except that to commit an act of aggression is wrong. Objectivism goes much farther than that. Its clear he wasn't talking about Objectivism, but even his analysis of libertarianism belies a deep confusion about the philosophy (and philosophy in general).

[LibertyEagle]

LE, how old are you? I'm 22 so please forgive me if I have an amateurish attitude.

(side note: i'm betting on 19 and 55)

Let's put it this way, I was a part of this movement before you were an itch in your daddy's pants.


At least Josh_LA makes us laugh.
I'm not here to make you laugh. Personally, I find the fact that our country has achieved most, if not all, of the 10 planks of the Communist Manifesto, has fallen off a cliff and is about 100 feet from hitting bottom, to be a rather serious matter.

[Truth Warrior]

I still wonder why Ron named his son, "Rand". Maybe it's just because of that typewriter company. :D

[LibertyEagle]

I still wonder why Ron named his son, "Rand". Maybe it's just because of that typewriter company. :D

Maybe because he didn't name him "Rand". That is a nickname.

[sailor]

This continual pitting of libertarians against traditional conservatives, Christians against other faiths, anarcho-capitalists against those who believe in a limited constitutional government, is doing nothing other than destroying us from within. The goal appears to be to keep us infighting, which appears to fall right within the plan, as these few people have made it clear that they do not support this movement.

Actually the way I see it far more infighting is initiated by mini-libertarians than by maxi-libertarians who tend only to respond.

The OP is point in case.

[acptulsa]

Its clear he wasn't talking about Objectivism, but even his analysis of libertarianism belies a deep confusion about the philosophy (and philosophy in general).

Considering all he thinks we want is more money, more sex and more drugs, I'd say you've made the understatement of the week. If that were all we were after, this movement would have fallen apart long, long ago.

Americans haven't lacked for any of these things in my lifetime.

[Truth Warrior]

Maybe because he didn't name him "Rand". That is a nickname. Now I wonder why "Rand" goes by "Rand". :D

[LibertyEagle]

Actually the way I see it far more infighting is initiated by mini-libertarians than by maxi-libertarians who tend only to respond.

The OP is point in case.

Yes, it was a divisive article, but it is FAR outweighed by the NUMEROUS articles that have been posted by a few members, slamming the others that I have already mentioned.

But. two wrongs don't make a right.

[LibertyEagle]

Now I wonder why "Rand" goes by "Rand". :D

Probably for the same reason a lot of people call me "Nance", when my first name is Nancy. :rolleyes:

[Truth Warrior]

Probably for the same reason a lot of people call me "Nance", when my first name is Nancy. :rolleyes: If you ran for public office and were a doctor, would you run as "Nance" _________? :confused:

Like Nance Pelosi? :D

[acptulsa]

From another thread:


I am fighting for our liberty by trying to secure our borders. Ron Paul, Michael Scheuer and others agree with me. You are nuts if you think open borders in this day and age will do anything to secure our liberties. You anarchists are living in your philosophical worlds, while the realists are trying to do what is necessary to fix the problem. Take your self rightious, la-la land, no- real- solution- to- the- problem arguments elsewhere. I'm not interested.


I don't think I am one of those people. The only utopia I am hoping to reach is one within my own personal standards. I simply cannot support something if I think it is morally wrong, even if it has some practical utility. I would gladly watch the world go to hell if I could also know I had no part in the wrongdoing that lead to it.

*sigh* Strange bedfellows indeed.

In my opinion, Deborah will draw us more support than Kraig. Maybe I'm wrong, but I really don't think so. Does that count for anything?

[LibertyEagle]

If you ran for public office and were a doctor, would you run as "Nance" _________? :confused:
Probably not, because I like my first name as it is.


Like Nance Pelosi? :D
:rolleyes:

Since we're playing make believe here, if you ran for office, would you use the moniker "Truth" Warrior, or would you use the more apt, "Couch Potato"? :p

[Truth Warrior]

Probably not, because I like my first name as it is.


:rolleyes:

Since we're playing make believe here, if you ran for office, would you use the moniker "Truth" Warrior, or would you use the more apt, "Couch Potato"? :p Does NOT compute. I'm an NAP guy.<IMHO> ;) :D

Maybe you could run as "Terrorist Nancy ______________". < LOL! >

[sailor]

Yes, it was a divisive article, but it is FAR outweighed by the NUMEROUS articles that have been posted by a few members, slamming the others that I have already mentioned.

But. two wrongs don't make a right.

Yeah but TW isn`t out against anyone specifically. I think he is a sarcastic, condescending asshole by nature.

[acptulsa]

Maybe you could run as "Terrorist Nancy ______________". < LOL! >

And who exactly is terrified of her? I hope you're enjoying using the same tactics as Missouri law enforcement.

By your standards I'm collectivist as hell, but I refuse to group myself with that crap.

Maybe the difference between libertarians and anarchists is libertarians have standards, while anarchists don't give a damn who they associate with. But then, I'm too much of a libertarian to group all anarchists in with you.

[Truth Warrior]

Yeah but TW isn`t out against anyone specifically. I think he is a sarcastic, condescending asshole by nature. Darn, I just work SO HARD to "dumb down" here. < sniff > :(

[jmlfod87]

Anarchists follow the non-aggression axiom to its rightful conclusion. Libertarians believe the government should maintain a monopoly on the use of force for some particular services (such as security).

[acptulsa]

Yeah but TW isn`t out against anyone specifically. I think he is a sarcastic, condescending asshole by nature.


Darn, I just work SO HARD to "dumb down" here. < sniff > :(

I have never in my life seen a working theory turn into a proven axiom so fast.

[heavenlyboy34]

Anarchists follow the non-aggression axiom to its rightful conclusion. Libertarians believe the government should maintain a monopoly on the use of force for some particular services (such as security).

Perhaps Libertarians believe this, but not too many libertarians do. (in my experience) Care to give examples of who you think exemplifies "Libertarian" and "Anarchist"? :confused:

[jmlfod87]

I am not a Libertarian, so I couldn't tell you. All I know is that anarcho-capitalism, described by Rothbard, is following the non-aggression axiom to its fullest meaning. Anything that doesn't follow the non-aggression axiom to completion can only claim to be a libertarian, not an anarchist. Anarchism is the extreme form of libertarianism.

[sailor]

Darn, I just work SO HARD to "dumb down" here. < sniff > :(

You mock everything but do it in oneliners so you never expose yourself to mocking in turn. And only post links to articles to back yourself up never writting like a normal person.

It comes out like you are way above us and can`t be assed to talk to us peasants face to face and with your own real words in a paragraph or two. Just with sarcastic oneliners and authorithative articles by old proffesors.

[Truth Warrior]

And who exactly is terrified of her? I hope you're enjoying using the same tactics as Missouri law enforcement.

By your standards I'm collectivist as hell, but I refuse to group myself with that crap.

Maybe the difference between libertarians and anarchists is libertarians have standards, while anarchists don't give a damn who they associate with. But then, I'm too much of a libertarian to group all anarchists in with you.

Ask her carefully "chosen" few, minus one. ;) You've gotten HOW MANY "RPF Guidelines" violations, warnings and banning since being here? :p

Lack of personal acknowledgment, doesn't alter any truth nor reality.<IMHO>

It's not a binary choice, more analog and relative.<IMHO> ;)

"An anarchist is anyone that believes in less government than you do." -- Bob LeFevre

Hence the mainline GOP view of the RP fans and supporters.

[danberkeley]

If you're talking about the fact that I won't sit here and allow a select few people to continually insult long-standing supporters of Ron Paul and of liberty, you're damn straight!


I havent insulted you. So why are you being hostile towards me. :rolleyes:


Others, appear to want to rip any chance of that apart.

Like who? Kade is gone. Electronicmaji is gone.


I still wonder why Ron named his son, "Rand". Maybe it's just because of that typewriter company. :D

His name is Randall "Rand" Paul.


Yes, it was a divisive article, but it is FAR outweighed by the NUMEROUS articles that have been posted by a few members, slamming the others that I have already mentioned.


I took it as an opportunity to polish up my analytical skills.


Probably not, because I like my first name as it is.

I like "Mean Moderator" better. :p


Since we're playing make believe here, if you ran for office, would you use the moniker "Truth" Warrior, or would you use the more apt, "Couch Potato"? :p

TW and hypotheticals dont go well together. :D


Anarchists follow the non-aggression axiom to its rightful conclusion.

Not hisotrically.
Please read this:
Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'?
by Murray N. Rothbard
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard167.html


Libertarians believe the government should maintain a monopoly on the use of force for some particular services (such as security).

Only the statist ones. :D

[danberkeley]

You mock everything but do it in oneliners so you never expose yourself to mocking in turn. And only post links to articles to back yourself up never writting like a normal person.

It comes out like you are way above us and can`t be assed to talk to us peasants face to face and with your own real words in a paragraph or two. Just with sarcastic oneliners and authorithative articles by old proffesors.

I think it's his avatar. :D

[acptulsa]

Ask her carefully "chosen" few, minus one. ;) You've gotten HOW MANY "RPF Guidelines" violations, warnings and banning since being here? :p

Lack of personal acknowledgment, doesn't alter any truth nor reality.<IMHO>

It's not a binary choice, more analog and relative.<IMHO> ;)

"An anarchist is anyone that believes in less government than you do." -- Bob LeFevre

Hence the mainline GOP view of the RP fans and supporters.

And this leads you to label her a terrorist.

Sorry the prospect of a warning or a ban frightens you so. My advice is get a life.

As for me, she no more knows me by sight than you, and we have no more connection than you. So, is the difference merely that she took a shine to me? Or is the difference that I earned her trust and you didn't? And if the latter, how?

[jmlfod87]

I was obviously referring to anarcho-capitalists like Rothbard himself. If I was referring to Kropotkin I don't think I'd be on this board in the first place, no?

[danberkeley]

I was obviously referring to anarcho-capitalists like Rothbard himself. If I was referring to Kropotkin I don't think I'd be on this board in the first place, no?

Who are you responding to / what are you refering to? Please use the "quote" function.

[jmlfod87]

You, obviously. No one else is talking to me. I've read that article months ago. Historically, anarchists have not followed the non-aggression axiom but that anarchism I was referring to was rothbardian anarcho-capitalism (obviously), which does follow that principle. I don't think this thread needs to go off on a tangent about the history of anarchism and the Kropotkin anarch-communist perversion of the modern form of anarchy being debated in this thread.

[Truth Warrior]

And this leads you to label her a terrorist.

Sorry the prospect of a warning or a ban frightens you so. My advice is get a life.

As for me, she no more knows me by sight than you, and we have no more connection than you. So, is the difference merely that she took a shine to me? Or is the difference that I earned her trust and you didn't? And if the latter, how? Nope, I got that label from the Missouri chiefs of police memo. ;)

Not exactly what I'd call a "moderate" view of "RPF Guidelines" enforcement, now is it? Yep, she's got her fans and supporters too. ;) Yep, you probably just get an automatic pass from her for being a member of the "movement" "collective". :(


So you're the one who taught Biden and Palin how to not answer a question. :D

[acptulsa]

Nope, I got that label from the Missouri chiefs of police memo. ;)

As I said, using their tactics. Glad I don't have the stomach for that.


Not exactly what I'd call a "moderate" view of "RPF Guidelines" enforcement, now is it? Yep, she's got her fans and supporters too. ;) Yep, you probably just get an automatic pass for being a member of the "movement" "collective". :(

:D

Sure, I've been skating along for ten thousand posts on my automatic pass. Anything you say--just so long as you finally find that last word you're so inordinantly fond of...

Good night, ya old curmudgeon. Hope your wife's too Christian to do to you what she really wants to do tonight. Now there's a truly terrifying thought for you!

[Truth Warrior]

As I said, using their tactics. Glad I don't have the stomach for that.



Sure, I've been skating along for ten thousand posts on my automatic pass. Anything you say--just so long as you finally find that last word you're so inordinantly fond of...

Good night, ya old curmudgeon. Hope your wife's too Christian to do to you what she really wants to do tonight. Now there's a truly terrifying thought for you! As sadly usual, only in your dreams. :(




So you're the one who taught Biden and Palin how to not answer a question.

[jmlfod87]

Hope your wife's too Christian to do to you what she really wants to do tonight.

Lol, that could be interpreted in more than one way...

[Truth Warrior]

Lol, that could be interpreted in more than one way... Yep, she's wilder than me, in several ways. :eek: ;) :) By and large, I like it. :D

[tmosley]

Marxism of the Right PDF (http://www.amconmag.com/pdfissue.html?Id=AmConservative-2005mar14&page=17)

By Robert Locke


Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics often find an attractive political philosophy in libertarianism, the idea that individual freedom should be the sole rule of ethics and government.

One could make a similar statement defining most any political movement. Defining any movement by the "worst" among them is divisive and doesn't serve any purpose other than to piss people off.


Libertarianism offers its believers a clear conscience to do things society presently restrains, like make more money, have more sex, or take more drugs. It promises a consistent formula for ethics, a rigorous framework for policy analysis, a foundation in American history, and the application of capitalist efficiencies to the whole of society.

This is true, though the author doesn't believe it.


But while it contains substantial grains of truth, as a whole it is a seductive mistake.

I think we will find that you have made a number of very serious mistakes.


There are many varieties of libertarianism, from natural-law libertarianism (the least crazy) to anarcho-capitalism (the most), and some varieties avoid some of the criticisms below.

If you feel that way, perhaps you should talk about those instead of deriding the whole group by putting them together with the "most crazy". Democrats hate it when we call them socialists. How do you think they would like it if we called them Filthy Commies? Communism and Marxism fall apart even when their "highest" ideals are applied. This happens no matter the extent of application. It is only the extent to which a society is free to produce (and individuals can profit from that production) that it can survive.


But many are still subject to most of them, and some of the more successful varieties—I recently heard a respected pundit insist that classical liberalism is libertarianism—enter a gray area where it is not really clear that they are libertarians at all.

You need to define your terms. Instead, you are using some definition known only to yourself, because libertarianism IS classical liberalism. Taxes on income did not exist in any meaningful way in this country until WWII. Those classes that were taxed (the extremely rich) were taxed at a very high rate, but there were so many write-offs that very few actually paid any taxes at all.


But because 95 percent of the libertarianism one encounters at cocktail parties, on editorial pages, and on Capitol Hill is a kind of commonplace “street” libertarianism, I decline to allow libertarians the sophistical trick of using a vulgar libertarianism to agitate for what they want by defending a refined version of their doctrine when challenged philosophically. We’ve seen Marxists pull that before.

Your failure to define your terms has degenerated into elitism, as your type is inclined to do. What is "street" libertarianism? What are their positions? I would venture a guess that the "refined" version that you refer to is that espoused by the Cato Institute, which is not libertarianism. That organization is centrist, leaning toward liberty, while not embracing it (and indeed apologizing for statist interventions).


This is no surprise, as libertarianism is basically the Marxism of the Right.

This is very wrong. Take a look at politicalcompass.org, and unlearn the left/right false duality that you are espousing. Libertarianism is a combination of individual and economic freedom. Liberals are generally pro-individual freedoms (gay rights, abolishing drug laws, etc), where conservatives are generally in favor of economic freedom (less regulation, less taxation, etc). The problem with both of those groups is that they also encompass evil ideology (liberals want to choke off economic production with taxes, conservatives want to choke off those not like them by outlawing behaviors they aren't comfortable with). The opposite of libertarianism is authoritarianism (or statism), like the opposite of liberal is conservative. Marxism and fascism both trend toward the authoritarian point of the compass, although they are (more or less) opposite in terms of left-right.



If Marxism is the delusion that one can run society purely on altruism and collectivism, then libertarianism is the mirror-image delusion that one can run it purely on selfishness and individualism.

You mistake both ideologies. The downfall of Marxism is that one can not centrally plan an economy. This has also been the downfall of our so-called "capitalist" economy. They thought that if you gave central planners enough power, they could control everything perfectly, and everyone would wind up happy. Capitalism, and by extent libertarianism, works because money, when it is of consistent supply, serves as a perfect measure of value. Prices self adjust over time to reflect the needs of society in a much more subtle and reflexive manner than any central planner ever could. By valuing production properly, you get more of it, and in exactly the way that is needed to enrich all participants. Those who supply the brainpower allow those who can only supply physical labor to receive dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of times as much for their labor as they could without the products of those minds. Tax the minds, and you get less mental power, to the detriment of society.


Society in fact requires both individualism and collectivism, both selfishness and altruism, to function. Like Marxism, libertarianism offers the fraudulent intellectual security of a complete a priori account of the political good without the effort of empirical investigation. Like Marxism, it aspires, overtly or covertly, to reduce social life to economics. And like Marxism, it has its historical myths and a genius for making its followers feel like an elect unbound by the moral rules of their society.

You are somewhat correct in your assertion that both collectivism and individualism are required for a functional society. The limits of collectivism are that we should be protected from foreign military threat, control of immigration (an extension of a military threat), protection from violence (police), protection from fraud, and providing a common forum for the redress of grievances (the court system). This, in addition to a code of laws that is set down and enforced, is all that is required. There is no need to pass laws attempting to prevent any crime. There is no need to expend resources prosecuting some action that may lead to a crime sometimes (such as drug laws). With those basic protections in place, we have as much security as we need. Any additional support you think is needed for the poor or for whatever other purpose can be provided by voluntary means (charity), just as it has been for thousands of years. Most religions command their followers to be charitable. It is not the role of government to mandate charity.


The most fundamental problem with libertarianism is very simple: freedom, though a good thing, is simply not the only good thing in life. Simple physical security, which even a prisoner can possess, is not freedom, but one cannot live without it.

I beg to differ. I could do just fine without all the "security" at airports. With all the "security" that comes from government monitoring my finances, or my movements, or those that I associate with. The fools who rule us think that it is their job to prevent violent acts, even while they provoke more violence in every sector (prohibition of drugs causes drug violence, occupation of foreign lands causes terrorism, etc). That doesn't even mention the fact that a government as large as ours is big enough to give us anything we want--though it declines to--is large enough to take everything away from us, which it is doing through taxation, civil asset forfeiture, eminent domain, and other confiscary policies.


Prosperity is connected to freedom, in that it makes us free to consume, but it is not the same thing, in that one can be rich but as unfree as a Victorian tycoon’s wife.

There is no such thing as a "freedom to consume", although the government often claims such a right by printing and spending money. What we want is the right to PRODUCE and afterwards, the right to FREE EXCHANGE. We don't ask to become hindu cows, mooching off of the pity and charity of others. We ask to be able to produce things to exchange for whatever it is that we want, so long as no-one is compelled against their will to participate, or is harmed involuntarily.


A family is in fact one of the least free things imaginable, as the emotional satisfactions of it derive from relations that we are either born into without choice or, once they are chosen, entail obligations that we cannot walk away from with ease or justice. But security, prosperity, and family are in fact the bulk of happiness for most real people and the principal issues that concern governments.

Emotional satisfaction comes from free exchange between individuals, such as between a husband and a wife. I don't think many parents get much emotional satisfaction from compelling their children to be somewhere they don't want to be, or forcing them to do something that they hate. Given the choice, almost all children will obey their parents most of the time, and will follow them willingly. Force is generally not needed. These days, government won't even allow a parent to apply force to their child (ie spanking). Indeed, these days, government has grown large enough that they can tell parents how to raise their children, and can seize them for little or no reason.


Libertarians try to get around this fact that freedom is not the only good thing by trying to reduce all other goods to it through the concept of choice, claiming that everything that is good is so because we choose to partake of it.

Again, this is wrong. Things aren't good because they are freely chosen, they are bad because they are forced on us, at gunpoint or implied gunpoint whenever the government is involved. Give us 30% of your income or we'll shoot you (or lock you in a box). Raise your children the way we say, or we'll shoot you or put you AND your children in a box, until we can find a more cooperative couple to take your child. Obey our morality (don't do drugs, don't possess certain types of pornography, etc) or we'll shoot you or put you in a box.


Therefore freedom, by giving us choice, supposedly embraces all other goods. But this violates common sense by denying that anything is good by nature, independently of whether we choose it.

You have to define "good". What is good for one person or company (a bailout of a floundering company, for example), may be bad for everyone else (because they printed the currency to pay for it causing inflation, or obtained it via taxes). Generally, "good" is defined in a social sense. If something contributes to society, it is good, but if it harms society, it is "evil". If it harms one society while helping another, then it is both "good" and "evil" (this is the source of the flawed philosophy of moral relativism). However, when one runs a nation on the principle of freedom, the only controls needed on the populace are those of natural rights enforcement (ie no theft, murder, assault) and border control (prevention of human smuggling, etc).



Nourishing foods are good for us by nature, not because we choose to eat them. Taken to its logical conclusion, the reduction of the good to the freely chosen means there are no inherently good or bad choices at all, but that a man who chose to spend his life playing tiddlywinks has lived as worthy a life as a Washington or a Churchill.

If nourishing food is inherently good, then more nourishing food must be better, right? So if we all just kept eating, perhaps if we were hooked up to machines that would force feed us 24/7 that would be the greatest good, wouldn't it? The fact is that being able to chose to eat when hungry and being able to chose to stop eating when full are choices. Your moral relativism reflects the decay of our socialist society today.

Considering Churchill's outspoken support for the policies of Hitler, I think I would rather have had someone playing tiddlywinks all day. Non-intervention by government in foreign affairs is always better than the alternative, save in self defense matters.


Furthermore, the reduction of all goods to individual choices presupposes that all goods are individual. But some, like national security, clean air, or a healthy culture, are inherently collective. It may be possible to privatize some, but only some, and the efforts can be comically inefficient. Do you really want to trace every pollutant in the air back to the factory that emitted it and sue?

Government hasn't done a particularly good job in this respect either. If someone had owned the Love Canal waterway, I can guarantee you that a certain factory would have been sued out of existence before it needed a bloody Superfund (that's money from Krypton) to clean it up. Air pollution is only tricky when the amounts are so small that they are untraceable (in which case they probably aren't dangerous). When you have a coal plant spewing toxic sludge into the air, it's pretty easy to know who to blame when it comes to blackened lungs among the locals. Removing government regulations that favor big business and make them harder to sue will allow people to get redress much easier.


Libertarians rightly concede that one’s freedom must end at the point at which it starts to impinge upon another person’s, but they radically underestimate how easily this happens. So even if the libertarian principle of “an it harm none, do as thou wilt,” is true, it does not license the behavior libertarians claim. Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.
Your writings are vulgar and profane. You should be hauled off to a box at gunpoint.

Notice how arbitrary that was? It's a slippery slope, and an impingement of human dignity. You say we are born into our families without choice, but you forget that we are born into our bodies without choice. There is nothing inherently vulgar about the naked body, or any act that could be committed by that body, save that it doesn't harm a non-consenting individual. You can take your Puritanical ideas and shove 'em, buddy.


Libertarians in real life rarely live up to their own theory but tend to indulge in the pleasant parts while declining to live up to the difficult portions. They flout the drug laws but continue to collect government benefits they consider illegitimate.

I hope you have some sort of figures or source on this. No? You're just blowing smoke from the straw man? I guess so.


This is not just an accidental failing of libertarianism’s believers but an intrinsic temptation of the doctrine that sets it up to fail whenever tried, just like Marxism.

Yeah, because there are so many nations that have tried libertarianism at some point in their history and failed because of it. Hint, the US was the only one that ever tried it, and it ushered in an era of unprecedented growth despite the drawbacks of a colonial economy. Notice how all the other American colonies that broke away and adopted other systems are in the gutter now? Yeah...

[tmosley]

Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free?

In such a situation (which hasn't occurred in the US since the Revolution), citizens would take up arms to defend their country. Due to the freedom allowed to individuals, many would already be skilled riflemen. Indeed, despite our rulers attempts to disarm us, we have maintained a martial tradition. None would ever dare to invade the US, as illustrated by Admiral Yamamoto during WWII.

"You cannot invade the mainland United States.
There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass."
- Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto
(Japanese Navy)

Combine an armed populace with a reasonably sized military, and you have a nation that no-one wants to invade, unless they are intent on destroying their own military capacity, rather than that of the enemy.


What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners?

Who would be unfriendly to us? We would have done no harm to anyone were it not for our foolish interventionist military policies. If oil were cut off, some enterprising individual or company would come up with an alternative that would truely work, absent government impediment in the form of taxes and regulations, or in the form of government subsidies, which makes uneconomical activity profitable (see corn ethanol).


What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society?

Citizens are less well educated today than they were 50 years ago. The United States has fallen behind virtually every other industrialized nation in the world in terms of education. Federal intervention in education has done nothing but decrease scores and entrench a faction of looter teachers who demand pay based on how long they have been working, rather than the quality of education they receive. Government intervention ALWAYS screws up economical calculations. ALWAYS. You are not smarter than the people at the state level. The people at the state level are not smarter than the people at the municipal level. The people at the municipal level are not smarter than the citizenry.


What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways?

...Or so they can give it to some developer to increase their tax base.


What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution? Such a scheme would be struck down as unconstitutional. Also, they wouldn't want to do it, as foreigners come here to make a better life, not to reduce this nation to a hovel like the one they left.


In each of these cases, less freedom today is the price of more tomorrow. Total freedom today would just be a way of running down accumulated social capital and storing up problems for the future. So even if libertarianism is true in some ultimate sense, this does not prove that the libertarian policy choice is the right one today on any particular question.

You are a thug. You demand that people give you something today in exchange for more tomorrow, yet your kind never deliver. You say "Oh, the tax is temporary" yet we still have to pay it 10, 20, 100 years later.


Furthermore, if limiting freedom today may prolong it tomorrow, then limiting freedom tomorrow may prolong it the day after and so on, so the right amount of freedom may in fact be limited freedom in perpetuity.

"Give up your freedoms! You'll never get them back, but it's for the best! Trust us!"

You should also remember that as you say that, you are holding a gun to the head of every citizen you are robbing of their present and their future. You comment blithely that you will also be putting a gun to our children's heads as well. You don't want to admit it, but you are nothing but a thug in jackboots.


But if limited freedom is the right choice, then libertarianism, which makes freedom an absolute, is simply wrong.

And if black were white, and up were down, we'd all live in a magical land where guns produce anything we want or need.


If all we want is limited freedom, then mere liberalism will do, or even better, a Burkean conservatism that reveres traditional liberties. There is no need to embrace outright libertarianism just because we want a healthy portion of freedom, and the alternative to libertarianism is not the USSR, it is America’s traditional liberties.

America's traditional liberties ARE libertarian liberties. Your philosophy is robbing us of those freedoms. The end result of that is systemic collapse like that of the USSR.


Libertarianism’s abstract and absolutist view of freedom leads to bizarre conclusions. Like slavery, libertarianism would have to allow one to sell oneself into it. (It has been possible at certain times in history to do just that by assuming debts one could not repay.)

One can work to repay one's debts directly to the owner of the debt, but the owner of the debt can NOT violate the rights of that person any more than they could any other employee. Slavery is a permanent status, and is passed on to the children, which is absolutely against everything libertarianism is about.


And libertarianism degenerates into outright idiocy when confronted with the problem of children, whom it treats like adults, supporting the abolition of compulsory education and all child-specific laws, like those against child labor and child sex. It likewise cannot handle the insane and the senile.

You talk as if libertarianism were a person. In truth, there is a legal status called "guardianship" which children fall under (the parents are usually the guardians by default). The senile or the insane follow the same profile. The guardian makes those types of decisions. In the case that the guardian is unfit (ie he or she submits the child to abuse), then he will either have his guardianship stripped or go to prison, depending on the crime (much the same as is done now, only with different standards ie not sending the child to school, or having the child work before they turn 16 is not grounds for removal).


Libertarians argue that radical permissiveness, like legalizing drugs, would not shred a libertarian society because drug users who caused trouble would be disciplined by the threat of losing their jobs or homes if current laws that make it difficult to fire or evict people were abolished.

Drugs were legal in this country until the 1920's. They didn't cause any more damage then than they do now, after countless billions (trillions?) have been spent trying to counter human nature. You might as well try to outlaw drinking water.


They claim a “natural order” of reasonable behavior would emerge. But there is no actual empirical proof that this would happen. Furthermore, this means libertarianism is an all-or-nothing proposition: if society continues to protect people from the consequences of their actions in any way, libertarianism regarding specific freedoms is illegitimate. And since society does so protect people, libertarianism is an illegitimate moral position until the Great Libertarian Revolution has occurred.

Natural order emerges in most systems (think black markets). Governments stop the emergence of such orders, and punish their efficient operations. If governments were to stop intervening so much, things would get better. It is NOT an all-or-nothing proposition, although the current government is attempting to force it in that direction, and as such, is setting itself up for collapse.

You also confuse "society" with "government". Government is to the public what the mafia is to a shopkeeper. They may pretend to be friendly, but the fact is that one group carries either the implicit or explicit threat of violence over the other at all times and in all dealings. If "society" wanted to protect people from the consequences of their actions, then they would, through volunteerism and charity. There are a lot of charities out there now, and the rich tend to give more than the poor, so it amounts to the same thing, but without the massive bureaucracy or the threat of violence. WIthout that bureaucracy to support, there would be more money to give, and to spend, increasing the size of the legitimate economy. There would also be more productive workers (ie former government employees), so production would go up, and goods would get cheaper, and everyone wouldn't have to work so hard to survive.


And is society really wrong to protect people against the negative consequences of some of their free choices? While it is obviously fair to let people enjoy the benefits of their wise choices and suffer the costs of their stupid ones, decent societies set limits on both these outcomes.

A decent society doesn't force it's citizens to comply with their leader's ideas of "fairness" at the point of a gun. Charity works. You should try it.


People are allowed to become millionaires, but they are taxed.

Thank you, great master, for "allowing" us to feed and clothe you, and put a roof over your heads! Thank you for letting us keep some portion of our income which you decide is fair! So very kind of you!


They are allowed to go broke, but they are not then forced to starve.

Yes, except when you decide that they are too big to fail, then you give them unending amounts of our (the productive people's) money. Also kind of you.


They are deprived of the most extreme benefits of freedom in order to spare us the most extreme costs. The libertopian alternative would be perhaps a more glittering society, but also a crueler one.

Who are you to decide what is extreme, and what is barely surviving? If half the people in the country stopped working, would you expect me to let my family starve in order to feed them? You would take from one to feed another, thereby reducing both to the same level, totally dependent on the state to decide who eats and who doesn't? Why bother to work then? Just increase your need so that you will get more in handouts. Commit fraud to get extra money from the government. Whatever it takes to survive, you know? This is where your system of looting breaks down, when you drive out the productive members of society for the sake of "helping" the poor, when you wind up making everyone poor and destroying your own economy.


Empirically, most people don’t actually want absolute freedom, which is why democracies don’t elect libertarian governments. Irony of ironies, people don’t choose absolute freedom. But this refutes libertarianism by its own premise, as libertarianism defines the good as the freely chosen, yet people do not choose it. Paradoxically, people exercise their freedom not to be libertarians.

Really? Here I thought it was because we have a two party system in the US, and a system that forces moderation (stagnation) elsewhere. Perhaps it's also because of the enormously powerful propaganda machine you people have set up by taking control of our schools? Perhaps it's your control over our airwaves and the regulation of mass media?


The political corollary of this is that since no electorate will support libertarianism, a libertarian government could never be achieved democratically but would have to be imposed by some kind of authoritarian state, which rather puts the lie to libertarians’ claim that under any other philosophy, busybodies who claim to know what’s best for other people impose their values on the rest of us. Libertarianism itself is based on the conviction that it is the one true political philosophy and all others are false. It entails imposing a certain kind of society, with all its attendant pluses and minuses, which the inhabitants thereof will not be free to opt out of except by leaving.

Libertarian rule can be constituted by spread of our message and education. It can also be instituted by the overthrow of a now despotic government controlled by fools just like you. Not all libertarians are minarchists, nor are they all pacifists. We will defend ourselves against aggression. We will defend our rights, and to the death. Those same rights that you want to give up for all time in order to gain a little safety (remember Ben Franklin? "He who would trade a little liberty for a little safety deserves neither and loses both").


And if libertarians ever do acquire power, we may expect a farrago of bizarre policies. Many support abolition of government-issued money in favor of that minted by private banks.

The vast majority of libertarians support a gold standard. When the money is backed by gold (or IS gold), it doesn't really matter who issued it. If banks want to issue fiat currency, let them. It can only promote growth. If they fail, let them fail, people can always go back to gold, especially if it is in circulation.


But this has already been tried, in various epochs, and doesn’t lead to any wonderful paradise of freedom but only to an explosion of fraud and currency debasement followed by the concentration of financial power in those few banks that survive the inevitable shaking-out.

And yet it worked in China for three hundred years, before the government got involved and decoupled from gold, causing hyperinflation, and the eventual collapse of the empire. If the banks issuing currency commit fraud, the banks are disbanded, and the fraudsters go to jail and/or pay restitution. Those who manage their currency well survive, and there are no monopolies.


Many other libertarian schemes similarly founder on the empirical record.

Many more non-libertarian schemes have foundered as well.


A major reason for this is that libertarianism has a naïve view of economics that seems to have stopped paying attention to the actual history of capitalism around 1880. There is not the space here to refute simplistic laissez faire, but note for now that the second-richest nation in the world, Japan, has one of the most regulated economies, while nations in which government has essentially lost control over economic life, like Russia, are hardly economic paradises. Legitimate criticism of over-regulation does not entail going to the opposite extreme.

You mean the same Japan that hasn't had any economic growth for the last two and a half decades? You mean the Russia that was taken over by statist Russian mafia? Laissez faire economics works incredibly well (but there apparently isn't space here here refute your non-claims.


Libertarian naïveté extends to politics. They often confuse the absence of government impingement upon freedom with freedom as such. But without a sufficiently strong state, individual freedom falls prey to other more powerful individuals. A weak state and a freedom-respecting state are not the same thing, as shown by many a chaotic Third-World tyranny.

The more powerful the group impinging on your freedoms, the worse off you are. Weak states lack the basic protections required for ANY society to function (most notably protection from violent crime and fraud), but at least the government isn't seizing the fruits of your labor (assuming some local warlord doesn't do the same thing). This is the difference between libertarianism and anarchy. Grouping the two together is like saying that democrats and communists share the same ideology. It's just not true.


Libertarians are also naïve about the range and perversity of human desires they propose to unleash. They can imagine nothing more threatening than a bit of Sunday-afternoon sadomasochism, followed by some recreational drug use and work on Monday. They assume that if people are given freedom, they will gravitate towards essentially bourgeois lives, but this takes for granted things like the deferral of gratification that were pounded into them as children without their being free to refuse. They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock. Society is dependent upon inculcated self-restraint if it is not to slide into barbarism, and libertarians attack this self-restraint. Ironically, this often results in internal restraints being replaced by the external restraints of police and prison, resulting in less freedom, not more.

Why do you hate freedom so much? The fact is that if you treat people like adults, the vast majority will ACT like adults. Your forced attendance schools are the main impediment to children becoming full-fledged adults by 15 or earlier. The fact is that people who don't practice self restraint in a libertarian society will end up in the same place that they do now, in prison or the gutter.


This contempt for self-restraint is emblematic of a deeper problem: libertarianism has a lot to say about freedom but little about learning to handle it. Freedom without judgment is dangerous at best, useless at worst. Yet libertarianism is philosophically incapable of evolving a theory of how to use freedom well because of its root dogma that all free choices are equal, which it cannot abandon except at the cost of admitting that there are other goods than freedom. Conservatives should know better.

You are the one who has contempt for self restraint. You want the government to restrain us. You want the government to tell us what is good and what is bad, you want more laws, so you don't have to think. You don't understand philosophy, either. Libertarianism is NOT moral relativism. It is moral Objectivism. Freedom is what ALLOWS us to use our judgement. The more laws you and your kind write, the less you have to think. The less you have to think, the less you are ABLE to think. When you abandon your minds, the world falls to pieces. You wave your guns at the night sky screaming "GIVE ME LIGHT!", and shoot the ground shouting "GIVE ME FOOD!" but it isn't the sky that lights our cities at night, and it's not the ground that grows the food we produce. Nor can your guns compel the sky or the earth to produce. It is our minds that allow these things to produce what we want and need. You scream at us "YOU MAKE TOO MUCH MONEY!" and take it from us, and give it to some wastrel, wallowing in the mud, crying that he has no food, until he goes home to his multimillion dollar mansion that he bought with money that you expropriated from us with your guns. Once it becomes easier to do nothing than to produce, watch out, because your bullets can only force men to give what they have, they can't force them to produce, nor can they force the world to produce.

You are a thug. I pray that you see the error of your ways before it is too late.

[Xenophage]

I still wonder why Ron named his son, "Rand". Maybe it's just because of that typewriter company. :D

Remington Rand! Maybe he was confused and was trying to name him after a rifle.

[Brassmouth]

Sounds like the writer knows neither Marxism nor Liberty.
Mostly sounds like an Apologist for authoritarianism.

My thoughts exactly.

[LibertyEagle]

Ask her carefully "chosen" few, minus one. ;)
I've chosen no one.


You've gotten HOW MANY "RPF Guidelines" violations, warnings and banning since being here? :p
The infractions you've received (and all that I'm seeing were yellow card warnings) were because of your own actions and roughly half of them were issued by Bryan.


Lack of personal acknowledgment, doesn't alter any truth nor reality.<IMHO>
I agree and it's about time you acknowledge your own personal responsibility for your actions.


It's not a binary choice, more analog and relative.<IMHO> ;)
What in hell are you talking about? :rolleyes:


"An anarchist is anyone that believes in less government than you do." -- Bob LeFevre

No, an anarchist believes in 0 government.

Hence the mainline GOP view of the RP fans and supporters.
What's your point?

[danberkeley]

Well, it looks like LE helped derail another thread. Good thing tmosley is getting us back on track.

[euphemia]

Marxism of the Right PDF (http://www.amconmag.com/pdfissue.html?Id=AmConservative-2005mar14&page=17)

By Robert Locke


Free spirits, the ambitious, ex-socialists, drug users, and sexual eccentrics

Sounds like Congress.