Look, LWM has a true idée fixe on the subject of libertarians. I've been down this same road with him back when Glenn was still at blogspot. He doesn't have a clue about the landscape of contemporary American libertarianism as represented by outlets such as Reason or Cato. For a time I ignored him, but he seems to have grudgingly been willing to give me some sort of "pass" in the last few months, and even admitted he doesn't know what he's talking about nearly as well as I do when it comes to discussing the arguments of F.A. Hayek.

Because of this obsession of his, it is not uncommon for Glenn's threads to get hijacked with the "libertarian wars." I try not to encourage that any more, out of respect for Glenn.

In the meantime, however, I proudly point out that one of my libertarian co-bloggers (and Reason's Dave Weigel), who writes under the cyber-nom "Thoreau," was today assaulted by The Weekly Standard. (Neocons do not like them no libertairans.) Thoreau has had many nice things to say about Ron Paul, and I am quite certain he could sniff any incipinet fascism in the doctor from TX.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2007/07/lieberman_restore_that_fear.asp

Do not try to eradicate [libertarians], I beg you. They are harmless, for one thing, and for another, nothing is more disheartening than watching a man try to rid his dwelling of cockroaches with an icepick.

So, now we libertarians are "cokcroaches." I expect better from you.

I called you wolves, Mona

Yes, but bombastic bullshit about libertarians is your signature eccentricity; it is not surprising. It is coming from WT.

And please do not speculate as to my waxing and waning comment output. My relative lack of commenting lately has ZERO to do with Lew Rockwell fans participating here, and unless and until they embrace the true fascist whose work Rockwell publishes -- and that most assuredly is not Ron Paul -- I'm cool with them.

Basically an angry drunken redneck clown. With a higher credit score. Take someone who's ever been hassled by the cops. Add some hateradio bullshit. A dash of racism. Stir until convinced you have a slightly higher standard of living than all the people you hate. Pour out on a hot bed of fuck you.

Outfduckingstanding! Truly just awesome; you clearly have the Ann Coulter formula for demonizing those with whihc you disagree down very well. Yup, you are as nuanced and insightful in your views of libertarians as she is about all those treasonous liberals.

I salute you, Mr. Coulter.

Well, I cannot stand Neal Boortz, and he and I pissed at each other in a particular forum back in the CompuServe days. His "libertarianism," as with that of Glenn Reynolds, morphed into authoritarianism in the wake of 9/11, the fear-mongering of the Bush GOP, and the neocons.

But no, libertarians most decidedly are not "rednecks who want to smoke dope." That's an absurd -- and ignorant as well as offensive -- characterization of me, the libertarians I blog with (Thoreau is a newly minted professor of physics teaching in the U of California system), the Reason crowd, the Cato Institute, F.A. Hayek, Milton Freidman & etc. Glenn has repeatedly cited Cato papers with strong approval, and I really doubt redneck potheads would be authoring anything Glenn would find worthwhile.

Can the plaintiffs be the entire US citizenry?

No, and for good reason. With some very narrow and inapplicable exceptions, mere citizenship does not confer standing to sue -- this is long-settled law.

Glenn's post is exactly accurate and he is also very right that standing doctrine, limiting it, is absolutely necessary to avoid the specter of the judicial branch routinely acting as the ultimate legislative branch. Every time Congress passes a law someone may not like, there is no "standing" to file suit against it simply by arguing that the law is bad, wrong etc. and as a citizen one objects. The "cases and controversies" language in the Constitution that Glenn cites becomes nugatory were it otherwise.

I found the result in yesterday's 6th Cir. decision disappointing, too. But I expected it. Lawyers all over the place have been predicting it would fall on the standing issue; indeed, as soon as the NSA program became known in December of '05, the issue of the standing hurdle arose several times at Glenn's old blog. I recall directly asking him in comments what -- in the absence of some party who found that they had been a target of the illegal surveillance -- could generate standing, and he couldn't come up with anything -- nor could a lot of other very smart lawyers who ardently opposed this lawlessness.

The judgment you describe is sort of like the "there is no proof tobacco hurts anybody" argument the tobacco industry used so successfully for over forty years

Respectfully, no. The situation of standing here is more analogous to someone who wants to sue an asbestos company by arguing s/he has lived in 11 different apartments and worked in 7 different buildings, and thinks they might someday become ill due to asbestos exposure. They are not ill, and have no idea whether any of these buildings even had any asbestos in them, but they claim standing to sue, anyway.