The Libertarian Party doesn't make my cut. There are two major factions within the Libertarians, similar in some ways to the two main factions in the Republican Party, i.e., social libertarians and economic/fiscal libertarians. I (naturally) agree with social libertarians in that I feel the state has no business intruding in matters of sexuality, freedom of speech, association, etc. I deeply disagree with the tendency of libertarian thought that would remove the state from things like the provision of health care, education, infrastructure, etc.

As a lifelong, lower-case "L" libertarian, I understand why you think all of that -- I've never joined nor voted for the LP. But many mainstream libertarians, e.g., Cato and Reason, take pragmatics into consideration in matters like education or infrastructure, and would only like to be sure that whatever the state does to meet a health care crisis does not establish a bureaucratic, rent-seeking monster that ends of with the power to dictate your personal choices by denying you treatment if, say, you smoke or are 50 lbs overweight. Or a Bush-type admin that could deny it if you, gay or straight, catch an STD. He who takes the king's coin dances his jig, and what not. (And yes, the "pre-existing condition" impediment in the scheme we have now is a similar and godawful issue.)

Libertarians are always going to favor the means that most leaves choice in the consumer's hands and cuts out bureaucratic, middle-men with a vested interest in expansion and power accumulation. Not all of us see zero role for safety net programs; we simply worry about how they are implemented.

Nor do many of us oppose all public infrastructure, or rational things like a driver's license, You can find libertarians who think a driver's license is one step removed from Stalinism. But many political groups have their nutbars.

But then we have our Arthur Silbers, about whom Chris Floyd wrote:

(And no one has limned the moral insanity of the new war fever with more power and urgency and eloquence than Arthur Silber. He has demolished the bogus arguments, exposed the true context and fatal delusions of the "debate" and proposed practical solutions to try to head off the coming disaster. Check out his work for a most unsentimental education about the realities of our time.)

Finally, I don't think any third party is a realistic alternative.

Actually, I'd like to catch up with you. Post a comment saying any damn thing at my post Glenn linked to with a real email address (that only I will see), and I'll write ya.

Sayeth dataguyx:

An abuse of the Greenwald soapbox

I would NEVER expect to have this kind of a diary from Greenwald. I think it's an abuse of trust to use this space for this kind of idiotic witchhunt.

Look buster, the equality rights of gay and lesbian Americans are no minor issue (she, a white heterosexual declares). Glenn doesn't address this subject often even tho he is gay, because his primary calling is to opposing authoritarian neoconservatism and the attendant corruption of the Constitution and the rule of law. But Pam has been on his blogroll since he began blogging in '05, and one can be reasonably sure he is entirely aware of what her focus tends to be.

About issue of the post, I have found that many African-American men are indeed deeply homophobic, including one I dated. We got into a huge fight about it once, when I asked him how he'd feel about me if I spoke about blacks the way he felt about "fags." That relationship didn't last long. And the deeply religious blacks I know in my little corner of the Midwest -- and they are overwhelmingly religious -- tend to take umbrage at the notion that the struggle for gay equality is anything remotely akin to, say, the ending of Jim Crow.

As a straight white woman I don't feel comfortable posting on this subject and have never blogged about it, but there is indeed a homophobia problem among blacks and I think Obama stepped in it big time by aligning his campaign with a "cured" gay man who attacks those who remain true to themselves. If the Republican "Southern strategy" and the Willie Horton ad were so execrable (all while Republicans of course mouthed platitudes about the evil of racism), how is Obama's behavior any different?

You are no better than my American Irish-Catholic forebears who hated "niggers" even as they themselves were vilified by WASPS for their popishness and ostensible allegiance to a foreign potentate (the Pope). The filthy micks could at least continue to despise the blacks and thus feel they weren't the highest on the totem pole of the despised.

bet you enjoyed writing the word "nigger'" in your weak personal attack on me because I dared to have an opinion that was not in step with your pedestrian view..

Real white of ya Mona...

Got me there. See, the KKK about 15 years ago dropped its opposition to papists, and even tho I'm an atheist, they looked aside at both that and my my Irish ethnicity. I was SO PROUD to join.

You are the flip side of shooter and nabblfuckwit.

Your [Thrasher's] approach to dialogue on this matter is part of the problem, not the solution.

The ironic thing is, I am deeply conflicted about your call to add gays and lesbians to the list of protected classes against whom employers may not discriminate. As one of those "zany" libertarians I tend to put freedom of association above compelled commerce or association. But I boycotted Cracker Barrel while it discriminated against gays.

That said, if ANYONE needs class protection these days, it is gays and lesbians.

But most of all, it is absurd for Thrasher to suggest Glenn hides behind your skirts, or that you would be Glenn's "mouthpiece." Both of you say what you mean in no uncertain terms. Glenn is Glenn, and Pam is Pam.