Letters to the Editor
-
And William
To this day, people on the right will tell you the Nazis were socialists because "socialist" was in the Nazi party's name. They were not socialists. They killed socialists. And those people aren't libertarians, so... no deal.
-
@ L.W.M. The "libertarian"
What a joke. You claim to be a Libertarian yet you take a dump all over Ron Paul and call him a fascist? Have you ever seen any of the recent interviews with Paul where they characterize him as a "Libertarian running for the Republican Nomination"? You know that he ran for President in 1988 on the Libertarian ticket, right? As a Libertarian, you do frequent sites like www.lewrockwell.com, home of the paleolibertarians, and see how much support Ron Paul has among them, right?
You claim Paul is a fascist, but do you realize how closely related real conservatism is with libertarian ideology? Beside Immigration and Abortion, Libertarians all over the net love Ron Paul, but I guess these aren't the Libertarians you associate yourself with? Let me guess, Ron Paul, Lew Rockwell, and all of the other people who are associated (and will be historically associated) with Libertarianism are wrong, and you, keyboard warrior on Salon, have it right? Get real, did you ever think that maybe they aren't the ones who don't understand Libertarianism, since it is SO complex?
Ron Paul is a Libertarian and you sir, are no Ron Paul (or a Libertarian for that matter). Get informed about what you claim to be before you go talking trash and badmouthing the one candidate running for the Presidency that most closely represents Libertarian values. Hillary Clinton is anything but Libertarian, she is the total opposite, a Big Government loving Statist. You are probably as Libertarian as Eric Dondero. Why don't you just find some other contradicting ideology to attach your views to like he did. He choose neolibertarianism, aka "total farce and closet neocon", which BS flavor of it do you want?
-
Where's Minion Bucky?
I hurt myself laughing at the following:
Beautiful image
LWM, sitting at home in his lonely apartment, his vintage "Die Yuppie Scum" T-shirt and his extra-husky Transformers Underoos, writing hate mail to Simon Wiesenthal and updating the Wikipedia entry on Henry George.
What, you couldn't get a solo ticket for the IceCapades?
I am still trying to forget I ever read that; what comedian wrote that for god's sake? I was concentrating on Glenn's idea of a 'noble and good' America before Bush, and now all I can do is sit here and laugh.
Damn. :-)
-
Mmm....
The Almighty in his/her wisdom, has given sheep the unparalleled ability to make more sheep; that is why they need no sentinels, except for those who protect the owner's purely economic interest in ungulate increase.
As for LRRH, well, she too is well-armed against predators, once she loses the tacky hood and cape. The wolf enamored forgets his hunger, after all.
And libertarians as wolves? Nah, I don't think so. More like seagulls, I should think, or geese.
-
straying OT--impeachment
If I may turn away from the libertarians for a moment, I'd like to ask GG if he's given any further thought to the whole impeachment issue of late. FDL has had a good (and ongoing I guess) discussion of commutation, censure, impeachment and the like. But one can never have enough opinions from counsel on such issues. What do you think, GG?
-
And while you are at it, WT
It might not hurt you to look yourself:
WHAT IS LIBERTARIANISM?
It's hard to clearly define libertarianism. "It's a dessert topping!" "No, it's a floor wax!" "Wait-- it's both!" It's a mixture of social philosophy, economic philosophy, a political party, and more. It would be unjust for me to try to characterize libertarianism too exactly: libertarians should be allowed to represent their own positions. At least two FAQs have been created by libertarians to introduce their positions. But the two major flavors are anarcho-capitalists (who want to eliminate political governments) and minarchists (who want to minimize government.) There are many more subtle flavorings, such as Austrian and Chicago economic schools, gold-bug, space cadets, Old-Right, paleo-libertarians, classical liberals, hard money, the Libertarian Party, influences from Ayn Rand, and others. An interesting survey is in chapter 36 of Marshall's "Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism", "The New Right and Anarcho-capitalism."
This diversity of libertarian viewpoints can make it quite difficult to have a coherent discussion with them, because an argument that is valid for or against one type of libertarianism may not apply to other types. This is a cause of much argument in alt.politics.libertarian: non-libertarians may feel that they have rebutted some libertarian point, but some other flavor libertarian may feel that his "one true libertarianism" doesn't have that flaw. These sorts of arguments can go on forever because both sides think they are winning. Thus, if you want to try to reduce the crosstalk, you're going to have to specify what flavor of libertarianism or which particular point of libertarianism you are arguing against.
Libertarians are a small group whose beliefs are unknown to and not accepted by the vast majority. They are utopian because there has never yet been a libertarian society (though one or two have come close to some libertarian ideas.) These two facts should not keep us from considering libertarian ideas seriously, however they do caution us about accepting them for practical purposes.
STRATEGIES FOR ARGUMENT
Many libertarian arguments are like fundamentalist arguments: they depend upon restricting your attention to a very narrow field so that you will not notice that they fail outside of that field. For example, fundamentalists like to restrict the argument to the bible. Libertarians like to restrict the argument to their notions of economics, justice, history, and rights and their misrepresentations of government and contracts. Widen the scope, and their questionable assumptions leap into view. Why should I accept that "right" as a given? Is that a fact around the world, not just in the US? Are there counter examples for that idea? Are libertarians serving their own class interest only? Is that economic argument complete, or are there other critical factors or strategies which have been omitted? When they make a historical argument, can we find current real-world counterexamples? If we adopt this libertarian policy, there will be benefits: but what will the disadvantages be? Are libertarians reinventing what we already have, only without safeguards?
There are some common counterarguments for which libertarians have excellent rebuttals. Arguments that government is the best or only way to do something may fail: there are many examples of many government functions being performed privately. Some of them are quite surprising. Arguments based on getting any services free from government will fail: all government services cost money that comes from somewhere. Arguments that we have a free market are patently untrue: there are many ways the market is modified.
There are a number of scientific, economic, political, and philosophical concepts which you may need to understand to debate some particular point. These include free market, public goods, externalities, tragedy of the commons, prisoner's dilemma, adverse selection, market failure, mixed economy, evolution, catastrophe theory, game theory, etc. Please feel free to suggest other concepts for this list.
One way to bring about a large volume of argument is to cross-post to another political group with opposing ideas, such as alt.politics.radical-left. The results are quite amusing, though there is a lot more heat than light. Let's not do this more often than is necessary to keep us aware that libertarianism is not universally accepted.
LIBERTARIAN EVANGELISTIC ARGUMENTS
Evangelists (those trying to persuade others to adopt their beliefs) generally have extensively studied which arguments have the greatest effect on the unprepared. Usually, these arguments are brief propositions that can be memorized easily and regurgitated in large numbers. These arguments, by the process of selection, tend not to have obvious refutations, and when confronted by a refutation, the commonest tactic is to recite another argument. This eliminates the need for actual understanding of the basis of arguments, and greatly speeds the rate at which evangelists can be trained.
Without preparation, even blatantly fallacious arguments may disturb or convince a targeted individual. Evangelists, who tend to be more interested in effect than in accuracy, don't tend to point out that there are usually lots of valid counterarguments available, sometimes known for millennia.
If the target is not the person spoken to (it may be a group of onlookers, such as the lurkers in newsgroups or listeners on a radio show), we might expect that the "discussion" will focus on making the person spoken to seem wrong, ridiculous, uncomfortable, at a loss, etc.
Small wonder many people are not interested in entering "discussions" with evangelists! They're likely to be out-prepared, swamped (or worse convinced) by specious arguments, and possibly used as a cat's paw in the persuasion of listeners...
http://world.std.com/~mhuben/faq.html#what
and so on... True, I am not as patient, well read or erudite as you, WT. And I am a bit too combative for some people's tastes. Well, I apologize for that and i'll try to cut back on my spinach.
http://world.std.com/~mhuben/libindex.html