Letters to the Editor
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I can give you one clear example of "loony libertarianism" anyway
It's somewhere in Murray Rothbard's online work at the Mises Institute, where he calls for the privatisation of the police force.
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@Rowan
I'm so glad you said that. Not because I agree with it, which I do, it's insane, but because now the harpies will descend on you for awhile!
I needed a respite.
;-)
I'm off to bed for a bit. I get about four hours then I'm up again.
cheers
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um .. and the whole judicial system ...
the trouble is, I am not going into that site to look for it. It's probably in the pdf files of "Left and Right" which was a magazine he was involved with some time back in the Vietnam era. When libertarianism is sufficiently wacky, as it seems to have been in his version of it, it's kind of entertaining to look at from afar, it's sort of scenic. But seriously, to call for the privatisation of the judicial system is to attempt to abolish politics altogether in favour of economics. It's the suicide of political thinking as such. It makes me rather angry when I think about the implications for a massively armed global super-power, and I can only thank heavens that the dollar is collapsing at long last. If it was an individual, rather than a state, that was flirting with this sort of thing, I would call it a psychosis.
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Oh, Mona!!
"But can I at least wear my merkin? If so, agreed."
Of course you may wear your merkin. It never pays to catch cold.
You may, however, wish to touch up the color a tad. I had it done in gray so I could use it as a toupe' and never got around to changing it back.
Pedinska wanted to change from the Hully Gully to the Hokey Pokey until I warned her of the dangers of stopping short. She's in!
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@Rowan Berkeley
It's somewhere in Murray Rothbard's online work at the Mises Institute, where he calls for the privatisation of the police force.
I'm a libertarian but not a Rothbardian, as is true of most mainstream libertarians.
http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/07/renewing-a-discussion-of-this-sites-purpose-liberals-and-libertarians-together/#comment-2560
http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/07/renewing-a-discussion-of-this-sites-purpose-liberals-and-libertarians-together/#comment-2570
I value the common law deposit this nation continued from its British inception, and the difference between libertarians and anarchists (among other things) is that the former generally thinks as I do on such matters.
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Rowan BerkeleyI
I'm wondering if you have ever taken the Political Compass quiz?
Most of the regulars here have and the majority fall fairly close together on the two dimensional scale..
http://www.politicalcompass.org/
I suspect you might be surprised to find out you have a libertarian streak, most of the regulars here do..
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@Rowan, et al
One of your contrymen was on Bill Moyers tonite, law professor Phillipe Sands:
Excellent segment on the tortue issue, you can probably watch it online here:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/index-flash.html
back to bed
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Oh, Mona!
I'm stealing that from Jebbie.
Watch the health care segment on Moyers, too.
Another reason why Uncle Milty thought Nixon was the most "socialist" of presidents of the 20th century.
Apparently Hillycare ("socialized medicine") was first proposed by... Nixon in his 1974 SOTU.
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@LWM et al re: when military intervention is justified
Another reason why Uncle Milty thought Nixon was the most "socialist" of presidents of the 20th century.
Um, it was the "wage and price controls." Any Dem proposing that would be labeled a commie. By definition, wage and price -- especially price -- controls are a command and control economy, and it was Tricky Dick who introduced those.
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Now I am angry
And I can't sleep.
20,000 Americans die each year as a result of having no insurance, being under insured, or having necessary procedures denied in spite of having insurance. That's 5 times as many Americans dying needlessly each year as the total death toll from this useless war in five years.
Both situations are abominations. You just can't ignore one and focus on the other. Lives are lives.
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Ignore this: "@LWM et al re: when military intervention is justified"
My effing computer remembers "too much" and inserts old headers I do not intend. And which are non sequiturs.
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@Mona
I thought you got a new "effing computer"?
I know it was the primarily the wage and price controls. Are you suggesting Uncle Milty thought the sweeping healthcare reforms and national health insurance Nixon was proposing were non-socialist ideas? If so, I am glad to hear it.
PRESIDENT RICHARD NIXON:I shall propose a sweeping new program that will assure comprehensive health-insurance protection to millions of Americans who cannot now obtain it or afford it, with vastly improved protection against catastrophic illnesses."
Then Watergate happened...
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No one wants to stop the flames ...
It's somewhere in Murray Rothbard's online work at the Mises Institute, where he calls for the privatisation of the police force.
-- Rowan Berkeley
Glenn was wrong, the people who emailed him and wanted you people to stay on topic were kidding him. I see page after page of posts about "loony libertarians" and no intellectual argument in support of that comment.
Just because you bought into your 5th grade social studies teacher's vision of a wonderful America does not mean elementary school thinking is correct.
Here we see a position that Rothbard wrote about at length laughed off without the intellectual honesty to tell us why it would not work. Rothbard was showing how the market would provide a better (no one said perfect) solution than the state. There are blogs all over the net dedicated to showing the abuses of the so-called justice system here in America.
It you want to show me that private protection agencies would never work, then at least explain your wonderful thugs and their brutal, illegal practices of today.
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Private justice
... seriously, to call for the privatisation of the judicial system is to attempt to abolish politics altogether in favour of economics.
You missed the whole point. The point is to do away with the state and its monopoly on the legal use of force and replace it with the voluntary cooperation that naturally arises when the state is not pointing guns at everyone. It is the same with private justice; it has been tried before and found to work well. Perhaps you skimmed over that part of the arguments.