Eventually, it happens to all of us. You’ll be talking to someone, online or in person, who seems completely normal. Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the person will say something really weird, like “You can’t fix a problem like underpaid public school teachers by just throwing money at them!” or “Why do they need tax-funded traffic lights at this corner? All the cross-traffic’s already stopped, which shows the Free Market works!” or “Hitler was a Communist! They called themselves the ‘National Socialists’ for a reason!”

You, my friend, have just made the unpleasant discovery that you’ve been talking to a Libertarian.

Now don’t get me wrong! Most smart people are, to a certain extent, libertarians with a lower-case “L.” We all like to be left alone to determine the course of our own lives without state intrusion. But Capital-L Libertarians tend to take those admirable sentiments to their logical extreme, wanting to shrink fire departments and public libraries and FEMA down to the size where they can be drowned in Grover Norquist’s bathtub, or, failing that, at least stabbed to death like Marat.

And some of them are smart people despite it all: they’ve just been sadly misled. I blame the proselytizers, who are every bit as creepily efficient as the Scientologists, if not quite as well regarded by society.* Young people, who from time immemorial have had to learn to find their way among varying political philosophies, come upon deceptive “political quizzes” left laying around on the internet like leg-hold traps in a beaver pond, designed to lure the unwary into the clutches of Official Libertarianism. The carefully designed questions display a subtle, nearly undetectable bias in favor of a Libertarian point of view:

Complete this sentence: “That government is best which…”
1) “…takes all the money out of my bank account.”
2) “…bludgeons cute little fluffy baby ducks to death.”
3) “…governs least.”
4) “…takes all the money out of my bank account and bludgeons cute little fluffy baby ducks to death.”

And after about 89 similar questions designed to pinpoint their opinons mathematically, the test-takers are told to plot themselves appropriately on a two-axis political graph. “If you land in the shaded area,” they’re told, “You Just Might Be A Libertarian!”

Libertarian politics test results

And they get sucked in from there.

Now most new Libertarians eventually, after repeated contact with reality, temper their beliefs. This article is not about them, the people who concede that some taxes are necessary to pay firefighters, who recognize that their success as business people might just depend on public education to give them a pool of potentially competent employees, and so forth. These people are fun to argue with over beer, once they get past the zealot stage. And it’s just possible that you might be the person who provides that needed spark of thought, who points out that, oh, I dunno, the government they decry for limiting suburban construction in the old growth forest also paves the roads that make housing developments in other places possible, or that their popular Free Marketeer blog owes its existence to several decades of government funding of ARPANET. If those don’t work, sometimes these people are persuaded when it’s pointed out to them that back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate, and a very few people got very wealthy while the rest of us died of food poisoning or coal mine collapses or shirtwaist factory fires. Or you can just give them a copy of Paulina Borsook’s Cyberselfish. With repeated exposure to reality, over time, the rational libertarian will grant that absolutism is not very useful, usually at about the same time they get their learner’s permit.

But there are some Libertarians who remain unswayed by such ugly facts. Whether through persistent ignorance or sociopathy or a mixture of the two, they hold as an article of near-religious faith that they derive no benefit from the modern regulatory apparatus that they could not duplicate on their own with the homebrew FDA they have in their garage. Or even worse, they manifestly hold the welfare of others as far less important than their own profit and comfort. (As an example of that last, witness this notable Bay Area Libertarian, a meat-packing magnate, who did not want the law to see how his sausage was made.) In a cutthroat economic free-for-all, with the mass of people on the bottom and a handful of ruthless Machiavellian princes at the top, each one of these goobers thinks it’s inevitable that he (gender specificity deliberate) will inevitably become one of the princes.**

You cannot argue these people into rationality, nor can you persuade them by logic to show compassion for their fellow humans. The best you can do is to make their heads explode with simple, fact-based declarative sentences. I’ve found a few reliable ways to do so, which I will describe here briefly. (You might know of others. Feel free to describe them in comments.) Using these sentences will cause Libertarian cultists to sputter, stammer, and occasionally start to think. Worst-case scenario: these sentences will usually at least cause them to shut up, and it’s hard to downplay the importance of that in making your typical day a bit rosier.

Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #1: Mentioning Libertarian history.

Most American Libertarians have precious little grasp of the history of their political philosophy. They seem to think that the Libertarian school of thought sprang fully formed like Athena from Ayn Rand’s beetled brow, with Robert Heinlein as attending midwife. Libertarianism’s true origins, however, unsettle most Libertarians to the point where the mere acceptance of that history often starts those rusty old mental gears grinding again. To wit, and here is tactical nuclear sentence number one:

“Libertarianism originated in the philosophy of a left-wing French political philosopher who also influenced Karl Marx.”

The French Philosopher in question is, as some of you have guessed (and with whose description a few of you are no doubt ready to quibble), Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who famously penned the Libertarians’ Sekrit Motto, “Property is Theft.”  Of course unlike modern Libertarians, Proudhon meant that as a condemnation. Among the pre-Marxist political thinkers strongly influenced by Proudhon was Johann Kaspar Schmidt, who under the pen name Max Stirner wrote one of the first true capital-L Libertarian texts, Der Einzige und sein Eigentum, which can be translated either as “The Ego and Its Own” or, more literally and more tellingly, “The Individual And His Property.” Stirner became a nucleus of a nascent school of political thought then called “individualist anarchism,”*** whose inheritance-tax-free heirs include Ludwig Von Mises, The Austrian and Chicago Schools, Murray Rothbard, Alan Greenspan, and so on.

Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #2: Mentioning Libertarianism’s siblings.

But Proudhon (and to a certain extent, Stirner) also influenced a number of political philosophers and activists who extended the anarchist critique of power relations to the economic sphere: Bakunin, Tolstoy, Kropotkin, Goldman, Malatesta, etc. The early twentieth century saw a mass Anarchist movement in the industrial world, and though that got pretty much squelched the philosophy lived on, to influence much of the modern progressive left. Despite the Libertarians’ historically illiterate insistence that socialism is synonymous with totalitarianism, much of current left thought is libertarian at its root, which provides us with the useful sentence:

“I’m a libertarian socialist.”

Of course, it’s easier to say that if you actually are one, but the definitions of both adjectives are broad enough to encompass a range of people from Noam Chomsky to Paul Wellstone. In fact, the boundary between libertarian socialist and liberal democrat is pretty much impossible to delineate with any kind of precision: people who are libertarian socialists in the long view are often liberal democrats in the moment.

What’s the more libertarian way of running the world? Coming up with ever-evolving procedures by which the largest number of people possible have the largest amount of input possible into the policy by which we run the world, moderated by recognizing certain expertise and the efficiency of delegating some decision-making — which is a bright-eyed and optimistic way of describing the mission of liberal democracy**** — or letting the people who are best at accumulating money bribe, bully , and blackmail their way into running huge sections of the world?

Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #3: Mentioning Libertarianism’s blindspot.

That accumulation of serious political power is the end result of the Libertarian political wankdream, and yet somehow boss-based coercion escapes the Libertarian scrutiny to which municipal zoning boards and feminist bloggers with itchy banning fingers are routinely subjected.

Look at it this way: what would you call a political system that regulates its subjects activities on a minute-by-minute basis; that often requires of its citizens prior restraint on freedom of speech; that controls where its subjects go, what they wear, and who they talk to; that restricts online reading material in a Beijing-style manner; that has a rigid hierarchy to enforce edicts from the upper echelons and do routine surveillance of the rank and file; that denies its subjects privacy even to the point of demanding the right to examine their urine; and that punishes infractions by permanent banishment?

Some people would call it a dictatorship. But many of us call it “the workplace.” Somehow, Libertarians never seem to object to restrictions of Liberty done by The Boss. “You can always get another job,” they say, as if that answers anything, as if the class of people who can leave a job blithely isn’t the same class that’s most likely to be able to pick up and move away from a conventional, state-based dictatorship. And as corporations extend their control to people outside their employ, with DRM and increasingly prevalent, shameless propaganda and their own armed forces and even co-optation of the nominal forms of governmental authority, the truth of our next useful sentence becomes ever more manifestly clear, that sentence being:

“Corporations are governments.”

Which is, of course, the libertarian socialist criticism of Libertarianism in soundbite form. I’ve never known a Libertarian to be able to answer that one without changing the subject completely, usually to a defense of Guantanamo from a Libertarian POV. At which point they’ve been made incapable of influencing anyone who’s not a fellow Libertarian, which means you can get on with your life. Try it and see!

* And without the soup cans. And also without the practicing medicine without a license. Though the Libertarians would defend the Scientologists’ right to practice medicine without a license.

** This is, of course, known as the Renaissance Faire Fallacy.

*** And now called “classical liberalism”

**** And you can come up with all kinds of objections to that description, I know, and I’d agree with most of them. Give me a damn break. This is a polemic, not an operator’s manual.

577 Responses to “How To Explain Things to Libertarians” 


  1. Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #2: Mentioning Libertarianisms’ siblings.

    Actually certain libertarians are wont to do this themselves: they’ll say “why do you liberals hate us — we’re the true liberals, not you big government phonies”, and they’ll cite these connections as proof even as they go about supporting the sorts of things about which every lefty (and even “classical liberals”) would be aghast.


  2. Please be my best friend. We’ll have sleepovers. It’ll be great.

    (the above exuberance brought to you by a week of battling MRA libertarian trolls)


  3. In a cutthroat economic free-for-all, with the mass of people on the bottom and a handful of ruthless Machiavellian princes at the top, each one of these goobers thinks it’s inevitable that he (gender specificity deliberate) will inevitably become one of the princes.**

    ** This is, of course, known as the Renaissance Faire Fallacy.

    THANK YOU. I cannot remember how many times I’ve had to tell people pining for the days of nights in shining and damsels in distress that they wouldn’t be either, that statistically, they’d be the peasant living in extreme poverty and dying in their 40s. Chances are they wouldn’t even get their own last name — they’d have to make due with their Lord’s, aka, the person who owned the land to which they belonged.


  4. Knights. Ka-nig-ets. Not nights. Sorry.


  5. I’ve noticed you’ve left those evil Hollywood bastards off this chart? Or are they under that mysterious pink X?


  6. Bitter Scribe

    One of the most annoying people I knew at college was a Libertarian. He was one of those seven-year undergraduates who spent most of his time hanging out at the school paper. He occasionally wrote a headline or something, but his main function seemed to be arguing with anyone who would listen. He would argue the most preposterous points: For instance, he spent one evening loudly insisting that Hitler knew nothing about the Holocaust. His favorite tactic, when cornered, was to screech, “I don’t know what books you’ve read!”

    I’m sure that by now, he’s a GS-11 or something, comfortably close to a government-funded retirement.


  7. Blue Jean

    I dunno, Carl; if the night is shining, then the damsels wouldn’t be in such distress, would they? ;-)


  8. tzs

    I’ve come to the conclusion is a Libertarian (with the big L) is someone who has never had to live in the real world. Either because he is too young (pimply-faced 17 year old reading Ayn Rand) or because he is with enough money etc. to be shielded from the effects of any of his choices.

    The third category (the majority, from what I’ve seen) are computer geeks in their early 20s who think DOOM and Mad Max are realistic and optimal descriptions of human interactions.

    (My way of engaging Libertarians’ minds is to point out that there has never been a society which has not had taxation throughout history. Either you pay taxes to the gov’t, or “protection money” to the Mafia, and which would they prefer?)


  9. honestly, I enjoy demonstrative brutal violence. as much fun as they have blathering about Randian Objectivism, it basically means “We get to use the government to enforce the power we like, but all other force isn’t FAAAAIR.” Which is why they want cops with guns to prevent people from robbing them. but a system rigged where they get rich at others expense, it’s “legal” so it doesn’t count.

    they want rigged anarchy, and I shall have none of that. Gimme your beer money, or I’ll crack you in the head with a blunt object. It’s my will to power that grants me a right to swing my club, so you better give me a damn good incentive to take my crowbar and leave.

    either EVERYONE gets a fair shake, or no one does.


  10. Most hard-core “movement” libertarians are little more than cranks with very little real influence outside of Silicon Valley. BUT tragically some libertarian memes have creeped into common knowledge. These are the worst ones in my opinion:

    “The problem with schools is the teachers’ union”

    “We should privatize x because the government is inefficient”

    “Social security is broken because I could do better investing the money myself”

    “Regulation always causes problems”

    “People want to go on welfare”

    The first pisses me off because EVERYONE believes it. It drives me insane. As if all those broken inner city schools have qualified candidates breaking down the door to make $40k…


  11. If those don’t work, sometimes these people are persuaded when it’s pointed out to them that back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate, and a very few people got very wealthy while the rest of us died of food poisoning or coal mine collapses or shirtwaist factory fires.

    THANK YOU!

    I get really annoyed by Libertarians that rave on about the “evils of government” and “just want one try” in order to prove that what they are suggesting will actually work … when you point out it’s been tried a few times in history and the results were HORRIBLE (and we’re not speaking mildly annoying here, we’re talking collapse of society horrible).

    It basically comes down for me to the point of who would you rather have looking out for your best interests and those of minorities; a company whose bottom line is intrinsically profit, or government that is technically “by the people, for the people”?

    I mean, the latter might be a tad ideal, but it still stands, and is fairly self evident the better solution.

    [as a snark, my personal fav of the insanely funny morons are the Christian Conservative Theocratic Libertarians … it’s kinda like the mutant child of a porcupine and a spider crab; having you wince merely at the thought]


  12. Elinor

    I am going to use the phrase “Renaissance Faire Fallacy” as many times as possible in the next week or so. Awesome.

    I cannot remember how many times I’ve had to tell people pining for the days of nights in shining and damsels in distress that they wouldn’t be either, that statistically, they’d be the peasant living in extreme poverty and dying in their 40s.

    White people who speak with dreamy appreciation of the Confederacy in particular and the antebellum South in general seem to have the same kind of fantasies, in my experience.

    As do Randroids, although the fantasies are a little different. They tend to think extremely highly of their own abilities and have thoroughgoing contempt for everybody else.


  13. lyle

    what was it, libertarians are really just republicans with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder?

    someone posted a link to the ‘Libertarian FAQ’ the other day and that was on it. thought it was very descriptive.


  14. aeroman

    If you just mention the word “externalities” to a libertarian, smoke comes out their ears. Luckily, this gives them the opportunity to complain about anti-smoking advocates, so they end up placated.


  15. Am I the only person on earth who has read Ayn Rand and not been able to find a philosophy in it? Atlas Shrugged should be famous only for being the world’s worst porn.

    Also, the last Libertarian I knew used to sit naked on the commons room couch and watch basketball. Do with that as you will.


  16. Charles

    These are excellent suggestions for dealing with the individual examples.

    But what if you stumble into a nest of the beasts?

    If you are ganged up on by Libertarians, the best thing to do is just remain silent. They’ll quickly start disagreeing on what “true libertarians” should believe, then the anarcho-capitalists will gang up on the synicalists, and you can just call in the disposal squad.

    If you want to help it along, you can start it off by asking, innocently, if Hayek can be reconciled with Rand. Just be prepared to duck.


  17. utsusemi

    Carl Rennie, that was my first clue that maybe my first college boyfriend was not somebody I wanted to stick around for long. His confused indifference when I mentioned that his pre- (post-?) technological fantasyland would be maybe not so fun for the women in his life was Clue #2.


  18. Gimme Back My Dog

    In a cutthroat economic free-for-all, with the mass of people on the bottom and a handful of ruthless Machiavellian princes at the top, each one of these goobers thinks it’s inevitable that he (gender specificity deliberate) will inevitably become one of the princes.**

    Libertarians certainly do not see themselves as one of the princes. That would imply that they control others. One of the fundamental beliefs of libertarianism is that in order to be free from the controls of others, you must be willing to give up your claims to control others.

    I think more of you all fall into that trap. You think that an all-powerful government can work as long as the “right people” are in power. And when you say “right people” you mean yourselves.

    back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate

    Living in the late 19th century sucked ass compared to the way we live today, but it should be noted that living in the US was better than living anywhere else.

    Really, I have no idea if Libertarianism would work in the 21st century. That is why I support the system the Framers envisioned–a weak federal government with states as individual “test tubes” of economic systems. New Hampshire and Wyoming could become libertarian, Massachusetts socialist and the lifestyle that people prefer would become evident pretty quickly.


  19. tzs said:

    I’ve come to the conclusion is a Libertarian (with the big L) is someone who has never had to live in the real world. Either because he is too young (pimply-faced 17 year old reading Ayn Rand) or because he is with enough money etc. to be shielded from the effects of any of his choices.

    My experience is similar, but the defining factor seems to be less their own circumstances than a lack of empathy and a blindness to privilege, especially structural. I’ve seen kids whose parents put them through good high schools, expensive after-school programs, and expensive colleges where they had their room and board, books and tuition fully paid for claim that they got where they were entirely on their own merit. They have a hard time imagining that someone without those privileges would find it more difficult to achieve on the same level.

    Libertarians often deny that structural barriers to success even exist, and it’s mostly because they haven’t encountered them. I had one person argue with a straight face that a CEO really works 2000 times as hard as a janitor holding down two full-time jobs.


  20. Blue Jean said:

    I dunno, Carl; if the night is shining, then the damsels wouldn’t be in such distress, would they? ;-)

    I believe in a market-based approach to communication. If people want to see complete thoughts and proper grammar, and are willing to pay for it, then that’s what’ll win out in a truly free society.


  21. Robert M.

    But Capital-L Libertarians tend to take those admirable sentiments to their logical extreme, wanting to shrink fire departments and public libraries and FEMA down to the size where they can be drowned in Grover Norquist’s bathtub, or, failing that, at least stabbed to death like Marat.

    Best. Sentence. Ever. I’m going to use it the very next time I argue with someone about Americans for Tax Reform, and watch the wingnut stumble around trying to remember his European history classes.

    Not that I probably need to point folks around here to PZ’s place, but this is one of the funniest things I’ve ever read.

  22. comment on link:

    Libertarians are the flip side of the religious right. I've got an old post exposing the moral poverty of libertarianism over at Philosophers' Playground. Their tactic is fairly simple, take liberty which is no doubt a moral good, and make it THE SOLE moral good, that is, subjugate everything else to individual freedom. It is the same error that ethical subjectivists make in elevating tolerance above all else. Yes, freedom and tolerance are morally desirable all other things being equal, but in the complex, ugly, messy real world, all other things are never equal and they have to get weighed in alongside of empathetic care for others and the general welfare. Libertarianism is a way for smart white guys who have theirs to rationalize (1) having more than they deserve, and (2) not wanting to share it. Libertarianism is just a way to backfill a justification for being a prick instead of a decent, caring, empathetic human beings who actually gives a damn about anyone other than himself.

    If that doesn't piss them off, how about this...Ayn Rand's writings are nothing but the work of Nietzsche with everything insightful or funny removed.

    I think everyone meets one of these guys (I say “guys” advisedly; in my experience, they’re almost universally male) at some point. My libertarian-crank cherry was broken by the VP of the forensics club in college, who (like Bitter Scribe’s acquaintance) was a perpetual undergrad. He was majoring in political science and international relations, and was frustrated that no one wanted to listen to his theories on how China could never be a real economic threat to the US.

    The second one I met was a coworker a couple of years ago. He was an otherwise-sane Flash/Director programmer, who idolized not Ayn Rand but Neal Boortz. He actually said to me once, in a heated argument about social safety nets, that “if you can’t afford to buy food, you deserve to starve”.


  23. j swift

    My snarky, off the cuff, previously typed, definition of Libertarians; “People who talk about the ideals of freedom, but at the end of the day, can’t keep their fucking hands to themselves.”


  24. Libertarians often deny that structural barriers to success even exist, and it’s mostly because they haven’t encountered them.

    *nods* ditto on that Carl.

    I’ve seriously had a Libertarian tell me that society doesn’t really exist, that there is no social-cultural structural system in place, and that we are merely a collection of individuals. His evidence? He’s never seen a ’society’.

    Did I mention he was a white straight guy?

    I just sat there with my mouth open and then left. It was pointless, to go any further would be to cross over and get pulled into that singularity of insanity …


  25. utsusemi said:

    Carl Rennie, that was my first clue that maybe my first college boyfriend was not somebody I wanted to stick around for long. His confused indifference when I mentioned that his pre- (post-?) technological fantasyland would be maybe not so fun for the women in his life was Clue #2.

    I know I long for the days when men were men and women all wore tight bodices and spoke in faux-Olde Englishe. I also have a strange craving for mead…


  26. Rob G

    Why on Earth would you want to engage in discourse with these people? I’ve found that “go away” works fairly well, if said in the right tone of voice.


  27. BunBun vonWhiskers

    Over at the JREF Politics forum I frequent, they have a lot of intelligent people of different political stripes. They also have a capital-L Libertarian who basically believes that everything is the fault of the government, and if the government were to be shrunk to practically nothing, civilization would achieve utopia. You can’t really change his mind on these things, but trying to reason with him can be an interesting journey into the world of behavioral psychology.

    The scary thing is the number of his posts you can read that sound perfectly rational, reasonable, and well-thought out before you hit nuttiness. Well-reasoned posts about privacy and government intrusion will then devolve into rants about how states have the legal right to secede and the evil of coming off the gold standard.

    And what is really frightning to me is that this guy votes.


  28. My libertarian-crank cherry was broken by the VP of the forensics club in college,

    Q: How do you know if a person is a libertarian-crank-virgin?
    A: If their Hayek is intact.


  29. Rob G

    I’ve seriously had a Libertarian tell me that society doesn’t really exist

    Hey, Maggie Thatcher said that too. Dunno if she was straight, but definitely white, and macho as they come.


  30. Nineteen Kilo

    Libertarin cranial detonation techniques 5 & 6:

    5. “Libertarianism doen not solve the problem of the asshole.” There are always assholes who will game the system, and Libertarian markets don’t punish them, they reward them. e.g. Lee Raymond, Dick Cheney, Ken Lay, et. al.

    6. “Shorter Libertarian dogma: Fuck the poor. They deserve their fate.” In order to believe in Libertarian dogma, you have to believe that all rich people are fundamentally superior to all poor people, and proportionately along the spectrum as well. This means Libertarians have to stipulate that Britney Spears is smarter (richer) than them, and high school science teachers are the moral inferiors of Larry Flynt.


  31. tzs

    Plus the fact that a real Libertarian society wouldn’t last more than one generation, if that much.

    As has been pointed out by people much wiser than I, you’re not going to have very many people raising children–child-raising is totally the opposite to any ideal put out by Ayn Rand. (I also note that Rand did not have any children, nor do they exist that much in her novels.) Why would anyone, attuned to “selfishness” want to put themselves through the burden of raising children?

    (This is in fact why I’m not into the “child-free” movement that much – I think the financial and emotional burden of raising children is hard enough already that I encourage any help people can get. And the whining about “property taxes going to SCHOOOOLS!” is silly. If it bothers you that much, move to an apartment.)


  32. Blue Jean

    LOL, Carl!

    Sarah in Chicago, if you ever run into that guy again, try saying “We’ve never seen oxygen either, yet we’d miss it in two seconds if it suddenly vanished.” Then watch his head explode.


  33. Nineteen Kilo

    Number 7: “Devil in the White City” That is all.


  34. Allison- I read Atlas Shrugged, We the Living, AND The Fountainhead and found no philosophical or literary merit to any of them. Rand is morally bankrupt and she couldn’t write her way out of a paper bag if her life depended on it. I can’t really fathom why such a huge cult has developed around her; her work is drivel and, from all accounts, she was a really terrible person who no one should want to emulate.

    tzs- As a current senior in undergrad, my experience with libertarians has been pretty similar to yours. In my time, I have encountered 3 key types of Libertarians:

    1. Sheltered middle/upper class kids who never bothered to ask their parents how the family finances work who never read anything other than Ayn Rand. And yeah- a huge number of them are engineering/computer science/hard science students, probably because of the minute amount of time they spend in Humanities classes, which require some amount of critical thought.

    2. Republicans who discovered that they like to get high/have consequence-free sex/insert anything else that the Republican moralists decry, but can’t be bothered to care about whether or not other people have access to it. They may be ferreted out by asking them who they voted for- nine times out of ten, they choose money over freedom (which fits right in with the class privilege inherent to that way of thinking),

    3. Republicans who don’t want to admit to being reactionary, socially regressive asshats (and have a chance of scoring, ever). They can be spotted by asking them how they feel about abortion or feminism.


  35. Am I the only person on earth who has read Ayn Rand and not been able to find a philosophy in it?

    I don’t know; I kept falling asleep. Maybe if I kept reading that joyful prose, I could have zzzzzzz……


  36. I love the traffic light analogy, hadn’t heard it before.

    But I think you went too far with the Kliban picture. Pigs don’t deserve to be compared to Libertarians.


  37. Sarcastro

    Very well put Chris, thank you. Although I must point out that Proudhon got taken to the woodshed once by Joseph Déjacque (who coined the term “libertarian”) for proposing that the patriarchy be a part of the anarchist society.

    I’m kind of with Carl, it’s a lack of empathy or something that causes this. Perfectly sane, quite intelligent people who just don’t rate on the other mental axis: enlightenment. Which fits into my personal definition of Objectivist Libertarianism: it’s just enlightened self-interest without the enlightenment.


  38. And yeah- a huge number of them are engineering/computer science/hard science students, probably because of the minute amount of time they spend in Humanities classes, which require some amount of critical thought.

    *nods* I have to totally agree with this … I’ve seriously had engineering students in their wonderful superiority sit down to tell me as a sociology phd candidate how society actually operates … I mean, I know wayyyy less than everything (WWAAYYYYY less) but I kinda felt like saying “you know, I kinda do this stuff for a living and all …”


  39. I like to point out to Libertarians that neither government or business is always efficient, but with free elections you get to fire the government every few years. You can’t fire a giant monopoly.


  40. Chris, you are so dreamy.


  41. This means Libertarians have to stipulate that Britney Spears is smarter (richer) than them, and high school science teachers are the moral inferiors of Larry Flynt.

    Oh, no, see… if you’ve ever read an Rand, there’s some sort of ridiculous stipulation that mere possession of money doesn’t make you a Prime Mover – you have to have money and be an emotionless sociopath. So, Britney isn’t a Prime Mover… but Dick Cheney would be.


  42. Gimme Back My Dog

    I like to point out to Libertarians that neither government or business is always efficient, but with free elections you get to fire the government every few years. You can’t fire a giant monopoly.

    Actually, you can fire any monopoly anytime you want. If you want to stop using MS Windows, no one forces you to. Forty-nine percent of the people cannot fire the government.


  43. I think more of you all fall into that trap. You think that an all-powerful government can work as long as the “right people‿ are in power. And when you say “right people‿ you mean yourselves.

    Partial cranial fracture at 4:53 pm.


  44. Karmakin

    I’ve used the “Corporations Are Government” argument a lot.


  45. Hava

    Uh, not using Microsoft Windows is just ignoring the monopoly, not firing it.


  46. Whenever I get into it with libertarians I recommend that they read two books: Friedrich Engels’s Condition of the Working Class and Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation. But they always refuse to do all that reading, particularly the Engels book, Engels so notoriously being eee-vil.


  47. Stafish Girl said:

    1. Sheltered middle/upper class kids who never bothered to ask their parents how the family finances work who never read anything other than Ayn Rand. And yeah- a huge number of them are engineering/computer science/hard science students, probably because of the minute amount of time they spend in Humanities classes, which require some amount of critical thought.

    Unfortunately, most of the engineering students I knew who took Humanties/sociology courses managed to get through them with their critical thinking faciilites turned off. I’ve heard “I got an A by just telling the teacher what they wanted to hear in my essays,” as if they’d gotten away with something. This always makes me angry — I just want to say, “congratulations, you’ve managed to spend 10 weeks in a class without learning anything.”

    Sarah in Chicago said:

    *nods* I have to totally agree with this … I’ve seriously had engineering students in their wonderful superiority sit down to tell me as a sociology phd candidate how society actually operates … I mean, I know wayyyy less than everything (WWAAYYYYY less) but I kinda felt like saying “you know, I kinda do this stuff for a living and all …‿

    There’s a certain arrogance that comes built-in with being in a hard science. First of all, Barbie aside, math IS hard, and it’s a skill that isn’t widely spread. So people who are good at math tend to think of themselves as better than non-math-geeks, whether or not the feeling is justified (it’s not; lots of people are really really good at ping-pong, too). There’s a widespread “understanding” that people studying soft sciences like psych and soc are doing so because they can’t hack it as a real scientist, and hence, as a real smart person.

    I took computer science in college, but I almost switched to sociology my senior year — not because I was bad at computer science, but because soc is sooooooo much more interesting. Learning about social structure and interaction was pretty revelatory for me.

    The people that crack me up the most are the economists. They’re essentially doing a narrowly focussed version of sociology — the Sociology of Money, if you will — but because they have a built-in system of numbers (money) they get to call it a hard science and most people buy into it.


  48. j

    I actually like Ayn Rand’s writing. I think many pimply-faced teenagers–those who purport to be well-read and intellectual–are attracted to Ayn Rand because public schools are so very socialist and anti-intellectual, and teenagers see Ayn Rand’s so-called philosophy as a way out of that unfairness. That is certainly how I discovered Ayn Rand. The problem, of course, is that libertarianism is ultimately a naive and immature worldview, and most people come to recognize that.


  49. cycles

    Also, the last Libertarian I knew used to sit naked on the commons room couch and watch basketball. Do with that as you will.

    Well, there’s your problem right there. He was just a poser. A real Libertarian would bar the door of the commons room, claim it as his own, sell the couch on the black market, and set up a pay-per-view system for the TV.


  50. Although I must point out that Proudhon got taken to the woodshed once by Joseph Déjacque (who coined the term “libertarian‿) for proposing that the patriarchy be a part of the anarchist society.

    True. And some theory types credit Stirner with paving the way for some left feminism, in that he promoted the truth of the individual’s existence over abstract absolutes, one of which absolutes the idea of immutable gender roles could be construed to be.


  51. Mnemosyne

    New Hampshire and Wyoming could become libertarian, Massachusetts socialist and the lifestyle that people prefer would become evident pretty quickly.

    Heh. I love when Libertarians say, “Hey, let us take over the infrastructure that’s been built up in New Hampshire for the past 300 years and we’ll make it libertarian.”

    Proving once again that Libertarians are parasites living off the body of a real society. When Libertarians manage to completely build a town from the ground up — sewer system, roads, electricity and all — then we can talk about it being a viable philosophy. But until that time, I know that when anyone who says, “I’m a Libertarian,” what they’re really saying is, “I shouldn’t have to pay my fair share to live in this country, because I’m special — Mommy told me so!”

    Oh, and The Fountainhead sucks ass. Worst movie ever, and Ayn Rand wrote it her very own self.


  52. Robert M.

    I read Atlas Shrugged, We the Living, AND The Fountainhead and found no philosophical or literary merit to any of them.

    I read The Fountainhead in high school (I’ll still read practically anything once). I found it interesting and oddly moving.

    After I got a little older, I got curious about the philosophy advertised at the back of all Rand’s books, and started doing some research–and was horrified. The only upside was that this experience happened to me before I read anything by L. Ron Hubbard and got curious about his philosophy.

    There is good, healthy, progressive stuff to take away from Rand’s books. Ambition isn’t evil; self-reliance isn’t evil; no one should be forced, out of fear or jealousy, to hide their brilliance. Rand is only a dollop of empathy away from Emerson, really.

    Inasmuch as they might lead the impressionable towards progressive little-l libertarianism, and therefore away from the ascendant proto-fascism that currently dominates the right wing of American politics, maybe we shouldn’t rip on Rand’s books too much.

    (I’m not going to deign to respond to Chris’ pun.)


  53. Maggie Pax

    Regarding Heinlein:

    I once spent a lovely week with Heinlein’s wife, Virginia. I asked her about the Ayn Rand award he received and the ever-gracious lady responed with a rather disparaging series of remarks toward libertatians. Too many of Heinlein’s readers assumed that the political opinions he expressed in his books reflected his personal beliefs. A more careful reading of his texts show that he was fascinated by all the varieties of human politics (and the varieties of religions, sexual mores, etc.). Although certain aspects of libertatianism were certainly appealing to him, so were certain aspects of democracy, socialism, and all the other isms. And he was were aware of the excesses of each system! I’m a long time reader and fan of Heinlein (and Pandagon!), and when libertarians (or anyone else) assume that Heinlein (or any other human) was some sort of uber font of wisdom (or evil), then I know I’m talking to a zealot (aka:jackass).

    And you’re right: it is fun to watch their heads explode!


  54. Gimme Back My Dog

    I read Atlas Shrugged, We the Living, AND The Fountainhead and found no philosophical or literary merit to any of them.

    I would recommend Anthem over any of those books. Less preachy and you can read it on a long lunch hour.


  55. Gimme Back My Dog

    Uh, not using Microsoft Windows is just ignoring the monopoly, not firing it.

    OK, fine, you can ignore a monopoly. You can’t really ignore the government.


  56. Allison–her philosophy was in the very hackneyed, and badly-told story, with shades of the thrown in. Honestly, that woman was the queen of the run-on sentence, as well as the ten-page monologue.

    BUT–Starfish Girl–she was apparently either very charismatic, was good at finding people who responded to her mercurial personality, or both, because she had quite the devoted and eggshell walking entourage.

    As for the whole GUMMIT IS EVIL! EVIL I TELL YA! drivel, all I’ll say is this: I lived in England and Japan. Both places had public transportation systems that were a damn sight better than the MBTA in Massachusetts (and here I have to remind myself that in many places, they don’t have public transit at all). Here in the US, we’re convinced that government-run services are inefficient, corrupt, wasteful, and mismanaged. Not so in other places, where the expectations are high, and the service (such as public transport) lives up to it. I experienced one late train in Osaka in the three and a half years that I lived there. Here in the Boston area, it’s a coin toss when I’ll get to work.


  57. Exactly Hava. And how many of us get to choose our electric or gas or water company. How about trying to find clothes that aren’t made in sweatshops. Even if the people who sew the clothes are treated well, often the people the wove the fabric are not. Christ, even my local co-op market has issues with busting union people. And short of purely electric cars, last time I checked all cars needed something from the oil industry. I don’t own a car, but everytime I take the bus I contribute to the oil industry.

    So ya, you can’t fire giant monopolies unless you want to live naked in the woods. Call me a great big sell-out cause I like hot water, electric lights and not being cold and naked all the time.


  58. They seem to think that the Libertarian school of thought sprang fully formed like Artemis from Ayn Rand’s beetled brow, with Robert Heinlein as attending midwife.

    Actually, you are thinking of Athena, there. Artemis was born on the Island of Delos, where she then turn around and served as midwife to her twin brother Apollon.
    If the government spent a little more on public education, Libertarians might know that.

    My favorite response to Libertarians is the “pay as you go” society:
    You don’t want taxes, fine. Every road is pay-per-drive. Gonna take a plane? Dn’t forget the overcharge for airport support, control tower personnel, etc. Oh, and don’t forget the extra $2000 for the weather report before you take off. Etc.
    Very quickly, they should realize that the “taxation” thing is the cheapest way to go.


  59. tzs

    I’ve run into some physicist-libertarians, but the really annoying libertarians seem to be, on the whole, computer geeks.

    I think it has to do with the ability to make up things in your system with computers. Don’t like how your simulation is coming out? Just tweak the parameters!

    With science, you WILL at some point run up hard against reality and have to Deal With It.

    I would guess that the group least prone to libertarianism would be historians, since in general they’re the most cynical group of bastards around. Yet another utopian fantasy, they sigh and mutter under their breath:”not AGAIN….”


  60. I took computer science in college, but I almost switched to sociology my senior year — not because I was bad at computer science, but because soc is sooooooo much more interesting. Learning about social structure and interaction was pretty revelatory for me.

    It’s funny you say that, because I originally went to college to do comp sci … switched really quick to astrophysics and got a degree in that before discovering sociology …

    The people that crack me up the most are the economists. They’re essentially doing a narrowly focussed version of sociology — the Sociology of Money, if you will — but because they have a built-in system of numbers (money) they get to call it a hard science and most people buy into it.

    Yes, we make fun of economists here … there’s a joke about this that an economist, a physicist and an engineer are marooned on a desert island together along with a crate of cans of food. They are sitting around trying to think of how to get the cans open. The physicist comes up with a theoretically possible, but practically impossible solution, the engineer comes up with a practical solution that would destroy the cans … and then finally the economist comes up with an idea … they ask eagerly what it is, and he says “well, first, assume we have a can-opener ….”

    It’s a good sign of who is a total geek if they get that :)


  61. Thanks, Dorothy. Brain fart. Corrected.


  62. Starfish Girl–she was apparently either very charismatic, was good at finding people who responded to her mercurial personality, or both, because she had quite the devoted and eggshell walking entourage.

    Which puts her about on par with L. Ron Hubbard.


  63. New Hampshire and Wyoming could become libertarian, Massachusetts socialist and the lifestyle that people prefer would become evident pretty quickly.

    Heh. I love when Libertarians say, “Hey, let us take over the infrastructure that’s been built up in New Hampshire for the past 300 years and we’ll make it libertarian.‿

    Hey, I’m sure Wyoming would do just fine without the money it currently receives from the Feds, most of which is generated by taxing the other 49 states.


  64. Lisa

    There is a crazy woman from Manhattan (with a spectacular boob job) who has a site called Atlas Shrugs. She is the nearly the stupidest human being on the planet, second only to Michael Medved (and she ties with Hugh Hewitt). She calls herself a libertarian, yet is the biggest bootlicking authoritiarian I have ever had the displeasure of encountering. She absolutely does not see the cognitive dissonance between her desire to do away with all social programs, public schools, publicly funded emergency services, etc. and her competing desire to see this country ruled by jackbooted fascists who grind liberals into dust and protect ze homeland and ze “real Americans”.

    I have never been able to understand these freaks of nature.


  65. MikeEss

    “So ya, you can’t fire giant monopolies unless you want to live naked in the woods. Call me a great big sell-out cause I like hot water, electric lights and not being cold and naked all the time.”

    That’s why Theodore “UniBomber” Kaczynski was such an influential Libertarian. He showed us all how to throw off the constraints of government and live free!…


  66. “There is good, healthy, progressive stuff to take away from Rand’s books. Ambition isn’t evil; self-reliance isn’t evil; no one should be forced, out of fear or jealousy, to hide their brilliance. Rand is only a dollop of empathy away from Emerson, really.”

    I suppose I might have taken that message away from her books had they been written so as to take place in a world that could actually exist. As it was, I got a more realistic moral education from Gandalf.

    “A real Libertarian would bar the door of the commons room, claim it as his own, sell the couch on the black market, and set up a pay-per-view system for the TV.”

    cycles is my new best friend.


  67. Em

    Geez, why the hate on engineers?


  68. One of my co-workers is a Libertarian. A good guy, actually, and I don’t really have quite as much contempt for the species as a lot of other lefties I know. It’s always struck me that Libertarians at least try to be intellectually consistent, even if so many of their premises are indefensible.

    (One point my friend was unable to answer in a discussion we were having on the nature of property rights was that whatever arguments you might have about whether property is inherently and intrinsically theft, it is an absolute historical certainty that the large majority of land in the United States was stolen from the various tribes. Stolen in direct violation of treaties that the thieves themselves had agreed to.)

    Anyway, that wasn’t the point I wanted to make. The funny part is that the company where we work makes software that is used by local governments to run their cities. This means that my Libertarian friend’s salary ultimately comes from tax dollars. He has admitted to an occasional sleepless night over this.


  69. Em said:

    Geez, why the hate on engineers?

    Because we’ve spent a lot of time with them?


  70. Well, Em, if it makes you feel any better my least favorite Libertarian is a web-designer.


  71. Stephen Stralka said:

    It’s always struck me that Libertarians at least try to be intellectually consistent, even if so many of their premises are indefensible.

    Yeah, the problem isn’t so much in the logic, it’s in the assumptions. A lot of liberatarian philosophy is the very definition of begging the question.


  72. joe in oklahoma

    chris says in the essay, ’sometimes these people are persuaded when it’s pointed out to them that back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate’.

    when libertarians say that libertaianism has never been tried, i always say, ‘o contraire, look at the robber baron era: child labor, corporate corruption, tamany hall, monoploies, sweat shops, etc’.
    and this year i have also pointed them to that miracle of freedom Russia, as well as Iraq, since after the fall of communism, libertarians rushed in to open wide the free market and the lawlessness that followed. in addition, when the US invaded iraq, libertarian capir=talism was the model the US govt imposed on the society and the market there….we see the joyful results each day, don’t we?’

    ‘I’ve seriously had a Libertarian tell me that society doesn’t really exist’

    i have actually heard that from a number of libertarians…they simply refuse to acknowledge communal behavior. i wonder what they make of the family.


  73. Jerry 101

    I may have all of you topped. I D-A-T-E-D a libertarian. A female, capital L libertarian!

    But, when it came down to it, her philosophy came down to the following:
    1. I don’t like to pay taxes

    2. The world revolves around ME!

    3. Though the prevailing evidence was to the contrary, she thought she was really smart and being a Libertarian, in her little world, was evidence of that intelligence. She was not smart.

    4. She went to a private catholic school and thought that public schools should be dismantled.

    I could go on. But Libertarians are really annoying, as they usually don’t have a clue.

    It really came down to 1 and 2. She didn’t really have a clue as to true Libertarian thought. And not all libertarian thought is wrong. It was one of the few libertarian thinkers who came up with the idea of a guaranteed minimum to be paid out of (omg) taxes. From that concept, we came up with the Earned Income Tax Credit - which is a good idea, and has mostly worked well.


  74. Em

    Well, thanks a lot, Carl. Fuck you too.


  75. christina b

    “But they always refuse to do all that reading, particularly the Engels book, Engels so notoriously being eee-vil.”

    Anyone who refuses to educate themselves further about the topic in which they are passionately arguing (for or against) isn’t worth arguing with.


  76. tzs

    Oh, yeah–one can have a lot of fun with a plurality of Libertarians. I often post over at Reason, albeit under an assumed name, and once got quite a lot of flame going simply by asking them to define the basic tenets of Libertarianism.

    The only thing they managed to agree on was they didn’t like paying taxes. No consensus on how to replace them.


  77. Em, some of my best frie I love some engineers dearly. My father-in-law is one, my spouse’s best friend another.

    But the profession does seem to carry with it the occupational risks of 1) a greater tendency toward Libertarian thought and b) making embarrassing public statements about intelligent design.

    This almost certainly has more to do with certain types being attracted to engineering than with any common trait of all engineers. I mean, we’re probably talking a fraction of a percent of the total here.


  78. Rand is only a dollop of empathy away from Emerson, really.

    I’m with ya here on the comparison between Rand and Emerson. In High School, we had to read Emerson, Trudeau, et al. We became convinced that Transcendentalism was philosophical Onanism. Indeed, we had quite a bit of fun finding all the references to masturbation in Emerson, et al. … Transcendentalist literature is full of ‘em (or maybe just seemed so ‘cause we were just a bunch of horny teenagers who weren’t actually getting any — if we took a more sour grapes attitude toward sex, maybe we’d have embraced the Transcendentalists for their ideas rather than rejecting them as something the English Dept. forced upon us?).


  79. Corporations are governments. I can deal with that.

    States are corporations, Mr Socialist Libertarian. (boom)


  80. tzs

    I’d disagree with those who claim that Libertarians are trying to be consistent–maybe more consistent than Republicans and Democrats, but that’s a pretty low bar to hop over. Those that do try to be consistent have my respect. Most don’t even try.

    Anarcho-libertarians I have absolutely no sympathy for, mainly because none of them have ever managed to explain how present-day Iraq isn’t what their perfect society would quickly devolve into. “It’s a civil war!” they bleat. Yes, and the term “anarchy” means…..?


  81. Em said:

    Well, thanks a lot, Carl. Fuck you too.

    Oh, come off it. I’m a (software) engineer, most of my friends are engineers. I am close to people pursuing PhDs in various branches of engineering, physics, biology, and psychology.

    The longer answer to your earlier questions is that engineering skills are overvalued in our current society. This overvaluing of skill leads to an unreasonable estimation of intelligence, and in some cases, self-worth. You can still be a very good person with a very inflated opinion of your own intelligence, but it helps to try to keep a sense of humor and humility about it.


  82. MikeEss

    Jerry 101, you mean you actually dated Jacqie Mackie Paisley Passey?

    You poor bastard…


  83. My full comment got too long to inflict here, so I’ve posted it to my site.

    The précis: My favorite anti-Libertarian example is phossy jaw.

    People needed matches. Companies made matches. But the white or yellow phosphorus that they used to make matches gave the workers a terrible, disfiguring disease, phossy jaw, which rotted their jawbone until death or until the bone was removed.

    Unfortunately, safer red phosphorus for match-making was more expensive, so most companies continued to use deadly white and yellow phosphorus until legislation outlawed its use in matches.

    There’s no shortage of examples like this to use on Libertarians who blindly believe in an all-correcting “invisible hand.”

    As for Ayn Rand, it’s instructive that her fictional world contains no significant references to the natural environment, children, elderly people, illness, or disability. Though of course even in a world where everyone is a clear-eyed, able-bodied adult, her system would still lead to the modern equivalents of phossy jaw.

    I also love that Rand makes such a big deal out of lesser people’s inability to make decisions, unlike her decisive heroes. It takes the focus off the fact that the heroes would need all those lesser people to actually carry out the heroes’ boldly decided plans.

    By privileging decision-making rather than action as all-important, Rand flatters do-nothing “managers” who like to pretend their TPM reports make them captains of industry.

    Libertarian computer geeks and engineers probably see themselves as the John Galts of Rand’s capitalist utopia. But to a Libertarian CEO, an engineer is just another match girl.


  84. Oh! Oh! I forgot to mention! Engineers (including me) often struggle socially, which leads to the wonderful “People Don’t Like Me Because They Don’t Recognize My Brilliance” fallacy, and the twin evils of arrogance and poor self-esteem. I’ve been there, man, I’ve been there.


  85. Em

    Chris, I have honestly never experienced this. The primary trait I’ve noticed in engineers is the cliched social awkwardness. Of course, if I weren’t so awkward myself, perhaps I would have socialized enough with my fellow engineers to discover they secretly harbored libertarian tendencies (which probably would have horrified me to the point of never socializing with them again.).


  86. Grilltacular

    There’s a certain arrogance that comes built-in with being in a hard science.

    The arrogance comes from knowledge of objective truths. Scientific types feel superior because they can only claim things they know to be true, instead of things they feel to be true or want to be true. Can’t say they same for the “subjective” areas of study.


  87. Grilltacular says:

    The arrogance comes from knowledge of objective truths. Scientific types feel superior because they can only claim things they know to be true, instead of things they feel to be true or want to be true. Can’t say they same for the “subjective‿ areas of study.

    It sounds nice, and yes, this is how people justify it, but it’s bullshit. The “facts” of hard science are outgrowths of symbols and the rules used to manipulate them. The application of these “facts” to observed phenomena is necessarily limited by the ability to observe and the framework in which these observations are interpretted.

    If anything, science makes you less prepared to deal with phenomena that’s not neatly observable, measurable, and predictable. Meaning that “hard” scientists are among the least qualified to talk about how society works.


  88. Well, plus, if you run into a humdinger of an Engineer with Issues, you’re pretty much set with stories for the rest of eternity. Just one is all you need.


  89. Ashley

    I have to admit that I have some pretty strong libertarian tendencies, though moreso when I was in high school. Yes, I was the pimply teenager who read Ayn Rand and a host of other works.

    I realized I couldn’t be fully libertarian once I realized that corporations are out to screw the people over as much as humanly possible. I fully believe in non-coercion of individuals, but people must be protected from the evils of corporations.

    Nowadays, I base more of my political philosophy on Daniel Quinn, and I’m a big fan of Penn and Teller. I’d hardly be called a “true libertarian,” and I still think tribalism is the best option possible for humans, though not workable with how many people we have.

    As a libertarian (lite), I believe there is no one right way to live. And that your rights end where mine begin.

    And you can’t fix the school system by simply throwing more money at it. Read John Taylor Gatto’s Dumbing Us Down to see why. And because that’s all the NEA wants, they are a big part of the problem. A new approach needs to be created, one that allows many possible choices for education, one that is not controlled by the government (though funded by them). If you take a history of education class, you’ll quickly realize that our current factory style school system was created to make complacent, controllable workers. That, in my not so humble opinion, is deeply deeply wrong. And now, we’re having our little workers learning how to do nothing but take tests, and certainly not teaching them critical thinking or decent history.

    For the record, I’m female, and a history student.


  90. joe in oklahoma

    i once saw “a libertarian is an anarchist with money or a management level job.
    an anarchist is a poor libertarian”

    that said, anarcho-libertarianism or left libertarianism makes more sense than capitalist libertarianism…because it desires peaceful cooperative living as opposed to cut-throat competive individualism.


  91. Grilltacular, are you an engineer or a scientist? I ask because most of the scientists I know are rather leery of throwing around terms like “objective truth” — they tend to be more aware than most of the limitations of any theory or or set of explanations.

    In fact, the people who I know who use terms like “objective truth” are almost always Christians, for whom “objective truth” is what is revealed to us by the agents of God over an approximately 800-year span ending about two millennia ago.


  92. You know when you were bullied in school and your mom told you, “That’s just because you’re better than the rest of them and they’re jealous”?

    Libertarians were the ones who believed it.


  93. Em

    Shorter Carl: Engineers are not sociologists. Engineers are arrogant. Now I, an engineer, will explain to you how engineers interact with society. This is not sociology, nor is it arrogant. I can do this b/c I am an Exceptional Engineer who Gets both Math and People.

    Arrogance and poor self-esteem? Been there?–you’re clearly still there.


  94. I am lucky enough to have met the rare female Libertarian–my favorite bit was when she complained about the new middle school built in town, saying it really didn’t need to be all that fancy, she didn’t want her tax money going to it, blah blah blah. Of course she sent her kid to a private school. So it’s not good enough for your kid, but too good for other kids? Fucking selfish asshole.

    She then went on to complain about poor kids getting breakfast while they were in school.


  95. And you can’t fix the school system by simply throwing more money at it. Read John Taylor Gatto’s Dumbing Us Down to see why.

    Problems caused by starving the system of money can usually be at least ameliorated by putting some of that money back. Put down your book and visit an actual public school to see examples.

    And now, we’re having our little workers learning how to do nothing but take tests, and certainly not teaching them critical thinking or decent history.

    Yeah, it was the NEA socialists who came up with No Child Left Behind.


  96. Thalia–I knew a girl that used to wear a shirt that she’d made with her own magic markers that said “Worker harder, people on welfare are counting on you!” She was, of course, a trust fund baby.


  97. Em

    Veronica, much like the bumper stickers that say, Vote Dem; It’s Easier Than Working.

    Ick.


  98. Em said:

    Shorter Carl: Engineers are not sociologists. Engineers are arrogant. Now I, an engineer, will explain to you how engineers interact with society. This is not sociology, nor is it arrogant. I can do this b/c I am an Exceptional Engineer who Gets both Math and People.

    No, engineers are not sociologists, though some of them think they are. Sociologists have their own set of quirks, their own lack of insights, and their own issues with arrogance, but libertarianism generally isn’t one of them — at least not in my experience. Since we’re talking libertarianism, they’re not particularly relevant to this conversation.

    I’m not attacking engineers, and I’m certainly not attacking you (though if this hits close to home, that’s not my fault). There are certain tendencies that I see in engineers, and hanging out with engineers *does* happen to fall into my area of expertise. I think I’m more intrigued by their foibles than truly bothered, and I certainly wouldn’t stop hanging out with anyone if they disagreed with me.

    Engineering does come with its own culture, and that culture has its own set of pitfalls. I certainly don’t hate engineering culture or I wouldn’t be part of it. I don’t think that engineers are uniformly evil or even mostly bad, just that some engineers can be very shortsighted, especially when it comes to their own shortcomings.

    I’m not an exceptional engineer. I’m a decent one, but I lack the focus necessary to become a great one.

    Arrogance and poor self-esteem? Been there?–you’re clearly still there.

    It’s a daily struggle.


  99. CS Lewis Jr.

    Robert Anton Wilson:

    “I was an Objectivist for a while. Then I met Ayn Rand.”


  100. SilverFox

    I happen to be one of those “capital L Libertarians”, and you are operating under some misconceptions here. You won’t be detonating my cranium, I can assure you. In the first place, do not make the mistake of confusing Randian Objectivism with Libertarianism. Also, don’t confuse it with capitalistic anarchism either.

    “Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #1: Mentioning Libertarian history.”

    This is incorrect. Libertarian philosophy owes far more to John Locke, John Stuart Mill, or Adam Smith than it does to Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. His tag line, which you mention, “Property is theft”, is the antithesis of Libertarian philosophy.

    “Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #2: Mentioning Libertarianism’s siblings.”

    This, too, fizzles out when given even a cursory examination.

    “What’s the more libertarian way of running the world? Coming up with ever-evolving procedures by which the largest number of people possible have the largest amount of input possible into the policy by which we run the world, moderated by recognizing certain expertise and the efficiency of delegating some decision-making u2014 which is a bright-eyed and optimistic way of describing the mission of liberal democracy or letting the people who are best at accumulating money bribe, bully, and blackmail their way into running huge sections of the world?”

    Well, obviously the first mentioned here. As for the second, that’s not Libertarian. That’s what we have right now. How did that come to pass? This is due to the gov’t’s giving unearned “goodies” to corporations. We hear a lot about “welfare queens” from conservatives. Yet, the biggest welfare queens do not live in decaying urban neighbourhoods. No, it’s corporations. Gov’t has even been known to send US troops into other countries to protect corporate inerests, as the Marines were sent into Nicaragua to make that country safe for United Fruit. This is inappropriate and would never occur under a Libertarian regime.

    “Libertarian Cranial Detonation Technique #3: Mentioning Libertarianism’s blindspot.”

    As for your statement: “Corporations are governments.”, how did this happen? This was the result of a thoroughly ridiculous Supreme Court decision: http://www.tourolaw.edu/patch/santa/ the infamous “Santa Clara” decision. This should never have happened, and would be reversed by any gov’t that took the designation “Libertarian” seriously. Getting corporations back to the original intent: a state charter for limited purposes and durations, subject to review by state gov’t’s, would put a stop to this corruption. Any corporation that attempted that could be dissolved as being against the public interest.

    “…sometimes these people are persuaded when it’s pointed out to them that back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate, and a very few people got very wealthy while the rest of us died of food poisoning or coal mine collapses or shirtwaist factory fires.”

    OK, fine. However, technology wasn’t as advanced in those days, and a late 19th century factory was a nasty, noisey, dangerous place to work. As bad as it was, it sure did beat subsistance farming by a very large margin. Let us also not forget that those early factory workers were the seed of an up and coming middle class. Some few did get mega-wealthy, but how did they do it? John D. Rockefeller did so by selling lamp oil (a.k.a. kerosine) Rockefeller’s kerosine was much cheaper than whale oil, so more people could afford it. Not only did he help save the great whales from extinction, he improved a great many lives in the process of accumulating that wealth.

    Same with Andrew Carnegie, who took a laboratory curiousity (the Bessemer process) and commercialized it. Carnegie’s steel built a great many things from ships to bridges that enhanced life for the masses.

    Not to say that these guys were saints, they weren’t. However, they did get rich by making everyone a bit richer. That beats the old ways of getting rich by far: warring on your neighbours to pillage from them and enslave their citizens.


  101. However, they did get rich by making everyone a bit richer.

    Buh … what pink rosy fictional book version of history did you read? … that lot got rich through monopolies and stripping everything they possibly could out of their workers … *blink*


  102. CScarlet

    I used to think I had an unfair view of Libertarians based on the fact that all of the ones I know are ass hats. By which I mean, “everyone deserves their fate”/fuck the poor, etc. And that as a socialist, my views sharply contrasted with theirs.

    And now I read this post and I think this is a common feature O__o.


  103. Beppie

    I’m actually greatful to Libertarianism in a wierd way. When I was 17 and first started using the internet, I was pretty left-wing, but in a very narrow way. When I found all the 17 year old Ayn Rand disciples online, I actually had to think about what I believed, and come to a more open-minded justification of those beliefs. So really, they helped me become a much better bleeding-heart lefty. :)


  104. “If you just mention the word “externalities‿ to a libertarian, smoke comes out their ears.”

    I did that the other day and their response was, “What’s an externality?”


  105. I get really annoyed by Libertarians that rave on about the “evils of government‿ and “just want one try‿ in order to prove that what they are suggesting will actually work … when you point out it’s been tried a few times in history and the results were HORRIBLE (and we’re not speaking mildly annoying here, we’re talking collapse of society horrible).

    Unfortunately, on some occasions when I have explained this to a Libertarian, he has responded with “Well, 19th Century America was not a TRUE libertarian society, because there was a government/people paid taxes/something else irrelevant”.

    Similar, but even more mindboggling, results occur when I mention the lawlessness of Afghanistan: “Well, that’s not a REAL libertarian anarchy, it’s just chaotic warlordism, because they aren’t trying to consciously adhere to libertarian principles.”

    Ooooookay, then! No true Scotsman would do that, huh?


  106. His tag line, which you mention, “Property is theft‿, is the antithesis of Libertarian philosophy.

    The Invisible Hand famously has no sense of humor.


  107. Beppie said:

    I’m actually greatful to Libertarianism in a wierd way. When I was 17 and first started using the internet, I was pretty left-wing, but in a very narrow way. When I found all the 17 year old Ayn Rand disciples online, I actually had to think about what I believed, and come to a more open-minded justification of those beliefs. So really, they helped me become a much better bleeding-heart lefty. :)

    I’ve always thought that being exposed to alternate viewpoints is essential to understanding your own. The Christian hatred of heresy and blasphemy seems to like the epitome of this; for some reason, the “one true faith” is too weak to withstand broader knowledge, but the “falsehood” of atheism is strong enough to stand up against constant attacks.

    Flewellyn said:

    Similar, but even more mindboggling, results occur when I mention the lawlessness of Afghanistan: “Well, that’s not a REAL libertarian anarchy, it’s just chaotic warlordism, because they aren’t trying to consciously adhere to libertarian principles.‿

    A functional libertarian society requires everyone in it to adhere flawlessly to libertarianism? And that’s not seen as a pretty big flaw?


  108. Damn. And I was just talking to someone who said we could fix the problems with our schools by giving them more money.


  109. BlackBloc

    Proudhon’s link to the Propertarians is historical revisionism by ‘anarcho’-capitalists.

    http://www.infoshop.org/faq/secGcon.html
    http://www.infoshop.org/faq/secF7.html


  110. Corporations are governments. I can deal with that.

    States are corporations, Mr Socialist Libertarian. (boom)

    Surely we’re not going to have to explain the difference between equivalence and set membership, are we??

    “Corporations are governments” means “corporations belong to the set of types of governments”. It does not mean “corporations are exactly equivalent to governments, and therefor governments are exactly equivalent to corporations”.

    For instance, corporations have certain properties that other governments do not necessarily share, the primary example being the profit motive; you could make a decent case for some non-corporate governments being motivated at least partly by profit for the rulers, such as feudal aristocracies, oligarchies, totalitarian dictatorships, and the like, but you will note that those types are in the set of authoritarian governments (of which set corporations are also a member), not the set of ALL governments.

    Governments such as the various forms of democracy (republic, constitutional monarchy, direct democracy, etc), which as a rule do not have a profit motive, cannot be considered equivalent to corporations.


  111. Indy

    Scientific objective truth? bullshit. I knew I loved being a biologist since high school, where the teacher stated the “central dogma” of biology (that’s what they actually called it, for all of about 10 years).

    DNA begat RNA which begat the Protien.

    and then she’s like, Yeah, except for HIV and all the other retroviruses. Damn dogma allready has a big hole in it. There are allways exceptions.

    My favorite libertarian story: I was drunk at a young democrats party and nearly got in a shouting fight with this (female) randroid who seemed to think that individual will to power was the prime mover in life, and that poor people were poor because they were weak and unworthy, and that her actions were moving her inexorably to a wonderful future.

    I asked her where she wanted to be in ten years, and what she was doing to make that happen. I asked her what she was doing in the next fifteen min. to make that happen (uh, nothing, partying). Then I asked her what she was doing tommorow morning, and she said she had a court date for her second reckless driving offense.


  112. Oh, here’s Exploding Sentence Number Seven:

    “If you contract with a security company for police services, what is to prevent that company from using violent action to subdue or drive off its competitors, thus asserting a monopoly on the legitimate use of force, which is the very definition of a state?”


  113. Fascinating links, BlackBloc. I especially like the alternative take on Stirner.

    And of course, as SilverSomething points out above, there were other influences on the early proto-Libertarians. Philosophy is not genetics: a thought can have more than one mother. Proudhon certainly would have found Libertarians anathema. But if they’re gonna quietly claim him as an intellectual forebear, justifiably or no, I think that claim is fair game.


  114. Indy said:

    Scientific objective truth? bullshit. I knew I loved being a biologist since high school, where the teacher stated the “central dogma‿ of biology (that’s what they actually called it, for all of about 10 years).

    DNA begat RNA which begat the Protien.

    and then she’s like, Yeah, except for HIV and all the other retroviruses. Damn dogma already has a big hole in it. There are always exceptions.

    Exactly! Anyone who spends their time dealing with physical phenomena knows that “objective truth” is a constantly moving target. Anyone with a decent grasp of scientific history knows it too.

    More importantly, scientists don’t really *talk* about objective truth. They talk about measured data, “the preponderance of evidence”, uncertainty, verifiability. Objective truth is a theological buzzword, not a scientific one.


  115. There is good, healthy, progressive stuff to take away from Rand’s books. Ambition isn’t evil; self-reliance isn’t evil; no one should be forced, out of fear or jealousy, to hide their brilliance. Rand is only a dollop of empathy away from Emerson, really.

    True, but I can’t help but feel like Rand took that (along with everything else) to an extreme. It’s not enough to not be ashamed of ambition, talent, self-reliance, sex, whatever– you have to be completely vicious to everyone around you in the process. I can get behind the first part, but I can’t fathom how gratuitously sadistic so many of her characters are.

    Geez, why the hate on engineers?

    You smell. ;-) (I say this from living in a dorm that seems to be full of them)

    In all seriousness, though, I didn’t just criticize engineers- I’ve known equally insufferable people in the other so-called “hard” sciences, and that’s because the same critique that Carl has of engineers applies to them as well. American society really over-values the sciences, in terms of both how well scientists are compensated relative to the rest of the population as well as the social prestige that they are endowed with. There’s this big, culture-wide thing that states that science and math are hard, and the logical conclusion is that everyone who does science and math is smarter than the rest of the population.

    The inevitable result of this is a population of smug individuals who think their academic interests make them superior to the general population. Combine that with the fact that many educational institutions don’t require hard science students to have as well-rounded an education as the rest of us, and you get a big, seething, insufferable morass of ignorance and superiority. They are the smartest, they don’t have to know other fields because those fields are for less intelligent people, and they know more about the lesser fields than the people who specialize in them because they’re smarter.

    Granted, not all sciencey-types are like that. However, that attitude is really prevalent. I’ve gotten into a number of knock-down drag-outs with my science friends over this stuff- they keep insisting that I make better grades than they do because I am “just an English major” and “everyone knows that humanities classes are easy.” I actually had to write up my schedule, sit them down, and show them just how much time I spend each day reading books, how many pages I read per week/semester, and how many pages I write. It was really, really obnoxious, and I’ve never encountered that attitude from people in other disciplines in the “soft” sciences or humanities.


  116. bluefish A

    in every work environemt i have encountered, there’s always been at least one libertarian- a straight, white guy.
    the last place i worked the resident libertarian was a short, straight, weirdly charismatic, white guy who wore member’s only jacket with the wrong kind of irony and rapped! he said he was hardcore. he spit rhymes around how if we wanted starbucks to disappear from every street corner we should stop being such slaves to our lattes.
    slaves to our lattes, y’all. if we want starbucks to disappear, send a message that the market can hear.


  117. Radalan

    I always seem to join the Really Good discussions late. Instead of a nice, cogent argument, allow me to toss some Rand-grenades :

    Corporations are Government

    Amen to what Chris Clarke wrote. I’ve written as much here before, too. Corporations are an artificial construct by GOVERNMENT - they cannot exist otherwise. I want to know why Libertarians assiduously avoid explaining that. In fact, given the incredible power that corporations wield in the U.S., why aren’t Libertarians out in front of the idea of abolishing limited liability companies?

    Despite its name of “National Socialism”, Nazi Germany was one of the first governments run by the corporate model. As I like to say, Auschwitz was a corporate venture (think IG Farben). The Nazis were big on privatization, too.

    The Sanctity of Holy Property

    When are we going to give the indians back their land? Or, as I suspect, does “property rights” really mean “white male rights”?

    Public Property vs. Private Property

    If the extreme Left (unlike Norbizness, who is just The Left) is represented by those who want to abolish all private property, what does that say about those who want to abolish all public property?


  118. Mnemosyne

    Same with Andrew Carnegie, who took a laboratory curiousity (the Bessemer process) and commercialized it. Carnegie’s steel built a great many things from ships to bridges that enhanced life for the masses.

    Yeah, that Andrew Carnegie. What a friend of the working man he was.


  119. Starfish Girl said:

    The inevitable result of this is a population of smug individuals who think their academic interests make them superior to the general population. Combine that with the fact that many educational institutions don’t require hard science students to have as well-rounded an education as the rest of us, and you get a big, seething, insufferable morass of ignorance and superiority.

    I think I’d qualify that with “can lead to” instead of “you get”, but yeah, I think that’s pretty much on target.

    One of the saddest things I remember from college is friends of mine going into their “diversity” classes with the stated intention of being exactly the same person when they leave as when they went in. They will go into classes sure that they have nothing to learn about the subject, and inevitably, they leave not having learned anything. It’s tragic, a completely squandered opportunity to expand your horizons. I used to sneer at “liberal arts” education, and now I look back on it and wish colleges would make everyone spend their undergrad doing liberal arts, no matter what they wanted to do afterwards.

    For the record, some of the kindest, most empathetic, most enlightened and (yes) smartest people I have known have been engineers. This was true back in college, too. Really, it’s up to the individual to react to their experiences, and people react in to the same education and culture in vastly different ways.

    Anyway, sorry for the threadjacking. I’m done with this subject =)


  120. “American society really over-values the sciences”

    I really don’t think that’s the case. I think it might be more accurate to say that American society mysterizes the sciences, overstating their difficulty so people assume that only a select few can master them.

    In a lot of our cultural discourse, the preface “Scientists say” or “Scientists believe” is thrown around so carelessly, it could just as easily be replaced with “Wizards say,” leading plenty of people in our society to dismiss any science that doesn’t suit them.

    I think that’s a symptom of society skimming over complex subjects and dumbing them down, not a symptom of society over-valuing science.


  121. Sniper

    The funniest thing about Libertarians is that they tend to view themselves as rugged individualists, islands of rational thought and clear-eyed competence. “Nobody helped me get where I am!” they proclaim in special snowflake certainty. Such bullshit. The only adult Libertarian I know went to public schools with the rest of us, received grants for college, and wouldn’t have survived to age 2 without treatment for his horrible asthma.

    Funnily enough, he doesn’t view himself as “surplus” despite his rather obvious health issues.


  122. Aren’t Libertarians just conservatives who want to smoke weed?


  123. Radalan

    Aren’t Libertarians just conservatives who want to smoke weed?

    I think William F. Buckley used to say that, actually.


  124. Did you compensate Buckley for using his intellectual property, Roxanne?


  125. Actually, I think it was on page 7 of the Baltimore Catechism.


  126. Libertarian

    I love when you guys talk about me.

    Always cheers me up. Somehow, I can never reconcile your view of “us,” and “us.”

    I’ll only say this, if you want to learn about libertarianism, you need to read some “other” authors than those you attack. Talk about “strawmen.”

    Rand is easy to attack, but she’s the wrong place to go if you’re genuinely interested in libertarians; on the other hand, she’s a good target for those looking for a strawman.


  127. The only thing I ever got out of Ayn Rand’s books (besides thrills) was her idea that what really hot, hyper-accomplished rich women really dig the most is to be raped by Nordic looking ubermenschen possessing personalities indistinguishable from robots’s. I’d not have guessed that all on my own.

    Oh, I still believe it to this day as a matter of revealed wisdom. Of course I’ve never actually met any of these haughty icy goddesses, as I never worked in a corporate office inside a mighty skyscraper. But even if I did, it don’t add up to no poon for me anyhow, on account of I always wear my all2human emotions out on my sleeve.


  128. See? The guy at 8:40 pm is definitely way high.


  129. Rounded

    Combine that with the fact that many educational institutions don’t require hard science students to have as well-rounded an education as the rest of us, and you get a big, seething, insufferable morass of ignorance and superiority.

    Well roundedness works in both directions, requiring knowledge of both the natural sciences and the humanities and social sciences. General education requirements almost always have a larger number of humanities and social science credits than natural science and math requirements, so it’s quite likely that scientists have more exposure to the humanities than people in the humanities do to science unless you’re at a specialized school like Caltech.


  130. SilverFox

    Sarah in Chicago Feb 23rd, 2007 at 7:12 pm:

    “Buh … what pink rosy fictional book version of history did you read?”

    Any history book which describes conditions in the US during the first decade of the 19th century, and the conditions as they were during the final decade of the same century. I’ll let you pick.

    ” …that lot got rich through monopolies and stripping everything they possibly could out of their workers … *blink*”

    And, where, do you suppose those monopolies came from? Now, it can be said that Microsoft has a monopoly on desktop operating systems. Did those 95 out of every 100 users have someone put a gun to thier heads, march them down to Best Buy, make them buy Windows and install it, then stand by and make sure they used it?

    Or did they decide to buy Windows because that’s what they wanted? I hear *a lot* of complaints from users about their Windows systems: “It crashes all the time.”, “I flunked the course when I lost all my work and the professor wouldn’t take ‘Windows ate my homework’ for an excuse”, “I got a nasty virus”, and so forth. When I offer to lend them my Linux install CDs, the excuses start: “It’s too hard”, “I can’t spend time learning a new op-sys”, “I want my games”. Suggest that they buy a Mac, and it’s: “They’re too expensive”. So whose fault is it really that Bill Gates has a desktop monopoly?

    Similarly, people could have chosen to sit around in the dark instead of buying Rockefeller’s kerosine. That way, he never would have had a monopoly. They didn’t, and, so he did.

    Mnemosyne:

    “Yeah, that Andrew Carnegie. What a friend of the working man he was.”

    Did you miss the part where I wrote: “Not to say that these guys were saints, they weren’t”? There were a lot of wrongs perpetrated — on *both* sides — then as now. Welcome to the imperfect human race. The disgusting behaviour in Homestead does not change the fact that Carnegie’s steel mills improved the lives of a great many people.


  131. What “other” authors should we read? And why are there quotes around “other”?


  132. Oh, damn, this guy isn’t worth talking to … there are so many fallacies in what he just wrote there’s nothing to start with …


  133. Tak, the Hideous New Girl

    I want to comment that this is a great article. Thanks for posting it.

    Oh, I also want to mention that I’m a secretary in an engineering department of a university, and I find the aspiring engineers and (most of the) faculty to be delightful people. Engineers are great (but they won’t build my flying car.)


  134. My usual disclaimer:

    Karl Hess once told me that he thought Ayn Rand stole all her best ideas from Max Stirner. I disagreed. I didn’t think she was that well-read.

    The piece on Stirner cited by BlackBloc is pretty good. There are no absolute prescriptions or proscriptions to be found in Stirner, save the avoidance of “fixed ideas.” If Mother Teresa were to tell him (and Stirner was a firm atheist), “Very well and good, but _I_ choose to serve _my own_ idea of God,‿ then what? The philosophy of egoism has no real answer, other than maybe, “Good for you, as long as you’re clear on whose responsibility it is.‿ And figuring out what one wants, and the getting it, those are the hard parts. What happens when you want contradictory or unrealistic things?

    Resolve the contradictions? Isn’t “contradiction‿ a fixed idea, a spook? And how often have you gotten what you thought you wanted, only to discover that maybe that wasn’t it after all?

    Ultimately, Libertarianism fails the Stirner test because Libertarians try to deny such things as empathy, compassion, and community. That constitites a diminishment of the self, not a realization of it.

    As Charles Foster Kane fictionally said, it’s not hard to make money if all you’re interested in is making money. Of course, he had inherited a gold mine.


  135. Here’s one of those quizes to test your commitment to libertarian ideals. But this one is much more mainstream.

    www.politicalquiz.us


  136. “Similarly, people could have chosen to sit around in the dark instead of buying Rockefeller’s kerosine. That way, he never would have had a monopoly.”

    The vast majority of people don’t have the time to vet every single item they purchase to ensure their purchases aren’t supporting anything harmful or unethical or objectionable to them.

    That’s why over time, people have charged the government with overseeing businesses: so that individuals can act in economically rational ways (buying the best products at the best price) while remaining at least somewhat assured that their money isn’t going to the Mafia, or a monopoly.


  137. Karl Hess is a person I admired a lot.

    Same goes for his son Karl.


  138. Durga_is_my_homey

    Capital L Libertarianism is what happens when somebody spends 18 years in the basement of their parent’s big house playing D & D and dis and re-assembling their computers before deciding they suddenly have insight to personal responsibility, foreign policy, and of how the social structure (if they acknowledge it exists at all) is a Just So story.


  139. Trystero

    I like to tell Libertarians that property is a legal fiction. I like to use the example of a plot of land. The only way you know it’s yours is that some agency that *everyone* adheres to has registered the fact that this bit of land bounded by this feature and that feature is yours.

    Of course, I also like to tell them that the only problem I have with taxes is that we don’t pay enough. I think they usually write me off as at lost cause at that point.


  140. I hate to ask, but does the lack of Dana and GBaker on this thread indicate that they’re off doing other things (it is the weekend) or that they’ve been banned?

    I’m afraid to go checking in other threads to find out.

    (Or, more aptly, I’m about to go out and may forget by the time I come back.)


  141. onymous

    I’m sort of baffled by the idea that going into the sciences makes one more likely to be a libertarian. Scientists have to be critical thinkers all the time, and they tend to apply it to more than just their work. I’m a physicist, and pretty much all the physicists I know are liberals, some quite far to the left and others just ordinary liberals. It’s rare to find a libertarian or any variety of right-wing person, as far as I can tell.

    It also seems to me that you will find many computer programmers who are libertarian (just look at the discussion threads on Slashdot, and be horrified!), but I don’t think it’s so common among computer scientists.


  142. Sniper

    The disgusting behaviour in Homestead does not change the fact that Carnegie’s steel mills improved the lives of a great many people.

    Or, to look at it a different way, many poor and oppressed people have improved their lives by taken advantage of whatever opportunities they could find, including those offered by steel mills. I’m not very fond of the Great Man theory of history as it ignores the vast majority of people who have effected societal change.


  143. felagund

    In the immortal words of my long-ago friend Hannah:

    The only people stupider than Libertarians are ravers.

    I’ve always felt that this was all that needed to be said on the subject.


  144. I have been bewitched by the Libertarian spell, and have only very recently emerged from it.

    It was, I think, the result of a sense of creeping defeatism on my part. I never stopped, ideologically, being a liberal. I just became so intimidated by the Right-Wing juggernaut that I was convinced that we could only beat ‘em by appealing to the one thing we all seem to share in common: an attachment to (at least our own) freedom.

    I began to see the light, first of all, when true believers to the Libertarian movement insisted upon calling me a liberal. I was never “real” enough for them, because I remained committed to social and economic justice. Most Libertarians could not possibly care less about those principles.

    When I pointed out a fact that has been mentioned here, that a corporation is essentially a government in and of itself, I was tuned out and turned off.

    Actually, it’s far easier to escape a particular government than it would be to escape from global corporatism. All you have to do, if you don’t like the government of one country, is move to another one. There is literally nowhere left on this earth you can go to escape the rule of the mega-corporations.

    I still consider myself to be a libertarian-leaning (small-L) liberal. But in order to be true to my conviction that forced authority is evil, I must oppose corporatism even more than I do big-government tyranny. Tyranny in one form is no better than tyranny in any other.

    I’m still rather disgruntled with the Democratic Party. Third parties have a romantic sort of appeal for me. Does anybody know very much about the Greens? I’ve heard some things about them that are good, and others that are terrible.

    Are they really just spoilers who keep Democratic candidates from being elected, or are they the real hope for progressives?


  145. Chris Clarke, editor of Terrain? I have some copies in my file.

    Alan Greenspan as a young social darwinist was a member of a libertarian cult headed by none other than Ayn Rand. Libertarians influence on social and economic policies is more than one might expect.

    From what I know of Stirner I believe his version of anarcho-individualism was anti-bourgeois and thus completely incompatible with modern libertarianism. His influence is wide but pretty unknown. Marx’s German Ideology is an attack on Stirner and the young Hegelians and is where Marx develops his theory of history. Also it’s thought that Nietsche ripped off a lot of his ideas from Stirner.

    According to wiki the first use of the word libertarian was by a French anarcho-communist named Joseph Déjacque. In the non-English speaking world Libertarian is still leftist usually refering to anarchists or anti-leninists marxists.


  146. mds

    Dominus Deus, Chris. Did Jim Henley recently hit you with his car?

    Or did they decide to buy Windows because that’s what they wanted?

    I think in most cases, they decided nothing of the sort, but Microsoft had pressured the computer manufacturer into preloading Windows, and few customers have ever had success getting Microsoft to honor its putative refund for the license they were required to purchase when they bought their computer. But yes, they should have been smart enough to go through Penguin Computing or whatever. That’s one of the things that pours grit into my fancy leather chaps about so many Libertarians: “Oh, well, if you were smart enough, you’d come out ahead.” Lots of people take the path of least resistance with Windows, sure. But why is it the path of least resistance? Its undoubted technical superiority?

    Though I gotta say that SilverFox has done pretty well so far with a tough audience [Applause]. As might be expected,

    Yet, the biggest welfare queens do not live in decaying urban neighbourhoods. No, it’s corporations.
    […]
    As for your statement: “Corporations are governments.‿, how did this happen? This was the result of a thoroughly ridiculous Supreme Court decision[…]
    are sentiments I definitely share.

    But somehow it’s all spoiled for me by

    His tag line, which you mention, “Property is theft‿, is the antithesis of Libertarian philosophy.
    which suggests that despite some promising skepticism about all concentrated power, SilverFox is a royal libertarian, rather than the real thing. Shame, really.

  147. teac

    Carl Rennie
    Feb 23rd, 2007 at 4:28 pm

    Knights. Ka-nig-ets. Not nights. Sorry.

    —–

    You made beer shoot up into my sinuses. No fair.


  148. Chris Clarke, editor of Terrain?

    Wow.

    Not for ten years. Thanks for remembering!


  149. yeah, mds, we’ve definitely lucked out in this thread with SilverFox being the main Lib contributor.


  150. Colorado Dave

    Sarah in Chicago, says…

    there’s a joke about this that an economist, a physicist and an engineer are marooned on a desert island together along with a crate of cans of food. They are sitting around trying to think of how to get the cans open. The physicist comes up with a theoretically possible, but practically impossible solution, the engineer comes up with a practical solution that would destroy the cans … and then finally the economist comes up with an idea … they ask eagerly what it is, and he says “well, first, assume we have a can-opener ….‿

    An engineer, a physicist and a mathematician walk into a room with a fire in the middle and a bucket of water in the corner.

    The engineer takes the bucket of water and douses the fire.. The physicist takes the bucket of water pours a circle around the fire and lets the fire burn itself out. The mathematician walks into the room sees the fire and the bucket of water and leaves confident that there is a solution.

    ba dum bum


  151. During the French Revolution a priest, a lawyer and an engineer are to be guillotined.

    The priest puts his head on the block, they pull the rope and nothing happens. The priest declares that he’s been saved by a miracle! The hand of God!. He’s let go.

    The lawyer is put on the block. Same thing happens with the blade. The lawyer points out that pulling the lever constituted execution, and as he can’t be executed twice for the same crime they let him go too.

    The engineer’s head goes on the block. He looks up at the guillotine and says, “Wait a minute, I see your problem….”


  152. onymous: Libertarians aren’t necessarily overrepresented in the sciences, they’re overrepresented in engineering fields, including computer engineering and programming. Engineering thought is based on a binary system. Biological sciences, by necessity, have to subject data to far more variable tests than engineering sciences do. The phrase “nature vs. nurture”, for instance, is not a valid phrase in biological sciences, because the real answer isn’t one or the other, it’s both — and both to a lesser or greater degree, in multiple tiers of interaction with various levels of intensity.

    The concept of depression, for instance, is something that cannot be approached in a binary fashion. Environment interacts with biology in various and sundry ways, and when the concept of spirituality gets into the mix as well, which it usually does in the case of this particular brain disease, the critical thinking involved is not and cannot be binary. It’s not 1 or 0, it’s both, or neither, or some fraction of the two.


  153. ok, way up there in the thread, someone mentioned that one way to sort out what kind of libertarian you’re talking to is to mention, say, abortion. i think that’s a really true point, although in my experience it hasn’t helped sort out anything because ALL of the self-styled libertarians i’ve met have said shit like “…except on abortion”. what does that even MEAN, dude. i think that’s because all the ones i’ve met have been the “white college guy libertarian” type. i’ve never met a libertarian in the flesh who appeared to know any real libertarian theory (let alone realize the theory didn’t coincide with reality).

    also, why didn’t anybody call out that dude who said “yeah the libertarian US of the late-19th century might have sucked, but it was still the best place in the world to live in at the time”? most people here are a lot smarter than i am, so i wish he’d been told to think about history a little. the u.s. was a shitty backwater for most of that century, and has only enjoyed this (arguable) “best place to live” honor for like the last fifty years.


  154. I majored in computer science in the 90’s.

    Math major plus stock bubble plus a low level econ course or two equals really, really stanky libertarianism. There’s something about that lack of social ability combined with studying an abstract pretend world of symbols and numbers that results in I wanna be RICH NOW, move to Silicon Valley, fuck the government, sell-your-mom-to-slave traders-libertarianism.

    Well as luck had it, turns out that cutting taxes and regulations isn’t all that important in the grand scheme of things. The jobs moved from the Land of Freedom to Communist China and Socialist India. Yep turns out, all corporations really want is cheap cheap labor.

    Most of these arrogant fucks lost their jobs (and so did I) between 2001-3, and they weren’t so mouthy after their jobs got offshored. Heh heh heh.


  155. One thing I’d like to say, as a computer scientist and programmer, is that yes, it’s true a lot of computer science people, at least in college, are Libertarians.

    But in my experience, none of the really good ones are anything of the sort.

    The Libertarians in my comp-sci classes in college were generally the mediocre programmers who were happy just learning one language (or two, tops), didn’t study things outside of the curriculum, and approached the classes in terms of “completing the assignments to get the course credit”, not “learning to do nifty stuff with technology.”

    These are the guys (yes, guys) who go on to work as code-grinding Java programmers in interchangeable jobs in the industry, churning out pages of functional-but-unimaginative code written using by-the-book standard practices, never questioning the methodology they were taught in school, not thinking too much about WHY the things they do work the way they do, and believing that Java/C++/C#/insert corporate flavor-of-the-month language is the best/only way to program. These are (most of) the Libertarians in computer science.

    The ones who do truly good work, who know ten or more different languages, work on multiple operating systems, understand the fundamentals of how computers really work, push the boundaries of what’s possible with a computer, and make interesting and imaginative software, by and large are not Libertarian. Or conservative. Those who are political (many aren’t) call themselves liberals, progressives, humanists, or whatever. They’re hardly of a piece, of course, and many of them have differing opinions on various political issues (I’ve met a few who are a bit misogynist, to my chagrin), but Libertarianism is rare among the true greats, in my opinion.

    It’s like the difference between Eric S. Raymond (open source evangelist, gun-nut, and Libertarian, who has actually written only a few useful programs and bloviates a lot in the right-wing blogosphere) and, say, Admiral Grace Murray Hopper (inventor of the compiler, first woman to achieve the rank of Admiral in the US Navy, a true pioneer of the field and politically a moderate).


  156. THANK YOU. I cannot remember how many times I’ve had to tell people pining for the days of nights in shining and damsels in distress that they wouldn’t be either, that statistically, they’d be the peasant living in extreme poverty and dying in their 40s.

    Oh, I come from Irish stock - I know damned well where I’d be in the Middle Ages.

    I have to admit I liked the bit in Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle where the best aristocratic swordsman in all of England, armed with his pretty three foot long rapier, ran into an Irish bogtrotter - armed with a six foot long stick…


  157. Why would anyone, attuned to “selfishness‿ want to put themselves through the burden of raising children?

    More to the point, anyone who has raised a two year old would not be extolling the virtues of selfishness


  158. Inasmuch as they might lead the impressionable towards progressive little-l libertarianism, and therefore away from the ascendant proto-fascism that currently dominates the right wing of American politics, maybe we shouldn’t rip on Rand’s books too much.

    Nah, I’ll do it if I want.


  159. and this year i have also pointed them to that miracle of freedom Russia

    Somalia, dudes and dudettes, Somalia. No government - must be utopia, right?


  160. heresiarch

    Sarah in Chicago said:

    [as a snark, my personal fav of the insanely funny morons are the Christian Conservative Theocratic Libertarians … it’s kinda like the mutant child of a porcupine and a spider crab; having you wince merely at the thought]

    So freakish, and yet, so common.

    “In his dream America, the one he believes both the Bible and the Constitution promise, the state will simply wither away. In its place will be a country so suffused with God and the free market that the social fabric of the last hundred years — schools, Social Security, welfare — will be privatized or simply done away with. There will be no abortions; sex will be confined to heterosexual marriage. Men will lead families, mothers will tend children, and big business and the church will take care of all.”


  161. A functional libertarian society requires everyone in it to adhere flawlessly to libertarianism? And that’s not seen as a pretty big flaw?

    Well, shit, if that’s a starting assumption a “real” communist society would beat a libertarian society’s ass.


  162. heresiarch

    (Sorry about the screwed up blockquote above)

    Leonard:

    Corporations are governments. I can deal with that.

    States are corporations, Mr Socialist Libertarian. (boom)

    Okay. All that we ask is that all corporations are as answerable to the people as government is. (We aren’t anti-business. We’re anti-exploitation.)


  163. Ank

    Regarding Engineers: I went to one of the best engineering schools in the world (granted, not an American engineering school) - and most of my closest friends are engineers in different parts of the world. Of all of these engineer-friends that I have, only one is libertarian. And not a capital L libertarian at that. A lot of my friends work in sustainable development, some of them do research on alternative energy, a large number of them work in Silicon valley, and are definitely left-liberal. They might not like big government, but they are definitely not averse to paying taxes.

    It might be a cultural meme, but where I come from, engineers tend to be socially liberal. Even those who read Ayn Rand.

    Given my experiences, the generalizations made about engineers seem somewhat unreasonable, but everyone has different perspectives and experiences.

    Also…Noam Chomksy works at MIT, and he is very well respected (indeed, almost revered) by the a large portion of the MIT student body. He calls himself a libertarian socialist - which is VERY different from being libertarian.


  164. Externalities are, in fact, the norm in almost every non-trivial case. Externalities are the rule. Not planning for externalities is like not planning for rush hour in your travel plans.

    Most Americans are largely libertarian in their instincts thinking; “don’t tread on me” is a common theme across the spectrum. And the country already is largely libertarian, probably 70-80 on a scale of 100. Libertarian extremists want to move it to 99.9.

    I was active in the Maryland LP for many years, largely over sexual and drug war issues that elected Democrats outside of Berkeley won’t touch. I am still registered Libertarian in my state to avoid having them - “them” being a large number of people at my wedding, which was largely a libertarian Mafia wedding - suffer ballot access penalties (which are outrageous procedural barriers to self-governance.) But I am working to elect libertarian-leaning Democrats (like Tester, Webb, probably Richardson) and have given up on the National LP since it became clear that moderate libertarians like me had little future in the LP.


  165. For what it is worth, lately I have met QUITE A FEW former Republicans who now call themselves Libertarians, because they are too embarrassed to be associated with the Rethug party anymore.


  166. inge

    Radalan, Nazi Germany was one of the first governments run by the corporate model.

    Copied that from the Italians to keep the old and new money happy, and dressed up in socialist-but-not-really-rhetoric to get the socialist-leaning workers and the socialist-fearing middle class. And fed money gained by robbery into the system.

    On computer scientists, engineers and Libertarianism:

    I feel that the appeal of Libertarianism to many computer geeks is twofold. First, they want to be left alone. (And they run into a significant lot of government folly, because there are enough computer-illiterate policy makers). Second is an aesthetic appeal: A stable, running system based on very simple modules and a single mode of interaction. Pretty, like medieval science based on the four elements is pretty.

    I wonder, though, why engineers would fall for a system with no error tolerance. (What Nineteen Kilo calls “The problem of the asshole”.)


  167. inge

    Trystero: Of course, I also like to tell them that the only problem I have with taxes is that we don’t pay enough.

    And I’ve got at least one set of numbers to prove it. Paying for stuff wholesale via taxes was much cheaper than paying for the same “as you go” and feeding a whole hierarchy of overpaid CEOs instead of a handful of civil servants.


  168. KH

    Philosophically inclined readers might be interested in the defense of left-libertarianism by Michael Otsuka of University College London: Libertarianism without Inequality (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2003).


  169. JT

    As a capital L, Libertarian I think you've got the ideology all wrong.
    Its about the feeling that you depend on yourself in this life.
    I agree you are right that if we all work together in a semi-socialist society we will get further…but that is not how I want to live my life.
    I don’t want the government to take my hard earned money and give it to some bum(s).
    Is that too much to ask for?
    Do you like having your money taken from you so that some government employee who has a guaranteed job for life; while the rest of us are at risk of being fired at a moments notice?
    If you dont mind your money taken by the government…just dont take mine…thats all I ask.
    And yes I agree Somalia is more of a utopia…you are left to your own devices to survive…that is a life worth living..not one where you are baby-sat like in Canada or UK etc


  170. Libertarian

    Trystero: Of course, I also like to tell them that the only problem I have with taxes is that we don’t pay enough.

    How much did you pay last year?


  171. Libertarian

    I was listening to Rush in my car one afternoon on the way to the pistol range (isn’t that a great sentence already?), when a caller attacked him for making eight million dollars a year, but being so cheap he only paid his maid minimum wage (Rush was talking about the minimum wage bill).

    Rush proceeded to tell him that he was truly embarrassed and humiliated that some of his listeners might believe he ONLY made eight mil, and that in fact he paid his MANY maids far more than minimum wage. One of the all time funny Ruch episodes. It’s at times like that, I love the guy. Other times, yeeech.


  172. Libertarian

    And Chris, I slept all night, and woke up still high. Ah, it’s great to be alive and a libertarian.


  173. http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/004518.html is an article I wrote a while back outlining the argument that it’s not the Government’s business to be insuring investors against liability - that, in fact, the “limited liability corporation” is a massive government subsidy in the form of free liability insurance to the investor.

    I’ve yet to see a decent refutation of this position and I think that libertarianism without limited liability is a very interesting - and as far as I can tell, largely unexplored - territory.

    What do you think?


  174. I am a Libertarian. Believing in small government does not make you a freak, it’s actually what this country was founded on. That is, until people took the system we had and extended the power of the federal government to the point we’re at today.

    I suggest you actually do some research. Visit the Libertarian Party’s website (http://lp.org/) and learn a little more about something you apparently do not understand.


  175. TomG

    Libertarianism springs, at least for myself, from a simple question of morality: When is it okay for *anyone* to coerce (via threat of imprisonment and/or physical violence) someone else to do something? Is that ever okay for you to do if yourself or a loved one are not under physical threat of danger? That is a seriously perplexing moral problem and libertarians generally consider it to be the most serious one we face when consider giving government the legal right to that power.

    Compassion? How often this jibe is thrown at libertarians, that they just lack compassion. What the hell does that have to do with anything? No one is being told they cannot be compassionate (that would be completely anti-libertarian) and we generally resent being coerced to give to someone else’s *idea* of what is compassionate, via the hands of inefficient, money-siphoning government bureaucrats.


  176. Epicurus

    “And some of them are smart people despite it all: they’ve just been sadly misled.”

    This sounds like a claim of “false consciousness.” Could it be, *gasp*, that libertarians have good and sound reasons for being, well, libertarians?


  177. impeckish

    Here’s a great way to dismiss any kind of philosophical, religious, or political belief system. You think up the most ridiculous and extreme examples of that belief system and then sweep the whole of the movement under that rug. And it works! At least judging by all the critically thinking challenged people who *nod* to some of the silly examples presented here.

    Let’s try it with some other groups.

    For Liberals: “Oh, all the liberals I have met thought people need to be coddled by the government 24/7. Think of any human action and they’ll say, ‘man, there should be a law against that. People need to be protected.’ Why if they had their way, everyone would be required to walk around wearing helmets wherever they went.”

    For Christians: “Every single Christian I have met thinks gay people are going to hell, no woman has the right to get an abortion, the earth is 6,000 years old, we should kill all Iraqis, and that man walked the earth with dinosaurs. god, I hate them.”

    For environmentalists: “I really really hate those people. What they all really want is to kill all humans (except themselves) so that the earth can be left to only plants and animals.”

    Sure, you can find examples of these people like this in any of these groups. But only the really simple minded think that the most extreme and ridiculous examples define the movements as a whole.


  178. Joe Tax Payer...

    How can it be “fair” that the majority of our tax dollars are spent on the Welfare and Warfare state? Aren’t there millions of American’s who deeply oppose that their dollars are used to fund the occupation of Iraq or the soon to be bankrupt Medicare and Social Security systems? Pacifist shouldn’t have to pay a penny to support the Pentagon, I shouldn’t have to pay a penny into a (CORPORATE) Public School system which forbids even the poorest parents from obtaining vouchers. Why should anyone be coerced into supporting causes they don’t believe in? How is that a characteristic of a moral or free society? These are the questions I find myself asking when I consider my Libertarian beliefs. Issues that I reflect on when I look at how many different taxes I pay (and how much they take), when I see the horrible results of our public school systems and when I read about the inner-city drug-related gang wars, deaths in Iraq, growth of the nanny state and the answers I get from Democrats and Republicans (the answer is to put more of OUR people into office). Discuss….


  179. Rugosa

    Carl R says: You can still be a very good person with a very inflated opinion of your own intelligence

    I have a brother who’s an engineer - a good person, active in his church and community service projects - but who is also a smug bastard who thinks that because he is successful, anyone can be. His thinking tends to be literalist; what is, is, with no reason other than that’s the way god did it. I think engineers sometimes fall into this kind of thinking because their profession and skills require them to acquire a vast amount of received information and be good at applying it. They don’t have to have the critical thinking skills that scientists, artists, etc., do.


  180. But if you tell them to read Cyberselfish, they may wind up with the parts about geek sex, such as geeks all being into s/m because otherwise they wouldn’t know what to do next.


  181. Em

    Well, based on other contributors who were awake while I was asleep, this engineer = libertarian thing seems to be linked with software engineers and computer science folks. I owe you an apology Carl. I am a ChemE and have worked with fellow ChemEs, MechEs, Material Science folks, and the odd IndustrialE, but never with software engineers (see, I don’t even know if you abbreviate yourselves the way I’m familiar with!). I was pissed not b/c you were ‘hitting close to home’ but that your characterization was something I was wholly unfamiliar with, and disparaging to boot. I still disagree that science (non-computer science, anyway) attracts people with libertarian tendencies. If anything, becoming aware of the interdependence of steps in a process required to achieve a desired outcome should make one less likely to believe in their own total independence or the power of their will. But I’m glad I was able to separate our experiences.


  182. dustyhoffsky

    Libertarians can be described as being either:

    1) Naive (or stupid, if you feel uncharitble towards them)

    2) Cruel

    Naive, if they truly believe everyone would benefit from a libertarian society, cruel, if they know better and just do not care.


  183. Robert M.

    TomG, you have cleverly hit upon the very reason that liberals get mad at Libertarians.

    When is it okay for *anyone* to coerce (via threat of imprisonment and/or physical violence) someone else to do something? Is that ever okay for you to do if yourself or a loved one are not under physical threat of danger?

    …when “someone else” doesn’t respect the same rule. If I eschew violence and all forms of coercion, I have no way to influence my next-door neighbor Bob, who beats up people who refuse to give him money. Out of pure selfishness, if I can’t muster any empathy for his other victims, I have a responsibility to prevent Bob from being a violent sociopath; I choose to invest that responsibility in a government, which in turn passes and enforces laws against protection rackets.

    It’s a kind of “social contract”, to coin a phrase which I’m absolutely certain wasn’t used by any Enlightenment philosophers of note.

    As several someones upthread commented, a free, libertarian society can’t exist if any number of individuals choose to reject its philosophy–and that’s a pretty damned significant flaw.


  184. Sniper

    Hey, look! The entire Libertarian Party came by for a visit.

    Oh, I come from Irish stock - I know damned well where I’d be in the Middle Ages.

    Heh. The Renaissance Faire Fallacy is not unlike the Shirley MacLaine Conundrum in which everybody was a princess or a warrior or a sage in a past life. I don’t believe in past lives and as someone from a long line of meat packers, train scrubbers and bargewomen I don’t even want to.


  185. Robert M.

    Em, I’m pretty sure software engineers don’t call themselves “SoftEs”. (c:


  186. mds

    Believing in small government does not make you a freak, it’s actually what this country was founded on.

    Oh, so that’s why President Washington invoked martial law to put down the taxpayer revolt known as the Whiskey Rebellion, and had a Treasury Secretary pushing for a strong central bank and powerful federal government. It was all because of his libertarianism. It’s all much clearer now; thank you for stopping by to tell us that we have no understanding of American history.


  187. FemaleLibertarian

    SilverFox and Libertarian - Thank You!

    Please allow me a brief introduction. I am not a trust fund baby and neither of my divorced-when-I-was-four parents had a cent to their name.

    My mother held, at one time, 3 jobs, worked for the city, then for the Post Office. My father, with the help of my second Mom, put himself through college, right through his Ph.D. My sister and I defined “Latch-Key Kids” 10 years before the term was ever used.

    I did a brief stint - 1 year - in a private school before I was returned to public education for lack of capital - so, essentially, I was “educated” through the public school system. I did attend college and graduated; I got through it with loans, academic scholarships, filing at a law firm, waitressing at diners, working in a distribution plant out in the middle of nowhere, working as an RA and helping people with their PC’s.

    There are several people who helped me along the way - not because they had to, but somehow, out of the goodness of their heart, they chose to. So put it in your head right now, that I am not a trust fund baby and I know well that I didn’t get to where I am today without the help of many people. I am keenly aware of and grateful for their contribution.

    Now, I AM a Libertarian.

    No, I’m not a purist and yes, I know a few. Binary thinking is not my forte unless I’m using a computer.

    But I do have a few basic tenets that seem to grate against bleeding-heart liberals. So here we go.

    1. My Body, Not-YOUR-Business

    Let’s consider abortion. This falls under the “my body, not your business” tenet. We shouldn’t even HAVE abortion laws but some group of someones out there think they know better than me what to do with my body and my life and want to take away my right to self-determination, so now we have a “law” to protect MY inherent, natural right.

    Before someone jumps up and screams, “She’s SO selfish!” I’ll submit that a measure of selfishness is required in this life and benefits not only me, but you as well, and potentially the child I may not want. (Sorry, but that is what abortion really boils down to).

    What you should come away with here is the “My body, Not-YOUR-Business” tenet. The corollary being, “Your body, Not-MY-Business.”

    2. Unless I am hurting YOU or infringing upon YOUR Rights, leave me alone like I leave you alone.

    If you want to smoke dope, snort coke, or shoot crack, what business is it of mine? Unless you are infringing upon my rights, this is none of my business.

    If I want to have oral sex, anal sex, sex with with another woman, sex in groups, what business is it of yours or the State? It’s not! I promise to let you live your life as you choose. Why? Because it is YOUR life. I expect the same.

    Will the country collapse? Fall apart? No. But a few right-wing religious conservatives may lose a bit of income preaching hell, fire and damnation. That’s alright, they’ll find a way to roll with the changes in their business model.

    3. My money and property are mine, NOT yours, NOT the State’s.

    Does this make me evil? No.
    Do I share? Yes. Why? Because I want to. Surprised?

    There is a very scary segment of “society” that believes that making money is bad, that any person that makes a profit or business that makes a profit and grows, is evil.

    They believe that a business owner is not “working” and is magically “profiting” off the sweat of her employees; that somehow, that business person has no right to take an idea she has, build on it and profit from it. And that if she does, she is the reason why we have poverty in America.

    And worse, there are people who think they have a “Right” to the spoils of MY sweat! They’d like to stick their hands in my pocket and claim my profit because I am doing “better” than they are (which, of course, must be wrong).

    I am no different than you. There is no silver spoon in my mouth. And even if there was, SO WHAT! You have every right to choose your own path in life.

    Really, the issue is one of Personal Responsibility and who we see as determining the course of our lives. I see myself as responsible for my life. I don’t expect you to carry me. And I do not want to carry you. I expect you to be living your life as YOU choose, without making excuses for why you can’t do this and why you can’t do that, or “they” (with reference to “big business”) control everything.

    I do not think that 51% of the population of this country should determine HOW I live my life. That is the most dangerous kind of “majority.”

    The fact of the matter is, no, you do not need to buy Windows software. And questioning WHY Windows is the path of least resistance just takes the focus off the real issue, which is this: you DO have choices.

    (But I will answer your question: Windows is the path of least resistance because people, over the past twenty+ years, have voted with their pocketbooks and MADE IT THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE.)

    It’s not anyone’s FAULT you only know Windows and no one is keeping you from learning any other operating system. No one is stopping you from DOING THE WORK OF ACQUIRING NEW KNOWLEDGE.

    You do have choices; you are not a victim of some namess, faceless machine.

    You really CAN choose not to buy a PC. You can choose to build one yourself, you can choose not to have one, you can choose an Apple product. But if you choose to purchase a PC and use Windows, for God’s sake, don’t complain that you are a victim of Bill Gates.

    You can choose to start your own business too. You can choose this. No one is stopping you from taking the risk of entering the free market and doing the work of starting your own business.

    You can choose to work for someone else. No one is stopping you from finding the job you are happy with, no one is keeping you in that job, no one is stopping you from making more money.

    You CAN find another job, negotiate for the combination of salary and benefits that suit you and you CAN choose other work. Stop complaining that the person or company you work for is “making all of that money.” Get off your butt and do for yourself if you really feel that way! No one is in your way.

    My Dad, on occasion, would tell me, “No one said the world was fair.” He’d say this to me because I have a very naive streak in me, still, that wants to believe in goodness and fairness. I want to believe that people will treat all others fairly, and be just.

    But when you understand that this is not the case, there there is no law in the Universe that says that all will be treated equally, fairly and justly, you begin to understand your own personal responsibility - to YOURSELF and then to your family should you choose to have one!

    You are responsible for yourself - for not only your actions, but for your own protection, as well. You are responsible for protecting the Rights you have as an American. YOU are responsible for protecting yourself from predatory employers, predatory competitors and predatory government. Why? Because there is no law that says the 800lb. gorilla will not eat you because you are a nice, giving person.

    The other bit of wisdom my Dad left me with was this: Sometimes, YOU do have to stand up and defend yourself and your rights. When you do not understand your rights, you stand to lose your rights.


  188. You know, my own experience as a science student and engineering intern prepared me to recognize in Marxism a straightforward, robust, sensible and workable model of the capitalist society I actually lived in. Whereas I shared with other Caltech undergrads a near-instinctive revulsion for the so-called “discipline” of mainstream, marginalist economics, which has absolutely no scientific value whatsoever and serves exclusively as an engine of pro-capitalist ideology.

    Few of my peers at Tech ever became Marxists, I suppose. But I think fewer still of them have any respect for academic economics, and fewer yet have found any practical application for its vacuous reasoning. Except, I suppose, in that it justifies by handwaving sophistry the social order we’ve got.

    “Objectivism,” eh? I wonder how many engineer types who adhere to various so-called “libertarian” theories ever notice the objective fact that few of them are or ever will be independent businessmen, and if they did make that leap they would cease to be engineers. In the real world engineers and scientists are people who draw paychecks working for some institution, public or private (but the private ones generally derive their revenue in the last analysis from guv’mint funding) which they have no control over and for which they produce product for someone else’s profit.

    OTOH I fully endorse the theory that such self-glorifying myths are embraced by the geek squad in part because they give a quick and easy self-esteem boost for people who, however valuable their skills may be, generally grew up rather inept socially. Perhaps Caltech was too extreme an instance of this general social pathology to generalize from, but I can testify personally that one motive for me to go into science in the first place was the desire to redeem long years of childhood misery by attaining arcane knowledge that I equated with power, and the notion that I would someday have a general revenge on the dull and cruel kids I was surrounded by had a lot to do with it.

    When I learned to mellow out a little and like people better, I dropped out.


  189. Robert M.

    1. My Body, Not-YOUR-Business

    Let’s consider abortion. This falls under the “my body, not your business‿ tenet. We shouldn’t even HAVE abortion laws but some group of someones out there think they know better than me what to do with my body and my life and want to take away my right to self-determination, so now we have a “law‿ to protect MY inherent, natural right.

    Either you’re under the impression that this is a site where people defend anti-abortion laws, or you believe that a federal law exists protecting a woman’s right to choose; either way, you’re sadly mistaken.

    2. Unless I am hurting YOU or infringing upon YOUR Rights, leave me alone like I leave you alone…

    If I want to have oral sex, anal sex, sex with with another woman, sex in groups, what business is it of yours or the State? It’s not! I promise to let you live your life as you choose. Why? Because it is YOUR life. I expect the same.

    Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with the tenets of the Church of Mouse and Disco Ball. The list of sex acts disapproved of at Pandagon of is pretty short, and mostly involves dead animals (and even then, only because of the thorny issue of consent).

    3. My money and property are mine, NOT yours, NOT the State’s.

    …There is a … segment of “society‿ that believes that making money is bad, that any person … that makes a profit and grows, is evil… believe that a business owner is not “working‿ and … has no right to take an idea she has, build on it and profit from it…

    These are unrelated statements, but both are false. First, your property is yours because the mechanism of government protects your “right” to own it. Continued generation of income depends on the protected climate provided by government; taxes exist so that the government can continue protecting that climate. Second, you’re battling a strawman: the segment of “society” that believes profit is intrinsically evil is vanishingly small, just as misled as the segment that believes it’s inherently good, and certainly not present in the comments on this thread.


  190. C. Diane

    Ursula leGuin has a very interesting book that looks into an anarchist colony. As with much of her work, your point of view can influence your reading of it. I wouldn’t want to live on Anarres, or in Urras for that matter.


  191. Dave

    …when “someone else‿ doesn’t respect the same rule. If I eschew violence and all forms of coercion, I have no way to influence my next-door neighbor Bob, who beats up people who refuse to give him money.

    Libertarians generally believe someone shouldn’t be able to “initiate” force on another person. If one of those people pulls out a .22 and blows Bob away, that’s self-defense. If every person he ever beat up jumped out of the bushes after the first punch, then too bad for Bob.

    I don’t think anyone would object to a third party, such as yourself, stepping in to help someone once violence has been initiated. Most libertarians would say Bob revoked his right not to have force initiated against him when he initiated force on another.

    There are also more peaceful means you could use, like contractual agreements (did you & Bob freely join a neighborhood association? Does the contract have a no-violence clause?) or blacklists (”sorry, Bob, you can’t shop here anymore”).


  192. satanist

    Wow. Another mindless rant against Libertarians. How trite and predictable. No meaningful analysis of what Libertarians actually think, just a pointless smear job using a lot of guilt-by-association. Congratulations, you must be very proud.


  193. Oh, no.

    The Libertarians are accusing me of having a simplistic outlook.

    (My snark aside, though, I am grateful for those folks who have shown up to argue constructively, even if peeved at me.)


  194. The Pee Wee Herman defense has always been one of my favorites.


  195. Dave

    Either you’re under the impression that this is a site where people defend anti-abortion laws, or you believe that a federal law exists protecting a woman’s right to choose; either way, you’re sadly mistaken.

    There’s case law, though. I get the feeling FemaleLibertarian wants to live in the kind of world that doesn’t need Roe v. Wade.


  196. learning where I can

    This might help to clarify positions of aggression/coercion and free association in regards to libertarian theory. It also shows how “social contract” doesn’t necessarily have to exist with a centralized government. I believe that many with libertarian views actually have more faith in society (and the individual’s liberty of free assocaiation in that society) than in government.

    www.mises.org/story/1185


  197. FemaleLibertarian

    Per Dave,
    “There’s case law, though”

    Thank you Dave for recognizing my quotes around the word, “law.”

    And yes, I would like to live in the kind of world that doesn’t need a Roe v. Wade. The crux of Libertarianism for me goes back to a “Live and Let Live” sentiment. (And, yes, I see the irony in that given the abortion topic.)


  198. Heh. This post made it to Reddit, which is just crawling with privileged computer-programmer/engineering type “libertarians.” I suspect that’s where the deluge of simplistic defenses is coming from.

    As for libertarianism, I think it’s awfully telling what issues get treated as “social liberty” and what don’t. For most of the libertarians I’ve seen, the “social” side of libertarianism is guns and drugs - issues that directly affect the straight, white, middle-to-upper-class men that form the libertarians’ core demographic. Issues that don’t directly affect these guys get ignored or dismissed. (Hell, even Wendy McElroy has criticized libertarians for not being feminist enough.)

    I’ve never seen a libertarian party stance on abortion that’s genuinely pro-choice. They don’t want to alienate the guns-and-drugs conservatives, so if they don’t go all out and call abortion “initiation of force against the fetus” they’ll just say “well, the state shouldn’t pay for it.” Ask them about gay marriage and they’ll say “the government shouldn’t be involved in marriage at all.” Then you ask them what should happen when a homosexual person dies intestate leaving behind a widow/widower.


  199. Answer Guy

    There is a very scary segment of “society‿ that believes that making money is bad, that any person that makes a profit or business that makes a profit and grows, is evil.

    They believe that a business owner is not “working‿ and is magically “profiting‿ off the sweat of her employees; that somehow, that business person has no right to take an idea she has, build on it and profit from it. And that if she does, she is the reason why we have poverty in America.

    That’s quite an impressive strawman you just knocked down.

    Making money is, all else being equal, a good thing. As G.K. Chesterton once put it, the problem with too much capitalism is not that it leads to too many capitalists, but that it leads to too few of them.


  200. impeckish

    Yes, Chris, it’s a simplistic argument, and a typical argumentative fallacy, to make sweeping statements and/or to build your arguments on a house of straw. Hyberbole and conflation are other argumentative fallacies offered up here. As well as sarcastic dismissals.


  201. Answer Guy

    There are also more peaceful means you could use, like contractual agreements (did you & Bob freely join a neighborhood association? Does the contract have a no-violence clause?) or blacklists (‿sorry, Bob, you can’t shop here anymore‿).

    And you enforce these agreements how exactly? With big, bad ol’ government? If so then there goes your whole “no violent, coercive state” thing out the window.

    And if you’re asking me (not to overly personalize things here) to help protect your assets then I’d expect to have some kind of stake in the matter. Otherwise we’re really in the Hobbesian state of nature.


  202. impeckish

    I’ll use your comments Chris, as well as many others here, as typical examples of fallacious argumentation for the class I teach in critical writing. Thanks, you’ve given my students a treasure trove of material to work with.


  203. You seem to have confused this post with a forensics team drill, impknish.


  204. The Dog

    Summarizing all the comments:

    We smart, they dumb.

    Quality discourse!


  205. impeckish

    “And you enforce these agreements how exactly? With big, bad ol’ government? If so then there goes your whole “no violent, coercive state‿ thing out the window.”

    Most libertarians are not against the existence of the state to support negative rights, so it’s not a contradiction that we’d want the police and the courts to function to protect the innocent against aggressors. It’s only the small minority of anarcho-capitalists who would reject a state for this purpose.

    Libertarianism is actually a pretty big tent. Personally, I guess I’m a small l libertarian. I’d want a much more limited government than we have now -end foreign interventionism, legalize all drugs, end ta riffs and subsidies to offer truly free trade, stop corporate welfare, improve school choice, support civil liberties and stop the government from snooping into our bedroom and other private places (so to speak…), etc. But at the same time, I favor laws to protect the environment (as I see it, pollution and other sorts of environmental damage is also a form of aggression) and I also think government has a place to support a robust social safety net. This net needs to be cast, however, in a way that does not lead to moral hazzard; a negative income tax is a good example of that.   (Very, very few Libertarians believe in any kind of enviro regs or social safety net.)


  206. Chris Clarke, how dare you snark at a teacher of critical writing! Don’t you know that one of the tenets (I dearly wanted to write “tenants” but that would have gotten us into all sorts of Propertarian details) of Libertarianism is the right to be free of all snark?


  207. Rimfax

    (WARNING: I’m a Libertarian, so feel free to shut your mind now.)

    1) You’ve got your libertarian aviary a bit wrong. Yes, many of the most active libertarians are assholes, much like the most active Greens, Republicans, and Democrats. Yes, many Objectivists and L/libertarians use their philosophy as an excuse to neglect their children and spouses and to justify their acerbic tone towards those they disagree with, much like others. However, the most abusive and wingnut libertarians, the most egregious trolls on fora, are not Libertarians. They don’t get along with anyone, especially not individualists who refuse to be bullied. Often they drift off to the Republicans, Democrats, Greens, or attempt to plant their flag on a fledgling political movement. They are never an official anything for very long. Come on over to “Hit and Run” sometime and see your cast offs troll us posing as “D”emocrats.

    2) Your political quiz example is a nice piece of rhetoric, but it is nothing more than a mind closer. The political quizzes that are alluded to are usually only 10 questions and are actually very useful for people of all political stripes. (Why didn’t you link to them so that others could see just how “awful” they are?) If you are a Democrat or a Green, you SHOULD truly believe in strongly limiting economic freedom to constrain those with resources from abusing their influence and very moderately to minimally limiting social freedom only in the furtherance of that goal. That’s the party platform and has been for decades now. If you are a Republican, you SHOULD truly believe in limiting social freedom to maintain a traditionally moral society and only limiting economic freedom to facilitate limiting social freedom. I cannot in the slightest imagine how these quizzes could possible “trap” anyone into buying the libertarian philosophy of maximum economic and social freedom.

    3) You don’t really need to dig that far to find skeletons in the libertarian, Libertarian, or Objectivist closets. For the most part, they are right out there for all to see. Liberty magazine has repeatedly aired out the dirtiest of mundane laundry in the Libertarian Party. Reason magazine has pretty fully aired out Ayn Rand’s glaring hypocrisies. Would mentioning that Stalin, Lenin, Mao, and Pol Pot and their enormous body counts were a part of the Democrat’s ideological legacy? Somehow I doubt it. Besides, their sins don’t necessarily bear on the ideology, in as much as it is a cohesive one, of the Democratic Party any more than Ayn Rand’s paranoia bear on the principles of the Libertarian Party.

    4) [rhetoric] If organizational governance is the Libertarian blindspot, it is also the Democratic sucking chest wound. So, pretending that we live in a world where there is a “class of people” who can’t just “get another job”, where there isn’t a multibillion dollar job search industry, where “Help Wanted” signs for jobs of all wage and skill levels aren’t everywhere you look, the Democrats would have us working for the government essentially. Yeah, our paychecks might say “Megacorp”, but the government would determine if we got fired or got a raise. Democrats also aren’t so fond of federalism, so there’s no state shopping either, just the feds. That means we’ll all be working for one huge monopoly on working conditions, wages, etc. That’s great as long as the great beneficent Democratic Party holds power. What about when they lose an election, after all “majority rules”, right? So, when the Fascists get voted in and have all the gays fired, well that’s just democracy in action, right? I apologize for the rhetoric and I’m out of time to devote to this.

    I recommend that you tell the asshole L/libertarians that you meet to go fuck themselves, but that you truly start communicating with the ones who aren’t assholes. We’re over here trying to do the same with the Democrats that we meet. Well, at least some of us are. Cheers.


  208. George Will once said something along the lines of:

    “Libertarians will never be powerful but will always be relevant.”

    You, on the other hand, will always be neither.


  209. The Constitution

    Hi. I’m the Constitution. Remember me? You should read me sometime. I explain everything. In fact, if you did read me, you’d find that most of the government programs out there are unconstitutional. What say you now, liberal?


  210. jasno

    This seems like the weirdos on one side of the fence casting feces at the weirdos on the other side of the fence. Yes, there are a lot of bizarre people who’ve latched on to parts of libertarianism(and from the sounds of it, anarchism, which they claimed was libertarianism) and given it a bad name. I think I could come up with a similar list of all the strange people who’ve latched on to pieces of other philosophies and ran with them, giving them a bad name as well. Who here hasn’t met the wacko communist, or socialist, or republican.. etc…

    This thread is filled with straw men. Although I have to admit having joked that the California Libertarian Party mascot should be a ferret smoking a joint and wearing a Star Trek uniform… but I digress. I understand the point of this thread probably wasn’t to come to some understanding but to vent and make snarky comments. Isn’t that what the internet is all about? But please, at the end of the day, remember that there are some generally well-balanced folks who still believe government is too big, that as much as we’d like it to fix some things, there are things it just can’t do(like be free from corruption, or rebuild Iraq, or raise your children). Then again, there are some things it can do - like provide for the common defense, protect us from each other(not from ourselves), and enforce equal protection for all. The idea, at least to me, is limited government, not no government.


  211. tzs

    I think we’re getting most of our visitors from Reason. They’re trying to figure out what name I post under. (Snerk!)

    The major reason I don’t believe in big-L-Libertarianism is because we have never had a stable society/economy that works on those lines in all of history. If we haven’t had something like it show up already, it’s probably not stable enough to be a realistic social/economic system. We’ve seen some pretty crazy set-ups already–from Calvin’s Geneva to Israeli kibbutzim to Soviet-era communism to 1950s housewife/breadwinner to present-day people living in the wilderness. Notice that none of them last that long. (Heck, the 1950s housewife/breadwinner setup didn’t even last 20 years–as shown by the rebellions in the 1960s.)

    Libertarianism contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction: the only way a Libertarian society could exist is if all the people involved decided of their own accord to follow all the tenents of libertarianism–which would, in the end, mean control of society through internalized controls.

    From THAT viewpoint, the most supremely libertarian society on Earth is Japan.


  212. FemaleLibertarian

    Actually, the quote is, “Too much capitalism does not mean too many capitalists, but too few capitalists.”

    As for the “strawman,” I encounter, on a regular basis, people who blame their “situation” - or whatever they conceive it to be - on “big business” or “the boss.”

    Just last week I was listening to a woman tell me she cannot “get ahead,” and proceeded the place the blame on credit card companies, business (all businesses in her opinion!) and her low pay (the government agency she works for doesn’t pay her enough and takes advantage of her); meanwhile, she says, “companies are getting rich.”

    As if that is wrong. And as if those companies are the reason she cannot get ahead.

    Yes, she feels trapped and I completely understand that feeling. But, she took the credit extended by the credit card companies. She chooses to work for the agency she works for.

    This is a woman who has no family obligations, no children to take care of, no mortgage. Yet she feels trapped and blames everyone but herself for her situation.

    That strawman is real.

    Then there are others who look at the salaries of CEO’s and believe they should not “make” that kind of money. Again, another real strawman.

    The argument has nothing to do with who works “harder” (the janitor or the CEO). It has everything to do with perceived value and the availability of persons with the knowledge to deliver that perceived value.

    I didn’t know there was a cap on the amount of money a CEO “should” make. I don’t think there is a cap on the amount of money a janitor “should” make.

    Do I see some CEO salaries as insane? Yes. Do I think we as a society should implement laws to redistribute those monies. No. It’s not OUR money.

    I am not arguing that barriers do not exist, that injustice does not exist and that people do not ever need a helping hand. I’ve experienced discrimination, I’ve had the pleasure of watching an 800 lb. gorilla attempt to extort my business for that which I legally owned and there have been many times in my life when the generosity and kindheartedness of another person helped lift me from my “station.”

    I’m just not in favor of an expansion of government that seeks to address those barriers and injustices by forcibly reaching into my pocket for money I have earned while limiting the freedoms granted me by virtue of my American citizenship.


  213. Charles Crumb

    Thank you for putting in the time and effort to painstakingly state the obvious in a manner that even deluded imbeciles should be able to understand.

    You made my day.


  214. tzs

    And this gets back to my question which I ask, over and over: “what is libertarianism?” As soon as you press self-identified (rational) libertarians about things like externalities, they start hedging their bets–well, no, we’ll keep the EPA around. Oh, and the FDA. And yeah, we’ll need enough gov’t to provide police and law courts….and yeah, we’ll agree that you can’t assume information is infinitely available and the time to do due diligence isn’t zero….

    Pretty soon, you get them to admit that aside from a few tweaks, the world they would like to see is close to what we have already. (As said, these are the rational ones–the ones that DO admit history has shown we’re either going to get a paying-taxes-to-the-gov’t or a paying-protection-money-to-the-Warlords setup, and the former is better.)

    The crazy ones are the ones who run for POTUS on the Libertarian platform.


  215. How To Explain Things to [Vulgar] Libertarians…

    Chris Clarke at Pandagon has some advice for people who are trying to communicate with Big-L Libertarians. I think he is slightly off with his suggestions, as some of them seem to be designed to deal with “vulgar libertarians” more than people who g…


  216. Sam

    As a pro market libertarian, I have to say I thought that whole bit about the graphs was pretty funny. Those short political quizes are pretty bogus and it’s about time someone made a good joke about it. As to the short LCDs:

    1. American libertarianism is distinct from Continental libertarianism; and anyway focusing on the evolution of the word is obviously entering a game of semantics that is entertaining and interesting at best, distracting at irrelevent at worst.

    2. I guess this is the same thing. I know you will accuse me of making an irrelevent point about wasteful inefficiency and functional redundacy, but I won’t.

    3. Ok, now this is an actual argument. I won’t ruin the efficacy of your LCD sketch here by going into the details, but this is where we enter not only a discussion of ethics and a politico-economical discussion about the distinction between different types of “government”, but also (and some would say most importantly) a discussion about the logical implications of attempting to realize whatever sort of society you think should exist. That is, here we enter economics, the invisible apodictic, sophist web of deceipt that libertarians have been weaving for over a centruy, waiting to ensare the proletariat…

    Bastiat is highly recommended for his discussion of economic sophisms…

    Sam


  217. FemaleLibertarian

    Rimfax said, “I recommend that you tell the asshole L/libertarians that you meet to go fuck themselves, but that you truly start communicating with the ones who aren’t assholes. We’re over here trying to do the same with the Democrats that we meet. Well, at least some of us are. Cheers.”

    YES!! I could not agree with you more.


  218. togolosh

    There are many important things progressives can learn from libertarians. Unfortunately the Prick Factor makes it hard to really connect, but there are still libertarians out there who can coherently argue their case without resorting to Randroidisms. It’s worth dropping by Reason Hit&Run from time to time and skimming through the posts. I’ve certainly learned a great deal from it.

    The progressive vision of the state has serious implementation problems - too often regulations are promulgated with a bit of a ‘fuck you’ attitude towards the people affected. Progressives need to focus on finding effective policies that deliver results with minimal inconvenience. Not only is it the right thing to do, but it’s politically smart - minimal intrusiveness means minimal backlash. One of the things I’ve gotten out of reading smart libertarians is a better understanding of the downsides of regulation and the dynamics that create needless drag on the economy. This is really, really important for progressives - as a general rule we prefer small business over megacorps. It’s the small businesses that are hurt most by clumsy regulation. Megacorps have megalawyers, so they can just suck it up knowing that despite the hassle they still benefit from having upstart competitors driven out of business.

    It is quite possible to obtain desired outcomes without overly burdensome regulation (at least in many cases), but it won’t happen unless progressives start caring about minimizing burdens as well as managing externalities.


  219. PhilBoo

    Follow the Money……
    Google up funding for the Cato Institute…Then you begin to understand the Libertarians…


  220. Cesar

    tzs-

    What is Liberalism? What is Conservatism? What is Marxism? Every ideology is going to have disagreements within it.


  221. jasno

    tzs,

    (I hope this comment gets ordered correctly, I’m not familiar with blogs in general and specifically this setup)

    As soon as you press self-identified (rational) libertarians about things like externalities, they start hedging their bets

    Why would that not fall in the spectrum of beliefs a libertarian could be expected to have? We’re not anarchists. Obviously political beliefs don’t fall cleanly into discreet bins, and there are a lot of libertarians who fall very close to anarchists, but I think the distinction is usually pretty clear. Your assumption that a libertarian must want to abolish every current function of government is just one more manifestation of the straw man being flamed in this thread.


  222. Dave

    Pretty soon, you get them to admit that aside from a few tweaks, the world they would like to see is close to what we have already. (As said, these are the rational ones–the ones that DO admit history has shown we’re either going to get a paying-taxes-to-the-gov’t or a paying-protection-money-to-the-Warlords setup, and the former is better.)

    Do I get to freely choose my “warlord”, or to have no warlord at all?

    Yes, my ideal world would be pretty much like what we have today, except with most things the government does today handled by private entities. You mention the FDA, but why can’t we have something like Underwriters Laboratories, but for medicine?


  223. rarr

    This article and a lot of the comments are a nasty caricature of libertarianism. You’re only describing the nuts! Every political party has its nuts. Any of the various stories that have been told - about the guy who sat naked on the common room couch, the guy who said that Hitler didn’t know about the Holocaust - those aren’t about libertarians, they’re about nuts. They could just as easily been a pair of liberals or a pair of conservatives. Also, I find it really interesting that you seem to be seeing Objectivism as the same thing as libertarianism. Atlas Shrugged is a bad book which collapses under the weight of its own philosophizing; people who say they are libertarian and demonstrate Atlas Shrugged as their bible are sadly misguided.

    they want rigged anarchy, and I shall have none of that. Gimme your beer money, or I’ll crack you in the head with a blunt object. It’s my will to power that grants me a right to swing my club, so you better give me a damn good incentive to take my crowbar and leave.

    One of the key libertarian principles is a prohibition on the use of force. Force deprives others of their rights. While this is not always realistic (people have to use force, after all, against somebody who is going to harm them or others), it is telling that you are unaware of it. Libertarians DON’T want rigged anarchy and we don’t want to crack people in the heads with a blunt object, because people don’t have the right to swing a club except in self-defense. It’s an offense against the rights of others.

    6. “Shorter Libertarian dogma: Fuck the poor. They deserve their fate.‿ In order to believe in Libertarian dogma, you have to believe that all rich people are fundamentally superior to all poor people, and proportionately along the spectrum as well. This means Libertarians have to stipulate that Britney Spears is smarter (richer) than them, and high school science teachers are the moral inferiors of Larry Flynt.

    Rich people are only “superior” to poor people in one sense; they (or their family) are better at making money than the poor people. In no sense but that would I call a high school science teacher the inferior of Larry Flynt; certainly it would be ridiculous to say that he was inferior MORALLY. Morals have nothing to do with it.

    I like to point out to Libertarians that neither government or business is always efficient, but with free elections you get to fire the government every few years. You can’t fire a giant monopoly.

    You’re right. As a realistic libertarian you have to admit that government will always exist and will always be needed; the only problem is that it should be small and it should stay out of people’s private lives, two things which are not very synonymous with government at present. In the ultimate libertarian utopia, it wouldn’t exist, but that is just a philosophical construct.


  224. FungiFromYuggoth

    To intrude reality into this discussion a moment, I’d like to point out that CEO salary is negatively correlated with firm performance but positively correlated with director compensation (sorry about the highlighting, but the main article is behind a paywall). So the “perceived value” relating to problematic compensation is based on the interlocking perspectives of some directors and CEOs, and has very little to do with anything resembling a market.

    As a mutual fund holder, it is likely that I am a shareholder in at least one of these companies, which would make it “my money”. I tend to think the solution involves better regulations of crony capitalism rather than an outright cap on CEO salary, but then again I hardly ever rant about how “the man” is keeping me down.

    What I’m wondering is how the rather proprietary Libertarian perspective on “my money” relates to the rather large government involvement in printing money, backing up paper credit, controlling the non-cash monetary supply, etc? I suppose Alan Greenspan would be the right person to ask about this, but I fear his answer involved a decades-long scam involving Social Security. Is there a Libertarian party plank I can check for references to the gold standard?


  225. impeckish

    John, I think snark is just fine as long as it’s not a substitute for critical thinking. Do you have a real, substantive point to make? Or did you just sneak onto daddy’s computer? (snark).

    “Pretty soon, you get them to admit that aside from a few tweaks, the world they would like to see is close to what we have already.”

    Tzs, I don’t agree with your assumption. I think that liberty is not an absolute good but is generally a good thing; I believe that occasionally externalities have to be weighed when discussing possible limitations on individual rights. But it doesn’t at all follow from that that things would be pretty much the same if you follow a general rather than an absolute form of libertarianism. Sing it with me now, “Imagine no drug laws. No Patriot Act, too.” A robust support for civil liberty and strong support for our Constitution (not the rejection of it as is currently being played out), a non-interventionist military (that would really be dramatic), totally free trade - not the pro. U.S. protectionistic one we have now that is mistaken for free trade, no corporate welfare, etc., etc. We’d have a federal government dramatically shrunken in other words.


  226. Heh. A pretty good essay. Well written and funny. You’re going to get a lot of people who call themselves libertarians to ’splode their crania with that one.

    Of course, if they were sufficiently intellectually honest as to actually allow their heads to explode, they’d probably also have at least made an attempt to address those points in a self-consistent manner. Your more crazed kid that just picked up Rand in highschool and decided to become a libertarian so he could smoke out and claim it was a political statement would likely just ignore these points and say “Fuck you, man - you can’t tell me what to do!” And this is not just true of libertarians. There could be similar pages written on socialists - and again thoughtful socialists would have tried to solve the internal conflicts that the libertarian might point out, while the ones who say “workers unite! fuck the man” becuase they’re pissed at their boss for telling them not to surf the web from work are likely to just point to their Che shirts and tell the libertarian to stop oppressing them.

    Indeed, corporate power is identified as a significant problem in many branches of libertarianism. Industries have been using governments to their advantage since the industrial revolution. Someone mentioned water, power, and gas as monopolies that they have to deal with, or be left naked and cold in the woods. This is true, but it is not exactly the result of free-market liberalism. Water is almost invariably a government service - more socialism than free-market liberalism. Gas and electricity are sometimes quasi-socialist in some cities, or government-granted capitolist monopolies in others. It’s important to note that capitalism and free markets are not the same thing. If a government tells one privately owned company that they have sole right to build power lines and provide electricity within their jurisdiction, that’s capitalism, but not a free market.

    So one of the challenges facing anyone trying to set up a workable middle-path state is extricating current private business from the privileges they’ve been recieving from the state. Many libertarians decry the excesses of corporations when the government is collusionary in those excesses. Many libertarians are upset about Kelo v New London not because the government forced people to sell their land, but that they did so to benefit a large corporate interest. That’s not to say that if New London were taking that land to build a swanky new city hall that libertarians would be pleased - they’d undoubtedly oppose it - but the honest ones would concede that it was legal and constitutional.

    Similarly, many libertarians see current IP law as being skewed in favor of large corporations. Copyright is especially problematic. While it does provide economic incentive to produce new works, it also stifles the rights of others to produce derivative works. Patent law - which is now very permissive to patent holders - also provides government backing to corporate excess.

    So libertarians are not (or at least should not be) knee-jerk in favor of the richest guy. They simply aren’t opposed to rich people being rich, and to the rich taking their toys and going home. This is interpreted by those to the left as cold-hearted but it should at least be impartially cold-hearted.

    People have discussed the fallacy that Nazis were socialists - and that’s largely true. However, they did share some key features with authoritarian communism - in that it was a planned political economy. People owned businesses, but they weren’t free to run those businesses as they pleased unless they were politically connected to the Nazi regime. Otherwise, the Nazis came and told you how to run your business to support the common good of the fatherland. This is where people get confused thinking that Nazis were communists. You could own a factory, and you could profit from it, but you had limited freedom - just try telling the Wehrmacht you’d rather not produce tanks for them. They’d find a new owner for that factory. Their ‘capitalism’ was more a system of property-privileges than property-rights. Big difference.

    Anyway, just some general thoughts in response. Y’all be y’all. Just remember that I’d just as soon you didn’t take a gun and force me to be y’all, m’kay?

    Oh, and while there were some good insights in Rand’s work, she was WAY over-the-top with it. I’ve never bought into the extreme tenets of Objectivism. And while The Moon is a Harsh Mistress was fun, and Stranger in a Strange Land is one of the finest parables of non-violent communitarianism out there, Heinlein did get into some wacky shit - Starship Troopers is hardly the non-aggression ideal. And I really would like to opt-out on the whole incest thing he had going on in his later novels.


  227. Oi - sorry for the long post. I’ll go now.


  228. I was tempted to write a long winded response to the more nuanced arguments here. Not the simple-minded detritus I suppose you find on every board with an ideological bent. Just replace the Pinochets with Pol Pots or “randroids” with “moonbats” and you have the standard pabulum that passes as acumen at blogs for Bush and the like.

    Like I said, I was tempted, but I have a long day ahead finishing my federal tax return. I started out a couple of weeks ago. I thought one weekend might do it, but there were some problems. For example, I wasted a lot of time trying to find what portion of my wife’s car accident is deductible. Our single car was significantly damaged when a hit-and-run driver sent her pin-wheeling off the freeway (no, no, she’s fine, thanks). As it turns out financial loss due to accidental damages are deductible. The form is longish, and the instructions tend to obfuscate more than not, but I made it through. But in the end I found that only the actual payout greater than 10% of our adjusted gross income could be applied to our itemized deductions. It wasn’t clear from my first cursory reading of the form that this was so. I guess I know now for next year’s return. Let’s hope I don’t need it. Then there is the deduction for state property tax. My state, perhaps like others, assesses tax on all property held through the year. Our car, such that it is, is taxed on it’s value. Well, sort of, and here is the problem. The state tax commission levies the fee, but it is done through the department of motor vehicles at the annual registration. Some portion of the registration is for administrative fees and some portion is based on the year of the automobile, or it’s actual value depending on a lot of crap I’m not inclined to write out. But it’s still called a fee in most of the tax commission’s publications. I looked up the statute that enables the commission to levy the tax, but unfortunately it doesn’t clarify if it is a tax or just a fee. In the end I took the deduction. I hope I’m not audited. If I am audited though, the auditor is allowed to decide if my plain reading of the instructions were reasonable (fingers crossed). There was also a mess with the deduction of the federal telephone excise tax (I hope you all remembered to take it, click my name for details). What they were offering as a flat deduction seemed low. I pulled a few of my bills and it really did seem they owed roughly twice the offered standard deduction. But after an hour of trying to track down the 40 or so odd phone bills I decided just to take the bit offered. And this just scratches the surface. I also found an error in last year’s return. I deducted the previous year’s actual state tax and not the current year’s state withholding. In my defense it was my first year itemizing; we just bought a house. I’ll be starting the amended return today.

    I suppose I could pay someone to do this for me, but my wife and I work very hard and I don’t trust someone to be as thorough as I am trying to be (not to mention the cost). And isn’t the whole point of this convoluted tax code, to some extent, to influence my spending and savings in a way that ‘benefits’ society; hybrid auto credit or philanthropy deductions and the like. If you don’t prepare your own return how would you know what sorts of behaviors are rewarded and which aren’t? I feel for less detail oriented people or those not so mathematically inclined. I’m a research scientists; alternative energy, thank you. You might think someone with math, physics, and graduate degrees, someone who makes their living doing tedious detail oriented calculations, wouldn’t be fixing last years mistakes while making some this year.

    Who am I to question it though? I’m sure some of you pro government folks can explain how this one small example of state sponsored social engineering is working out “in the real world” where simple-minded libertarian ideals would quickly turn into a quagmire of unintended consequences. I’ll leave you to it, I’m back to work.


  229. tzs

    Oh god, yes, when you get the Libertarians coupled with the go-back-to-gold-standard people….they start to sound like the nuttiest of the LaRouchites.

    If “sensible libertarians” don’t want to be hit with the “warlord or gov’t” choice, they should stop running around claiming that they shouldn’t have to pay taxes. NOBODY wants to pay taxes. It’s just that most of us are intelligent enough to agree with the aphorism “taxes are the price of living in a civilized society.”

    Please point to a technologically advanced, stable society/economy that does NOT have taxes. And please explain how you plan to support the US miltary, legal system, highway infrastructure etc. without paying taxes.

    Also please explain how the US is expected to maintain a position of relative technological strength if we remove all public funding of science and technology, given that other countries such as Japan, China, and the EU *will* be carrying out public funding.


  230. rarr

    And while The Moon is a Harsh Mistress was fun, and Stranger in a Strange Land is one of the finest parables of non-violent communitarianism out there, Heinlein did get into some wacky shit - Starship Troopers is hardly the non-aggression ideal.

    Heinlein was not really dedicated to any one political philosophy. I prefer to read his books without really looking deeply into the philosophy under them, because you’ll just confuse yourself if you try to point at anything and say “that is what Heinlein believed.” Starship Troopers is a really good book, even if I don’t agree with some of the philosophy under it.


  231. Larry Edelstein

    “Libertarianism contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction: the only way a Libertarian society could exist is if all the people involved decided of their own accord to follow all the tenents of libertarianism–which would, in the end, mean control of society through internalized controls.”

    So, if people decided something for themselves, they’d _actually_ be oppressing themselves? Is that really your point? Or are you making a lot of assumption with “in the end”, perhaps?


  232. *nods* I have to totally agree with this … I’ve seriously had engineering students in their wonderful superiority sit down to tell me as a sociology phd candidate how society actually operates … I mean, I know wayyyy less than everything (WWAAYYYYY less) but I kinda felt like saying “you know, I kinda do this stuff for a living and all …‿

    The fact that you resort so quickly to the logical fallacy of credentialism seems to indicate to me that his feelings of superiority may well have been justified. Engineering is practical by nature. If something doesn’t work in the real world then an engineer is by definition a failure at their profession. The biggest blind spot that they have is in assuming that those they are talking to are as rational as they are.

    Contrast this to the “soft sciences” where if you are as spectacularly wrong as Marx was in almost every regard then you get a whole branch of studies christened in your name and they make statues of your likeness. I know it is galling but a PHD in sociology would make your opinion about economic and political systems worth exactly as much as his. Whereas his opinion about internal combustions engines, if that were his field of study, would be worth a lot more than yours. Not because of credentialism but because of the nature of what you are studying.. one is based on repeatable scientific facts and the other is based on interpretation of human behaviour. This is why there are so many jobs for engineers and so few for sociologists.


  233. This essay and most of the replies have no clue about libertarianism. I would recommend reading these links:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harm_principle

    to get at least a clue before bashing libertarians.


  234. tzs

    I also agree with those who state that the present tax system is arcane, over-complex, and stupid. Problem is, it’s a case of special interests whining for special treatment (mortgage interest deductions, anyone?) which then get passed, people looking for loopholes in the system for arbitrage, hastily-passed legislation to cover the loopholes, which just make things more complex….

    N years of this and you have the present system. We COULD have had a very simple tax system–either a flat tax, or a graduated tax, with no exemptions. Period. We chose not to.

    The problem with idealistic systems is that they are, well, idealistic systems. There’s always the assumption that all the people under it will act in a “virtuous way”, no one will try to game the system, there’s no corruption and no power struggles. This is why Marxism and Libertarianism are, in the end, in the same boat–the assumption of “virtuous activity” by its adherents.

    Libertarians also have a touching faith in the activity of non-government entities. I’ve always found it hilarious that privatization of a service of government is supposedly somehow going to magically fix things. Bureaucracy is bureaucracy, whether in gov’t or outside. There also are bits and pieces that don’t fit very well in a private-sector setup–as someone once said, “Government is the place of last resort.” It takes care of the burden of supporting those that really shouldn’t be supported, for a cost-efficient point of view. It has the US post office deliver mail to places way out in the wilds of Wyoming still for 39 cents/letter. We have electricity delivered out to rural farms in Kansas, where an accountant would point out the building of such an infrastructure makes no sense at all. We provide medication to the poor and elderly–which again can be argued against from a “supporting productive members of society.”

    So–based on the above–what would a libertarian society do instead?


  235. Sam

    Actually TZS, libertarians are fond of pointing out that when political power is decentralized, the assumption of subjective valuation (if you like it can be greed, or altruism, it need not matter) is all that’s needed to justify libertarianism. Even if the ideals of socialism are worth achieving (and *some* of them certainly are, any good economist will tell you that it just won’t work and is based on many erroneous assumptions. There are a fair share of Randian libertarians, but the majority are not. The foundation for libertarianism lies in economic theory, which addresses the issue of incentives which you noted is very important. Listen to the Paul Krugmans and the Rush Limbaughs if you like, but if you want to understand the implications of any policy proposal, you will need to think of it in economic terms at some point. Having been a socialist originally, I just don’t see that socialists care about economics; most leftists I know have barely gotten into the theory, or if they have it’s invariably confined to a select few economists rather than a more general and complete approach.


  236. better understanding of the downsides of regulation and the dynamics that create needless drag on the economy

    Yeah, remember when ENERGY was deregulated? That was G R R E A A T T T ……..we went from having the best, most reliable, and least expensive power grid in the world, to ENRON. Yeah. Regulation, ooooooo, it’s so evil!



  237. JDCasteleiro

    Joe Tax Payer said:

    How can it be “fair‿ that the majority of our tax dollars are spent on the Welfare and Warfare state?

    My God.

    Do you seriously believe that?

    If so . . . How can you possibly be smart enough to gain the employment to earn enough income to pay any taxes at all?

    Are you really that fucking uninformed?

    Try less than one percent.


  238. Larry Edelstein

    tzs, L (if I may abbreviate) doesn’t assume virtuous behavior. Not relying on virtual behavior is practically the chief feature of L. Rather, it assumes people look after their own self-interests.

    Non-governmental entities are different from the other kind because they are subject to competition, and don’t require participation or public funding.

    Since our society is in large degree L, the answer to your last question is probably something like “just what it does now”. But to be less flippant…it doesn’t seem that hard to me to deliver letters to Wyoming, especially if there are a reasonable number of them, so I’d imagine that a private postal service might offer a similar price, or at least an affordable one. About medication: the system in place is already underserving, and it’s a hard problem, I think. The variety of treatments available has expanded so quickly and lifespans have increased so quickly - everything is in flux. Non-market solutions respond more slowly. And this has been a highly regulated market for years.

    I’ll think about it more. But your comments are so ignorant that it hardly seems worth it.


  239. I’m a libertarian.

    I got down to the “governments aren’t as overbearing as monopolistic corporations” posts and found this gem:

    Exactly Hava. And how many of us get to choose our electric or gas or water company.
    Who do you think selects or runs local utility companies? Yeah. Governments will rescue us from the corporations they grant monopolies to and get cash payments from.

    Then there’s:

    That’s why Theodore “UniBomber‿ Kaczynski was such an influential Libertarian. He showed us all how to throw off the constraints of government and live free!…
    Wasn’t the Unibomber the one that targeted corporations, not government? An enviroluddite? Well outside the libertarian camp, more of a Green Party liberal.

    Governments such as the various forms of democracy (republic, constitutional monarchy, direct democracy, etc), which as a rule do not have a profit motive, cannot be considered equivalent to corporations.

    1. Which is why we have so many Congresspersons in the poorhouse?
    2. In government, for-profit corporations, and not-for-profit corporations power is a greater motivation than cash. Power over your life. Backed up by guns and prisons.

    What we have in the U.S. right now is a government of two parties who both want to severely restrict individual liberty. The only difference is which rights they target first. Consider the Pink Pistols. (http://www.pinkpistols.org/) They are GLBT gun owners. Who should they vote for? Democrats hate them because the Pink Pistols want to keep guns to defend themselves from Republicans who hate them because they want to get married. Libertarians say, “Keep your guns and marry whoever you want to.‿ That’s the “fundamental principle‿ you asked for.

    I’d keep going, but I’m selfish so I’ll spend my time more profitably.


  240. JDCasteleiro

    Hmm, my comment was automatically truncated. Probably something to do with my bold tag. I can’t recall everything I wrote, but in case Joe needs it spelled out for him:

    Less than one percent of our tax dollars is spent on anything remotely resembling welfare.


  241. Grimm

    He is addressing “extremists” here people. You could do the exact same thing for Republicans or Democrats. But you would probably see how ridiculous it was when he got to the part and said “Most Democrats are small d Democrats” or most Republicans are small r Republicans” and that he was only referring to big D and big R Democrat/Republicans. It’s not big L it’s not big D or R, it’s extremists and every group/party has them.


  242. Sam

    The libertarian objection to welfare has less to do with its direct price tag (taxation), but all its hidden costs. Most libertarians see welfare as an insidious type of slavery.


  243. JDCasteleiro

    It happened again. There was more. No tags that time. I give up.


  244. Grimm

    “You can’t fix a problem like underpaid public school teachers by just throwing money at them!‿
    BTW - Nice straw man argument there. A libertarian would point out that in school districts were teachers are not underpaid you still have the same problem of poorly educated children. They would also point out that many “private school teachers” are paid LESS then the “public school teachers” and yet the children are better educated. They would be in the position to argue that this is evidence that just paying teachers more does not solve our education problems.


  245. JDCasteleiro

    Most libertarians see welfare as an insidious type of slavery.

    See welfare as a lemon-mereingue pie, for all I care. You can’t oppose the >1% of government spending that helps people to just-barely survive and be anything but a selfish, sadistic prick.


  246. “I’ve seriously had a Libertarian tell me that society doesn’t really exist, that there is no social-cultural structural system in place, and that we are merely a collection of individuals. His evidence? He’s never seen a ’society’.

    Did I mention he was a white straight guy?

    I just sat there with my mouth open and then left. It was pointless, to go any further would be to cross over and get pulled into that singularity of insanity …”

    You would think a sociologist would understand the point he was trying to make which is that society is just a name we give to the collective actions of individuals. It is not a physical construct. It does not take up time and space. It cannot be acted upon or act upon others. Only individuals can do these things. This is really not a debateable proposition. It is a fact. Its implications are debateable but not the substance.

    Unless you are implying that only “white straight” guys are able to understand that society is an intellectual construct and has no set meaning that is universally agreed upon then I don’t see the relevance of that comment other than to give vent to some underlying prejudices on your part. Which is OK as long as you understand that your prejudices aren’t due to the “culture” in which you live and aren’t the fault of the “society” or “postmodernism” but are actually due to your own failings and inadequacies as an individual.

    Somehow, I get the feeling that your interlocutor wasn’t exactly sad to see you go….


  247. FemaleLibertarian

    tzs wrote, “It’s just that most of us are intelligent enough to agree with the aphorism “taxes are the price of living in a civilized society.‿”

    Sure.

    And now I get to takeoff my shoes and throw away my shampoo, tooth paste and hair gel when I go to the airport to get on a commercial plane. I guess that is the price of living in a civilized society.

    I get to produce my Driver’s License sp the pharmacist can record my Driver’s License number and home address to buy MucinexD or Primatene Mist (which contains ephedrine) at the pharmacy. I guess that is the price of living in a civilized society.

    I’ve also heard of a uniformed police office tell an experienced 35 year, 15,000+ hour pilot at a general aviation airport to shut down the engines of the light twin he was about to test fly because, in the officer’s oh-so-vast and very broad experience, the engines were “too loud.” The officer told the pilot he was comparing the noise of the engines to the noise the cars make as they are driving by the airport. I guess that’s the price of living in a civilized society.

    Wake up. Stop giving away your rights, along with mine, by claiming, “I guess it’s the price of living in a civilized society.”


  248. You would think a sociologist would understand the point he was trying to make which is that society is just a name we give to the collective actions of individuals. It is not a physical construct. It does not take up time and space. It cannot be acted upon or act upon others. Only individuals can do these things. This is really not a debateable proposition. It is a fact. Its implications are debateable but not the substance.

    In the same way that a “solid” is just a name we give to the collective actions of sub-atomic particles?


  249. jw

    Then there are others who look at the salaries of CEO’s and believe they should not “make‿ that kind of money. Again, another real strawman.

    The argument has nothing to do with who works “harder‿ (the janitor or the CEO). It has everything to do with perceived value and the availability of persons with the knowledge to deliver that perceived value.

    I didn’t know there was a cap on the amount of money a CEO “should‿ make. I don’t think there is a cap on the amount of money a janitor “should‿ make.

    Do I see some CEO salaries as insane? Yes. Do I think we as a society should implement laws to redistribute those monies. No. It’s not OUR money.

    You’re using a strawman too. Yes, it’s not a good idea to cap CEO salaries by law. However, you’re ignoring the fact that corporations are legal entities constructed by the government to behave in certain ways and that it’s the responsibility and right of the people to modify the laws that create corporations if they dislike corporate behavior. CEO compensation is tremendously high in the US compared to the rest of the world because US laws regulating corporate governance are quite different from those in other countries.

    We need to fix American corporate governance to eliminate the perverse incentives for CEOs and boards of directors to increase each others compensation. It’s much the same situation as Congress voting itself raises, but involving much more money. There’s a growing shareholder movement born from events like Enron and books like Pay without Performance: The Unfulfilled Promise of Executive Copmensation that realizes this fact and has begun to lobby for just this type of solution.


  250. Larry Edelstein

    But it’s very different from Congress voting itself raises because we don’t have to pay the money to fund a CEO’s raise.


  251. […] An entry titled How to Explain Things to Libertarians has been posted over at the widely read progressive blog Pandagon. If you want to navigate your way through the mass of comments, you should be able to pull a few good critiques and humorous observations out from among the slain carcasses of all the straw men. Equally entertaining are all the comments similar to: Also, the last Libertarian I knew used to sit naked on the commons room couch and watch basketball. Do with that as you will. […]


  252. When is it okay for *anyone* to coerce (via threat of imprisonment and/or physical violence) someone else to do something?

    Great. I’ll be round to burgle your house and take your stuff in the morning.

    I mean, you not going to stop me by threatening or initiating force against me, are you?


  253. Slappy McJackass

    While I’m not exatly a hard-core, this post is just embarassing. Not one mention of Austrian economics, the most obviously influential force in modern libertarianism outside of Rand? And this gem:

    “Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who famously penned the Libertarians’ Sekrit Motto, ‘Property is Theft.’ Of course unlike modern Libertarians, Proudhon meant that as a condemnation.”

    That makes no sense. On multiple levels. Nevermind that the whole historical lineage argument is stupid. Ideas rise and fall on their own merit, Not necesarily by who dreamed them up. Eisenhower got the idea for the national highway system from Nazi Germany. Does that make Ike a Nazi or it a bad idea? No and no.

    I’ll cede that there are a lot of Libertoids and objectivists who are a bit nuts who carry every libetarian idea to extremes (Tolls on neighborhood roads! Privatize the police!), but none of these arguments would stand a chance against the onslaught of someone well versed in Hayek or Mises, who believe it or not actually anticipated many of these arguments in their writings. But that would require you to read them,you clearly haven’t.  (Tolls on roads and privatized police is as mainstream as Murray Rothbard, one of the godfathers of Libertarianism, student of Mises.)

    I’m not saying there aren’t arguments to make against libertarianism. Quite the contrary. But this post is laughably shallow.


  254. And yes I agree Somalia is more of a utopia…you are left to your own devices to survive…that is a life worth living..not one where you are baby-sat like in Canada or UK etc

    Oh, that quote’s a keeper. Vote Libertarian, and move the US towards the Somalian utopia…


  255. Mr D

    Phoenician in a time of Romans:

    Man, you simply cannot be that stupid and still be able to type.

    For f**k’s sake, stealing is initiation of force.
    WTF is wrong with you?


  256. Tim

    Well that was a excellent with lots of big words and no relevence to the American Libertarian movement. Seriously that must of been one really hot Libertarian who dumped you and left you lost and lonely and oh so bitter. Go vote for Bush you bastard keep getting me in Foriegn Wars. Keep taxing the hell out of me and do nothing to better the lives of the Middle Class. Keep giving money to Wellfare it so obviously gets people out there doing for themselves. Just my 2 cents! Once again congrats on all the big words!


  257. There’s only one argument Libertoonians have to make now. As far as I can tell they haven’t discovered it yet.

    Government is out of town without even an

    Uh, oh. What will you do?


  258. CTD

    Ask them about gay marriage and they’ll say “the government shouldn’t be involved in marriage at all.‿

    You do know the primary reason states became involved in the marriage business at all was to stop blacks and whites intermarrying, right? If the .gov weren’t involved in marriage, any one could marry whomever they wanted, man or woman. Or lost men and women. Do you have a problem with that?

    Similarly, our nation’s first gun laws were put in place largely to prevent blacks, Indians and other “undesirables” from being armed.


  259. Corrected post:

    There’s only one argument Libertoonians have to make now. As far as I can tell they haven’t discovered it yet.

    Government is out of town without even an American Express Card.

    Uh, oh. What will you do?


  260. FemaleLibertarian

    jw wrote, “We need to fix American corporate governance to eliminate the perverse incentives for CEOs and boards of directors to increase each others compensation.”

    We? Who is “we?”
    Why should I care what some CEO makes or doesn’t make in a private or public corporation. That, literally, is not my business, unless, of course, I own stock in the corporation.

    “Perverse incentives?” Who judges what is perverse?


  261. Most libertarians are not against the existence of the state to support negative rights, so it’s not a contradiction that we’d want the police and the courts to function to protect the innocent against aggressors.

    Translation: It’s immoral to use force, but it’s alright for men in uniforms to shoot people if we think it’s okay…


  262. CTD

    That’s “lots of men and women.”


  263. Colleen

    I don’t know if this has been mentioned, but there’s a discussion of this post going on at the Reason Magazine blog: http://www.reason.com/blog/show/118844.html


  264. We need to fix American corporate governance to eliminate the perverse incentives for CEOs and boards of directors to increase each others compensation. It’s much the same situation as Congress voting itself raises, but involving much more money. There’s a growing shareholder movement born from events like Enron and books like Pay without Performance: The Unfulfilled Promise of Executive Copmensation that realizes this fact and has begun to lobby for just this type of solution.

    Let’s deconstruct this mass of problems.

    1. Who says that CEO’s and BoD’s have perverse incentives? Who says their pay is too high? Once you answer that, tell me why they should have any ability to determine what the people that own that company do?

    2. There is no similarity to Congress raising their own pay. First, Congress uses tax dollars to pay themselves. Second, Congress has deliberately constructed a situation where they are not accountable to the people they are supposed to be accountable to. This is not the case for a CEO, or other corporate officer.

    3. Shareholders have a simple and effective way to solve the “problem” of executive compensation. They can vote directly to change the BoD, or they can vote indirectly by selling their stock holdings. I have not heard of such a “shareholder movement”, this sounds like a fairly typical claim/construct that can’t be disproved and is bandied about until “everyone knows” that shareholders feel that way.

    How do you suggest that high functioning, highly capable business leaders be compensated for their talents? Why aren’t you railing about the “ridiculous” compensation of Hollywood actors and professional athletes? It is, after all, in the same class as that of corporate CEO’s. Not only that, the lowest paid people in those industries are paid about 1% of what the actors and athletes are paid. If you are consistent in your principles, you should object to that. So, let’s hear it, tell us about how wrong it is for Oprah to get compensated like she does!

    Here’s my post that responds to Clarke’s significant inaccuracies and provides some interesting and contradictory ideas and facts to consider.


  265. Engineering is practical by nature. If something doesn’t work in the real world then an engineer is by definition a failure at their profession. The biggest blind spot that they have is in assuming that those they are talking to are as rational as they are.

    Engineering is dealing with objects and numbers. People are not objects and numbers. Engineers mistake the physical world for the social world, and assume that because they can build models and map the former, they can do the same for the latter. The biggest blind spot they have is assuming that people are just objects to be manipulated.

    I suspect strongly that there’s a correlation between mild Aspergers and libertarianism.

    Oh, and BTW - Marx was mostly right - when it came to his criticisms on capitalism. He sucked as a prophet, but his take on the flaws within capitalism is still relevent today.


  266. Translation: It’s immoral to use force, but it’s alright for men in uniforms to shoot people if we think it’s okay…

    Ever heard of the idea of Rule of Law? Establish a set of laws that treat all people equally. Government exists to enforce the Rule of Law. Nothing more, nothing less. That is the concept of Rule of Law. So, when a libertarian says that they believe in a government that protects the negative rights of individuals and that they oppose the use of force except in self-defense, they are entirely consistent. Apparently, though, it is easier to put words in people’s mouths and then claim that you are correct about what they believe.


  267. Marx incorrectly applied the term Capitalism to Corporatism and Mercantilism. Other than that, he was entirely correct in his critique. Of course, what he was critiquing was not what he said he was critiquing. But that’s not such a big deal, is it?


  268. It is interesting how an all-or-nothing standard must be applied to Marx, that doesn’t apply to other people . After all, we can recognize that Darwin, Maxwell, and Gauss were partly right and partly wrong in their theories.


  269. Phoenician said:

    Great. I’ll be round to burgle your house and take your stuff in the morning.

    I mean, you not going to stop me by threatening or initiating force against me, are you?

    in response to:

    When is it okay for *anyone* to coerce (via threat of imprisonment and/or physical violence) someone else to do something?

    The statement you are responding to is about coercing someone to do something, not self-defense. Interesting that you acknowledge, indirectly, that the government won’t prevent my house from being burgled, but that I, an individual, clearly can.


  270. “You would think a sociologist would understand the point he was trying to make which is that society is just a name we give to the collective actions of individuals. It is not a physical construct. It does not take up time and space. It cannot be acted upon or act upon others. Only individuals can do these things. This is really not a debateable proposition. It is a fact. Its implications are debateable but not the substance.”

    In the same way that a “solid‿ is just a name we give to the collective actions of sub-atomic particles?

    And, CB, these are the people who believe property rights are somehow concrete objects (which you find when you start drilling them on “initiation of force”…)


  271. Lesbia's Sparrow

    So, I know an objectivist libertarian traditionalist Catholic. He asked me out one time. I told him “my mother always said never to sleep with someone pro-life,” and then we got into an argument about abortion.

    Him: A fetus is a human life.
    Me: Morally equivalent to the life of a born person?
    Him: Yeah.
    Me: So…the government should require me to do things to save that “person’s” life?
    Him: Yes.
    Me: Okay, so the government should presumably also require me to spend my money to save the lives of starving children in Ethiopia.
    Him: No!
    Me: Why not? They’re both non-citizens of this country, and so our government has no positive obligation to protect their lives.
    Him: Because that’s your PROPERTY.
    Me: …so’s my body.
    Him: No, you’re sharing it with your baby!

    And then my girlfriend showed up.


  272. Fritz

    A very interesting thread. And, in the spirit of full disclosure, I am a long-time Libertarian and a computer geek.

    Yes, many programmers are libertarian. One comment on this thread suggested that this was because programmers could tweak the simulation and avoid reality. I find that comment rather absurd — there are few things as obvious and untweakable as a blue screen of death. I would suggest that programming is frequently a solitary artistic endeavor with demonstrable results — when your code works it is YOUR code that is doing cool things. And when it fails, well, that is usually clear also. Individual effort; individual validation.

    I imagine many historians are not libertarians for a number of reasons. First, libertarians are idealists and nothing is quite as disillusioning as history. Second, most history is written about large groups of people doing things under the control of someone — rather the antithesis of libertarian self-direction.

    I hope this is a conversation that can be maintained with at least a modicum of mutual respect. The Right in the US has been utterly hijacked by large-government busybodies — and I don’t see their deathgrip loosening in the next few years. If the Left cannot loosen up a bit in terms of a desire for larger and larger government intrusion, than I fear we will be in for a rough ride.


  273. Syd

    And all Liberals are Communists that want to give everyone’s paycheck to the poor, and all Conservatives are members of the KKK. This satire is way too heavy-handed and people are (obviously) not going to understand that it’s satire.

    The whole “reduce the size of fire departments” in the opening is a dead giveaway to some, but most people will read that and really think that Libertarians want everything privatized (the entire military) or eliminated (no more Pure Food and Drug Act or Sherman Anti-Trust law).

    The piece is pretty funny, but on the other hand, you have seriously mislead people.


  274. And, CB, these are the people who believe property rights are somehow concrete objects (which you find when you start drilling them on “initiation of force‿…)

    Wow, where did you get that from? How about providing some substantiation for this claim. Right to property is a right, not a concrete object. I don’t know of anyone that is in the libertarian or classic liberal camp that holds the views you attribute to them. Maybe you would be better served by finding out what they really believe and debating that?


  275. Syd

    A minute later and I am worrying that you might actually be serious. So much effort apparently went into this.

    I mean, you conflate Objectivism and Libertarianism in parts and misidentify the father of Libertarianism (who is Milton Friedman).  (No it's not, it's Mises, Rothbard, and later Hayek.  Mises believed Hitler was OK, because at least he was defending capital from the Communists, Rothbard liked privatized police, and  von Hayek believed Pinochet was OK, because if you ignore the bloodbaths, at least he was not Allende).

    Was the piece serious…?


  276. history_mom

    A few random comments:

    TZS: you are right that there are fewer history majors/historians that profess as Libertarians, but the ones that do boggle the mind. The ones I have met are all (and I mean all) white, heterosexual males; they are socially conservative, but disaffected with the Republican Party’s move toward right wing zealotry; they are convinced that big business and the “free market” is an almost unqualified good; they believe that no structural barriers to success exist for some classes of people and that no structural privileges exist to boost success for other classes of people; they smoke pot regularly; and most are “rugged individualists” and study the American West (gee…is there a connection?). These same Libertarians often accuse those of us who study cultural/social history as engaging in rank revisionism, but you should see their tortured attempts to make Machiavelli, the age of exploration and conquest, imperialism, et. al. fit their warped perspective on history. Most of them do not continue into graduate school, and if they do, they are much more likely to decide not to pursue a career in academia, but go into public history, journalism, or think tanks.

    On “hard” sciences and humanities: As a teacher, my “hard” science majors have been some of the most difficult students to have in my classroom. They are intelligent, no question, but their critical thinking skills are often limited by the inability to conceive that there are multiple “right” answers that can be derived from analyzing evidence (or put another way, that there is not only one possible interpretation of data). They hate it even more when I say that scientific observation is culturally conditioned and therefore not necessarily more objective. In trying to assimilate the idea of multiple valid interpretations, they tend to go to the opposite extreme of assuming all interpretations are valid (they are certainly not alone in this). Many do assume that history is “easy” and get very upset when they do not ace the class- parroting me /= getting an “A”. The ones that have decided to learn something often end up becoming some of my best students; the ones that stubbornly insist that history is a vanity class and not a “real” skill are the ones asking the day before finals how they can raise their “C” to an “A” to keep their scholarship. Do with that information what you will.

    I have noticed a big trend recently of social and economic conservatives identifying as Libertarian, but you wouldn’t know it from their voting record (which is almost exclusively Republican). Maybe this has something to do with why most of us have met the “caricature” Libertarian that the self-identified Libertarians on this thread decry.

    In my experience, the Libertarians I have met are very egotistical (convinced that they possess superior intellect and capabilities), buy into the exceptionalism myth, are short on empathy and compassion, and generally have the moral reasoning of a toddler (it’s mine! I don’t wanna share! You can’t make me!). I’d be interested to meet some Libertarians who did not project themselves as asshats all the time- maybe it’s just defensiveness?*

    *Before anyone accuses me of making them feel defensive, in face to face conversations with Libertarians I never approach them with my sampling bias, I always say “I looked into Libertarianism, but I only agreed with about half the platform.” That way, we can attempt to have an interestng conversation on the assumption that we have some things in common.


  277. dead_elvis

    or that their popular Free Marketeer blog owes its existence to several decades of government funding of ARPANET. If those don’t work, sometimes these people are persuaded when it’s pointed out to them that back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate, and a very few people got very wealthy while the rest of us died of food poisoning or coal mine collapses or shirtwaist factory fires.

    L(l)ibertarians hear this kind of argument often; the problem is always that you are assuming that an internet or these improvements in living standards would never have happened without government acting the way it did. I don’t think it’s a stretch to imagine a world in which the internet would have evolved privately (isn’t the WWW at heart just a glorified collection of BBSes?). I also think it’s absurd to say that, without the government interventions of the era, we would still be having the same problems regarding work safety and health standards that we had in the late 1800s. Don’t assume that since history took one particular course and we arrived at a certain result, that we wouldn’t have arrived at another equal, or perhaps better point, by history traversing a different path.


  278. Wow. This article is the biggest cry for help since Britney Spears took an umbrella to K-Fed’s car.

    Delusion cloaked by patronization is a hallmark of so-called “progressive” thinking, but the degree to which you try to marginalize people who disagree with you with these rather bizarre arguments is almost clinically disturbing.

    Libertarians are more “liberal” by the classic definition. So called progressives are nothing but people regressively clinging to failed crypto-Engles/Marx paradigms that have been proven to fail over and over again in the last century.

    So your only hope is to use ad homium arguments and other logical fallacies as some kind of carny smoke and mirrors act.

    Next time, I suggest opening your mind to more possibilities than ideology.

    Yes, there are extremist libertarians. All political thought has its extremes. But when you start off by saying “You, my friend, have just made the unpleasant discovery that you’ve been talking to a Libertarian.”, you’ve revealed yourself to be a close-minded bigot.

    “Progressive”, indeed.


  279. For that matter, one could argue that Engineering isn’t a science. Engineers in designing internal combustion engines can easily “cheat” by specifying the variance of the quantities they deal with. “The spark plug has a gap of .8mm+/- 10%” is a reasonable statement to make in regards to engineering. Because engineers can control the variance of every component that goes into a system, their predictions about the behavior of that system have a high degree of precision.

    Scientists who study the behavior of the real world don’t have that luxury. Astronomers can’t define the galaxy as consisting of stars within 10% of solar mass, and my microbiology mentor admitted that the laboratory behavior of select strains of bacteria was of minimal theoretical use in understanding the behavior of bacterial ecosystems (which include hundreds or thousands of unclassified and uncultivated strains.) Because social and behavioral sciences can’t arbitrarily constrain variance, they are forced to use mathematics that are theoretically as tricky and complex as those used in mechanical and electrical engineering. (Unfortunately, Gauss, Fisher, Pascal, and Gosset are not as widely remembered as Edison and Tesla.)

    The fact that theories in the Sciences rarely produce predictions with the same precision as theories in Engineering, does not mean that theories of natural, human, and social behavior are without value, or fanciful. It simply reflects the reality that the universe is not a workbench with a wastebasket.


  280. You know, the one thing I’ve got to add to this debate is this: Gupta’s Libertarian Observation, which states:

    Free people make free markets, but free markets do not necessarily make free people.

    I think that a libertarianism which starts with free people, who then form markets according to their taste and preference to trade is a much stronger libertarianism than one which assumes that the freedom to trade as you will is equivalent to freedom.

    A person who sold themselves into slavery is still a slave, even if they are responsible for their own condition.

    This is not necessarily acceptable if one starts with the assumption that free people make free markets, but it is acceptable if one assumes that free markets (i.e. freedom of contract) makes free people…

    Carts and horses must go in the right order.

    Does that help?


  281. As a small “l” libertarian I can certainly understand all the frustration with my big “L” brothers. Some of them simply like to argue a bit too much, often about subjects they have no business discussing. I’m bothered by the intellectual orthodoxy of the movement, but not by its general thrust.

    I view libertarianism as a direction, not a goal. I think if we (the movement) were more about pragmatic reform rather than creating a Randian utopia we might find more common ground with the libertarian socialists and whoever else is interested in building a just and free society.

    However, I dont want to abandon the moral/intellectual absolutism entirely. There are certain ideas about how to organize a society that have been tested by history and failed.

    I believe these things:
    Closed states fall behind their more open neighbors.
    Politicians given free reign will tend to expand their own power.
    People are neither angels or demons, but respond to the incentives and opportunities around them.

    As for the police, when was the last time you saw them stop a crime in progress? Never, that’s when. Libertarians tend to agree that they are tools of state power. Someone above said that you could take your pick between the mafia and the government for protection. I for one don’t really see much difference.


  282. CBrachyrhynchos: Gauss, Fisher, Pascal, and Gossett

    And here is another good litmus test for determining whether someone is qualified to talk about the social and behavioral sciences. If you can’t describe the contributions these people made to the study of individual and aggregate human behavior, you are probably not qualified to make statements about the methodologies used in the social and behavioral sciences. (I’d also add Zipf as well.)


  283. But it’s very different from Congress voting itself raises because we don’t have to pay the money to fund a CEO’s raise.

    Really? CEO salaries just come out of a magic money machine? Cool! Okay, I’m on board.

    I notice that it still comes down to the fetishizing of property rights for the fake, or “royal,” libertarians who have stampeded to post here. Property rights are an obejctive immutable fact, but a collective society is complete fiction? Axioms are not automatically truths.

    I also think it’s absurd to say that, without the government interventions of the era, we would still be having the same problems regarding work safety and health standards that we had in the late 1800s.

    True, because left to their own devices, businesses always seek to improve things for their employees and their communities. We’re back to “externalities” again. It’s not hypothetical when there’s an existing track record. The labor movement and regulation advocates didn’t say, “Well, you’ve had a week, let’s try something else.” They were a response to long-term abuse. How long were people supposed to wait before market forces took care of the problem?

    but most people will read that and really think that Libertarians want everything privatized (the entire military) or eliminated (no more Pure Food and Drug Act or Sherman Anti-Trust law).

    As to the latter, you might want to look up “minarchist” or “Nozick” in the index of your Libertarian manual. And check under “anarcho-capitalism,” or see how many of your peers are Vinge fans, for the former.


  284. History Mom:

    I have noticed a big trend recently of social and economic conservatives identifying as Libertarian, but you wouldn’t know it from their voting record (which is almost exclusively Republican). Maybe this has something to do with why most of us have met the “caricature‿ Libertarian that the self-identified Libertarians on this thread decry.

    First, let’s start with this idea. A libertarian, by definition, would not be a social conservative. They would not believe that society or government has any place in determining the individual values and private behavior of individuals.

    I’m not sure what you mean by an economic conservative, except to suppose that you mean someone who likes things to not change a whole lot from how they are now. That, also, would definitely not describe a libertarian.

    If this is accurate, it explains a lot about this post and thread.

    History Mom:

    In my experience, the Libertarians I have met are very egotistical (convinced that they possess superior intellect and capabilities), buy into the exceptionalism myth, are short on empathy and compassion, and generally have the moral reasoning of a toddler (it’s mine! I don’t wanna share! You can’t make me!). I’d be interested to meet some Libertarians who did not project themselves as asshats all the time- maybe it’s just defensiveness?*

    Let’s tackle these ideas through my filters. I am a self described “classic liberal” and “libertarian”, but also self-described as not being a Libertarian or Objectivist (Ayn Rand).

    I wonder if you would describe me as egotistical. I happen to know that I have an IQ that places me in the top 2% of the population, give or take. My earnings and property place me in the wealthiest 1% globally. My professional position is such that I am at the very peak of my chosen industry and profession. There are, perhaps, 6 or 7 other people in my industry that could legitimately say they are closer to “number one” than I can. This is all stated as objectively as I can speak about myself. For these reasons, I believe that I am a very capable person. You might even say that I have superior capabilities to the majority of the population, even if you insist on narrowing that to people who would directly compete with me. Does that make me exceptional? By the definition of that word it would seem to.

    On a side note, I do not have a college degree, and my family could best be described as working poor (food stamps in the 1970’s, for example). I didn’t get where I am by advantages conferred by social privilege or education. My father-in-law is roughly in the same position as I am, by the way, including no college degree, working poor origins, etc. What this all means is that I don’t buy into the position and privilege myth of the left.

    Next, empathy and compassion. I presume, since you don’t clearly explain this, that it has to do with the fact that libertarians don’t believe in government provided welfare, social programs or “safety nets”? Especially because such things have to be provided by money taken from us through taxation? If that isn’t the right track for what you mean, let me know.

    Given that, it is a mistake, simply because we don’t agree with you on how to take care of the poor, vulnerable and underprivileged in society to decide that we lack in empathy and compassion. I willingly and voluntarily donate significant amounts of money to charity on a regular basis. More, in fact, than I can deduct tax-wise. I get no financial benefit from these donations, in general. I do so because I have empathy and compassion for the poor and vulnerable and want to put money into organizations that directly assist them. I also happen to work for a not for profit institution because I believe in its mission and values, one that directly makes a difference in the lives of tens of thousands of people each and every day.

    I have discussed what I perceive to be your position on the empathy and compassion of someone like me with our Director of Ethics. He and I disagree on such things as welfare, safety nets and such. He, however, takes the position that there are multiple solutions to such issues and that reasonable and intelligent people can disagree on which solution will have the best outcome. When you impute a lack of compassion because I don’t agree with your preferred solution, that denies the ability of reasonable, intelligent people to disagree, it directly attacks me as a person, rather than my idea (the ad hominem fallacy), and prevents a reasonable debate of the issue and possible solutions.

    The moral reasoning of a toddler statement is interesting. Apparently, if I don’t want to share at gunpoint (i.e. involuntary charity through taxation), I have poor moral reasoning. My money IS mine, as is my property. It is not yours, nor is it society’s. That does not mean I don’t want to share my good fortune, I do. I just don’t want to do so at gunpoint, whether the gun is held by a criminal or a government bureaucrat. I have no problem, at all, with paying taxes to create a government that can defend me from other countries, provide for the Rule of Law and create equality of opportunity. I have significant issues with the idea that I should be forced to give up my wealth through coercion in order to provide for equality of outcome, which is not achievable in any case.

    When I was much younger and had much less wealth (making a few dollars an hour in my early 20’s), I was actually far less compassionate, far less willing to part with my money and property, and much more in favor of Libertarian positions than I am today, lest anyone think this is all about selfishly wanting to keep my now acquired wealth. That said, how come you get to define it as selfish to not part with my wealth for things that you think I should?

    Now, I wonder if I project myself as an “asshat”? Or if there is any idea here worth discussing further, or even some ideas that you might consider adopting yourself? I suspect, based on some of your comments about history and history students, that you are not very open to that, but we’ll see.


  285. jw

    Let’s deconstruct this mass of problems.

    1. Who says that CEO’s and BoD’s have perverse incentives? Who says their pay is too high?

    I cited a reference that explained this in my original post. The fact that much executive compensation is camoflauged from shareholders also suggests that CEOs and boards think that their shareholders would think their pay is too high if they realized how large it actually was.

    Once you answer that, tell me why they should have any ability to determine what the people that own that company do?

    Corporations aren’t part of the natural world. They’re a legal fiction created by the people by law, and the people have the right to create them or not create them in whatever ways they wish. This can easily be seen by realizing that the rules governing corporations vary widely over both time (earlier eras had quite different laws) and space (different countries.)

    2. There is no similarity to Congress raising their own pay. First, Congress uses tax dollars to pay themselves. Second, Congress has deliberately constructed a situation where they are not accountable to the people they are supposed to be accountable to. This is not the case for a CEO, or other corporate officer.

    CEO’s have done exactly the same thing you claim that Congress has done. See the reference I cited above for details.

    3. Shareholders have a simple and effective way to solve the “problem‿ of executive compensation. They can vote directly to change the BoD, or they can vote indirectly by selling their stock holdings.

    First, the camoflauging of executive compensations has historically prevented most shareholders from realizing that such a problem exists.

    Second, since you like to deconstruct problems, why not deconstruct corporate elections? Like any elections, they can be controlled by controlling the nomation process, by controlling who gets to vote, by controlling who can campaign to the voters and how they can do so, by controlling who has to stand for relection and when, and by how the results are tabulated. Several of these features ensure that it’s extremely difficult to unseat boards, but they can be changed by changing corporate governance laws. Looking back at the last decades of corporate governance, we find that it’s as hard to unseat a director as it is to unseat an incumbent congressmen.

    Third, selling stock holdings doesn’t help as this is a systematic problem. All boards are protected under the same laws regarding shareholders and elections, and the biggest source of distorted compensation is interlocking boards of directors, where executives are board members of other corporations and board members are current or former executives of other corporations, creating a network of cronyism.

    I have not heard of such a “shareholder movement‿, this sounds like a fairly typical claim/construct that can’t be disproved and is bandied about until “everyone knows‿ that shareholders feel that way.

    You could have done a few second google search and found a large number of articles and shareholder proposals on executive compensation.
    You can find articles in Business Week, The Economist, and Fortune, and there are a growing number of books on this. Read Warren Buffet’s comments about CEO pay in “CEO Pay: Have They No Shame?,” Fortune, April 13, 2003, for one example, or read some shareholder proposals like this one to Ford: http://www.iccr.org/shareholder/proxy_book05/MEMBER-INITIATED%20ISSUES/GLOBALWARM_EXECCOMP_FORD_HARRINGTON_BLUE.HTM

    How do you suggest that high functioning, highly capable business leaders be compensated for their talents?

    We need to change the structure of corporate government to increase shareholder power over boards, and shareholders will fix the problem. Shareholders need the power to be able to change corporate governance rules, and boards need to be more accountable by being easier to unseat (no more staggered boards, for example.) See some of the books on the topic for more detailed proposals.

    Why aren’t you railing about the “ridiculous‿ compensation of Hollywood actors and professional athletes?

    There are substantially different issues with CEOs, such as me being one of the shareholders responsible for paying the CEOs and me being one of the people responsible for the laws that created corporations and control their governance.


  286. Interesting that you value Warren Buffet as a source of thinking on corporate governance.


  287. jw

    Interesting that you value Warren Buffet as a source of thinking on corporate governance.

    He’s an extremely successful investor. Why wouldn’t I value his advice?


  288. We’re Not All Objectivists…

    Adam Selene in response to Chris Clarke:
    It should be noted that Clarke claims that Libertarians derive their philosophy from Ayn Rand and Heinlein. This is just silly. Clearly he is talking to some stereotypes. Objectivists (followers of Ayn Rand) can…


  289. […] It’s interesting and coincidental that today I would find How To Explain Things to Libertarians. It’s a good read, because it shows how easy it is to get sucked in to believing what is a selfish and non-viable ideology. […]


  290. An extremely successful investor does not make his advice on corporate governance good.


  291. FemaleLibertarian:

    tzs wrote, “It’s just that most of us are intelligent enough to agree with the aphorism “taxes are the price of living in a civilized society.‿‿

    Sure.

    And now I get to takeoff my shoes and throw away my shampoo, tooth paste and hair gel when I go to the airport to get on a commercial plane. I guess that is the price of living in a civilized society.

    I get to produce my Driver’s License sp the pharmacist can record my Driver’s License number and home address to buy MucinexD or Primatene Mist (which contains ephedrine) at the pharmacy. I guess that is the price of living in a civilized society.

    I’ve also heard of a uniformed police office tell an experienced 35 year, 15,000+ hour pilot at a general aviation airport to shut down the engines of the light twin he was about to test fly because, in the officer’s oh-so-vast and very broad experience, the engines were “too loud.‿ The officer told the pilot he was comparing the noise of the engines to the noise the cars make as they are driving by the airport. I guess that’s the price of living in a civilized society.

    Wake up. Stop giving away your rights, along with mine, by claiming, “I guess it’s the price of living in a civilized society.‿

    The only problem with this rant is that none of the three examples given have anything whatsoever to do with taxation. Or with “living in a civilized society,” for that matter.

    Hell, they don’t even make for good Libertarianism. They’re just self-important whinging about how nobody else is abiding by your declaration that you’re the only person on the planet who matters.


  292. jw

    An extremely successful investor does not make his advice on corporate governance good.

    If you disagree, you could address the substance of my post or the substance of his advice instead of carping about his name.


  293. MrX_TLO

    That’s not the chart the Libertarians use and you know it. The orginal author is guilty of the typical hateful and dishonest propaganda that is polarizing the world. Everyone should read Adam Smith for themselves and see the truth.

    It’s only when you realize that most people get their money by working for time that you can see that taxation is slavery. If the government came right out and said, we expect you to work 3 hours a day without pay, most people wouldn’t put up with it. But most people haven’t realized yet that they already are!

    What Libertarians really say is:

    You spend your money on what you want and I’ll spend my money on what I want.

    I shouldn’t hurt or force you and you shouldn’t hurt or force me.

    Yes, it’s really that simple.


  294. Or I could simply point out that you are committing a logical fallacy by citing the authority of Warren Buffet.


  295. […] from a great post by Pandagon. I don’t want to live in that kind of world.  Apparently, the GWBush administration is Libertarian. […]


  296. “And, CB, these are the people who believe property rights are somehow concrete objects (which you find when you start drilling them on “initiation of force‿…)”

    Wow, where did you get that from?

    Generally from statements like Adam Selene’s above: “My money IS mine, as is my property. It is not yours, nor is it society’s. “

    Money does not exist in the absence of society. Property does not exist in the absence of society. Both money and property are predicated on a working, sustained social context. That context both implicitly and explicitly puts limits on the usage and ownership claims to both money and property - including the obligation to help sustain that social context through taxes.

    But consider Selene’s comment - he is assuming that property and money exist FIRST, and that the social context exists LATER. Thus HE owns stuff, and society is a mere interloper trying to take away HIS stuff.

    The best way to demonstrate this is to closely examine the common libertarian claim that taxing income or property is an “initiation of force” - men with guns coming to take your stuff.

    Adam Selene’s money is not HIS money. Rather, it is a SOCIAL claim on exchange values created and sustained within a particular social context, enforced by LAW AND GOVERNMENT and ASSIGNED to him through possession of SOCIALLY ACCEPTED tokens of exchange.


  297. tzs

    Well, hasn’t Warren Buffet made a lot of money, which as far as we can tell, is the indication of virtue within the Libertarian universe? (/end snark)

    If self-professed libertarians don’t want to be tarred with the nuttiness of the BAN ALL TAXES NOW!! or the ANARCHY IS GREAT crowd, they’d better stop accepting them in their tent. If you have enough people running around presenting themselves as Libertarians who claim that Licence Numbers are Evil, then such a statement becomes, de facto, a Libertarian statement.

    Which gets back to the question I keep raising: what are Libertarian philosophies and how would an actual, technologically sophisticated society work if it were run according to such principles? (And please don’t bring up The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress. I’ve read it. I also point out that even that supposedly libertarian society started breaking down at the end, after the revolution succeeded.)

    I’d love to see one, but I see NO EVIDENCE that a Libertarian society/economy would be stable in the long term or even in the short term–in fact, the more strongly “Libertarian”, the more likely it will be to break apart or not reproduce itself.


  298. wtmesq

    The problem with Libertarianism in a nutshell is the lack of a social equality component. As you have eloquently pointed out, maximum financial freedom only leads to maximum social inequality.

    Great article. Good to see my thinking on Libertarinism is bourne out by others.


  299. tzs

    What we’re trying to pound into the heads of our Libertarian visitors here is that the concept of property rights only exists in a social context. They don’t exist in absentia as some intrinsic inalienable part of a good. Otherwise, “property” would only yours until someone bigger and meaner comes along to take it away from you.

    If you want an Authority around to “protect” your Property Rights, then the next set of questions are: a) how to define that authority? b) how do you fund that authority? c)what social contract do I have with that authority? d) what authority does it have over me? What can it force me to do?

    If you have no government, you end up with Warlords. Someone asked above whether he got a chance to vote for “no warlords”–sorry, that’s not a possibility. We’ve not seen it in history–if you don’t have a gov’t, you get warlords (or you are in such small groups and at such a technological level that you can live as a communual tribe, at which point it’s usually “elders rule.” Or maybe you prefer anarchy?)

    And for the commentator above who burst her spleen about my comment that “taxes are the prices we pay for living in a civilized society”–what’s your alternative?


  300. Liberty = civilization

    You’ve attacked the weakest arguments of libertarians, and in the comments the people have spoken of the weakest, most-easily-mocked types of libertarian personalities. By why shouldn’t you do this? You’re preaching to the choir not being scholarly.


  301. fletch

    Chris-

    Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the person will say something really weird, like “You can’t fix a problem like underpaid public school teachers by just throwing money at them!‿

    Abject stupidity…

    We’ve already did the “throw ridiculous amounts of money to the schools” thing… In Ohio, the ‘inflation adjusted’ amount going to schools has tripled in the last 30 years… In Columbus, this amount is now over $13,000- per student- per year… and more than half of all entering 9th graders will still never graduate- while of the 47% that do manage to graduate- 20% will be ‘functionally illiterate’… another 35% will be ‘college-bound’- but even 50% of these ‘college-bound’ students will be required to take a ‘remedial’ course in Math or English that wasn’t taught in our $13k/yr high school classes.

    Did I mention that the Columbus Public Schools have seen their enrollment drop from 100,000 to 54,000 over the last 30 years-while the overall population has doubled? Not to mention the decline of the student pop. from 66k to 54k just in the last 5 years.

    In 1973, The Cols. Pub Schools had 103,000 students and 243 “upper level administration”… They now have less than 54k students(they lost another 4000 in the last year alone!)- with over 500 “upper level administrators” today!

    I love unions and state bureaucrats…


  302. Cesar

    Tzs, I assume you are Democrat. According to your logic, I should assume you, Jim Webb, Dennis Kucinich and Lydon LaRouche all have the same views. If you didn’t have the same views as LaRouche, he wouldn’t call himself a Democrat, after all.


  303. The fact that you resort so quickly to the logical fallacy of credentialism seems to indicate to me that his feelings of superiority may well have been justified.

    BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

    No, seriously? You mean this?

    If you read what I wrote, you’ll see I didn’t actually resort to credentialism (does that even exist as a word?). I actually pointed out the HUGE fallacies and impracticalities in what he was suggesting.

    And I love your “soft sciences” prejudice there …

    You would think a sociologist would understand the point he was trying to make which is that society is just a name we give to the collective actions of individuals. It is not a physical construct. It does not take up time and space. It cannot be acted upon or act upon others. Only individuals can do these things. This is really not a debateable proposition. It is a fact. Its implications are debateable but not the substance.

    Again; BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

    lol, the mere fact that you seriously think this has any credence whatsoever shows how little you get how society actually operates. There ARE societal level forces and phenomenon that don’t occur on the individual level. Their effects are felt at the individual level, but they are just that; effects. Structural systemic forces and phenomenon are very easy to study and see and the only reason one would not would be through being blinded by ideology.

    I mean, DAMN, Soci 101 … lol

    You still believe in “objective” reality, right?

    Oh, and as Phoenician above said, Marx’s critiques of capitalism (and, further, as developed by Weber) are still highly valid. Did his prescriptive stuff add up? Nope, but that doesn’t invalidate his original critiques.


  304. The Rebutting X Thread:

    Joe Blow puts up a web page “Why Political Ideology Grue Sucks.”

    Joe Blow, of course, is not a serious political thinker, and only has a passing familiarity with Grue. So he puts up a bunch of strawman arguments he can knock down easily. It’s basically like watching a first-year algebra student “refute” Godel.

    Then, some adherents of Grue hear about the page. They don’t really know much about Grue either, however, and they post a bunch of half-assed responses.

    Then Joe’ Blow’s friends and the Gruesters talk past each other for about 9347 posts.

    This thread meets the standard.


  305. Money does not exist in the absence of society. Property does not exist in the absence of society. Both money and property are predicated on a working, sustained social context.

    Money is a construct to represent the value of the action and products of individuals. We tried barter first, which worked as a means of determining value, but not very well as things got larger and more complex. Money and markets came into being to place value on the actions and products of individuals in place of barter because it was more efficient. But, money is not necessary to exchange value, as barter makes obviously clear. Money is a token that represents wealth belonging to me, not wealth belonging to society. This is such a clear idea that no collectivist system has ever been able to get rid of money, or individual exchanges of value.

    Property does not depend on society to exist. Property laws and rights came into existence to reflect the reality that existed before them. If I have a piece of land, I improve, and I defend it, it has become mine. This can happen outside of a society. I can then take specific actions with that property, whether it be a boat I built or a piece of land. Property laws and rights evolved over millenia to reflect this reality. One of the most basic reasons for society to exist is to protect property rights.

    None of these arguments indicate that I believe, in any fashion, that property rights are concrete objects. A right is a reflection of a basic human condition and behavior. It is a construct to aid our understanding of behavior and how societies are constructed, nothing more, but certainly also nothing less.

    On the topic of Moon is a Harsh Mistress, I think you misunderstand one of the key points of that book, including the ending.


  306. FungiFromYuggoth

    A certain female Libertarian spake:
    And now I get to takeoff my shoes and throw away my shampoo, tooth paste and hair gel when I go to the airport to get on a commercial plane. I guess that is the price of living in a civilized society.

    I get to produce my Driver’s License sp the pharmacist can record my Driver’s License number and home address to buy MucinexD or Primatene Mist (which contains ephedrine) at the pharmacy. I guess that is the price of living in a civilized society.

    Sadly, no.

    Taxes are the fuel on which government runs. No taxes, no government, and we all know that Libertarian believe in just enough government that no one can take their stuff.

    The examples you cite have nothing to do with taxes, nor the intrinsic nature of government. They are the price for voting Republican - or, more technically, the price for “CYA Security”. This is what happens when a large organization wants to appear to be doing something so they won’t get blamed later, but doesn’t actually want to do anything legitimate, doesn’t care, or don’t think they can do anything.

    You get to show your driver’s license at the pharmacy because today’s government would rather force you to show ID than forbid companies from shipping bulk pseudoephedrine to Mexico. The question of whether or not this is the progressive or corporate position is left as an exercise for the reader.

    Mr. Selene - There have been two references in this thread, backed up by a reference to an expert (or, if you like, an appeal to authority). This more than somewhat outweighs your unsupported appeal to assholery. For further reading, I assign three papers (your choice which three) from Harvard’s Program for Corporate Governance. I believe “The Myth of the Shareholder Franchise” and “Pay Distribution in the Top Executive Team” have some applicability to the audience.


  307. tzs

    Cesar, what I’m saying is there are enough kooks in the Libertarian party that they’re the ones that are defining the image most people have of it.

    Heck, I like a lot of libertarian ideas. I LOVE Hayek and the Austrian school. But I’m not stupid enough to sign on to a platform that rants “Taxation is THEFT!” which is what 99.5% of libertarians do. (As example, witness the commentator above.) The official Libertarian platform wants to get rid of taxes. How realistic is that?

    As said, if you don’t like taxes, what’s the alternative? Pay-per-X? (Have fun implementing that one, given the fun we have on toll roads.)

    For all the huffing and puffing of our commentators, NOT A SINGLE ONE has come up with an alternative for taxation–they’d prefer to rant and rave about how it means the Evil Government Is Stealing From Me.


  308. Sidus

    Great article and I agree with most of what you say. But I think calling these people “Libertarian” is a bit of a misnomer. I think radical leftist might fit better.

    I have met the people you are talking about and to me they are too non-conformist to be anything but pissed off kids with an idea that the two party system is dysfunctional. They are also a minority of older people overly fixated on reducing government or just pissed off at some past obsession. But all of this, to me, means that Libertarianism has finally arrived as a full fledged political party.

    Just like the neo-con republicans and the socialist democrats, the libertarian party also has it’s extremists. And just like the other two parties, the libertarian extremists are comprised of mis-informed, mis-guided, and aggressive people that, above all else, just want something to bitch about or a cause to champion.

    The majority of the membership of the 3 parties tend to not claim or not pay much attention to these fringe elements. Even though the fringe seems to get far more than it’s fair share of attention.

    In short, anyone with ideals lacking or going outside the bounds of the greater party ideals can’t really be considered a representative of that party.

    I do consider myself a “capital-L Libertarian” but not as you describe. I don’t know the answers to everything and don’t believe in anarchy, hand gun vending machines, or free Marlboro day at the elementary school. But I do believe that without an organized voice from people like me the ruling two parties are going to swiftly and irreparably remove this country from the path set by the founders of the nation. And if that means that some idiot school kids have to throw some fits about the establishment for a couple of years before they figure it out then so be it. The up and coming idiots from the other two parties may not be as vocal but they are every bit as dangerous, and potentially more in my opinion.


  309. fletch

    This article is not about them, the people who concede that some taxes are necessary to pay firefighters

    Umm… some of us “flyover-country rednecked hicks” live where the “libertarian Ideal” of the ‘Volunteer fire dept.’ is actually the reality! Over 20% of all counties in this country have nothing but “volunteers” protecting them…

    I can see why a “liberal” wouldn’t figure this out– after all, 86% of the “counties” in America do not have an “abortion provider”– how many ‘blogospheric leftists’ are ‘volunteers’?

    Or, as I like to call them– “chickenchoicers”…


  310. tzs

    And Adam Selene’s view of property rights show he falls SMACK into the “property rights according to who has the bigger gunl” viewpoint.

    Yeah, standing on your homestead with your trusty rifle–that’s a great way to defend yourself. And when you get old and infirm, or you don’t have enough money to buy ammunition…then how will you defend yourself? What are you going to do when someone with a bigger gun and more ammunition decides to take over your property?

    So much for property rights.


  311. Cesar

    Tzs-

    The vast majority of libertarians have nothing to do with the libertarian party. Most of us think they are completely full of nutbags waiting for black helicopters. Small l-libertarians think of members of the Libertarian party the way most(?) liberal democrats think of out-and-out socialists.


  312. Cesar

    Btw tzs-

    NO and read (NO) small-l libertarian would *ever* suggest we don’t need taxation. Its the means by which taxes are collected we disagree with. I personally would like to see tho closing of all tax loopholes if we have to have an income tax. Ideally, I’d like to see a tax on *wealth* replace a tax on *income*, or a national sales tax.

    I think you can agree with me that the tax code is rediculously complicated and needs desperate reform, no?


  313. And Adam Selene’s view of property rights show he falls SMACK into the “property rights according to who has the bigger gunl‿ viewpoint.

    Not at all, but it’s a nice stereotyping comment you can throw out rather than dealing with the idea I’m trying to convey.

    Yeah, standing on your homestead with your trusty rifle–that’s a great way to defend yourself. And when you get old and infirm, or you don’t have enough money to buy ammunition…then how will you defend yourself? What are you going to do when someone with a bigger gun and more ammunition decides to take over your property?

    Which is the point to individuals working together to protect their individual rights. But, rather than work through the implications of that idea you would rather attack a strawman.

    So much for property rights.

    Shrugs, property rights are antecedent to society. Society exists to protect individual rights. Those rights don’t exist because of society. The description I give of how property rights exist outside of society is a fairly simple thought experiment you can follow to determine if society or property is antecedent. That you choose to ignore it simply means you are unwilling to have an intellectually honest discussion.


  314. Cesar

    Tzs-

    Governments *exist to protety property rights*. Government exists to protect life, liberty , and property. Thats what libertarians believe. We are *not* anarchists. We believe government is necessary, but *only* to protect those rights.


  315. Rich Paul

    What is Libertarianism? Libertarianism is the radical belief that you own yourself. It is the belief that no person or institution, however noble their intentions, has a higher claim on your life than you do. It is a very simple and logical philosophy, one that many of you could learn from.

    The reason that Libertarians are often called “classic Liberals”, despite the fact that no “leftist” would hold the positions that we hold is historical. The meaning of the word “liberal”, in the 18th and 19th century was applied to people like Adam Smith, J.S. Mill, David Ricardo, and many others who were opposed to slavery, to serfdom, and to arbitrary government. It was not until the 20th century that liberals became fixated with Marx. So when we say “classic liberal”, we mean “liberal in the original sense of the word, not in the modern sense of the word”.

    The Worlds Smallest Political Quiz, parodied above, is available here: http://self-gov.org. The questions are not entirely as depicted above. It basically splits the “left-right” continuum into two pieces: economic liberty, and personal liberty. Placing libertarians at the top, you preserve the left-right orientations, but add a dimension. It is very useful for those of us who find ourselves simultaneously to the left of the Democrats and to the right of the Republicans.

    Businesses do not require employees who have attended schools, they require employees who have attended schools. Since Americans spend as much money on cigarettes and beer as we spend on education, and since we seem to attain those things without recourse to “public cigarettes” or “public beer”, it stands to reason that we could obtain education without resorting to “public education”. Please also note that without involving the government, schools would be much cheaper. This is largely because we would not require the huge hierarchy to run our schools. Think about a school system, as it is today: You have teachers, principals, school board members, state board of education, federal department of education. webmasterschneier.com

    The United States has never been Libertarian. We have been closer in some ways, at some times, but never very close. For example, businesses and individuals were frequently awarded privileges such as free land, monopolies, and in extreme cases even leeway to hire private thugs to attack unionizing workers. In several cases, the government actually provided the thugs, in the form of police and military personnel, to break strikes. Hardly libertarian. Libertarians (unlike conservatives) are opposed to all forms of privilege. (Think about the origin of the word: from Latin, privis legis: “private law”)

    As far as “becoming the princes” is concerned, you make some economic assumptions that we do not stipulate. For example, that if people were free, there would exist “mass of people on the bottom and a handful of ruthless Machiavellian princes at the top”. Actually, I’ve studied economics, and do not believe that there would be any such distribution in a free society. As a matter of fact, I believe that distributions of wealth would be much more even than they are today. This is because much of the extreme differences in wealth today are actually caused by government.

    Consider CEO compensation: leftists decry it, but are very vague about explaining it. They seem to believe that the directors of large companies are SOOO generous that they WANT to pay CEO’s an extreme amount of money, just because it makes the directors smile to write huge checks. I think not. The reason that many CEOs make so much money is that they are politically connected, and can deliver laws and government contracts that will make their companies money. Halliburton is a prime example of that sort of company.

    Then consider the income tax. It does not tax wealth. It taxes income. It doesn’t have much effect on people who are already rich. It effects people who are trying to GET rich. Big difference.

    Then consider the thousands of laws that a business has to obey. There are so many of them that in order to do business, you have to have a legion of lawyers. Do you think that harms big companies, or small ones?

    As for compassion, watch “A Clockwork Orange”. Those who give “gifts” at gunpoint are NOT displaying compassion. They are displaying cowardice. Those who give because they think it is the right thing to do, and who take the time to see that their gifts do to those who truly need them and will use them well, are displaying compassion. They are giving not only of their wealth, but of themselves. Compare this to the professional busybodies that the government sends with their meager alms. These are people who build their whole self-image on holding the lives of other human beings in their hands. They want POWER. It must be a real rush for them to take somebody’s kids, or to cut off their benefits because they got a job. People who give by choice are an entirely different sort of people.

    Proudhon was, indeed, a libertarian of sorts, though not a consistent one. And although he did write that “Property is theft”, he also wrote that “Property is freedom”.
    J.S. Mill, too, seemed to make some exceptions in his defense of liberty on economic matters. But they had much less prior art to work with. You take what you can from a philosopher, and leave the rest.

    Ayn Rand, for that matter, was rather more militaristic than most Libertarians, and rejected the label. She was influential in Libertarian thought, but had a nasty tendency to try to live by a political philosophy. It is on thing to say “one should not rob the rich and give to the poor”. To say “the rich should not give to the poor” is quite another. After having actually suffered under Socialism in her youth in Russia, I suppose a certain amount of bitterness is to be expected.

    As for your sibling comment, see above re: “classic liberal”. Libertarians are very close to anarchists. We believe in an absolute minimum of government. Some call us minarchists.

    Obviously, bribing, bullying and blackmailing require government help. Enough said on that.

    Corporations are not actually governments. Governments are permitted to use force. Corporations are not. In the few cases where a corporation has used force and gotten away with it, there has been a failure of government. But that does not make the corporation itself a government.

    Corporations are, however, a creation of government, and one that comes with some perks that are not available to most people. Specifically in the areas of liability law and taxes. Of course the tax issue would be a non-issue in a libertarian society (there would be some taxes, probably, but they would be tiny) but the liability issue is troubling. I am not entirely sure that the corporation as such was a good idea. If offered the chance to get on a rocket to one of two Libertarian planets, of which one chartered corporations and the other did not, I would probably choose the latter.

    ———————————-

    A few responses to choice responses:
    On “rigged anarchy”: We would indeed allow government power to prevent the initiation of force. But how is it that anyone could “get rich at others expense” in a system where all exchange is voluntary? In a voluntary exchange, both parties walk away richer than they were. Why would anyone make an exchange that made him poorer? I think you underestimate yourself. But maybe I overestimate you.

    ———————————–

    It basically comes down for me to the point of who would you rather have looking out for your best interests and those of minorities; a company whose bottom line is intrinsically profit, or government that is technically “by the people, for the people‿?

    I would rather have a company whose bottom line is intrinsically profit looking out for me. If they do a lousy job, I don’t pay them. And I find somebody else to do the job. Mostly, however, I look out for myself.

    Do you find you get better service from private companies (exclude utilities and cable companies with government granted monopolies) or from your local Department of Motor Vehicles?

    ————————————

    If you just mention the word “externalities‿ to a libertarian, smoke comes out their ears. Luckily, this gives them the opportunity to complain about anti-smoking advocates, so they end up placated.

    Externalities exist. They are instances of government failure. It is not the job of the market to define property rights. That is the job of government. In some cases, they can be mitigated through government. If they can improve the situation, fine, provided that it is a bare minimum intrusion. But in the overwhelming majority of cases, their attempt to make things better make things worse. BTW, I’m smoking a cigarette right now, so I can’t tell if there’s any coming out of my ears.

    ————————————

    Libertarians often deny that structural barriers to success even exist, and it’s mostly because they haven’t encountered them. I had one person argue with a straight face that a CEO really works 2000 times as hard as a janitor holding down two full-time jobs.

    Structural barriers to success exist! God knows they do. The public schools are exhibit ‘A’. As for a CEO working 2000 times as hard as a janitor, think of it this way: 1 CEO could not do the same amount of janitorial work as 2000 janitors. By the same token, 2000 janitors could not, unless they were exceptional, do the work of 1 CEO. The difference? The CEO PRODUCES more. He does it either by working smart (rather than hard) or by having political connections. In a Libertarian society, the latter option would be worthless.

    ————————————–

    I like to point out to Libertarians that neither government or business is always efficient, but with free elections you get to fire the government every few years. You can’t fire a giant monopoly.

    I can fire Kroger’s any day I like, go to Food Lion, and hire Kroger’s back the next day. As for monopoly, it is extremely rare to see any sort of a monopoly without government assistance. The monopolies you see are either awarded by government (patent and copyright, Cable TV), ARE government (post office, OPEC), or do something better than anyone else on earth. In the last case (which is possible), if you don’t want to deal with them, you can always fall back on another option. Or even better: start a company and compete against them! How many companies actually produce a product that A) has no substitute and B) is indispensable?

    ========================


  316. tzs: You commented a long while back about Ayn Rand’s lack of support for child-rearing. I couldn’t help but recommend my favorite Simpson’s episode, which contains as a side plot Maggie’s adventures at the Ayn Rand School for Tots. The poster on the wall reading “A is A” is to die for.


  317. tzs

    well, as said, you’d better start reining in your big-L-libertarians before you all get tarred with the same brush.

    Ok, so your gov’ts exist to “protect life, liberty and property”. I can make arguments now for the following:

    1. Law courts. Police. Tracking of every sales transaction (to help recover stolen property.) Registration of property (to help track it.) (If we weren’t making a fuss about tracking “laundering money” due to “the War on Drugs”, I bet you anything we’d be carrying out the same bloody actions with the excuse of “the War on Terrorism.”)

    2. The military. Lotsa nice shiny things that fly and/or go BOOM! Oops, guess we have to have the DOD around here. Also all the Patriot Act and equivalent silliness we’ve already seen under the guise of anti-terrorism.

    3. Protect life. Ok, that’s the EPA, right? And a nice National Health System, hmmmm?

    …see what I mean? And forget that “only to protect….” stuff. Irrelevant. Look at what’s already been shoved in under the anti-terrorism umbrella.

    And how to pay for all of this….well, ummm….we’ll-have-to-charge-everyone-something-but-let’s-not-call-it-taxes-ok?

    I realize I’m a bloody cynic, but I would bet that within 20 years of the establishment of a “libertarian economy” we’d be back at something that looks like the bloody same system as we presently have. Either that, or Somalia.

    And Adam Selene, if people-bind-themselves-together-to-protect-their-individual-rights, what’s to keep a chunk of them going out and taking this PROPERTY of other people?
    (You realize you’ve just shown why you get Warlords and the Mafia, right?)

    Warlords, gov’t, or anarchy, people. Show me how you’re going to get a system that doesn’t end up in one of these three barrels.


  318. roo

    Adam Selene–let me present you with an alternative definition for money: it is the representation of value used in a society where direct compensatory value is not guaranteed.

    Or, to put it another way, a society in which individuals can be assured that they may freely partake in the products of others as a compensation for their own products does not need the concept of money.


  319. tzs

    Cesar, see my comment above as to why we ended up with the wreck-of-an-income-tax system that we have.

    Actually, France has (or at least did) have a wealth tax, which has been around for some time. Colette had an essay on this in an issue of Vogue way back when (unfortunately never been translated as far as I know.)

    The problem with sales taxes, VAT taxes, etc. is that they are horribly regressive. A rich person ends up paying far less of a percentage of his income in taxes than a poor person (unless you tax only things which people who are better off buy.) Which, if you consider how much more protection a rich person theoretically gets from the gov’t (property protection!), means he’s a free rider. Not good.

    Plus, haven’t calculations been done on how high a sales tax we’d have to have for this to work and note it was over 35%?


  320. tzs

    Ok, one last question: so are Libertarians FOR or AGAINST patents and copyrights?

    Honestly, I’m coming to the conclusion that no matter what libertarians say they believe (aside from NO TAXES), for any issue, I can find someone claiming that Supporting X is Libertarian.


  321. In my experience, the Libertarians I have met are very egotistical (convinced that they possess superior intellect and capabilities), buy into the exceptionalism myth, are short on empathy and compassion, and generally have the moral reasoning of a toddler (it’s mine! I don’t wanna share! You can’t make me!). I’d be interested to meet some Libertarians who did not project themselves as asshats all the time- maybe it’s just defensiveness?

    Yeah, I wanted to comment on this one also, and not just the irony of a seemingly egotistical, poorly reasoned, ad hominem rant about the poorly reasoned, egotistical, asshattery of others. Some of my liberal friends frequently ape this sentiment, that is, that libertarians are uncharitable and lack compassion. My wife and I are reasonably comfortable and, as such, give a lot of our money to charities. I like the Human Society in particular. Animals are especially vulnerable to human cruelty and cannot advocate on their own behalf. The incongruous bit; it has been shown that states typically associated with liberal voting trends are the least charitable. It seems that liberal generosity is limited by the extent to which they can coerce others into doing the right thing along with them. Look, the state isn’t doing a very good job of dealing with poverty. We can all agree with that. But my conservative friends and I believe the solution is to do charity. Not simply bitch and point fingers while asking why the government isn’t doing more.

    It’s funny. You can tell a lot about a person from what they read into libertarian ideology. Authoritarians are quick with shrill arguments about libertarians wanting to help terrorists. Social conservatives complain about a modern Sodom and Gomorrah. And to fiscal liberals we are apparently selfish elitists asshats. I don’t condone terrorism, I don’t want my friends using meth, and I don’t want the truly vulnerable to go without. It’s just about personal freedom. There surely are solutions other than the coercive force of the government, or at least some with a lot less than what goes around these days.


  322. Come on now.

    And the whining about “property taxes going to SCHOOOOLS!‿ is silly. If it bothers you that much, move to an apartment.

    And pay property taxes through our rent.


  323. Cesar

    Tzs-

    I could also come to the conclusion that no matter what liberals say they believe (aside from keeping abortion legal), for any issue, I can find someone claiming that X is being a good Democrat.


  324. Cesar

    Also, why do liberals view inheriting wealth as unfair? How is it any different from inheriting musical talent, for example? Someone who comes from a famous musical family is obviously going to be more adept at music than me. So should we keep them out of an elite musical academy and let in someone mediocre like myself to be “Fair”?


  325. Cesar

    Tzs-

    Before I answer about copyrights, answer me this-

    Are liberals FOR or AGAINST cutting off funding for the Iraq War?


  326. A libertarian is someone who

    1. Screams bloody murder when government violates his rights with seat belt laws and mild gun restrictions. But is not too concerned when government kidnaps, detains, tortures and occasionally murders little brown people from overseas.

    2. Needs software to inventory his gun collection.

    3. Uses government funded ARPANET to discuss government incompetence.

    4. Claims climate change is unproven. Because if it were proven, then a hell of a lot of government regulation would be coming down the pipe to mitigate. Cue the cognitive dissonance and conspiracy theories.

    5. Generally believes government is inefficient and should be run more like WorldCom, Arthur Andersen and Tyco.

    6. Mourned Augusto Pinochet’s indictment, house arrest, disgrace, and death. Because, you know while he did kill a few thousand people, he did make the economy hum along jolly good.

    7. Rants about America’s high taxes, as compared to well there’s uh er.. never mind.

    8. Invested heavily in Enron as proof of market-based mechanisms. Heh heh heh heh, sucker.


  327. Also, why do liberals view inheriting wealth as unfair?

    Not “unfair,” precisely. Simply not different in kind from other sorts of income. Why do you believe it to be an income category that should be so dramatically favored over other sorts of income?

    Your analogy is a poor one. Musical talent is just that–a genuine talent. In your example above, the system is at least in principle a meritocratic one–you’re being admitted to conservatory on the basis of your tested skills, not your family. (It’d help if the auditions are blinded–it’s been shown, for example, that women are much likelier to be admitted to music schools and to orchestras if the auditions are conducted with the performer behind a screen so their sex can’t be determined.)

    Precisely what talent is “being born wealthy?” Honoring that talent is plutocracy at best and aristocracy at worst, not the meritocracy that libertarians usually claim to prefer.


  328. Jonathan C. Hohensee

    A libertarian is someone who

    1. Screams bloody murder when government violates his rights with seat belt laws and mild gun restrictions. But is not too concerned when government kidnaps, detains, tortures and occasionally murders little brown people from overseas.

    Liberterians are anti-interventionism. They see it a waste of lives and resources to send troops overseas for a war that is not done for the purpose of self-defense.


    2. Needs software to inventory his gun collection.

    Thank God I’ll only use it for either self-defense or entertainment.


    3. Uses government funded ARPANET to discuss government incompetence.

    We’re on the internet, not the ARPANET. The fact that the commerical internet has slightly more staying power than it’s goverment-funded predecessor should stand for something


    4. Claims climate change is unproven. Because if it were proven, then a hell of a lot of government regulation would be coming down the pipe to mitigate. Cue the cognitive dissonance and conspiracy theories.

    Their is a consensus among scientists that global warming is happening and that it is caused by emmisions. There is not a consensous, however, that we should abandon all economic freedoms in order to have that happen. (The goverment completely wasted something like 7 million to make the failure that was the EV1, not to mention what would happen to third-world countires when we tell them that we would have to tell them that their fledging industries would now have to become even MORE fledgin)

    5. Generally believes government is inefficient and should be run more like WorldCom, Arthur Andersen and Tyco.


    6. Mourned Augusto Pinochet’s indictment, house arrest, disgrace, and death. Because, you know while he did kill a few thousand people, he did make the economy hum along jolly good.

    Pinochet made great progess on economic freedoms, but his track record on personal freedoms where so appalling that he deserved a lot worse than what he got.

    7. Rants about America’s high taxes, as compared to well there’s uh er.. never mind.

    The tallest dwarf

    8. Invested heavily in Enron as proof of market-based mechanisms. Heh heh heh heh, sucker.

    No, I didn’t


  329. Cesar

    Nick-

    Wow, you are really, really full of shit if you think libertarians don’t oppose this war and the constitutional violations this president has committed. Many libertarians in fact voted for Democrats in the last congressional elections because of the putrid excesses of the past six years. Most oppose the war in Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, the suspension of habeus corpus, and the intimidation of the the legislative branch. Fortunatley, we had those brave liberal Democrats in the Senate back in 2002 to filibuster the war resolution. OH yeah, thats right–I forgot, they were too cowardly to stop it.

    Llelldorin-

    I never, ever said people who inherit money should be “favored” or “honored” in any way. I simply said that starting off life wealthy is one kind of advantage–another would be starting off life with high intellegence, or with musical talent, or being born in an industrialized country. There are many kinds of privilege one can be born with, but for some reason inheriting wealth really seems to get under the skin of people on this blog.


  330. tzs

    Yah, some would say that a “meritocracy” is as anti-democratic as a “get there via your connections and wealth” setup.

    I’d argue along the lines of it being more efficient and it fits in to our American heritage ideal–Horatio Alger, anyone? What could we replace it with that would be as productive? (Actually, the same argument for capitalism–a system with problems but everything else is worse.)

    I’m for estate taxes for the following reasons: first of all, the bars are now set so high that there’s quite a lot that gets allowed under an exemption and most people don’t have to worry about it. (The “losing the family farm due to death taxes, whine whine” is a canard–a non-existent problem right now.) Second, why isn’t it fair to tax income arriving from inheritances but it is fair to tax income from salaries, period?

    Think of progressive taxation and death taxes the insurance rich people pay against a re-enactment of the French Revolution.


  331. Anna

    I think most of you are confusing libertarians with anarchists. In case you need the definitions: Libertarians are for a small governement. They are NOT against all governement. Anarchists are against all governement. I think you all need to change the word libertarian to anarchist to explain who you are really talking about.


  332. Cesar

    How would you all feel, seriously, if a Conservative blogger posted a la Ann Coulter that Liberals-

    1) Want to raise income taxes to 95%

    2) Have booths on every street corner for abortion-on-demand

    3) Destroy the nuclear family

    4) Surrender to Al Qaeda since Americans are the *real* terrorists


  333. Nick gave us the following definition of a libertarian:

    1. Screams bloody murder when government violates his rights with seat belt laws and mild gun restrictions. But is not too concerned when government kidnaps, detains, tortures and occasionally murders little brown people from overseas.

    Uhhhh, do you read Lew Rockwell, Randy Bartlett, Catallarchy, The Liberty Papers, or any number of other libertarian and classical liberal sites that oppose Gitmo, Iraq, etc? Apparently you don’t.

    2. Needs software to inventory his gun collection.

    I don’t own any guns. I fully support the individual right to keep and bear arms.

    3. Uses government funded ARPANET to discuss government incompetence.

    I haven’t used the ARPANET since the 1980’s. I use the Internet, owned by a variety of private and public organizations, fairly extensively these days. This is one of the favorite left wing strawmen that makes an assumption that no communications network could have come into existence without the government.

    4. Claims climate change is unproven. Because if it were proven, then a hell of a lot of government regulation would be coming down the pipe to mitigate. Cue the cognitive dissonance and conspiracy theories.

    Hmmmm, most libertarians I know agree that climate scientists have shown that there is a minor change in temperature that has occurred over the last century. They also follow all of the developments around climate change, not just the ones that support a single point of view and are aware of the discussions among those studying this about sun and cosmic ray impacts, the shrinking of the ice caps on Mars (no CO2 output there, hmmm), the variability during the last century of cooling and warming trends, the inaccuracy of the “hockey stick” graph and so on. They have concluded that there is nowhere near enough data to come to the conclusion that climate change in the past century is manmade. They even know, which you apparently don’t, that the climate change models have not proven correct for the past 5 years.

    5. Generally believes government is inefficient and should be run more like WorldCom, Arthur Andersen and Tyco.

    Generally believes government is horribly inefficient and should be reduced to the minimum tolerable level and instituted as close to the citizen as possible. Centralized bureaucracies in far away cities are incredibly inefficient and wasteful. Rather than a bunch of silly programs, we could simply divvy up the money the US government collects for social programs among all those beneath the poverty line and bring them all out poverty. Oh, wait, that’s too simple, that can’t possibly be!

    6. Mourned Augusto Pinochet’s indictment, house arrest, disgrace, and death. Because, you know while he did kill a few thousand people, he did make the economy hum along jolly good.

    Chile’s economy did improve under Pinochet, which doesn’t change the fact that he murdered quite a few of his own citizens. That said, in the grand scheme of things, I’m a bit more worried about governments like the USSR, China, North Korea and Cambodia that killed tens of millions of people and destroyed their economies at the same time.

    7. Rants about America’s high taxes, as compared to well there’s uh er.. never mind.

    Well, since I don’t pay taxes in Germany and I do pay taxes in the US, I think I’ll worry about taxes here and their affect on the poor and vulnerable.

    8. Invested heavily in Enron as proof of market-based mechanisms. Heh heh heh heh, sucker.

    Well, no, I didn’t invest in Enron. Nor any other energy company. For a whole lot of good reasons. But, nice try.

    What a ridiculous, untrue, sad stereotype.


  334. Second, why isn’t it fair to tax income arriving from inheritances but it is fair to tax income from salaries, period?

    Actually taxing income, of any variety, is a very poor idea. Taxing consumption and property is the right approach if you need to tax. What amazes me is the insistence of the progressives and socialists on taxing income rather than property. This allows the truly wealthy to protect most of their wealth by the simple expedient of not generating income. Income taxes impact the middle class, not the wealthy.


  335. For f**k’s sake, stealing is initiation of force.

    No, what you are doing is redefing common terms to suit your own argument. I could define “icecream” as a vegetable, but I’m still going to get fat(ter) if I gobble four servings of the stuff a day.

    Everybody knows what force is - the use or threat of violence against people. People. You are not the stuff you own. Burglery, any theft other than extortion or robbery, is NOT force - save as Libertarians have redefined the word to suit their own special little theories. It’s a violation of property rights, sure - but, whoops, those property rights are not absolute. Taxation, for example, is not theft and not an initiation of force.

    Prove to us that theft is “an initiation of force” without spluttering like a drowning cat. Lay out your starting assumptions clearly.

    So, when a libertarian says that they believe in a government that protects the negative rights of individuals and that they oppose the use of force except in self-defense,

    As we have seen, when a libertarian says this, he/she is carefully cherry-picking and redefining terms to lead to their own desired conclusions.

    Interesting that you acknowledge, indirectly, that the government won’t prevent my house from being burgled, but that I, an individual, clearly can.

    How exactly do you intend to stop me from burglarizing your house - peacefully - without initiating force against me? I’m not going to hurt you in any way - I’m just going to wait until you’re out, or elsewhere, smash a window or two, and nick off with your computer or TV. I’m not going to hurt anyone.

    Are you going to initiate force to stop me? Are you going to threaten me? Are you going to shoot me? I haven’t threatened or shot you - how can you justify your initiation of force?

    It’s only when you realize that most people get their money by working for time that you can see that taxation is slavery.

    Of course, by that standard, capitalism is slavery. After all, capitalists derive interest from wealth created by the actual labour of other people…

    Property does not depend on society to exist.

    Proof? Assume no society - how exactly, in any meaningful way, do you “own” anything that you’re not holding in your own two hands? On what basis does a landlord tell a squatter to get off “his” property?

    If I have a piece of land, I improve, and I defend it, it has become mine.

    If you step off it, I can take it. It’s mine now, right?

    And there’s a blindingly stupid “begging the question” assumption in that quote - the third word…

    Shrugs, property rights are antecedent to society.

    Proof?

    Also, why do liberals view inheriting wealth as unfair?

    Actually, we don’t. We just see taxing inherited wealth as fairer than taxing earned income, and realise that there’s a trade-off between the two.

    I simply said that starting off life wealthy is one kind of advantage–another would be starting off life with high intellegence, or with musical talent, or being born in an industrialized country.

    Intelligence doesn’t accumulate from generation to generation, and it doesn’t give ancillary advantages save as people earn them.


  336. Jeez. This has got to be humor. Or at least, an attempt at humor.

    But a factual, rational debate about the merits and failings libertarianism? Sorry. Waaaay to many blanket statements, stereotypes, intentional confoundations and so on. Then again, the author is a “liberal”… (give us back our political denomination, you SOB’s!).

    In any case, this page has been added to my list of stuff to debunk.


  337. Mark

    Adam Selene, I just scrolled to the bottom and read your comment. Well done my friend. We need more libertarians like you. One good point I think Chris Clarke made here was that young-uns tend to take on extreme ideologies which are tempered as they are exposed to reality. Hopefully they turn out like you (might I guess that you’re over 30?).

    But Chris was also right that many turn out batshit insane. And you gotta deal with them as swiftly and effectively as you would a Jesus freak.

    To the author - Good article overall, but I take issue with this passage:
    “What’s the more libertarian way of running the world? Coming up with ever-evolving procedures by which the largest number of people possible have the largest amount of input possible into the policy by which we run the world, moderated by recognizing certain expertise and the efficiency of delegating some decision-making — which is a bright-eyed and optimistic way of describing the mission of liberal democracy— or letting the people who are best at accumulating money bribe, bully, and blackmail their way into running huge sections of the world?”

    That’s a false dichotomy. First of all you don’t want the “largest number of people” to have too much input–inevitably they vote the nation into bankruptcy, asking for and receiving all manner of pet programs. And delegating decision-making to experts is asking for trouble, especially when you grant these decision-makers monopoly power. Consult history for reasons why central control is a bad idea. On the other side of your “two possible worlds”


  338. Mark

    On the other side of your “two possible worlds” you’ve got bullying, blackmail, and other nasty stuff. I hope you don’t think that kind of behavior would be impossible in your lovely world of liberal democracy. And while the control over our lives by corporations is indeed a problem, it’s not like the government is doing anything to free us from this condition, and in fact is probably helping corporations accumulate further power over us, both purposely and as an unexpected side effect of well-intentioned actions. I’d go as far as to say that without a free market keeping companies in check, today we’d probably have very few freedoms left.

    There is a middle road.


  339. HistoryMom wrote:

    “In my experience, the Libertarians I have met are very egotistical (convinced that they possess superior intellect and capabilities), buy into the exceptionalism myth, are short on empathy and compassion, and generally have the moral reasoning of a toddler (it’s mine! I don’t wanna share! You can’t make me!). I’d be interested to meet some Libertarians who did not project themselves as asshats all the time- maybe it’s just defensiveness?*”

    I don’t think so HM. It takes a special kind of person to make greed and rampant self interest into a personal philosophy.

    Luckily I believe what we have here is a self-limiting political philosophy. Anybody who engages in the substantial personal contribution of time and money to organize build a political movement ceases to become somebody in the Libertarian ideal - a rational actor motivated by self interest. Put it another way - the more time you spend on organizing and campaigning the more you subscribe to the notion of a common good.

    I think libertarianism will continue to be a fringe movement because it will continue to lack mass appeal.

    Most people want lower taxes and less government to a point. That point ends at rational self interest. You might convince people that say government water inspectors are a wasteful lazy lot, but when Grandma starts shitting blood from E.Coli, people will wake up pretty quick and change their vote.


  340. What is Libertarianism? Libertarianism is the radical belief that you own yourself. It is the belief that no person or institution, however noble their intentions, has a higher claim on your life than you do. It is a very simple and logical philosophy, one that many of you could learn from.

    Thank you for the arrogant puffery. Just one teeny, tiny, minor little question related to your lofty idealism:

    In the Libertarian Utopia, will anyone be burning anything, releasing anything into the water, or otherwise polluting the environment in any way that might - even remotely - hurt others without the prior and express approval of everyone else who might be affected? If they’re my lungs, how exactly will you be reconciling your belief that I own myself with your desire to burn fossil fuels in your car, and thus put my lungs at risk without my approval?


  341. Wow. That’s a lot of hate up there. Reminds me of one of the fringe benefits of being a (small-l AND big-L)ibertarian: the ability to make people go apoplectic at the mere mention of my political affiliation. I get the same reaction out of people when I say I’m an atheist. (I used to get it when I said I was a vegetarian — alas, I’ve strayed from vegetarianism, but I’m thinking about going back to it, in part because it just makes people so gosh darn angry)

    The reason the libertarian position is so inherently inflammatory is that people are under the impression that we libertarians look down upon you statists. That we do not take you seriously. That we believe your ideas are quaint, infantile, and outdated. That we constantly trumpet how history, science, and logic have proven all non-libertarian ideas incorrect, unworkable, and internally inconsistent. That statism destroys the soul.

    But, really, NONE of that is true. We just think you’re ignorant, possibly a little bit evil, and/or have a hidden agenda that benefits you at the expense of others whom you’ve convinced you’re trying to help. That’s all. So, seriously, you guys need to settle down and not be so sensitive about everything.

    Sheesh.


  342. EvilYeti

    My personal recipe to induce Libertarian cranial structural failure.

    Me:”I’m an anti-prohibitionist, but I don’t go as far as the Libertarians. They want to make it legal to sell crack from vending machines.”

    Libertaridan:”WHAT? LIAR! Thats not our postion!”

    Me:”Excuse me? Based on libertarian principles, should the sale of narcotics be regulated or deregulated”

    Libertardian:”Deregulated of course.”

    Me:”Ok, so can we infer from that the sale of rock cocaine from an automated vending appliance would be legal, or illegal in a fully Libertarian society?”

    Libertardian:”…. well yeah ok, it would be technically legal BUT NO ONE WOULD DO IT!”

    Me:”I would!”


  343. “Property does not exist in the absence of society.”

    now that’s just plain weird. every example of a country suffering from rampant warlordism or civil war would seem to throw this out the window right quick; if anything the line of property ownership is rather easy to trace - he who has the guns has the property.

    regardless, it is sort of strange to see the label of “libertarian” achieve some kind of second coming in a number of hands (we had the democratic - libertarian alliance a few months back, as well as the perennial republican assumptions of said mantle) because as many people have noted - scornfully and otherwise - the brand is not in good shape. maybe it’s a hunger for a third choice? something that’s different, at least in terms of the rapidly expanding government thing that our elected officials are so durn into. i don’t have a good answer as to why the label is suddenly an “it girl” of sorts.

    it does, of course, make for good strawman burning, but so do many things.


  344. tzs

    Well, we could move to a consumption tax (hello, VAT, anyone?) and wealth taxes–I could see that and would be ok with it.

    Chances of it occurring? 0.1%. I predict an absolute storm of teeth-gnashing and howling about how we’re “destroying the family heritage!!!”, with a sizable amount of the noise coming from self-described libertarians. Or do you think you could get your fellow travelers on board?

    Also, if one is fine with a wealth tax, how can one be against a death tax? (I understand an argument against having both.)


  345. history_mom

    I find it interesting that the only two professed Libertarians that addressed my points left out the various qualifications that I made about the people I have met who claimed to be Libertarians. They also decided to read their own prejudices into my post.

    For example: Why would you assume that my characterization of the Libertarians I know as lacking empathy and compassion merely stems from differing opinions about social justice? In reality, I have had them deny that racism, sexism, and many other -isms are still institutional problems that need to be addressed. In particular, they deny that sexism is actually a problem because they buy wholesale to evo psych essentialism. They believe everyone can and does succeed/fail based on their own merit. The less privileged their background, the more they buy into the myth of their own exceptionalism, while contradictorily assuring us that if they could do it so can anyone else.

    One of my peers during undergrad, a Randian Libertarian, wrote an essay that not only defended, but praised, the Spanish conquest of the Americas as bringing civilization (especially Christianity) to the New World and that without Europe the rest of the world would still be living in a state of savagery (and not the “noble savage” variety). It completely ignored relevant historical and anthropological evidence to disprove his thesis and he interpreted the evidence he did use in a flagrantly inappropriate way. But this was the same kid who also tried to make Machiavelli an Objectivist.

    I have had Libertarians express what can only be described as Social Darwinist ideas: if one truly was intelligent/capable they would succeed; that they don’t succeed proves that they are neither intelligent nor capable; ergo they deserve to be poor and downtrodden and unsupported by “their” tax dollars.

    If you contribute to private charity as a way to address social justice, I commend you. You are not, however, typical of the Libertarians I have met, nor many Americans in general.

    Another example: Claiming that I have defined social/economic conservatives as Libertarian, when I clearly stated that I had noticed that many professed Libertarians are actually disaffected Republicans. This is not a controversial statement. More specifically, I used the big “l” to denote party affiliation, so if you identify as little “l” then I wasn’t talking about you. If they are not “real” Libertarians to you, then that is something your party needs to address. I acknowledged a sampling bias, which presumes that one cannot necessarily generalize from that information (and you will notice I don’t). I am very clear that these are people who claim to be Libertarian- I did not label them- and I am giving my observations of what they professed as part of their “Libertarian” values. So stop claiming that I am reading these into Libertarianism.

    Look, people wouldn’t think you are an asshat if you didn’t intentionally misrepresent their arguments and then call them names (close-minded, egotistical).

    And Adam, what was it about my description of the classroom that bothered you so (especially since it had nothing to do with libertarianism)?


  346. “But a factual, rational debate about the merits and failings libertarianism? Sorry. Waaaay to many blanket statements, stereotypes, intentional confoundations and so on. Then again, the author is a “liberal‿… (give us back our political denomination, you SOB’s!).”

    You know, there are a lot of us anarchists who think the same damn time some oligarch-loving wage-slavery-promoting “Libertarian” calls himself an anarchist or calls his opponents “statists.”


  347. “The less privileged their background, the more they buy into the myth of their own exceptionalism, while contradictorily assuring us that if they could do it so can anyone else.”

    it would seem you’d have to pick one or the other here. perhaps a lack of self-esteem pushes them in the direction of downplaying their achievements; perhaps it was a false modesty. or perhaps they honestly felt that if they were capable of such achievements, nearly anyone would have been.

    it’s also possible they were messing with you. that’s an entertaining pastime for some (i.e. the blog entry that started this particular kerfluffle).

    obviously, if they’ve succeeded, then their exceptionalism is at least, in part, real and not mythic.

    taken at face value, plenty of arguments seem utterly insane, if only because people aren’t listening to their dialogue partners, but rather waiting for their turn on the soapbox. for example, if you’re feeling objective-ish - but not Objectivist-ish, har har - watch a back and forth between regular people who support greater gun control and those who support greater gun freedoms. both are concerned with exactly the same factor - the safety of their family, friends and loved ones - but are often unable to understand the arguments of their opponents in any terms other than an implicit or even explicit threat of violence. (i.e. “gun grabbers” v. “gun nuts” etc etc and so forth)


  348. omfg

    omfg - how many pathetic little fanboy readers do you have?

    Are you really letting all comments through, not censoring any pro-”L” ones?

    Pathetic tripe.


  349. By the same token, 2000 janitors could not, unless they were exceptional, do the work of 1 CEO. The difference? The CEO PRODUCES more.

    Exhibit A: capital-L Libertarians, by and large, are ‘Great Man’ authoritarian cultists. They just prefer the Leviathan to sit at a boardroom table.


  350. “You know, there are a lot of us anarchists who think the same damn time some oligarch-loving wage-slavery-promoting “Libertarian‿ calls himself an anarchist or calls his opponents “statists.‿”

    Heads up, Djur:

    1) “Statist” is a correct descriptive term for any person who advocates the existence of a state.

    2) Since you seem to be a left-anarchist, there are two things you should know:

    a) You do not have a monopoly on anarchist ideology. Anarchocapitalists are anarchists as well, as much as you leftist-anarchists wants to deny that fact.

    b) Oligarchy and wage slavery, even if these would be true in a libertarian or ancap society, is much preferable to the indiscriminate killings which took place in the time-honoured left-anarchist experiment of Spain in the 30’s.


  351. I never, ever said people who inherit money should be “favored‿ or “honored‿ in any way.

    You’re complaining about Democrats, “thinking of inherited wealth as unfair.” This criticism usually comes up when we oppose elimination of the estate tax.

    Eliminating the estate tax very much favors inherited wealth–it treats the transfer of wealth to inheritors as fundamentally different — and much favored — over salary and investment income.

    Do you really not see any difference between a child with inherited talent working hard to develop that talent and succeeding and a child doing nothing and succeeding anyway? One is an unavoidable but mitigatable flaw in any meritocratic system, the other is raw aristocracy.

    Inherited wealth is different in kind from inherited talent because our society treats it as a measure of success in and of itself. Someone with raw, innate musical talent won’t be recognized for it in any way unless they put in the hard work to develop their talent into a useable skill. The same isn’t true of inherited wealth–with no personal effort at all, someone who inherits enough wealth is treated by society as a success immediately. That’s a only a hop, skip, and a “right honorable” away from an outright aristocracy.


  352. Just like the neo-con republicans and the socialist democrats, the libertarian party also has it’s extremists.

    And, of course, the Satanist Catholics and the gay pedophiles.


  353. >>By the same token, 2000 janitors could not, unless they were exceptional, do the work of 1 CEO. The difference? The CEO PRODUCES more.

    >Exhibit A: capital-L Libertarians, by and large, are ‘Great Man’ authoritarian cultists. They just prefer the Leviathan to sit at a boardroom table.

    Exhibit B: Anti-Libertarians does not seem to fathom that CEO are just business leaders, and not all businesses are corporations, which as, by the way, a creature of the state, existing solely by state grant and state privilege.

    In a world without corporations, CEO’s (or their equivalent, by any other name), would still exist, and do productive activities (yes, people CEOs usually do those things, believe it or not).


  354. 1) “Statist‿ is a correct descriptive term for any person who advocates the existence of a state.

    Yes. Such as Libertarians.

    2) Since you seem to be a left-anarchist, there are two things you should know:

    a) You do not have a monopoly on anarchist ideology. Anarchocapitalists are anarchists as well, as much as you leftist-anarchists wants to deny that fact.

    Yup, you’re anarchists who enthusiastically embrace the hierarchical system of capitalism. Regardless, I was responding to the claim that ‘liberal’ is somehow a term that originally belongs to Libertarians. The original liberals were no more Libertarians than they were modern liberals, because they lived in a pre-industrial society.

    b) Oligarchy and wage slavery, even if these would be true in a libertarian or ancap society, is much preferable to the indiscriminate killings which tookplace in the time-honoured left-anarchist experiment of Spain in the 30’s.

    It’s a good thing that someone took care of that problem, then.

    (Note: the quoted excerpt is now my favorite thing that anyone has said to me ever.)


  355. tzs

    Ok, so are Libertarians FOR the existence of corporations or AGAINST them? I’m confused.

    And I still haven’t gotten an answer back as to whether Libertarians are in general FOR patents and copyright or AGAINST them.

    Could an anarchic-libertarians please explain why your supposed society wouldn’t quickly turn into Somalia?


  356. Exhibit B: Anti-Libertarians does not seem to fathom that CEO are just business leaders

    What’s the difference between a business and a government?

    and not all businesses are corporations, which as, by the way, a creature of the state, existing solely by state grant and state privilege.

    A criminal syndicate by any other name would kill as many people. A corporation is a state-created entity, true, but the only purpose of that categorization is to define how the state treats it. The corporation receives no succor from the state that it couldn’t obtain without it.

    In a world without corporations, CEO’s (or their equivalent, by any other name), would still exist, and do productive activities (yes, people CEOs usually do those things, believe it or not).

    I fail to see your point. I was addressing the comment that two thousand janitors would somehow be incapable of producing as much as one CEO.


  357. >> 1) “Statist‿ is a correct descriptive term for any person who advocates the existence of a state.

    >Yes. Such as Libertarians.

    Correction: Such as SOME libertarians.

    >> 2) Since you seem to be a left-anarchist, there are two things you should know:

    >> a) You do not have a monopoly on anarchist ideology. Anarchocapitalists are anarchists as well, as much as you leftist-anarchists wants to deny that fact.

    >Yup, you’re anarchists who enthusiastically embrace the hierarchical system of capitalism. Regardless, I was responding to the claim that ‘liberal’ is somehow a term that originally belongs to Libertarians. The original liberals were no more Libertarians than they were modern liberals, because they lived in a pre-industrial society.

    Irrelevant. Political opinions do not depend on whether the steam engine and the automatic loom has been developed or not.

    >> b) Oligarchy and wage slavery, even if these would be true in a libertarian or ancap society, is much preferable to the indiscriminate killings which tookplace in the time-honoured left-anarchist experiment of Spain in the 30’s.

    >It’s a good thing that someone took care of that problem, then.

    I take it that you agree that there has been no successful large-scale attempt at making left-anarchism workable without such excesses are mass murder?

    Read Bryan Caplan’s essay for details:

    http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan/spain.htm


  358. >> Exhibit B: Anti-Libertarians does not seem to fathom that CEO are just business leaders

    >What’s the difference between a business and a government?

    You’re kidding, right?

    What happens to you if you go into a store, and there is a salesman from Microsoft, and you turn down his offer to buy Microsoft Windows?

    Nothing.

    What happens if you move to the USA, and decide to decline the US Government’s offer to provide you with… ahem… protective services, for a fee?

    Jailtime.

    Are we clear on the difference?

    >> and not all businesses are corporations, which as, by the way, a creature of the state, existing solely by state grant and state privilege.

    >A criminal syndicate by any other name would kill as many people. A corporation is a state-created entity, true, but the only purpose of that categorization is to define how the state treats it. The corporation receives no succor from the state that it couldn’t obtain without it.

    Walmart, Halliburton and Exxon would disagree very strongly.

    >> In a world without corporations, CEO’s (or their equivalent, by any other name), would still exist, and do productive activities (yes, people CEOs usually do those things, believe it or not).

    >I fail to see your point. I was addressing the comment that two thousand janitors would somehow be incapable of producing as much as one CEO.

    Probably because you fail to understand that sucessful administration of a large company can lead to enormous amounts of wealth for both the company the CEO runs and society as a whole. As opposed to a large company who is run by a dork in a suit, and whose foolish policies runs the company under, squaders wealth, results in unemployment for the employees and losses for the investors.


  359. Correction: Such as SOME libertarians.

    You just want to give the keys to a different jailer.

    Irrelevant. Political opinions do not depend on whether the steam engine and the automatic loom has been developed or not.

    Are you honestly claiming that the advent of the mass media, the enormous shift of the population into cities, the move from self-sustaining farms to the family wage, the development of industrial warfare, and all the other developments of the last two centuries were so insignificant as to have no notable effect on the polity?

    I take it that you agree that there has been no successful large-scale attempt at making left-anarchism workable without such excesses are mass murder?

    Uh, are you sure you want to go down that route? I mean, all I was trying to point out was that the Spanish Civil War featured just a few more participants than left libertarians. I really didn’t expect a goddamn Libertarian to try and use the “existing socialism” gambit. I mean, your track record is no better, and your own rhetoric explains the reason: libertarian movements tend to be put down with bullets, batons, and gas. Wielded by authoritarians of both ‘public’ and ‘private’ types.


  360. Grokked

    I can grok the stereotype. I have met him in the flesh. Yet, libertarians themselves ridicule the Axiom spouting Randbot as much or more so than anyone. So, it might be a good idea to expand your circle of acquaintances.

    Any sort of charge of this type can work for other groups. I had a communist acquaintance some years ago who was generally likeable until he went on his sanctimonious communist rant. He loved explaining how selfishness needed to be reigned in but he was the last person who would lift a finger to do the dishes, take out the garbage, or any smallish contribution to the community he lived in. You definitely wouldn’t want to go down any foxholes with that guy. But so what, he doesn’t get to define the whole of the communist or socialist movements simply because he was a hypocritical lazyass.

    Also, to back up some other earlier sentiments: there’s a difference between thinking a principle is generally good and axiomatically sticking to one under any sort of conditions. Most of the libertarians I know favor the former. It’s *generally* good to avoid coercion. We should not initiate force when there are other peaceful options available. This is why I often favor market or other sorts of civil societal approaches to problem solving over legislative approaches as the former is based on voluntary agreements. But I do not favor market solutions axiomatically - only generally and when the evidence points in their favor. Wanting to minimize coercion and force when other peaceful options are availabe is not the same as axiomatically opposing those concepts under any conditions. The axiomatic libertarian would oppose any sort of laws against car pollution. But I would reason this way. Is there a more efficient and peaceful way to deal with car pollution than inviting the state in to regulate it? If yes, then we should go with the peaceful solution. If not, then regulation is necessary.


  361. You’re kidding, right?

    What happens to you if you go into a store, and there is a salesman from Microsoft, and you turn down his offer to buy Microsoft Windows?

    Nothing.

    Yes. There are laws preventing them from doing anything. A more pertinent question is “what happens if you try to run out on your lifetime labor contract?” or “what happens when you can’t pay your landlord, who also happens to own or collude with the owners of all other property nearby?”

    What happens if you move to the USA, and decide to decline the US Government’s offer to provide you with… ahem… protective services, for a fee?

    Jailtime.

    Well, shit, I guess it was a bad idea to move into a state, then. Well, luckily we have freedom of choice and all — nothing forcing you to live in a specific place, right?

    Are we clear on the difference?

    Crystal. It’s nugatory.

    Walmart, Halliburton and Exxon would disagree very strongly.

    Really? You think Walmart wouldn’t love to have minimum wage repealed? You think Halliburton wouldn’t love to be able to annex land itself for oil exploration?

    Probably because you fail to understand that sucessful administration of a large company can lead to enormous amounts of wealth for both the company the CEO runs and society as a whole. As opposed to a large company who is run by a dork in a suit, and whose foolish policies runs the company under, squaders wealth, results in unemployment for the employees and losses for the investors.

    So a successful CEO shits on the workers and delivers wealth for the oligarchs. An unsuccessful CEO shits on the workers and fails to deliver wealth for the oligarchs. My eyes are truly open as to the fine work done by the brave executives of our ships of industry.


  362. Technocracygirl

    FemaleLibertarian:

    Do I see some CEO salaries as insane? Yes. Do I think we as a society should implement laws to redistribute those monies. No. It’s not OUR money.

    Except when it is. Or didn’t you realize that the wealth of the Enron executives was built on the backs of Granda Millie? Using phony accounting and fraud (i.e. stealing) to get said money from a whole lot of Westerners to redistribute to their upper echelons. That money was not Enron’s to take if they had been behaving in an ethical, moral or legal manner. But because there were no watchdogs/the watchdogs had been half-blinded and defanged, people got robbed.

    Fletch:
    Property does not depend on society to exist.

    Yes, it does. If there is no society, there is no property. Or, to be more specific, if there is no society which recognizes something as property, it is not property. Property is a name we give to things we own. Is the air a property? What about space? Before Anglos landed on the Atlantic Coast, the First Nations, as far as my admittedly limited knowledge recollects, did not concieve of any personal ownership (property) of land or natural resources. They had the concept of ownership of things, certainly, but not resources.


  363. Rimfax

    Technocracygirl,

    Minor point: There is substantial sociological evidence supporting the theory that much of what is libertarian about modern American political culture was absorbed from the Algonquin tribes. All of the Native American tribes had a concept of land ownership, even if only that of the land owned by the tribe.

    After trading amicably with private traders for decades, the eastern tribes were eradicated or forced into a nomadic lifestyle by the colonial governments. The concept of the roaming plains tribes as an ancient tradition is a myth.


  364. Rimfax

    Djur,

    Walmart would probably love to repeal the minimum wage. Of course, they will probably lobby to have it reinstated after a few years when the ensuing labor shortage makes it impossible to hire competent workers for less than $10 an hour.

    On the other hand, Halliburton would probably lobby against being able to annex and develop their own land. It is far more lucrative for them to have the government own the land. It shields them from any responsibility for any damage they do to any of their neighbors or to anyone downstream from them.

    Therein lies the big difference between big government and big corporations. With big corporations, there is recourse to the civil courts and to the legislature. With big government, at best you have recourse to the ballot box.


  365. now that’s just plain weird. every example of a country suffering from rampant warlordism or civil war would seem to throw this out the window right quick; if anything the line of property ownership is rather easy to trace - he who has the guns has the property.

    Proves the point very nicely, actually. When the guy with the bigger gun comes along, it goes to him - and screw any claim to inherent “property rights” by the previous holder.

    You’re really going to have to try harder…

    Irrelevant. Political opinions do not depend on whether the steam engine and the automatic loom has been developed or not.

    Oh, brother.

    So what’s your political opinion on sapiency rights for lethetic engines? Quickly now…

    Suggested reading - Connections by James Burke, and perhaps The Disappearance of Childhood by Neil Postman.


  366. Marmot

    While we participate in and are part of society, each one of us is a unique individual. Our uniqueness includes our backgrounds, beliefs, hopes, dreams, fears, and abilities–just to name a very few facets.

    Each of us must recognize that if want want to live in a diverse society where others are tolerant of our unique individuality then we must be willing to be tolerant of others in return.

    Civilized society exists to the extent that there is this mutual toleration of individual uniqueness among diverse people. (Civilized society can defend itself against aggressors, but that’s another post…)

    Legal concepts like “property rights” and decision-making processes like “democracy” are merely tools a mutually tolerant society may use. Both libertarians and modern liberals get confused when they start focusing on these sorts of legal concepts and decision-making processes as ends in themselves rather than as means to ensure a society of mutual toleration among unique individuals.

    Libertarians need to do a better job in taking America’s decidedly non-libertarian history into account when deciding whether government intervention is needed in a particular area. For example, libertarians cannot ignore the fact the government supported slavery for generations when looking at issues like affirmative action. (I’m not saying racial preferences are the right answer, but a decent understanding of history requires more than just “ok, the government is color-blind now”.)

    Modern liberals need to do a better job in understanding that government decisions, even those of democratic governments, are going to be enforced against everyone with no tolerance for the unique individuality of those who would chose otherwise. Remember, every power you give to the government is a power that you give to your political enemies who will (mis)use it when there turn in power comes.


  367. Walmart would probably love to repeal the minimum wage. Of course, they will probably lobby to have it reinstated after a few years when the ensuing labor shortage makes it impossible to hire competent workers for less than $10 an hour.

    Uh huh. This makes no sense — why would putting a floor on the value of an item decrease its effective utility? Subjecting wages entirely to the market (they nearly are already) would, by the calculations of most economics, cause at least some of the currently unemployed to be hired at wages below minimum (otherwise, they would have already been hired). Presumably, a few hiring and firing cycles would result in something close to full employment, barring structural unemployment, at a somewhat lower average wage. All right.

    Now, what you’re suggesting is that the minimal unemployment would mean there’s a labor shortage, and wages would increase. But we haven’t seen that in the many nations without minimum wages. Furthermore, if somehow the price of labor did get that high ‘naturally’, the marginal utility of importing foreign workers or exporting jobs would become greater than the marginal utility of giving that job to an American here.

    In addition, we haven’t reached the limits of the automation of many jobs. Currently, there’s greater marginal utility in hiring another worker at shit wages to do shit work than to invest in the technology necessary to eliminate that job entirely. Sure, Wal-Mart is service industry, which is difficult to mechanize, but the labor shortage would affect the entire economy. More factory jobs done by machines = more unemployed suckers to wear paper hats and ask if you want fries with that.

    Finally, you’re ignoring the quite likely choice of simple collusion between employers. Just because government is the current vehicle of collaboration for capital doesn’t mean that it can’t be replaced by a more efficient model.

    With big corporations, there is recourse to the civil courts and to the legislature. With big government, at best you have recourse to the ballot box.

    With collusion between the two, you have neither. A weak minarchist government would be as much of a puppet of oligarchs as a strong corporatist one is.

    On the other hand, Halliburton would probably lobby against being able to annex and develop their own land. It is far more lucrative for them to have the government own the land. It shields them from any responsibility for any damage they do to any of their neighbors or to anyone downstream from them.

    So does a private army, really. You can’t really hold someone to account for their misdeeds when they have gangs of armed thugs willing to shoot you.


  368. You:‿I’m an anti-prohibitionist, but I don’t go as far as the Libertarians. They want to make it legal to sell crack from vending machines.‿

    Libertaridan: The market in crack exists primarily because of prohibition. If drugs had always been legal, then the market in cocaine would look more like the market in cocaine did back when cocaine was legal.

    You:‿Excuse me? Based on libertarian principles, should the sale of narcotics be regulated or deregulated‿

    Libertardian:‿Deregulated of course.‿ But changing overnight from regulated to deregulated is a market shock, with the shock itself doing great harm. The drug market should be deregulated slowly over decades so that things like crack in vending machines does not happen. Common sense, really. You start by legalizing softer drugs like marijuana and dexedrine. As consumer patterns adjust to this new freedom in a (generally) healthy way, you can expand the freedom because people will have developed the knowledge and sense of responsibility neccessary to handle the freedom. As a comparison, the lack of speed limits works well on the Autobahn in Germany, but if that approach were to be applied to freeways in North America, it would be a disaster if they did it overnight or over a mere year or two.

    You:‿Ok, so can we infer from that the sale of rock cocaine from an automated vending appliance would be legal, or illegal in a fully Libertarian society?‿

    Libertardian: Eventually. 20 years out maybe. By that time nobody would do it because first of all, a greater number of people would come to realize that cocaine is a bad drug, and second of all, there would be more pleasant ways of ingesting cocaine even if you do choose to indulge. I mean really, would you like to experience a crack hangover?

    You:‿I would!‿


  369. A Poor Libertarian

    You know, as a consistent libertarian, I have mostly considered conservatives as “bad/evil/stupid” ( you get the idea) and “modern liberals” as more “nice and well-meaning , but misguided/too trusting in power,etc.”

    I honestly don’t know what to say about this. Some of the comments sound like liberals talking about themselves, like the whole ” a libertarian is someone who has never lived in the real world, rich,etc.”

    Maybe you just miss the point about actually having beliefs and sticking by them regardless of circumstance. I am poor. I am in my late 20s. I don’t play any computer games. I have a family, and my number one priority is taking care of them. I don’t hold philosophical beliefs because I hope to personally benefit from them or attain power for myself. I have values and beliefs and stick by them. I have never been rich, I grew up in a poor multi-racial family ( and most of my childhood racist abusers were “liberals” but that’s another issue).

    So-called liberals for some reason think libertarians aren’t compassionate for some BS reason. I guess just because we don’t believe in a massive welfare state. I’d like to think we just support policies of freedom that don’t HARM people when liberal/socialists tend to support things that most harm poor people in “The Real World”.

    Who are the first ones on the case when people are murdered or abused by the police or the state? Not “liberals”. Libertarians.. “Liberals” apparently, JUST LIKE “conservative” Republicans think that those in power are always right.

    Libertarians are always the ones outraged when there is police brutality, a minority abused by the government, a Cory Maye, an UNJUST War. Who speaks out against the Iraq War, the War on Drugs,etc? libertarians, again.

    That’s right, Libertarians. Who seems to care more about poor people, minorities,etc- easily Libertarians. Where are the “Liberals” in the fight against unjust war, eroding civil liberties,etc?

    Socialist-Libertarians? Ha, the face of modern Liberals is more like socialist-republicans except for a slightly more socialist economic view. Support civil rights abuses? check. Big Government with special favors for the powerful? Check.

    If Liberals really were Liberal ( you know like libertarians who actually are social AND economic liberals), instead of attacking the ONLY people who are actually standing up for civil liberties and individual freedom, you would JOIN us Libertarians in the fight for civil liberties. But apparently you’d rather be socialist-Republicans and bow-down to power and worship rich, powerful white people under the guise of really caring about poor people, workers, minorities,etc.


  370. Your arguments bring shame to me for you - maybe rather than make wild claims about what Libertarians believe you should listen to what we really have to say. I wrote a very long rebuttal but have the feeling it would be wasted. I encourage anyone interested to discover the truth about the Libertarian party and the views of it’s members (Google is a good place to start and will provide far more literate critiques than this slander


  371. wayne

    Full disclosure: I am a small L libertarian.

    Many interesting points have been raised here. I can’t possibly respond to them all, but some deserve comment. Before I comment though, let me agree with most of you here that Libertarians certainly have their share of kooks. I have not done a statistical evaluation of Libs versus Dems versus Reps, but my impression is that Libs are no kookier than the others.

    1. “Property rights don’t exist absent a society”. Tell that to the pit bull next door who seems quite convinced that he “owns” the yard he lives in.

    2. “Taxation on income and property is not done by coercion”. They have a place for those who opt out; It is called Federal Prison.


  372. impeckish

    Regarding the issue of whether the Native Americans had property rights before the Anglos arrived: Yes they did but it’s important to remember that every socio-economic tradition arranges property rights in different ways. The Indians who were hunter gatherers had territorial property rights. Come on to their hunting grounds without some sort of permission and hunt there and you’d better be prepared to pay the consequences. Tribal wars often started for this reason. Additionally they marked their arrows to see who was the one who brought down the prey. The successful hunter was given the first and largest cut.

    Regarding OMFG who favors that commenters be censored who disagree with him or her I think that says it all about his or her sense of ethics and fair play.


  373. Wow, you managed to leave out Smith, Ricardo, Mill….you know, the founders of classical liberalism. Way to go.


  374. As has been proved above, one good way of shutting up a libertarians mouth is to ask them to explain what makes property a “right”. It is just a social contract, very much like taxes are. Just as well there are people who do not believe in property (communists), what makes them more wrong than anyone who thinks property is more than just a contract? Both are (silly) belief systems.

    The most common argument given is the one about land ownership: if you cultivate and improve a piece of land it gives you the right to that land. This might have worked back in the days when the West was conquered (although Indians might have a say on that) but today a lot of land and property is just owned, not cultivated. What gives people the ownership to them? A social contract, nothing more. We have agreed that someone who buys a lot owns it regardless of what he does with it (within limits, of course).

    There was a case of a factory in Argentina, where the owners just basically disappeared and left the factory and workers because the factory wasn’t making any money. The workers took over the factory and eventually it started to make money again. Then the owners came back and stated the factory is theirs. Is it? They clearly abandoned it, although not in the same sense as you abandon an empty bottle by throwing it into a bin.

    But if that give priviledge to property it leads to rather interesting questions. If someone owns several apartments and keeps some of them empty can anyone move in and claim it theirs? If someone owns several vehicles but never uses some of them, can someone just take them? If not, why not? Again, we have just made a pact that it can’t be done, nothing more, nothing less. Just as we have made a pact that part of the money you get goes to this common pool used to provide different kinds of benefits and services to all of us.


  375. “Taxation on income and property is not done by coercion‿. They have a place for those who opt out; It is called Federal Prison.

    We have millions of illegal immigrants in the U.S. who work for cash and don’t file tax returns. The U.S. Government doesn’t seem interested in jailing these individuals for tax evasion, much less for violating immigration laws.


  376. […] How To Explain Things to Libertarians at Pandagon You, my friend, have just made the unpleasant discovery that you’ve been talking to a Libertarian. (tags: politics libertarian libertarianism funny) […]


  377. Grokked

    It’s true that the U.S. government does not go after everyone that doesn’t pay the right amount or that doesn’t file at all. This is because there are so many people in the system. It’s not because it’s a voluntary system. Sure, you can roll the dice and see what happens if you don’t pay. But the threat your home will be taken away, you will go to prison, or suffer some other punishment is always there.

    Personally, I’m not against some form of taxation but I think the argument for taxation, that it’s voluntary is obviously flawed.

    Coming back to the general theme. You know, some libertarians have sometimes stereotyped liberals as sanctimonious hypocrites who while they talk of compassion, generosity, helping the poor, etc. rarely do any of that themselves. They say they love humanity and then behave with complete intolerance, bigotry, and meanspiritedness towards anyone who does not totally conform to their worldview. I know it’s just a stereotype myself as I have very nice liberal friends. But the original poster and some of the earlier comments are in support of that stereotype.


  378. a libertarian

    my brain exploded. I never realized that corporations are powerful entities and that socialist thought inspired/ is inspired by libertarianism. Those facts are much more important to winning any idiological arguement, than you know… facts and logical reasoning.

    most of the ill done by corporations comes from involvement with the government, and abusing their powers to serve the corporation’s interests. And as to the fact that socialism is linked with libertarianism??? um who cares?


  379. Some libertarians took offense at my ideas on how to spot a libertarian. Let’s review:

    1. Screams bloody murder when government violates his rights with seat belt laws
    and mild gun restrictions. But is not too concerned when government kidnaps,
    detains, tortures and occasionally murders little brown people from overseas.

    I’m glad to hear that our visitors are fairly decent folks who don’t support torture and murder. OK, let’s try a search of ‘Guantanamo’ on the LP web site. Ok…yes there is one obscure blog posting on Guantamo and a few comments that objected to
    the suspension of habeus corpus.

    Contrast that with the reams of frothy articles on ending foreign aid, promoting gun rights, ending welfare, and cutting taxes, etc etc. I’m going to have to stand by my claim above. Libertarians obsess over government inconveniences that affect them while largely ignoring horrific abuses of state power that are perpetrated on other people

    2. Needs software to inventory his gun collection.

    Visitor Jonathan C. Hohensee enthusiastically confirmed the claim.

    3. Uses government funded ARPANET to discuss government incompetence.

    The libertarians were a bit confused by this and pointed out that they use the
    *Internet* not the ARPANET. You’re missing the point. There’s a little irony happening when you post a rant about wasteful government using a technology that was developed by government departments and government funded academics. If you don’t like this perhaps you should go back to using dial up BBS’s. I think I have one in the basement that you can have.

    4. Claims climate change is unproven. Because if it were proven, then a hell of
    a lot of government regulation would be coming down the pipe to mitigate. Cue
    the cognitive dissonance and conspiracy theories.

    Adam Selene confirmed this observation, and it’s an important characterization because it goes to credibility. Climate change denial places libertarians wayyy off on the lunatic fringe out past the creationists and just short of the Holocaust deniers.

    6. Mourned Augusto Pinochet’s indictment, house arrest, disgrace, and death. Because, you know while he did kill a few thousand people, he did make the
    economy hum along jolly good.

    Nobody at this site disagreed with the idea that Pinochet was a scumbag. Good stuff. That means you’re not facists. Ok let’s see what a prominent libertarian think tank, the Mises Institute has to say about Pinochet. Well it turns out the General was not such a bad chap after all:

    George Reisman Dec 15, 2006 (http://blog.mises.org/archives/006032.asp )

    “It may well be that some substantial number of innocent Chilean citizens did die or disappear or otherwise suffered brutal treatment as the result of his actions. But in a struggle to avoid the establishment of a Communist dictatorship, it is undoubtedly true that many or most of those who died or suffered were preparing to inflict a far greater number of deaths and a vastly larger scale of suffering on their fellow citizens.
    […
    Life and liberty are positively helped by the death and disappearance of such mortal enemies. Their absence from the scene means the absence of such things as concentration camps, and is thus ardently to be desired.”

    Are you paying attention, liberals? This quote is a keeper, because it means you are first up against the wall if the libertarians seize power. If you advocate public sector control of something (say control over resources, or a national health care system) you must be a socialist. And socialist is another word for communist. And nothing, NOTHING is off limits when dealing with a communist.


  380. Grokked

    To Tzs:
    I don’t get it. Are liberals For or Against banning tag on school grounds? Are liberals For or Against legalizing marijuana? Other drugs? Are liberals For or Against allowing gays to legally marry? For or Against intervention in Iraq? Kosovo? Afghanistan? The initiation of war on foreign soil in general? I could go on.


  381. Corporations are governments.

    Except, they are not. Let’s back up.

    Look at it this way: what would you call a political system that regulates its subjects activities on a minute-by-minute basis; that often requires of its citizens prior restraint on freedom of speech; that controls where its subjects go, what they wear, and who they talk to; that restricts online reading material in a Beijing-style manner; that has a rigid hierarchy to enforce edicts from the upper echelons and do routine surveillance of the rank and file; that denies its subjects privacy even to the point of demanding the right to examine their urine; and that punishes infractions by permanent banishment?

    If it allows those citizens to disassociate themselves at any time, and only “governs” them for a few hours a day, I wouldn’t call it a government, because it’s not one. The comparison is nonsensical, and only makes you look like a fool for trying to base your argument on it.

    Some people would call it a dictatorship. But many of us call it “the workplace.‿

    Or a public school.

    Somehow, Libertarians never seem to object to restrictions of Liberty done by The Boss. “You can always get another job,‿ they say, as if that answers anything

    Of course it does. Employment, in general and in particular, is voluntary. Being a subject of the government generally is not. Sure, I can leave the governed land I live in, assuming another one will let me in, but that’s a pretty big assumption, and then I will be subject to their rules too. There’s almost nowhere you can go and not be a subject of a government. But in a free country like the U.S., I can simply not work.

    And as corporations extend their control to people outside their employ

    Don’t do business with them.

    with DRM and increasingly prevalent

    Don’t use DRM.

    “Corporations are governments.‿

    No, they are not. At least, not in the sense that Libertarians mean when they talk about government. So you’re attacking them by changing their definition, making it broader than intended — so broad, in fact, that the word becomes literally meaningless (for by the same standard, I am my own government, and therefore I should not regulate myself!). This wordplay is ignorant or dishonest. Pick one. No need to tell me which, as I am not out to slam you. I am just pointing out that your statement is unreasonable.

    I’ve never known a Libertarian to be able to answer that one without changing the subject completely

    Well, I am no Libertarian, according to your definition of the term. I do believe in using taxes to fund essential government services. I even believe in using taxes to fund public schools, though I think they have far too much power and more than enough money (the problem with any schools I’ve ever seen is not “underpaid teachers,” and throwing money at the schools simply will not fix the real problems that do exist). So maybe your above sentence indicating lack of knowledge of a Libertarian to answer it without changing the subject still stands, for even though I did it, I am not a Libertarian.


  382. impeckish

    Nick,
    I believe Reason Magazine had a cover story on torture at Guantanamo bay. And they’ve run other articles about it, opposing it. Don’t think that libertarianism starts and stops with the LP. If I followed your tactic I would say, “Let’s look at what the official Republican or Democratic Party says about X on its website. You see, they don’t say that much, therefore, it’s not important to Republicans or Democrats.”

    As for climate change, I’m not a scientist so I demure to the official consensus. Stating one person as an example (and I don’t remember what he said about it - but judging by the standard of your other comments I’m guessing you’ve wildly misrepresented his opinion) does not prove a rule.

    As for Pinochet. Yes, scumbag. I disagree with Reisman that the ends justified the means; besides many of those were innocents. And a statist murderer is a statist murderer, regardless if he’s communist or fascist. However, it does raise a larger underlying question. Would there be any conditions or principles that you would consider worth fighting for? I’m assuming not all liberals are pure pacifists. If so, then the charge could be leveled against you as well. You’d put libertarians up against the wall to defend what you believe if the conditions developed into warfare.


  383. Wow, you managed to leave out Smith, Ricardo, Mill…

    Were you addressing Chris Clarke, Mr. Worstall, or many of the ostensibly libertarian commenters? Because very few of them seem particularly familiar with Ricardo.

    And Nick, there are indeed principled libertarians who decry the trampling of civil liberties. Jim Henley and some of the Reason crew come to mind. The inscrutable Mona of Greenwald / Inactivist / Henley fame would also fit the bill, had she not voted for Bush again in 2004, fully knowing what he had been doing to the Constitution.

    Now for those who dump on Nick, beware the “No True Scotsman” fallacy. Glenn Reynolds identifies as a libertarian, and has a somewhat higher profile at the moment than Lew Rockwell. Virtually every self-identified libertarian elected to major public office, from Butch Otter to Ron Paul, believes that states should have the right to control an individual’s reproductive decisions. So some of us get skeptical about libertarian thought, especially when one dismisses criticisms as not applicable to a particular flavor of libertarianism.


  384. impeckish

    On property rights: personally, I hold that property rights work as a utilitarian construct, not as some absolute principle.


  385. “Proves the point very nicely, actually. When the guy with the bigger gun comes along, it goes to him - and screw any claim to inherent “property rights‿ by the previous holder.”

    which is an argument for contractual enforcement, which nearly everyone - at least that i can tell - thinks is a legitimate governmental duty, including libertarians. it’s also a general complaint against government abuses, since their monopoly on force can be misused in several ways.

    to say that property ceases to exist as a legal distinction in the case of civil breakdown is obviously true. but to say it doesn’t exist absent society as an actual fact is sort of missing the point in my eyes - property can be land, a vehicle, or the shoes on your feet. [insert the usual “without private property there is no private life” etc etc and so forth.]

    i find the overt hostility towards the concept of libertarianism, ad hominems and all, fairly interesting. generally speaking it rotates along two seemingly opposed concepts - that libertarianism marginal and therefore not actually effective, but that it is also dangerous or at the very least distasteful.


  386. I want to address another misconception floating around here, that is, that libertarians don’t ‘believe’ in society. I certainly do. It is a very obvious artifact of a collection of people; history is replete with examples. Society is necessary for a functioning libertarian ideal. Without a strong justice system things would quickly fall apart. Libertarians are not anarchists. The absolute deference for the powerful makes the argument that the United States was mostly libertarian in the 19th century ridiculous. Organizing labor in those days could be lethal. Supporting special rights for large business isn’t a hallmark of libertarians. Mary Landrieu pleading pleading for increased tax benefits for Big Oil in her state comes to mind. Society is a tool, it isn’t an entity. it doesn’t have needs or desires, it can’t owe or be owed a debt. This is likely where we differ.


  387. Libertarian

    Yep, them crazy libertarians sure are nuts. They’re so fanatical that some of their comments to articles can run as high as 386 posts! Oh, wait, nevermind………


  388. tzs

    Well, there seem to be self-professed libertarians (see near top of the thread) who claim that “society doesn’t exist,” so I’ll take your statement that they don’t with a grain of salt.

    The “hostility” people see here against Libertarianism is because, frankly, a lot of you people come off as wild-eyed lunatics who don’t have the foggiest experience of how economies work or humans interact with each other. Particularly if we’ve ALREADY pointed to bits in history where yes-we-tried-that-Libertarian-idea-already and it all went pear-shaped. I’ve noted that the standard excuse has been “well, that’s not Libertarianism”, as the poster above says about the 19th century US. Sounds suspiciously like the die-hard Marxists who, when pressed on the historical record, say “well, what the Soviets did wasn’t True Marxism.”

    And if there has NEVER been a Libertarian society in existence, don’t you think that mightn’t say something about whether one can actually exist in reality, without quickly slipping towards revolution and/or anarchy?


  389. Jonathan C. Hohensee

    I’m glad to hear that our visitors are fairly decent folks who don’t support torture and murder. OK, let’s try a search of ‘Guantanamo’ on the LP web site. Ok…yes there is one obscure blog posting on Guantamo and a few comments that objected to
    the suspension of habeus corpus.

    Contrast that with the reams of frothy articles on ending foreign aid, promoting gun rights, ending welfare, and cutting taxes, etc etc. I’m going to have to stand by my claim above. Libertarians obsess over government inconveniences that affect them while largely ignoring horrific abuses of state power that are perpetrated on other people

    Lew Rockwell, Reason, and others have been very local about ending gitmo, the PATRIOT ACT and the other eroding of our freedoms and…oh! What would you know, they also have been vocal about advocating things you don’t agree with.

    2. Needs software to inventory his gun collection.
    Visitor Jonathan C. Hohensee enthusiastically confirmed the claim.

    Actually, I don’t own a gun and last fired one when I was in boyscouts. I still fail to see how owning a gun (or having a collection of them) alone can be a bad thing.

    Nobody at this site disagreed with the idea that Pinochet was a scumbag. Good stuff. That means you’re not facists. Ok let’s see what a prominent libertarian think tank, the Mises Institute has to say about Pinochet. Well it turns out the General was not such a bad chap after all:

    George Reisman Dec 15, 2006 (http://blog.mises.org/archives/006032.asp )

    “It may well be that some substantial number of innocent Chilean citizens did die or disappear or otherwise suffered brutal treatment as the result of his actions. But in a struggle to avoid the establishment of a Communist dictatorship, it is undoubtedly true that many or most of those who died or suffered were preparing to inflict a far greater number of deaths and a vastly larger scale of suffering on their fellow citizens.
    […
    Life and liberty are positively helped by the death and disappearance of such mortal enemies. Their absence from the scene means the absence of such things as concentration camps, and is thus ardently to be desired.‿

    Are you paying attention, liberals? This quote is a keeper, because it means you are first up against the wall if the libertarians seize power. If you advocate public sector control of something (say control over resources, or a national health care system) you must be a socialist. And socialist is another word for communist. And nothing, NOTHING is off limits when dealing with a communist.
    Hey, a strawman argument! What are the odds that we would see one of those here? Why don’t you take a step further and say Pinochet is the ideal liberterian? Then I’ll respond by saying that all liberals think Castro and Che and two OK guys.


  390. TZS:

    I’ve noted that the standard excuse has been “well, that’s not Libertarianism‿, as the poster above says about the 19th century US.

    Let’s try this one more time.

    - Antebellum USA is closer to the ideals of classical liberalism (which is a major historical input for modern libertarianism, see Hayek, Friedman, Rothbard, et al for details) than any other time period in US history. And, in fact, during this time period significant amounts of wealth are generated, most people get wealthier, the US overall stays out of entangling issues, doesn’t spend a whole lot of time making war, etc. A couple of major drawbacks, though, which makes this not a time period you can say “tried libertarianism”. First, we have slavery, very anti-libertarian. Second, we have Manifest Destiny, also very anti-libertarian.

    - Post Civil War USA is far from the ideals of classical liberalism. We have a Reconstruction Era government that is oppressive towards a major portion of the population. Corrupt politicians and bureaucrats make sure their buddies get lots of money, favor and privileges (e.g. the Transcontinental Railroad, US Steel). The police power of the government is used to support corporations and bust the heads of union organizers, socialists and anarchists. Yep, pretty anti-libertarian.

    So, starting with this brief recap of 1800 to 1900, it’s fairly clear, IF you know anything about libertarianism, classical liberalism and US history that we did NOT try libertarianism in the 19th century. Perhaps you should spend some time finding out what libertarians actually advocate instead of listening to your internal groupthink myths. You should probably also spend some time discovering what capitalism, classical liberalism and laissez-faire economics really is, then compare it to the actuality of the US economy and politics. Then report back on whether we “tried libertarianism”.

    To your secondary, and fairly silly point, we have tried libertarian ideas. I can point you to three of them. The Hanseatic League. Medieval Iceland. The USA from 1774 to 1830, give or take (and with the glaring exceptions noted above). Do some research. Find out if those things worked well, or not. Find out if people lived well, had liberty, made money. Find out if those societies had more equality of opportunity and better outcomes than those around them.

    I wonder if you’ll actually go find out, or if you will simply continue your derisive dismissals.


  391. Greg Newburn

    I’m up for funny libertarian critiques as much as the next guy, and I don’t really like talking to people who think traffic lights ought to be privatized, but this “polemic” is just really, really bad.

    I didn’t read through any of the comments, so maybe these points have already been addressed, but:

    1) Libertarians don’t use “property is theft” as a motto, “sekrit” or otherwise. Many of the more radical libertarians have used “taxation is theft” to vividly describe the relationship between the individual and the state, and many libertarians have cited Proudhon for other points, but nobody I’ve known in the libertarian world has ever thought “property is theft.” So you’re not really springing on us anything we didn’t already know. It’s possible to take to heart some parts of what a thinker said without taking the whole. Hell, libertarians don’t even think everything Adam Smith said was right.

    2) Libertarian history stretches much, much further back than Proudhon. For instance Murray Rothbard argued that Lao-Tzu, the founder of Taoism, was the first libertarian. See “The Libertarian Reader,” by Cato’s David Boaz, which includes Lao-Tzu’s description of “spontaneous order,” the cornerstone of libertarian political theory.

    3) Ludwig von Mises was not in any sense a member of the “individualist anarchist” school of thought. He was just your basic, simple “classical liberal” who saw a clear and well-defined role for government. Rothbard, of course, was an anarchist, but Mises was not.

    4) As long as we’re just handing out literature and assuming that to amount to argument, check out Brian Doherty’s vicious review of “Cyberselfish” over at the Reason site:

    http://www.reason.com/news/show/27773.html

    Doherty knows as much about libertarianism as anyone; his recently published book “Radicals for Capitalism” is a great resource for anyone who wants to learn about libertarian theory and history without relying on straw-man arguments and poorly researched “polemics.”

    I’m tired, and I don’t feel like dealing with the rest. You’re spot on about the political quizzes and the anarchists, but come on. Do yourself a favor and do a little–even a little–research before writing something like this next time.


  392. “And if there has NEVER been a Libertarian society in existence, don’t you think that mightn’t say something about whether one can actually exist in reality, without quickly slipping towards revolution and/or anarchy?”

    there’s also never been a truly egalitarian society, yet many people find that a goal worth striving for. why? because we’re talking about tendencies and trends, rather than absolutism.

    for me, personally, it’s a matter of degrees, since political absolutism is impossible without some kind of mass murder-y behavior (cambodia, etc). the world is going increasingly statist in many ways - patriot act and its clinton era precursors being the tip of the iceberg, unfortunately; the uk seems to be where the most ground is being broken for the time being in a formerly “free” society - so some measure of counterbalance is necessary, or at least desireable. frankly, i’m more of a single issue kinda guy anyway - ending the war on some drugs and its detrimental effects in foreign policy, narcoterrorism, the massive toll it takes on minority communities (almost entirely due to utterly unbalanced sentencing), further militarizing the police, the general shit-ness of black markets, etc. i find several useful toolkits for arguing for this position in libertarianism that help me address several audiences - focusing either from a straight self-ownership position, or the detrimental effect on minorities due to the creation of black markets via government action, or from a position of states rights, or from the angle for medical marijuana and not letting the state interfere with doctor/patient practices, etc.

    i’m not particularly doctrinaire on all counts, because i see it as a kind of political taoism, at least in one sense; swings too far in one direction breed a natural resistance which must be encouraged by some, at least in small ways.

    the hostility thing is something else entirely. one can disagree of course without turning directly to insults for ammunition. for example, i think it is hard to argue that government collusion with industry oligarchs during the supposedly laisse faire parts of our nation’s history didn’t actually exist and wasn’t obviously a deeply unfree market, and you can disagree. but our disagreement doesn’t make you a nanny-statist commie looter anymore than it makes me a selfish poor-hating retarded sonofabitch.

    i realize this is directly opposite to how human discourse works, by and large, but i’m a big fan of aiming for the top rung, as it were.

    even on the internet.


  393. Fritz

    Nick…

    As others (impeckish) have pointed out, there are a lot more interesting libertarian blogs than the LP one. I would recommend you check out the Reason magazine blog Hit & Run, which has a thread referencing this thread. Actually, I urge you to go join that thread. And you probably should not read too much into the applause that a free-market economic institute gave to Pinochet.

    My major concern witn the whole global warming debate is that I fear it will be used to set up a blackmail money stream to poorer nations (already China gets serious carbon-trading money even as it expands coal burning) and to have government regulation of all significant industrial activity. If we really want in the short term (like 40 years) to get off of most oil/coal/gas use then we had best start cranking out some fast-breeder reactors.

    As far as guns go… can’t liberals just leave it alone? The only reason Demorats took the Senate in 2006 (and considering Joe Lieberman and Tim Johnson that control is still somewhat in play) is that some pro-gun-owner Democrats won. If the Dems crank up the “ban the ungly rifles” (and, in the spirit of full disclosure, I legally own and enjoy shooting a number of those ugly rifles) campaign again, 2008 could be another 1994. I’ve noticed (I listen to a lot of National Parents Radio) the drumbeat starting. Which is sad. And intensely stupid.

    A lot has been made over the fact that the Internet derives from ARPANet, which was built by the government. Apparently that means the government should run healthcare or something. Of course, ARPANet was actually made by the Department of War… er, Defense. So does that mean the Pentagon should get all of the money it wants? I’m really not sure what public policies one should derive from that history.

    In a purely libertarian society whould crack in vending machines be legal? Sure. Of course, most businesses that provided such products would be boycotted to oblivion. And while I’m not too keen on the prospect of crack in vending machines, it is not clear to me that the personal destruction wrought by that condition would be more extensive than that wrought by our current drug laws.


  394. Nick:

    4. Claims climate change is unproven. Because if it were proven, then a hell of
    a lot of government regulation would be coming down the pipe to mitigate. Cue
    the cognitive dissonance and conspiracy theories.

    Adam Selene confirmed this observation, and it’s an important characterization because it goes to credibility. Climate change denial places libertarians wayyy off on the lunatic fringe out past the creationists and just short of the Holocaust deniers.

    Do you read for comprehension?

    Comparing me to a Holocaust denier is a way of trying to prevent free speech. A fascist in our midst, gasp!

    Oh yeah, I’d like to know why Amy Alkon’s comment has never been approved for posting? Wonder what I’m talking about? See this post. Maybe somebody should get off their moral hobby horse.


  395. All the posts I’ve seen in moderation for this thread have been approved.


  396. Tim Worstall:

    Wow, you managed to leave out Smith, Ricardo, Mill….you know, the founders of classical liberalism. Way to go.

    Not to mention de Tocqueville, Hutcheson, Hume, Lord Acton, Hayek, Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Thomas Paine, and so many others its fairly pointless to list them all. As one commenter above points out, there is a tie to Lao-Tzu as well.

    Shrugs, stereotypes and lack of real knowledge. If you were actually, you know, “liberal”, you might approach libertarians with the goal of understanding instead.


  397. Chris Clarke:

    All the posts I’ve seen in moderation for this thread have been approved.

    Explain Amy’s screen shots then. Perhaps, while you’re at it, you will answer her questions about the Kliban cartoon.


  398. Rimfax

    OK. How about some common ground? I, as a Libertarian, believe:

    - drug prohibition is immoral and destructive; restrictions on minors and private prohibition aside

    - legal restrictions on the right to engage in a consensual private contract, such as a gay marriage, are immoral and destructive; restrictions on minors and private restrictions aside

    - corporate welfare and government funded favoritism of corporate interests is immoral and destructive; government enforced monopolies and protectionism aside

    - legal bars on participation in the armed services that have nothing to do with personal capabilities are immoral and destructive; the disabled and the ethics of military actions aside

    - support of the needy is ethical and productive; government welfare and taxation aside

    - caring for the environment is ethical and productive; the EPA and Kyoto Protocol aside

    - racial disparities in various organizations and in prisons are a profound concern; affirmative action and restrictive clubs aside

    - police power is a dangerous benefit that must be evenly applied and have transparent rules and vigorous private sector and court oversight

    - parents must have ample leeway in how they raise their children, but that does not include the leeway to neglect or abuse them; legal definitions of neglect and abuse aside

    - government sponsorship or patronage or endorsement of a particular religion or arbitrary philosophy is unethical and destructive and divisive; private expressions by government employees or permissiveness of expressions on government property aside

    - government secrecy is a dangerous privilege that must be subject to ample court scrutiny and private challenge

    Leaving the asides for now, can we at least agree on some common goals? Yes, I know that the asides hold some pretty profound differences, but can we at least agree that our hearts (some of us at least) are in the right place?


  399. Rimfax

    Adam Selene,

    I think that the post dropping is an automation problem. I read about a thousand comments back where a clearly liberal commenter was having the same problem.


  400. Rimfax, seems suspicious that it was a post that suggested theft of intellectual property by Chris Clarke, don’t you think?


  401. K-Man

    ” You’ll be talking to someone, online or in person, who seems completely normal. Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the person will say something really weird, like ‘You can’t fix a problem like underpaid public school teachers by just throwing money at them!’ or ‘Why do they need tax-funded traffic lights at this corner? ‘ ”

    Sounds like selective insanity, or insanity beneath a thin imitation of sanity; like someone in an insane asylum, whom you can talk with and wonder why he’s institutionalized, because he seems so rational and together, and suddenly he says, “I saw you peeking through my keyhole last night!”

    If someone asks me for a definition of a libertarian,
    my reply is “a right-wing, atheistic authoritarian, dominance-submission driven, and probably a repressed sadist.”


  402. Rimfax:

    Leaving the asides for now, can we at least agree on some common goals? Yes, I know that the asides hold some pretty profound differences, but can we at least agree that our hearts (some of us at least) are in the right place?

    This goes back to a point I made early on. I work for a not for profit that provides services, including healthcare, education, long term care, hospice and end of life care to the poor and vulnerable. Our Director of Ethics and I tackled the topic that my beliefs on how society best cares for the poor and vulnerable is different from his. We agreed that we both hold similar ethical values, but believe there are different solutions to implementing our ethical values. His position is that there are multiple solutions, and that reasonable people can disagree while continuing to strive towards their common goal.

    This way of thinking is not one you will find exemplified by the folks here at Pandagon.


  403. Explain Amy’s screen shots then.

    I’d have to see them to explain them, and — having read her column — I have no interest in visiting her blog. In any event, what I’ve told you is the truth. I haven’t nuked any comments here. Believe me or don’t believe me.

    Perhaps, while you’re at it, you will answer her questions about the Kliban cartoon.

    Haven’t seen the questions. See above. But I did see mention of them on the Reason blog, and if that one sentence summary was accurate then I assume they have something to do with IP issues involved in reproducing a low-res copy of a piece widely available on the net in a use that generates no income, said work being credited to the artist, who is dead.

    If so, has Ms. Alkon issued screeds against people blogging YouTube videos? Or does her righteous outrage extend only to people who openly disagree with her politics?

    And did she ever reimburse Dan Savage for ripping off, and watering down, his schtick?


  404. Chris, do you habitually avoid a question by attacking other people?


  405. If someone asks me for a definition of a libertarian, my reply is “a right-wing, atheistic authoritarian, dominance-submission driven, and probably a repressed sadist.‿

    Woohoo, I finally know what I am.


  406. Christian

    “Libertarian philosophy owes far more to John Locke, John Stuart Mill, or Adam Smith than it does to Pierre-Joseph Proudhon.”

    I love when libertarians try to claim Mill, Locke, or (the most laughable) Adam Smith.
    If you read (An Inquiry Into The Nature And Causes Of) The Wealth Of Nations, you’ll quickly realize that it is a refutation of Mercantilism. Smith warns in his treatise of the need to regulate and tax business as a means of keeping them from becoming mercantilist of a non government variety. Wealth Of Nations, like Democracy In America and Sun Tzu, a book that everyone loves to quote, but never reads.

    BTW, SilverFox, you may remember me from my original handle, Hardigan.


  407. Mirabeau

    This thread is devoid of reason and completely filled with strawmen. There are countless defamations of Ayn Rand, but nary a reference to Milton Friedman - the author you would read if you actually had any desire in understanding libertarianism.


  408. No, Adam, I habitually answer questions asked by people who seem to have trouble understanding that the question has in fact been answered. Sometimes I do so by way of rhetorical questions, which often throws those who operate on the assumption that answers always end with periods. Or exclamation marks!

    The attacking other people is just a minor vice. Lagniappe, after a fashion.


  409. If you read (An Inquiry Into The Nature And Causes Of) The Wealth Of Nations, you’ll quickly realize that it is a refutation of Mercantilism.

    Libertarians oppose mercantilism, and it’s modern descendant, corporatism. So, what’s your point?


  410. Ah, but you didn’t answer the question. Is that Kliban piece available for use by this publication, or not?


  411. For that matter, Chris, have you gotten any clues that your beliefs about libertarians might just be a wee bit off the mark?


  412. K-Man

    K-Man wrote: If someone asks me for a definition of a libertarian, my reply is “a right-wing, atheistic authoritarian, dominance-submission driven, and probably a repressed sadist.‿

    Adam Selene wrote: “Woohoo, I finally know what I am.”

    You needed me to tell you that, “Adam”?

    You’re right: it’s not who you are, it’s what you are. Sociopaths love being sociopaths.

    Adame Selene wrote: “Our Director of Ethics and I tackled the topic that my beliefs on how society best cares for the poor and vulnerable is different from his. We agreed that we both hold similar ethical values, but believe there are different solutions to implementing our ethical values. His position is that there are multiple solutions, and that reasonable people can disagree while continuing to strive towards their common goal.”

    How “reasonable” are you really, Adam? And what the hell are you trying to communicate in that paragraph?


  413. mds

    So, Mr. Selene, you spewed out an impressive-looking follow-up to Mr. Worstall’s list. So, have you ever read Ricardo? For that matter, given your appropriation of Thomas Paine to your cause of “royal” libertarianism, what did you think of Agrarian Justice?

    And are you really curious why Chris responded angrily to the question, “Chris, why are you a liar who censors people?” Come now. None of us fell off the turnip truck yesterday.


  414. I did answer the question, Adam; you just didn’t understand my answer. Now I could sit here and explain my answer until you got it, but that would be involuntary servitude.

    And this thread has in fact confirmed my beliefs about Libertarians, which many commenters here seemed to miss were expressed rather clearly in the first few paragraphs of this post, to wit: Much of libertarian philosophy makes sense.
    Most libertarians are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot libertarians who are both clueless and annoying.

    I’m going now to that little-known place dimly rmembered by those zealots known as “outdoors.” You folks behave yourselves in here.


  415. Jonathan Hohensee

    “For that matter, Chris, have you gotten any clues that your beliefs about libertarians might just be a wee bit off the mark? “

    I’m not a mind reader, but I doubt it, considering any backlash he might had got from liberterians are covered in his ass-saving/patronizing qualifier;

    Now most new Libertarians eventually, after repeated contact with reality, temper their beliefs. This article is not about them, the people who concede that some taxes are necessary to pay firefighters, who recognize that their success as business people might just depend on public education to give them a pool of potentially competent employees, and so forth.


  416. Christian

    Man this reminds of the old days(circa 1996) arguing with libertarians(small or large) at the Time Warner Pathfinder. Not much has changed since then.

    What is it about this philosophy that leads to so many TL;DR posts?


  417. Jonathan Hohensee

    I think it is an inherent part of philosophy to make things tl:dr


  418. Riggald

    Grilltacular says:
    The arrogance comes from knowledge of objective truths. Scientific types feel superior because they can only claim things they know to be true, instead of things they feel to be true or want to be true. Can’t say they same for the “subjective‿ areas of study.
    ———–
    Carl Rennie says:
    It sounds nice, and yes, this is how people justify it, but it’s bullshit. The “facts‿ of hard science are outgrowths of symbols and the rules used to manipulate them. The application of these “facts‿ to observed phenomena is necessarily limited by the ability to observe and the framework in which these observations are interpretted.
    ———–
    Eppur si muove, Carl.


  419. While we participate in and are part of society, each one of us is a unique individual.

    I’m not.

    1. “Property rights don’t exist absent a society‿. Tell that to the pit bull next door who seems quite convinced that he “owns‿ the yard he lives in.

    Gee, I wasn’t aware a pit bull could own anything. Did he turf the human owner out? Take him to court? Claim the yard under squatting laws? Help us out here - what property rights do pit bulls have in the Libertarian Utopia?

    “Proves the point very nicely, actually. When the guy with the bigger gun comes along, it goes to him - and screw any claim to inherent “property rights‿ by the previous holder.‿

    which is an argument for contractual enforcement, which nearly everyone - at least that i can tell - thinks is a legitimate governmental duty, including libertarians.

    Oops - the claim is that property rights exist prior to a society, and government. But how can that be if they need both a “contract” and an enforcement agent before they can meaningfully asserted?

    Try again - prove property rights exist without society.

    Let’s try this one more time.

    Yes, let’s - Somalia.

    The Hanseatic League. Medieval Iceland. The USA from 1774 to 1830, give or take (and with the glaring exceptions noted above).

    None of which were libertarian.

    I love when libertarians try to claim Mill, Locke, or (the most laughable) Adam Smith.

    Especially when they forget The Theory of Moral Sentiments.


  420. From the referenced article:
    “In 1996, he (Alexander) was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse and burglary in the beating of his 75-year-old neighbor, Clifford Berg. The charges were later dropped when Berg accepted an out-of-court settlement.”

    Four years later, he shoots three people dead.

    I think that kinda sums up what’s wrong with Libertarianism: Alexander beats his neighbour, he pays the neighbour off, end of story. The beef’s between Alexander and his neighbour, nothing to do with the community. Except that he’s a psycho, and four years later, instead of being in an institution, he offends again. Fatally.


  421. “Oops - the claim is that property rights exist prior to a society, and government. But how can that be if they need both a “contract‿ and an enforcement agent before they can meaningfully asserted?

    Try again - prove property rights exist without society.”

    i’m going to rip off papa pierre and break things down like this:

    property [1] - the legal status afforded belongings.

    property [2] - human ownership of something. [shoes, or sadly, people, etc] a belonging.

    i think there’s some confusion here between these two things; many of us think - if i may generalize - that the pursuit of property is a human trait. perhaps it is some kind of natural law hangover, i know not. [1] falls under the umbrella of [2], which stretches back to the most root form of property - ownership of oneself. that human history has largely been dominated by an utterly lack of personal sovereignty is something i’m sure all of us are acutely aware of. the argument today, at least in the west, is over what kinds of sovereignty different people deserve.

    to put it another way, even someone lost in the woods still exercises dominion over their shoes. and while having to defend oneself is indeed an ugly state, it is uglier still to have no shoes. hence one of the useful things about a reasonable legal culture.

    but to say people wouldn’t still craft, collect and contain their property [2] - as well as desire the control of the property of their being [3?] - absent a legal culture to enforce them as [1] seems shortsighted to me.

    “You’re right: it’s not who you are, it’s what you are. Sociopaths love being sociopaths.”

    pathologizing the beliefs of others is great fun, no doubt; who among us doesn’t feel vindicated when a gay-hating bigot like ted haggard turns out to have spent his free time crankin’ and yankin’ all over the love that dare not speak its name in church?

    at the same time it’s certainly ugly when turned against oneself; i.e. are liberals cowards, thieves or both? it’s a bullshit move. (that last one is a favorite of the rightwingnews folk, who are - if nothing else - a colorful group. some of the commentors’ favorite description of libertarians were as dope fiends who only wanted to end the war on drugs so they could buy them more cheaply and drug/rape children.)


  422. “I think that kinda sums up what’s wrong with Libertarianism: Alexander beats his neighbour, he pays the neighbour off, end of story. The beef’s between Alexander and his neighbour, nothing to do with the community. Except that he’s a psycho, and four years later, instead of being in an institution, he offends again. Fatally.”

    so the problem with libertarianism is a lack of psychic powers?


  423. i think there’s some confusion here between these two things; many of us think - if i may generalize - that the pursuit of property is a human trait. perhaps it is some kind of natural law hangover, i know not. [1] falls under the umbrella of [2], which stretches back to the most root form of property - ownership of oneself.

    Alas and alack, there are two teeny tiny minor problems with basing a supposed inherent right to property on these:

    i, For most of history, people have not (fully) owned themselves (as you noted). Which means that this supposed inherent right of property not only needs a society, but needed Western society to develop to a level which extolled individual autonomy.

    ii, Even if we accept that premise your property is not you.

    to put it another way, even someone lost in the woods still exercises dominion over their shoes.

    Really? And if a larger, meaner hiker comes along, beats them up and takes those shoes where exactly is their dominion? Is it hovering around the shoes like a little cloud? Is it, perhaps, personified in a little stickman that runs after the bigger hiker squeaking “not yours! not yours!”. Temporary possession or “exercising dominion” is NOT a property right.

    And let’s go past shoes - how exactly do you “own” land, absent a society that says you do? How exactly do you “own” intellectual property, absent a society that says you do?

    Nope, still not convincing. Please elucidate further.


  424. Tanya

    Posted by Makis:

    “[Property ownership] is just a social contract, very much like taxes are.”

    Heh?

    Property is purchased, inherited or given. The transfer of property from one person to the next - the social contract - involves voluntary participation.

    Explain how that is ‘very much like taxes’.

    Please and thank you.


  425. Fritz

    Rich…

    I don’t think your example of a violent nutter who paid off a neighbor to deal with an assault complaint and the later killed three people is an indictment of libertarianism. Unless you wish to support a societal policy of involuntary psychiatric commitment for assault, then that kind of occurance will happen. And if you support such a policy, you have to contend with the expense and the other lives you will be destroying.


  426. LJM

    Much of libertarian philosophy makes sense.
    Most libertarians are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot libertarians who are both clueless and annoying.

    Couldn’t you replace “libertarian(s)” with “liberal(s)” and have it be exactly as true? Same with “Christian(s)?” I’m trying to think what else qualifies. “Wiccan(s).” “Athiest(s).” Maybe even “socialist(s).”


  427. “ii, Even if we accept that premise your property is not you.”

    this would be where we disagree. the sovereignty of the individual is the root justification. (i see a similar track for issues of sexual freedom, something which is also a recent phenomenon in the west.)

    as you note, it is only in the west where this concept actually (and sadly for a very short time, relatively) began to expand to include more members of the population. (as an aside, this is an interesting way to analyze the issue of abortion, in that one group wants to expand this circle of “being” - a la singer - a bit farther than the other.)

    “And if a larger, meaner hiker comes along, beats them up and takes those shoes where exactly is their dominion?”

    the creation of weapons was, at least in part, a reaction to this obvious and painful truth of existence. we would agree that people have the right not to be murdered; a similar case to one you outline above would not indicate that the right to life is some kind of temporary thing.

    do these things exist metaphysically? no, i don’t think so. i’m not one for natural rights myself - i.e. if there is no universal moral authority, etc etc and so forth - but i am a big fan of societies which treat human rights as a real and unending moral truth. i realize this wings into “noble lie” territory, but i don’t see much of an alternative. i’m not a big fan of tribalism, and for the most part neither are most people (i.e. loathesome restrictions on personal sexuality on the basis they’re bad for society or “the family” and other conservative calls to collectivism) at least when their personal oxes are being gored.


  428. impeckish

    I think the Theory of Moral Sentiments confirms my libertarian leaning way of thinking. It doesn’t reject it. An idea that underpins libertarianism is voluntary cooperation based on mutual sympathies or corresponding interests. “The dog eat dog” view of libertarianism as presented by the Christian right or the secular left is a myth, or at least letting one extreme part of a movement define the whole. Try reading some Hayek in addition to Smith to get another view.

    Or as Friedman would say, the market is moral under these conditions. When two people exchange something they value less for something they value more, then both sides win. No coercion is involved and both sides leave happier than they were before.


  429. K-man

    If someone asks me for a definition of a libertarian, my reply is “a right-wing, atheistic authoritarian, dominance-submission driven, and probably a repressed sadist … You’re right: it’s not who you are, it’s what you are. Sociopaths love being sociopaths.

    I know it’s tempting to simplify things; us, them. But easy things usually aren’t very rewarding, you know, empty calories and all. I assure you I’m not a sociopath. I’m someone’s kid, a husband, a research scientist working on alternative energy delivery technology. I’m proud to be part of the effort to end US reliance on fossil fuels, and the war and environmental damage that goes along. My wife, also a libertarian, is a physician who spends many sleepless nights worrying and caring for her patients. I don’t know where your hostility comes from, probably you are expressing your frustration at feelings of inadequacy in your offline life, but I assure you libertarians are regular folks who just disagree with you. Now, if you would excuse me from the two minute hate, I’m going to go watch the Oscar’s with my wife while I work a puzzle from the National park series. And then we are going to eat the kids.


  430. .“ii, Even if we accept that premise, your property is not you.‿

    this would be where we disagree.

    Let me just check this carefully - you disagree with my assertion that your property is not you?

    the creation of weapons was, at least in part, a reaction to this obvious and painful truth of existence.

    Quite true, from the first ape to pick up a stick. However, that force, advantage gained by force, and property taken by force is the method trumping all other methods precludes any claimed inherent property right except that which can be invoked by membership within a society which claims an effective means of greater force than any individual can muster.

    It is NOT an inherent property right which prevents the strong from taking from the weak. It is a social mechanism allowing the weak to call on agents stronger than the strong that prevents such predation, and the major mechanism for mediating this within that social context is property rights. They exist because society says they exist, not prior to society.


  431. My favorite refutation of the “L”ibertarian is Adam Smith, who said, among other things, that absent gov’t oversight, the invisible hand would rest it’s thumb on the scales, and that whenver two businessmen were gathered together, they were figuring out a way to cheat the public.


  432. Jeff: As for libertarianism, I think it’s awfully telling what issues get treated as “social liberty‿ and what don’t. For most of the libertarians I’ve seen, the “social‿ side of libertarianism is guns and drugs - issues that directly affect the straight, white, middle-to-upper-class men that form the libertarians’ core demographic. Issues that don’t directly affect these guys get ignored or dismissed. (Hell, even Wendy McElroy has criticized libertarians for not being feminist enough.)

    I’ve never seen a libertarian party stance on abortion that’s genuinely pro-choice. They don’t want to alienate the guns-and-drugs conservatives, so if they don’t go all out and call abortion “initiation of force against the fetus‿ they’ll just say “well, the state shouldn’t pay for it.‿ Ask them about gay marriage and they’ll say “the government shouldn’t be involved in marriage at all.‿ Then you ask them what should happen when a homosexual person dies intestate leaving behind a widow/widower.

    Yeah. Back when Sasha Volokh was writing for “Reason” magazine we were driving somewhere, and that topic came up (what constitutes a social liberty).

    I’m in the Army, and I think the prohibition on homosexuals serving is nonsense, and said this struck me as something the Libertarians ought to agree with me on. He explained how it wasn’t something for gov’t to get involved with, that market forces would correct for such things

    But drugs were different, the state interfering in who could smoke what was somehow different from the state saying “so and so” isn’t fit to serve because of what they do for bedroom fun.

    I was already willing to put the Libs to the curb, that was just the final nail in a well-finished coffin.


  433. It’s true that the U.S. government does not go after everyone that doesn’t pay the right amount or that doesn’t file at all. This is because there are so many people in the system. It’s not because it’s a voluntary system. Sure, you can roll the dice and see what happens if you don’t pay. But the threat your home will be taken away, you will go to prison, or suffer some other punishment is always there.

    I would have thought that libertarians might want to study a lifestyle not only income tax-invisible, but also operating in plain sight and with apparent government complicity. The IRS shows no more inclination to crack down on this underground economy than the Border Patrol and the Immigration & Naturalization Service show any diligence in sealing the Mexican border and deporting non taxpaying illegals.


  434. Brian R. Miller

    As a Libertarian who chuckled heartily at this smear job (which reads a bit like a neoconservative treatise that argues that liberalism’s history is tied up with communism), I am reminded of an old Ghandi quote:

    “First they mock you, then they fight you — then, you win.” ;)

    On a more practical note, it’s rather rich for liberal Democrats to attack Libertarians for our positions on equality when our party called for marriage equality for gays on Valentine’s Day, while Democrats enshrined permanent inequality through DOMA.

    The rest of the commentary, as well as the article itself, reminds me that when the left calls for “diversity and tolerance for multiple points of view,” it’s a hollow bit of rhetoric and not a bona fide commitment to that philosophy.


  435. Brian R. Miller

    Ask them about gay marriage and they’ll say “the government shouldn’t be involved in marriage at all.‿

    This sort of mischaracterization is typical. Here’s the Libertarian Party press release on gay marriage from this month. Get back to me when you Democrats manage to get your national party to make a similar release, OK? :)

    http://www.lp.org/media/article_464.shtml

    Millions of Americans Denied Equal Rights on Valentine’s Day

    Some States Provide “Separate But Equal” Policies While Others Still Practice Absolute Discrimination
    (Washington, DC) Valentine’s Day is the traditional holiday where loved ones express their affection for each other through the giving of cards and gifts or the sharing of romantic dinners. It is also the most common day for Americans to become married. This Valentine’s Day is an appropriate time to reflect on the millions of Americans who are denied, by law, the same basic rights most people in this country enjoy.

    At the federal level and in most of our states, lifelong homosexual partners are not allowed the same property and contractual rights as their heterosexual counterparts. As gay couples in these states aren’t recognized as being married, it impacts their ability to obtain insurance, make health care decisions for each other in times of medical crisis, adopt children and inherit property.

    Massachusetts is the only state in the country to treat gay people the same as everyone else. Hawaii, California, Maine, Vermont, Connecticut, New Jersey and the District of Columbia provide “Separate But Equal” policies in the form of civil unions or domestic partnerships. Most states don’t honor same-sex marriages or civil unions granted in other states.

    “There is a cloud of sadness hanging over the heads of countless Americans this Valentine’s Day,” said Libertarian National Committee Chairman William Redpath. “It’s certainly more difficult to enjoy that bouquet of roses or box of chocolates from your partner when you realize that your government won’t accept your long-term relationship. Hopefully, Americans will use Freedom to Marry Week to reflect on equality in marriage issues. We’ve eliminated our racist marriage laws, but not those that discriminate based on sexual preference or identity. Perhaps some day the government will treat all people, black and white and gay and straight, exactly the same.”

    Libertarians call for real equality for gay marriage on Valentine’s Day — Howard Dean goes on the 700 Club to bash gay marriage; Hillary Clinton announces her strong support for DOMA; John Kerry calls his only gay-issues press conference to condemn gay marriage in Massachusetts.

    If liberal Democrats want to attack Libertarians on social issues, I assure you that our party won’t come out waving the white flag.


  436. tzs

    It’s also weird how actions and/or services somehow magically turn from Evil to Good when they are moved from being done By The Government to By The Private Sector. The inability of Libertarians to explain exactly why providing the same services somehow morally flipped depending on who did it always struck me as a glaring flaw. It sounded too much like “Women do Housework==Good; Man do Housework==Bad.”


  437. I’d like to thank Chris Clarke for finally proving heavier-than-air machines really can’t fly.


  438. Something occurred to me: in one very important respect, Libertarians and Marxists are the same.

    How? Well, both are good at critiquing the problem (that being the abuses of excessive state power and the abuses of unfettered capitalism, respectively), but do a terrible job of either diganosing the cause, or prescribing the cure.

    Also, both Libertarian and Marxist visions of society require that ordinary people behave with an extraordinary amount of wisdom and foresight, either requiring that humans dispense with selfishness altogether (Marxism) or that they only engage in enlightened self-interest (Libertarianism). Alas, people are often selfish for stupid reasons, even when the enlightened thing to do would serve their self-interest as well; witness corporations laying off masses of workers to bring up short-term stock prices, which puts people out of work and ultimately harms the economy by decreasing the level of spending.

    Both philosophies, furthermore, have no good answer to “the Asshole Problem”, namely, what do you do about someone who just plain and simple doesn’t want to follow the rules? In a Marxist society, this would be someone who wasn’t willing to work for anyone’s benefit but his own; in Libertarian society, this would be someone who ignored the rights of others. What do you do about them?

    And finally, both are ignorant of the actual facts of human evolution and social development. Marxism ignores the tribal nature of human social instincts, and Libertarianism (in its most Randian forms) ignores the existence of human altruism. We are neither as selfish as the Libertarians believe, nor as selfless as the Marxists believe.

    There, now I’ve pissed off both the Libertarians and the Marxists in one go. Do I get an award?


  439. David

    tzs: This is because private actions are voluntary while all government actions, even the justifiable ones, are compulsive by their very nature. Also, government has no incentive to do anything well- it cannot go bankrupt and has a monopoly on the use of force to ensure compliance. Government has legitimate roles, but you have to realize its limitations. The market cannot handle everything, but everything which can be handled by the market should be.


  440. Brian R. Miller

    And finally, both are ignorant of the actual facts of human evolution and social development.

    Actually, libertarianism recognizes that systems work better when they’re voluntary versus when they’re mandatory (and enforced by big guys with guns).

    Liberals, in critiquing libertarianism, make three fatal mistakes.

    First, they claim that the status quo of any situation (for example, health care) is evidence of libertarianism’s failures — as though the heavily regulated health care market, with its HMOs and government-granted monopolies, is anything close to a free market.

    Secondly, they compare the utopian outcomes of their theories to the non-libertarian “libertarian” status quo. I’ve never seen a liberal in health care, for instance, acknowledge that most major “universal health systems” are failing in serious ways — such as Britain’s NHS or Canada’s provincial plans. I’ve lived in both countries and experienced their dismal nature repeatedly, but the liberal tends to ignore the reality and instead insist that this time, on the 50th try, it will be different. As Einstein noted, insanity is trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results — but that epitomizes modern leftism in America.

    Finally, leftists assume that all people are selfish, greedy individuals when acting individually or in voluntary association — but are suddenly enlightened and ungreedy individuals when they enter government. Hence, you have the surreality (and ultimate illogic) of liberal Democrats demanding that our retirements be managed by the government under George W. Bush, or that universal health care be delivered via a Congress run by Tom DeLay.

    Ultimately, libertarianism is realism. It acknowledges that societies that succeeded most brilliantly were those that allowed individual creativity and individual rights to flourish without well-meaning central planners taking over. Liberalism in America, on the other hand, simply assumes that utopia has never been reached because the prior 450 liberal efforts to tax and regulate us to prosperity were thwarted by “big corporations” or whoever the evil bogeyman of the moment may be.


  441. To answer Flewellyn’s “the Asshole Problem‿, at least from the Libertarian perspective…

    If someone infringes on another’s rights to life, liberty, or property, you require them to pay restitution and/or put them in prison if no restitution is possible.

    Don’t confuse Libertarians with Anarchists. Libertarians may believe that 90% of what government does is wrong, but a huge part of the 10% it does right is protecting the rights of individuals. Libertarians would not let murderers, rapists, kidnappers, thieves, etc. run amok. But I think everyone here already knew that and were more interested in creating a straw man of Libertarian philosophy.

    Sadly, the Marxist answer to “the Asshole Problem‿ is about the same — if someone is unwilling to work as a slave to the state, they are thrown in prison.


  442. Sorry, Brian, but you don’t get to duck the critique I made by slinging mud in return. None of the things you have said are anything close to accurate.

    You LOSE! Good day sir!


  443. thwap

    “The IRS shows no more inclination to crack down on this underground economy than the Border Patrol and the Immigration & Naturalization Service show any diligence in sealing the Mexican border and deporting non taxpaying illegals.”

    Mark Plus, tell that to my aunt’s second husband who got his house taken away. Of course, you compare it to the border control. My bad. I could also tell you of quite a few El Salvadoran refugees who were hassled for months, before being deported, by the INS. This was back in the day when I was working against the war in El Salvador. Go ahead, Mark Plus, roll the dice and take your chance.

    Now, my own story. I started out my working career in social services. I saw a lot of corruption, inefficiency, and ego-posturing getting in the way of doing good social service work. I started then to rethink some of my left-leaning biases. What I saw in libertarianism was hope and a sound moral point of departure. Basically, it’s a restating of the golden rule. Left leaning solutions often seemed like band-aid type of solutions that were often ill-formed and lacking an understanding of human nature. What’s more, they were often top-down approaches and often coercive - there’s a problem so the first thing we should do is pass a law (never mind how real human beings will react to that law - what’s important is that we make a show of caring). This is not to say I don’t ever accept that something might be better handled through regulation than through the market. But I don’t think the regulatory route should be the first solution we reach for. It should be as a last resort.

    I began reading a lot of economics and began to believe that some of my old worldview about economic concepts like “profit” were just reactionary or wrong. What I learned is that business is also a form of social work. At its best, business and the profit motive work to create new ideas, technologies, and other goods and services that make all of our lives, not just the rich, better. Refrigeration was only available to the rich some 100 years ago. Now, even the poor have refrigeration. Same for indoor plumbing, a wide variety of foods, cars, televisions and radios, and a host of other goods and services.

    This is not to say that business doesn’t create its own problems - that there haven’t been or aren’t bad practices and actors in the business field. Of course there have been and are. And we should continue to boycott, or get the word out, or in the case of companies like Enron, prosecute, the bad actors.

    But overall, the good outweighs the bad when it comes to the overall record of whether business in a semi-free society is mainly a positive or negative social force. And many times, when it’s bad, it’s when the government is operating in collusion, in the form of corporate welfare, or subsidies, tariffs, or failing to prosecute the fraudulent or the cheats. Not always, but often. And finally, I still believe there are ways for business practices to continue to evolve and reform. Personally, I wish every left leaning university student studying the humanities would also be required to study economics. And every business major would also have to take classes in philosophy and ethics.

    Flewellyn: you’re confusing libertarianism with randianism. There are crossovers but the distinction is important. Get a hold of some Hayek to find that out.


  444. Brian R. Miller

    Let’s also address this “selfishness” point for a moment.

    Question for the lefties here — why is a middle-class working guy “selfish” if he wants to keep more of his money (lower taxes), but a well-compensated union employee isn’t “selfish” if he goes on strike to try and force his employer to give him better pay?

    Why are small businesspeople who want to earn higher profits “selfish” but people who want free government health care (despite often being able to pay for insurance today) not selfish?

    Why are folks who want to be able to put a door in their homes without getting a permit from a bureaucrat “selfish and unsafe,” but Democrats who voted for the Iraq War (and sending thousands to die under false pretenses) to keep their seats aren’t selfish and unsafe for our military?

    It seems to me here that the issue of “selfishness” isn’t so much that libertarians (or indeed Libertarian Party members) are selfish so much as libertarians aren’t willing to give leftists the goodies that they demand for themselves.

    Myself, I see little difference between a billion dollar corporation demanding corporate welfare payments and a guy earning $50K a year who refuses to buy his own health care demanding I shell out extra taxes to insure him. Both are the epitome of “selfish” — and worse, they’re crooks because they’re stealing from my pocket and everyone else’s to get what they want.


  445. Brian R. Miller

    you don’t get to duck the critique I made by slinging mud in return

    I didn’t sling mud, I made valid points that aren’t answered (and probably won’t be).

    However, I’ve come to expect double-standards from leftists. The same folks who were demanding that we “count every vote” in 2000 also spent millions to prevent Libertarians, Greens and independents from getting on the ballot in various states, and you get a similar dismissive tone when those who dare to think differently bring up valid critiques of our own.


  446. I think you’re making the mistake of assuming I am a leftist because I don’t agree with Rand-style Libertarianism.

    Recall that I was equally hard on the Marxists too.

    Also note that I didn’t say acting in self-interest was inherently evil, but you seemed all too happy to assume that I believed it to be.


  447. Thwap, I appreciate you calling attention to the fact that Libertarianism and Randianism are not entirely the same. I don’t disagree, in principle.

    In practice, the Libertarian Party in the US is almost entirely Randian in character, and it is Randians who have the influence in government circles, and Randians who most young people first meet when they meet a self-professed Libertarian. So if the non-Randian Libertarians are unhappy about this, I suggest you work to take back your label from the Randians.


  448. Brian R. Miller

    Flewellyn’s “the Asshole Problem‿

    Ahhh, someone who complained that empirical analysis was “mudslinging” is running around referring to other people as “assholes,” eh?

    Well, I guess I am liberated for a bit of colorful language myself. As a gay man, I find leftists like Bill Clinton, Paul Wellstone and other “liberals” who voted for the DOMA laws that make LGBT a stranger to the law to be “assholes.” I guess that makes me selfish — being one of those sorts who wants his constitutional rights and who makes that a higher priority than $500,000 grants for midnight basketball.


  449. Brian R. Miller

    the Libertarian Party in the US is almost entirely Randian in character

    What utter nonsense.


  450. As a Libertarian who chuckled heartily at this smear job (which reads a bit like a neoconservative treatise that argues that liberalism’s history is tied up with communism), I am reminded of an old Ghandi quote:

    “First they mock you, then they fight you — then, you win.‿ ;)

    Thank you, Brian, for demonstrating the intellectual pride, arrogance and casual wrongness we’ve all come to associate with Libertarians.

    As liberals, we’ve heard the quote before - correctly.


  451. Brian R. Miller

    I suggest you work to take back your label from the Randians.

    What’s the difference between your statement and Bill O’Reilly saying that most liberals hate Christians, and that if you don’t like it, take back your party from the God-haters?

    Oh, yeah, the difference is that it’s unfair when it’s done to you, but all’s fair in love and war when it might be useful for your agenda to do it to someone else.

    Sorta like “count all the votes” when they benefit Gore, but throw the Greens, Libertarians and others off the ballot when they pose a threat. Principle as posture, rather than as fact.


  452. Brian R. Miller

    Thank you, Brian, for demonstrating the intellectual pride, arrogance and casual wrongness we’ve all come to associate with Libertarians.

    And thank you for demonstrating that when push comes to shove, Democrats don’t give a damn about gay rights, and Libertarians do.

    What you call “pride, arrogance and casual wrongness,” I happen to call equal rights for all Americans. It’s a commitment that Libertarians have — and liberal Democrats do not.


  453. What’s the difference between your statement and Bill O’Reilly saying that most liberals hate Christians, and that if you don’t like it, take back your party from the God-haters?

    The primary difference is that one accusation has truth behind it, and the other does not.

    False equivocation does not become you.

    Ahhh, someone who complained that empirical analysis was “mudslinging‿ is running around referring to other people as “assholes,‿ eh?

    Cherry-picking single words or phrases to complain about does not become you, either.

    As a gay man, I find leftists like Bill Clinton, Paul Wellstone and other “liberals‿ who voted for the DOMA laws that make LGBT a stranger to the law to be “assholes.‿ I guess that makes me selfish — being one of those sorts who wants his constitutional rights and who makes that a higher priority than $500,000 grants for midnight basketball.

    No, actually. I was incensed when the Democrats rolled over and let DOMA go through, and when Clinton signed it into law. I was infuriated when the Democratic party responded to Republican mudslinging and noisemaking by retreating from important issues of civil rights. I’m still angry about this, and still working to take the Democratic party back from the weak-spined concessionists who are willing to abandon rights for GLBT people, for women, and for other minorities, in order to “appeal to” an extreme right-wing that will never vote for them anyway.

    Wanting your constitutional rights protected doesn’t make you selfish, it makes you a progressive. That many small-l (non-Randian) libertarians share this quality with many liberals is a sign that we should be working towards comon ground.

    Assuming that one who critiques part of your philosophy is your enemy does not become you.


  454. Brian R. Miller

    The primary difference is that one accusation has truth behind it, and the other does not.

    Well, I guess even Bill O’Reilly gets it right sometimes.

    I was incensed when the Democrats rolled over and let DOMA go through, and when Clinton signed it into law. I was infuriated when the Democratic party responded to Republican mudslinging and noisemaking by retreating from important issues of civil rights. I’m still angry about this, and still working to take the Democratic party back from the weak-spined concessionists who are willing to abandon rights for GLBT people, for women, and for other minorities, in order to “appeal to‿ an extreme right-wing that will never vote for them anyway.

    Gosh, you could have fooled me. Last time I checked, the Democrats were even more spineless than last election.

    For instance, Nancy Pelosi has already told her congressional delegation to forget voting on any “gay bills,” including repeal of the anti-gay military ban, DOMA, or reforming tax and pension systems to allow equal treatment for gay people.

    Apparently, the Democrats needed to focus on important issues, such as four bills to name post offices or other federal buildings which was debated just last week.

    Can’t let the fags’ concerns get in the way of important issues, eh?

    That many small-l (non-Randian) libertarians share this quality with many liberals is a sign that we should be working towards comon ground

    Except that you’re not interested in working towards common ground. I know plenty of so-called “libertarian Democrats” (and plenty of “libertarian Republicans” for that matter), and when push comes to shove, they head on off to defend the party and drop the issues that matter.

    Whereas the Libertarian Party can be counted on to defend everyone’s rights — rich, poor, black, white, straight, gay. Libertarian candidates are consistently more socially liberal than most Democrats, and they’re willing to unambiguously defend the rights of all people.

    For Democrats, and their apologists, to sling mud at the Libertarian Party and its activists is thus not merely laughable, but plain old dishonest. For you to attack our party, when your own (by your own admission) is so far behind it in the areas that you claim are most important to you, is something else I’d expect from a Rovian sort.


  455. LJM

    Flewellyn, I think you make good points and I appreciate your efforts to make the Democratic Party more protective of our rights. Unfortunately, the most powerful Democrats have been and continue to be against gay marriage, for the death penalty, and very supportive of the war on some drugs

    The fact that someone like Hillary Clinton (who, along with supporting the above assaults on our rights, still won’t take responsibility for voting to give the least qualified president in our history increased and terrible power) is a front runner for the Democratic nomination makes me think you’ve got your work cut out for you. When your political party’s leaders are disingenuous authoritarians, libertarianism is the last thing you need to be worrying about.


  456. LJM

    Oh, and Pigwiggle’s post on 2-25 at 8:54pm wins.


  457. I’m sorry, Brian, you’ve lost me.

    See, you seem to be looking at the actions of the Democratic party leadership, and inferring that these are my actions, my beliefs, because I have stated that I don’t agree with your party’s core philosophy.

    And then you accuse me of being hypocritical because I vote for the party that, overall, supports the political ideal I believe in (and is far from immune to my criticism when it doesn’t; Wellstone got some rather angry letters from me over not fighting DOMA hard enough), while simultaneously claiming both that your party is the only one fighting for your ideals, AND refusing to police members of your party which openly espouse ideas you say you disagree with.

    This is beyond incorrect, it’s incoherent. Nothing further can be served by this conversation.


  458. I’m sorry, Brian, you’ve lost me.

    See, you seem to be looking at the actions of the Democratic party leadership, and inferring that these are my actions, my beliefs, because I have stated that I don’t agree with your party’s core philosophy.

    And then you accuse me of being hypocritical because I vote for the party that, overall, supports the political ideal I believe in (and is far from immune to my criticism when it doesn’t; Wellstone got some rather angry letters from me over not fighting DOMA hard enough), while simultaneously claiming both that your party is the only one fighting for your ideals, AND refusing to police members of your party which openly espouse ideas you say you disagree with.

    This is beyond incorrect, it’s incoherent. Nothing further can be served by this conversation.


  459. Why the hell did that post twice?


  460. “so the problem with libertarianism is a lack of psychic powers? ”

    No, it’s that Alexander was allowed to get away with assault because he paid off his neighbour. The Californian justice system seems to allow this (see also Michael Jackson) - less Libertarian influenced nations do not.

    A reasonable course of action would have been for the police to continue with the prosecution using any evidence available (this is often done in domestic violence cases where the complainant retracts) and/or to have removed his firearms license on the balance of probabilities that he was unstable.

    Libz would of course object to this on grounds that:
    - if the complainant is happy with his settlement, no further grounds for action exist
    - the absolute right to be armed to the teeth must not be abridged on grounds including probable violent lunacy


  461. Brian R. Miller

    Oh, and Pigwiggle’s post on 2-25 at 8:54pm wins.

    Tee hee. It is pretty damn funny.

    I find it hilarious that so many of those spewing such bile towards libertarians (or Libertarians) consider themselves to be examples of compassionate folks who we need to run our lives for us. If they took over, we’d never even notice a change from the Bush administration’s Ashcroftian dynamics and benevolent dictatorial syndrome.

    Well, perhaps that’s not quite fair. I’m sure the new government “compassionaries” would truck around in limousines instead of SUVs. :)


  462. Brian R. Miller

    The Californian justice system seems to allow this (see also Michael Jackson) - less Libertarian influenced nations do not

    Wow, so not only are we all child molestors (bad enough), but we’re Californians too?

    Are there no limits to the depths that leftists will plumb to find insults to lob at us?


  463. Brian R. Miller

    you seem to be looking at the actions of the Democratic party leadership, and inferring that these are my actions, my beliefs

    How’s that different from what you have done to Libertarians?

    Well, except that in my case, I’m actually accurately describing the actions of your party’s leaders, not pulling stuff out of where the sun don’t shine to score points.

    If you’re going to judge me on the positions of my party, that’s perfectly alright. I’m proud to be a Libertarian and affiliated with a party that actually believes in the fundamental equality under the law of all people. I think our party, our platform, our candidates, and the vast majority of our activists (even here in Sunny California) can stand tall and proud of what we have accomplished and our positions.

    I certainly don’t think that any acolyte of the Democratic Party, with its abominable record and pathetic leadership contest (I mean c’mon — Obama vs. Hillary vs. Edwards?) has any legitimate basis for even comparing himself and his movement to us — let alone slinging crap in our direction.

    Like I said, I’ll start accepting some of your criticisms the day you get your national party to issue a press release on Valentine’s Day like the one my party did. Until then, all your attacks on our party and our candidates are just covering for the corrupt homophobia that characterizes the entire Democratic party from its activist base all the way up to the top administrator — Howard Dean — and every single major candidate for President.


  464. Tanya:
    “[Property ownership] is just a social contract, very much like taxes are.‿

    Heh?

    Property is purchased, inherited or given. The transfer of property from one person to the next - the social contract - involves voluntary participation.

    Explain how that is ‘very much like taxes’.

    Please and thank you.

    In the sense that others respect you right to property only by mutual consent. If majority of the people thought you didn’t deserve to keep your property there would be nothing you could do. How you got your property has no bearing to this. Besides, property could also be taken or stolen and stil they could be considered “yours” (say, a Warlord takes someones possessions).

    So, just like we respect each others property we also pay taxes. It doesn’t matter that a) it’s not nice to pay them and b) we didn’t exclusively sign a contract but neither have we excusively signed a contract that we obey the laws of our country. In any society there are laws (although not always written), only anarchy lacks them (and even in anarchy someone tends to come along and write their own set). The right to property ultimately comes from that same law that we haven’t each and everyone signed.

    As for someone else pointing out that the most succesful countries have advocated freedom: I beg to differ. I would say the most succesful one was the Roman Empire (at least in the West, Chinese empires might have actually been even more successful in comparison) and not only did they have slavery they were effectively a dictatorship during most of their heyday, at least from 47 B.C onwards, about 200 years after Rome had become a powerhouse in the area while the empire was it largest at 116 A.D. And of course the Western part of the empire didn’t completely collapse until 476 A.D. So the Roman Empire in the West lasted for 600-700 years (depending on how you calculate). Constantinople lasted til 1453.


  465. Brian R. Miller

    As for someone else pointing out that the most succesful countries have advocated freedom: I beg to differ. I would say the most succesful one was the Roman Empire

    So you’d rather have lived as a member of the Roman non-voting class than as a middle-class American, eh?


  466. Brian R. Miller:
    So you’d rather have lived as a member of the Roman non-voting class than as a middle-class American, eh?

    Well, you obviously need to define “succesful” then. I’m not going to play your bal game where you get to make the rules as you go along. If your argument is that a) that the most succesful countries have advocated freedom and b) you define succesful countries as those having the most freedom, well, you have just demonstrated a nice case of circular logic.

    But I have to congratulate you: you are a good example of what obviously sparked off the original article.


  467. Brian R. Miller

    you obviously need to define “succesful‿ then

    Sorry, I’m not a Democrat — I tend to go with the common, straightforward definition of words rather than tortured nuances.

    When I talk about successful countries, I’m talking about countries that were successful — the USA being the most successful in virtually every measure, especially economic, in history.

    Now I realize that the Democratic Party doesn’t like simple, straightforward concepts — it’s one reason why you guys keep talking about “equality” when you sign anti-gay laws and all. But please, these tortured efforts to redefine words (wasn’t it Clinton who even claimed that “is” could have multiple definitions?) are getting to be comical.

    I have to congratulate you: you are a good example of what obviously sparked off the original article.

    This is the other thing that cracks me up about the left.

    They complain ceaselessly of the unfairness of the hateful, personal attacks from folks like FOX News — driven by inaccurate smear-job “articles” in partisan press sources.

    Then they engage in it lock stock and barrel themselves — from the original post down to your personal attack.

    You’ve become what you claim to stand against — even down to the substance free meme you’re regurgitating.

    I always suspected that you weren’t opposed to FOX because it’s misleading, more because it was against you. Now that these tactics could work for you, the politics of personal attacks and inaccurate demonization of individuals and entire groups of people (libertarians, in this case) have become standard Democratic Party campaign tools. Mix in a generous dollop of cash from your big corporate welfare contributors like ADM, and your claim to be the free-thinking party of ideas who defends the little guy is even more ludicrous.

    And unlike your swipe at me, my riposte is completely based on the facts. Oh, and common definitions of everyday words. ;)


  468. Riggald

    Rich Paul said: Since Americans spend as much money on cigarettes and beer as we spend on education, and since we seem to attain those things without recourse to “public cigarettes‿ or “public beer‿
    ———————
    If you want as small a proportion of the populace to be functionally numerate and literate as you have smoking or drinking, that would be a good idea. Better to have literacy and numeracy as more than a (substantial) minority habit.


  469. Geeze, this just gets funnier.

    “Thank you, Brian, for demonstrating the intellectual pride, arrogance and casual wrongness we’ve all come to associate with Libertarians.”

    And thank you for demonstrating that when push comes to shove, Democrats don’t give a damn about gay rights, and Libertarians do.

    Gee, Brian, how did I do that? Please lay out for the assembled Pandagons why exactly you believe I’m a “Democrat”…

    What you call “pride, arrogance and casual wrongness,‿ I happen to call equal rights for all Americans.

    Really? So a preening post congratulating yourself on your intellectual superiority in which you trip on your dick and quote Ghandi incorrectly is “equal rights for all Americans”? I wasn’t aware that attempting to bolster your ego and making yourself look like a fool in the process was a civil rights issue, Brian. I seem to recall “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”; from where do you derive your claim that strutting your particular ignorance is part of the American tradition?

    I would say the most succesful one was the Roman Empire (at least in the West, Chinese empires might have actually been even more successful in comparison)

    Largest contiguous empire ever - the Mongols.


  470. Let’s see, so far with Brian we’ve got massive hyperbole, ad hominem attacks thinly disguised as “analysis”, selective reading of posts to only pick out words and phrases he can attack, while ignoring their context altogether, outright refusal to respond to criticism in any substantive way, and free space.

    TROLL BINGO!


  471. Annmal

    Gee, Brian, how did I do that? Please lay out for the assembled Pandagons why exactly you believe I’m a “Democrat‿…

    Admit it, you’re really a McGillycuddite in disguise :P


  472. Brian R. Miller:

    USA being the most successful in virtually every measure, especially economic, in history.

    *snort*

    You also have the very common trait among libertarians, i.e. poor knowledge in history and total lack of perspective.

    Phoenician: True, but the empire crumbled quickly after Khan Ogadui died when his armies were in Austria. Just a few decades later the empire started to erode. The Mongol Empire only lasted for about 160 years, although some remains lasted until about 1500.


  473. Blast Pundit

    I love watching the little circle jerks that go on on sites like this. Slap a bunch of silly generalizations together and watch the hacks chime in agreement.


  474. flying frack

    On the question of whether taxation is voluntary or not: One or two libertarian contributors say it isn’t; Mark Plus claims it is, based on the reasoning that many people can get away with not paying. Let’s see if we can sort this out. Does the government we have consider it a crime to steal or not? Well, according to Mark Plus’s *logic* it doesn’t as many people get away with it everyday. Does that make sense to anyone?

    Also, if I followed the ad hominem and straw man style of many of these oh so tolerant, broad and fairminded *liberal* posters I’d say, “One day, you’ll be talking to someone and then he says out of the blue, you know, gays ought to be locked up.”


  475. flying frack

    “you also have the very common trait among libertarians…”

    You also have the very common trait among leftists of smearing an entire group based on one example. But nice ad hominem. You’ve got that trick down well.


  476. I base my observation on almost every libertarian I know. Oh wait, correction: the word “almost” can be removed from that sentence. I’m yet to meet a libertarian who has a decent grasp of history.

    Besides, why should liberals be nice towards total assholes? I didn’t know it was a requirement.

    BTW, I love the way everyone even slightly to the left from the ultra-right are labelled leftists. Is that really the worst you can think of? Not only is it totally ridiculous and proves what bigots you are it is also very amusing to think it is thrown around like an insult.


  477. jp

    Speaking as a libertarian who was formerly a very liberal Democrat (and who still votes much more often for Ds than Rs), I wish to offer one thing for your consideration. This is not meant to win converts but merely to aid in the exchange of ideas:

    Most libertarians, myself included, want the same things for all Americans that liberal Democrats want — prosperity, peace, happiness, fulfillment. The difference is just that we have concluded that market-generated solutions are likelier to accomplish those goals than government-generated solutions.


  478. LJM

    Makis, your arguments (”every libertarian I know”) are the very definition of “bigoted.”


  479. I’m thinking more about the cranial detonation techniques, and I’m thinking they’re pretty irrelevant. Almost all could as easily be directed against progressives/liberals. I mean, every intellectual movement has some weird baggage. Many early luminaries of the progressive movement had good things to say about eugenics. I kinda assume that none of the Pandagonettes are going to proclaim that as a good thing. But I doubt any liberal, upon hearing that for the first time, would suddenly renounce progressivism just because early progressives got something wrong, would they? So to with libertarians.

    Of course, if you just want to mock libertarians without understanding them or their ideas, you can pretty much say anything you want. Polemics are judged more on their glibness than their logical consistency.


  480. wealthy, prestigious scientist

    >

    Wow. I had to respond to this. Just how much money do you think scientists actually earn? As a PhD biochemist at a major research university, I make over 35% less than my mom, a public elementary school teacher in California. Before grad school I worked (with a BA) in private sector biotech, and made slightly less then than I am now. I’m not complaining, I like what I do and I actually find what I make reasonably easy to live on. As far as prestige, I must be on a totally different planet - it’s sad but I think your bizarre sour grapes attitude is probably more common than I had realized. Well, back to being insufferable.


  481. history_mom

    Let’s also address this “selfishness‿ point for a moment.

    Question for the lefties here — why is a middle-class working guy “selfish‿ if he wants to keep more of his money (lower taxes), but a well-compensated union employee isn’t “selfish‿ if he goes on strike to try and force his employer to give him better pay?

    Generally because a lot of union employees are not as well-compensated as you think (teachers, anyone) and need wage increases to keep up with rises in the cost of living, while the “middle class guy” wants to pay few taxes, but bitches about the roads needing improvement, bad traffic, lack of adequate law enforcement, that public universities cost too much, that public schools are not good enough, that municipal libararies are understaffed and not open at convenient hours, etc. Most people want the services the government provides but you have to pay for it in taxes to make it cost efficient. See previous comments on the inherent problems of a “pay-as-you-go system.”

    Why are small businesspeople who want to earn higher profits “selfish‿ but people who want free government health care (despite often being able to pay for insurance today) not selfish?

    Who are these “often able to pay for it” uninsured you are talking about? I am one of those people, in that the government considers my family income enough to afford single-payer health care, but the reality is that we can’t. We don’t get the discounts on healthcare that the insured get- we get to pay 100% and often have to set up payment plans that run for years to get basic medical care. If we miss a payment, it goes to collections where we get penalized with interest on the already inflated cost of medical care.

    It is not selfish for small businesses to want to make a profit, but this has nothing to do with healthcare.

    Why are folks who want to be able to put a door in their homes without getting a permit from a bureaucrat “selfish and unsafe,‿ but Democrats who voted for the Iraq War (and sending thousands to die under false pretenses) to keep their seats aren’t selfish and unsafe for our military?

    Again, two completely unrelated issues. I live in one of those houses where non-permitted construction was done. I’ll tell you why we have the permit process: in our house the electrical work is so shoddy that our electrician friend is surprised that we haven’t had a fire; the walls were constructed in a haphazard fashion so that they bow in some places and are not square in others; the plumbing is another problem altogether. In the city I live in there are many garage conversions which have been the source of homes being entirely consumed by fires that originated in the shoddy electrical work. The reason permits became necessary is because people tend to take dangerous shortcuts when they do construction without the oversight and others may pay the price for their carelessness. If houses were only ever owned by one person, they could assume the risk, but this is not reality.

    Myself, I see little difference between a billion dollar corporation demanding corporate welfare payments and a guy earning $50K a year who refuses to buy his own health care demanding I shell out extra taxes to insure him. Both are the epitome of “selfish‿ — and worse, they’re crooks because they’re stealing from my pocket and everyone else’s to get what they want.

    Which just proves that you are an idiot. The guy earning $50K a year is paying his fair share of taxes, just like you. The guy earning $50K and wanting universal health care understands that it is not “free” and that he will have to pay higher taxes to get it. The guy earning $50K understands that a universal single-payer system will cost him less in taxes than it currently costs him to pay for his own for-profit health care out of pocket. The guy earning $50K a year understands that there are about 40 million people just like him who would benefit and that millions more will too. And maybe, just maybe, the guy earning $50K believes that employers should not be in the business of health insurance at all- then employers would have to find another excuse for keeping wages below the cost of living.

    That you don’t understand the difference between a billion-dollar corporation not paying their fair share of taxes, continuing to reap benefits by moving facilities out of the country, and depressing their employee’s incomes to keep their profit margins intacts tells me a lot about your libertarianism.

    In regard to selfishness: pot meet kettle.


  482. Brian R. Miller

    You also have the very common trait among libertarians, i.e. poor knowledge in history and total lack of perspective.

    Actually, unlike most so-called “progressives,” I’ve lived in many of the wealthier and poorer countries of the world.

    And I know that you guys like to claim that Cuba and Venezuela are “more successful” than the USA in various pet issues, and like to claim a “superior knowledge of history” based on your reading of books written by fellow lefties (as opposed to actual experience), but it doesn’t negate the absurdity of your contention.

    Others have already pointed out your bigotry, so I won’t say much more on that front other than your “very common trait among libertarians is [insert bullshit attack here]” reads just like something from Free Republic or FOX News.

    You guys realize that the rest of the world — independents, libertarians, Libertarians, greens, Greens, and others — see you and the Freepers as different sides of the same coin, right?

    Read your own posts and writing sometime. Snorts of derision, ad-hominem attacks on individuals and groups who have the temerity to disagree with you, lies and innuendo through your media outlets to attempt to humiliate those who dare to disagree with you, etc.

    There’s not a single thing that’s “intellectual,” “well-read” or “thoughtful” about it. If you were “reality based,” you’d drop the pretense to the contrary and admit that you’ve got a problem with intellectual, experiential and philosophical diversity.


  483. Brian R. Miller

    The guy earning $50K a year is paying his fair share of taxes, just like you.

    Yeah, but he’s chosing to smoke 2 packs of cigarettes a day and lease a Lexus while not having health insurance, while I’m choosing to be responsible and drive a Hyundai car I can afford, stay healthy, and pay for my own insurance — at the same income level that he’s at.

    Who’s the “idiot?”

    And why am I supposed to pay higher taxes to prop up his decision to spend his health insurance money on a luxury car and cigarettes?

    The guy earning $50K understands that a universal single-payer system will cost him less in taxes than it currently costs him to pay for his own for-profit health care out of pocket.

    That’s also incorrect. I lived in the UK and Canada, and the tax burdens of both societies are considerably higher for “national insurance” than in the USA. The delta in UK national insurance tax and US tax was about four times the cost of private health insurance in the USA.

    And even funnier, most Britons who can get private health insurance do so, because the “universal system” that you’re so keen on is atrocious at delivering services. People don’t want to wait in line to see a GP with a four week wait, wait decades to get routine transplant operations, or die of a chronic condition because the government’s rationing system failed.

    In the UK, there’s not just a shortage of hospital beds in the “public” system, there’s now also a shortage of AMBULANCES.

    Like I said, you guys need to spend some time living in the systems you’re advocating rather than spouting utopian claptrap about how “costs will be lower.” Costs are, after all, easy to make lower if — like in EVERY “single-payer” system — care is not delivered on time and lots of people die before they can get the care they need.

    I don’t want to see the US turn into a copy of the UK — high taxes, lack of affordable and accessible care, and people chartering jets to Mumbai to get heart transplants because the “universal” system cannot get them a doctor until eight years after their projected date of death.

    Experience counts.


  484. LJM:

    Makis, your arguments (‿every libertarian I know‿) are the very definition of “bigoted.‿

    Huh, could you define “bigoted” to me? As in, how does it fit the “only talking about people I know” comment?

    I could also say every crow I have seen is black. It still doesn’t mean I claim every crow that exists is black.


  485. Brevity is the soul of libertarianism.


  486. Brian R. Miller:

    And I know that you guys like to claim that Cuba and Venezuela are “more successful‿ than the USA in various pet issues, and like to claim a “superior knowledge of history‿ based on your reading of books written by fellow lefties (as opposed to actual experience), but it doesn’t negate the absurdity of your contention.

    Others have already pointed out your bigotry, so I won’t say much more on that front other than your “very common trait among libertarians is [insert bullshit attack here]‿ reads just like something from Free Republic or FOX News.

    You guys realize that the rest of the world — independents, libertarians, Libertarians, greens, Greens, and others — see you and the Freepers as different sides of the same coin, right?

    Read your own posts and writing sometime. Snorts of derision, ad-hominem attacks on individuals and groups who have the temerity to disagree with you, lies and innuendo through your media outlets to attempt to humiliate those who dare to disagree with you, etc.

    There’s not a single thing that’s “intellectual,‿ “well-read‿ or “thoughtful‿ about it. If you were “reality based,‿ you’d drop the pretense to the contrary and admit that you’ve got a problem with intellectual, experiential and philosophical diversity.

    This gets better and better. How do you know you have annoyed a libertarian? The quote above is a good example. The funniest part is the strawman he builds (”you like to claim”) and then goes and blames me for ad hominems. Bit of different rules for you and me, eh?

    Besides, I never claimed to have a superior knowledge on history. I just said that lack of knowledge seems to be a common trait among libertarians. A bit like saying yellow skin is a common trait among Chinese, which doesn’t imply anything about my skin colour.

    But I must be more powerful than I imagined as it seems I can control the media(”lies and innuendo through your media outlets”).

    Yep, typical libertarian response. “You are all in a conspiracy against me just because I think myself and you are just stupid and uneducated”( “you and your media/you’ve got a problem with intellectual, experiential and philosophical diversity”).

    Damn! Annoying libertarians is almost as much fun as it is easy. Although novelty tends to wear off quickly because the responses are almost always the same, no matter which libertarian is in question.


  487. Brevity is the soul of libertarianism.

    Oh yeah? Well I can play that game too!

    Libertarianism is the brevity of the soul!

    How’s it feel to have the tables turned, Mr. Democrat Party?


  488. LJM

    Makis,

    A bigoted argument asserts or implies that because the members of Group A that one is aquainted with (a uselessly small sample for objective purposes) are “insert negative characteristic here”, then it must follow that most or all members of Group A must also have that negative characteristic. It’s usually expressed as a subjective justification of racisim, but it can be a way of simplifying one’s uninformed opinion of any group of people with differing lifestyles or belief systems.

    Being bigoted against crows is no big deal, since they’re birds. Being bigoted against human beings (considered by most experts to be more complex than birds) is one of the more prominent sources of misunderstanding and injustice throughout history.

    Yes, that’s right, history. ;)


  489. mobile the libertarian troll

    “Libertarianism originated in the philosophy of a left-wing French political philosopher who also influenced Karl Marx.‿

    Proudhon? Proudhon?!!?!? Oh, thank God. I thought he was going to say Hitler.


  490. LJM

    “racism”

    Libertarians can’t spell.


  491. Admit it, you’re really a McGillycuddite in disguise :P

    Alf’s Imperial Army, puh-lease.

    Phoenician: True, but the empire crumbled quickly after Khan Ogadui died when his armies were in Austria. Just a few decades later the empire started to erode. The Mongol Empire only lasted for about 160 years, although some remains lasted until about 1500.

    True enough. Fantastic starting season, no staying power.

    There’s not a single thing that’s “intellectual,‿ “well-read‿ or “thoughtful‿ about it.

    We’re well-read enough to not quote Ghandi incorrectly when we’re trying to show off intellectual superiority, Brian…

    “racism‿ Libertarians can’t spell.

    To be fair, spelling mistakes are too common on the Internet to flame, unless they form a pattern.


  492. impeckish

    “I love the way everyone even slightly to the left from the ultra-right are labelled leftists. Is that really the worst you can think of? Not only is it totally ridiculous and proves what bigots you are it is also very amusing to think it is thrown around like an insult.”

    “Left” or “leftist” is an insult??? Not sure the way it is usually used here, or in the post you are referring to, but when I use it I just use it in a short-hand way to identify the people I am talking about. I could say “liberal” but not all leftists are liberals and I suppose the same charge could be directed towards the use of “liberal” as though it’s a pejorative. I don’t feel insulted when someone says “libertarian.” I only feel insulted when they start out with sweeping claims like “Every libertarian I know…” fill in the pejorative comment.

    Well, so much for the claim that leftists…uh, liberals…uh, whatever you are, are the ones who are full of tolerance, love and compassion for humanity. You’ve demonstrated the opposite here. Oops, wait, I forgot; you’re only one little prick at the urinal. Apologies to the decent pandonians out there.

    But I think I had my fill of hate for the weekend. Guess I’ll join the Krsnas. Maybe there’s more hope for broaminded discussion over there.

    Chris Clarke, I actually found your ‘brevity of the soul comment amusing.’ Hat tip.

    P.S. it’s too bad though that a more constructive dialog never emerged. I suppose I’m at fault as much as the next person here. But I actually believe that liberals, leftists, and libertarians share much common ground. There’s a lot we could agree on. Perhaps these for starters? End the drug war, get us out of Iraq and possibly other foreign adventurism, restore civil liberties - end Patriot Act, allow gays to marry, end capital punishment, legalize victimless crimes (thus reducing the record amount of people in prisons), etc.

    Oh well, another day, another site, perhaps.

    Okay, history quiz at 40 paces….


  493. history_mom

    Brian: I notice that you did not address most of my post with any sense of intellectual honesty. Instead, you moved the goal posts by deciding that I am talking about some person who smokes and drives a luxury car.

    Okay Brian, since you can move the goal posts to prove your point, so can I. Here’s a scenario for you that is much closer to the reality of the uninsured in this country:

    Joe Smith is a self-employed consultant making $50,000 per year. He has a wife, Betty, who, as a graduate student makes, only $13,000 per year teaching. They have one child. Their income places them significantly above the national average household income, despite being well below the income necessary for a middle class existence in his state. Each year they pay the IRS about $10,000. They both drive cars that are paid off and almost ten years old, but it costs them $4,000/year to insure and register them. Their rent/mortgage is about $1500/month and their utilities about $500 (they have basic cable, water, electricity, garbage pick-up, and have cell phones- his is used for business- but no land line). Their weekly grocery bill is $150- $200. If you’re running the total, they have between $14,600 and $17,200/year left over for discretionary spending. Since Joe is self-employed and Betty is a grad student, they do not get health insurance through their jobs. In their area, the best insurance they can get for the family is $1000/month with a $5000 deductible. That’s $12,000/year minimum for insurance. This year, Joe got in a hit-and-run car accident, spending five days in the hospital (at a cost of almost $30,000). His insurance only picks up 70% of the cost after the deductible of $5000, leaving Joe to pay $7500 out of pocket. This means that for the year, his family actually has a negative income of between $7,300 and $9,900. What I have failed to include is a budget for clothing, entertainment (the occasional night out for dinner and a movie, or maybe some books or CDs), credit card debt, or savings.

    Or let’s try again with no health insurance and no major catastrophes: Betty had a baby last year and it cost $10000 cash. Prior to her pregnancy (but that same year) she also has to have gyno exams due to health issues ($400 for the doctor, $500 for the labs), their child has well-visits ($100/visit, five visits the first year of life). Joe got strep throat this year and had to go to a quick care/emergency room ($300 to be seen, $200 for the doctor to talk to him for 10 minutes, $200 for the throat culture, $60 for the antibiotics). Last year they had to pay $12,160 in medical costs, which leaves them with between $2,440 and $5, 040. If Joe had his car accident instead, they would have been in debt between $4,200/$6,800 (if the hospital knocks 2/3 of the cost off the $30,000 for being uninsured state residents) and $24,200/$26,800.

    However, if everyone paid into a universal single-payer system (at say $5000/year at this family’s income) and assuming the government coverage was the same (without the deductible), Joe and Betty Smith would have had between $2,100 and $4,700 at the end of the year despite Joe’s car accident. If you assume a deductible would still apply, then they would have a negative income between $2,900 and $300. That is still a significant difference for the Smith family. So, despite the problems of universal health coverage, it is still better than a for-profit system for this family.

    I also am amused that you assume that nobody else knows anything or anyone from a country with universal health care, or that no “lefties” ever travel or live abroad. Pandagonians are not all Americans. Though I am an American, my research takes me to England. When there I have asked residents (taxi drivers, bartenders, university students, random people met on the rail) what they think about universal health care. While they all admit the system has flaws that need to be worked out (and what system doesn’t- that includes democracy), they cannot fathom our system. We claim to have the best health care in the world, but it is not accessible to a significant minority of Americans. I’ve met many Canadians who feel similarly. What does this prove: that your anecdotal evidence is not any more a proscription for universal health care than my experience is a prescription for universal health care.


  494. LJM:

    A bigoted argument asserts or implies that because the members of Group A that one is aquainted with (a uselessly small sample for objective purposes) are “insert negative characteristic here‿, then it must follow that most or all members of Group A must also have that negative characteristic.

    I did not claim all libertarians are that way, but I do wonder what the odds are that every time a libertarian talks about history he just shows how little he knows. I *do not* make claims on entire groups of people, unlike, say some libertarians have done (”you leftists…”). And I’m not talking about dates or names, but the larger picture. Why things happened and what these events caused. Stuff like that.

    I don’t consider being called leftist to be insulting but I have been called leftist or communist many times in discussions with libertarians in such a way that the terms were clearly used as insults. As I wondered earlier, where exactly is the insult? And Miller above clearly uses the term in such a way it appears he thinks he’s insulting me.


  495. history_mom:

    I also am amused that you assume that nobody else knows anything or anyone from a country with universal health care, or that no “lefties‿ ever travel or live abroad.

    Well, I *am* from one such country..


  496. LJM

    Makis wrote:

    I did not claim all libertarians are that way…

    You only need to imply it for an argument to be bigoted. Like when you wrote:

    You also have the very common trait among libertarians, i.e. poor knowledge in history and total lack of perspective.

    How do you know that “poor knowledge in history and total lack of perspective” are common traits among libertarians? Based on the ones you know? How do you know that it’s more common among libertarians than among liberals or leftists?

    I’m yet to meet a libertarian who has a decent grasp of history.

    The implication is that libertarians don’t.

    My feeling is that libertarians are just like liberals and conservatives and most other groups of political thinkers. There are assholes and saints, thinkers and idiots among them all.

    Go check out “Hit ‘n’ Run,” the blog at Reason.com. There are Democrats and anarchists and Republicans and everything in between there. There are deep thinkers and shallow ones. I disagree with folks as often as I agree and I tend to learn a lot.

    And there are even folks with a profound knowledge of history. Fun and educational!


  497. The quickest way to turn a Libertarian into a Socialist is a pink slip.


  498. Steven W

    And this thread has in fact confirmed my beliefs about Libertarians, which many commenters here seemed to miss were expressed rather clearly in the first few paragraphs of this post, to wit: Much of libertarian philosophy makes sense.
    Most libertarians are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot libertarians who are both clueless and annoying.

    So what?

    That could be accurately said about anything or anyone. What’s the purpose of pointing it out specifically in regards to libertarians or Libertarians?

    Let’s try this out:

    Most southerners are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot southerners who are both clueless and annoying.

    Most liberals are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot liberals who are both clueless and annoying.

    Most Christians are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot Christians who are both clueless and annoying.

    Most feminists are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot feminists who are both clueless and annoying.

    This remark reminds me of those ludicrous studies concluding college students are more likely to get drunk and have sex on spring break than on the Sunday before finals.

    Let’s see if this gets “moderated.”


  499. That could be accurately said about anything or anyone. What’s the purpose of pointing it out specifically in regards to libertarians or Libertarians?

    The purpose was answering a direct question as to how the thread had affected my attitudes about Libertarians. Do try to keep up.

    Let’s see if this gets “moderated.‿

    Guess it didn’t! See? Tendentious assholes with reading comprehension problems aren’t unilaterally banned!


  500. Steven W

    Or alternately;

    Most Muslims are good people with whom one can disagree pleasantly and constructively.
    There is a minority of zealot muslims who stab manifestos in the hearts of their critics, throw gays from rooftops and sentence women to gang-rape because of something their ten-year-old brother supposedly did.

    This kind of language is nothing but a pedantic, intellectual cop-out act, designed to shield yourself from criticism through the claim that you aren’t lumping everyone in a particular group together (even as you are).

    That or an effort to write a thousand or so words and manage to say nothing at all.


  501. Steven W

    The purpose was answering a direct question as to how the thread had affected my attitudes about Libertarians. Do try to keep up.

    That still fails to impart any meaning to the statement. Do try to keep up.


  502. tzs

    Very easy to talk about how wonderful the Libertarian world is vis-a-vis what the Democratic Party has managed to deliver so for.

    May I just point out that there’s one very big difference? One is still in the imagination, the other is in reality, resulting from all the messiness of political realism and horse-trading and everything else. It’s very easy to burble on how wonderful utopias are when they’re non-existent. I’ll bet anything you want that if it ever gets to the point that a quasi-libertarian party looks like they might get some power, they’ll be starting to compromise on their positions as well….

    Frankly, I don’t think you can have a Libertarian society for the long haul. It would either destroy itself through lack of reproducing, be a cult like Calvin’s Geneva, or break up into fragments. Governments self-generate–go read the history of the Italian city-states.


  503. Very easy to talk about how wonderful the Libertarian world is vis-a-vis what the Democratic Party has managed to deliver so for.

    Yup - you still run into the occasional Bolshie who claims, quite correctly, that real Communism has never been tried (revolutionary Marxist-Leninism being something quite different), and that the Glorious People’s Utopia is yet to come.

    Not really that much difference between them and a True Believer Libertarian, save that the Commies have better art and a stirring anthem…


  504. highnumber

    Libertarians don’t want to create a utopia. Utopias don’t exist. Utopias can’t exist. Libertarians aren’t so naive. Libertarians believe that market based solutions are not perfect. Libertarians believe that market based solutions tend to be the best because they tend to be the fairest and most efficient. I recommend reading some articles published by the Cato Institute for more information about Libertarianism.
    By the way, since y’all think the Objectivists have co-opted “Libertarianism,” can we have “Liberal” back, please?


  505. bleah

    What we’re trying to pound into the heads of our Libertarian visitors here is that the concept of property rights only exists in a social context. They don’t exist in absentia as some intrinsic inalienable part of a good.

    How is this different from other rights? Do you think that saying “I have a right to my body” is going to stop anyone from clocking a 2x4 over your head? All rights are social constructs, property rights or otherwise.

    If you want an Authority around to “protect‿ your Property Rights

    But we don’t. At least, not the anarcho-capitalists like me. The idea is that rights (to both life, liberty and property) can be protected by things other than capital-A Authorities. There would still need to be social contracts, and police forces to deal with criminals, but no Authorities.

    Also, Phoenician wrote:

    Everybody knows what force is - the use or threat of violence against people. People. … Burglery, [sic] any theft other than extortion or robbery, is NOT force - save as Libertarians have redefined the word to suit their own special little theories.

    Gosh. Dictionary.com, not known as a libertarian propaganda site, defines “force” as Law. unlawful violence threatened or committed against persons or property.. Exactly what constitutes force (or “coercion”) can be tricky, I agree: is it coercive to play Abba records at 50 decibels? But the basic idea is that people should be free to enjoy their own liberty and property unless they infringe upon other people’s right to do the same.

    The objections you’re raising are pretty simplistic stuff that people have considered and come up with answers for. I mean, I don’t think you necessarily have to agree with us or be convinced, but gosh, we’re not idiots here…


  506. “Everybody knows what force is - the use or threat of violence against people. People. … Burglery, [sic] any theft other than extortion or robbery, is NOT force - save as Libertarians have redefined the word to suit their own special little theories.”

    Gosh. Dictionary.com, not known as a libertarian propaganda site, defines “force‿ as Law. unlawful violence threatened or committed against persons or property..

    The two comments do not contradict each other. I will grant that “force” can also be defined as the use of violence against property in common language - when one breaks a window, one uses force. Against the window.

    Alas for the Libertarian position, when one takes property, one does not necessarily use force. If I walk into an unlocked house and take the stereo, I have not used force. If I smash a window, and take the stereo, I have only used force against the window. If I copy your computer software and sell it myself, I have not used force.

    So, allow me to rephrase that first sentence - “everybody knows what force is - the use or threat of violence against people, or against inanimate objects.”

    Burglary - “The act of entering a building or other premises with the intent to commit theft” - is not force (although it may possibly involve force against the defences of that building). Theft - “the wrongful taking and carrying away of the personal goods or property of another” - is not force. Violation of property rights is not force.

    At least as normal, sane people use the term.


  507. Dave

    Andrew Carnegie was a Robber Barron? Andrew Carnegie made oil cheap enough that even the poor could afford it, which is how he drove his competitors out of business. Which is a lot more than you smug liberals have ever done for the working class.

    I think it’s hilarious when you accuse libertarians of being arrogant. There is always going to be a certain amount of arrogance involved with thinking you are right while others are wrong, but let’s not be hypocrites about it, eh?


  508. “If those don’t work, sometimes these people are persuaded when it’s pointed out to them that back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate, and a very few people got very wealthy while the rest of us died of food poisoning or coal mine collapses or shirtwaist factory fires.”

    Bah!

    “back in the late 19th century, the US essentially was the Libertarian state they now advocate”

    Is this not the time when the US actually became the richest most desirable place on te earth to live?

    “and a very few people got very wealthy while the rest of us died of food poisoning or coal mine collapses or shirtwaist factory fires”

    No, a LOT of people got rich in the Libertarian US while a very few died of food poisoning and factory accidents, much less than in supa government UK.

    You may not agree with most of the Liberatarian agenda but surely even the least enlightened of you can see the need for less government than the choking overlord we have now. Or are you ok with the notion that the days of real freedom are in the past?


  509. Katherine

    Hello. My friend just sent me this link and I don’t know who you are, but I just wanted to say: I love you.

    That is all.
    -K


  510. bleah

    Ehhhhh… no. You are quibbling and being asinine. People use the word “force” in a variety of different meanings. People use the term about “physical force” — clearly what you’re talking about — but they don’t regard that term as a redundancy.

    And while taking someone else’s unattended possessions doesn’t involve physical force, I think most people would still regard it as an “act of force.”

    The legal theory is that “force is implied in every trespass quare clausum fregit … If a man goes upon another’s land without right, however peaceably or thoughtlessly, the law will imply force, and trespass will lie.”

    You can find lawyers discussing how taking someone else’s car for a joyride w/o permission is an act of force here, btw.

    Similarly, unlawful confinement may not involve any actual violence .. but most people would call it an act of force.


  511. bleah

    Slappy mentioned “tolls on neighborhood roads” as one of those wacky libertarian ideas. I should point out that London has actually used neighborhood road tolls to good effect to reduce gridlock. As someone who lives in Manhattan I would LOVE to see road tolls … sometimes walking is quicker than driving here.


  512. blech

    “Constructive dialog.” That’s a funny one. Clearly the purpose of the original poster and most of the liberal commentators is not to ask for constructive dialog. That’s the domain of emotionally mature and fair minded adults. The purpose here is just to get one’s rocks off on coming up with clever insults. So, asking for constructive dialog here is analogous to walking up to the school bullies and insisting it’s not right to steal other people’s lunch money.


  513. Maxwell Guerrin

    A challenge issued. Will Chris accept?


  514. I appreciate the offer, but my interest in writing on this subject has been more than sated for the time being, and I have some paid writing chores to catch up on.

    Don’t get me wrong: I’m sure I’d learn something from you. I appreciate the good faith offer of discourse, and I was interested to read what you wrote in your rejoinder to me about concentration of power in corporations or firms or whatever you care to call them. (Despite the protestations of some above, my qualifying paragraphs, about many or most libertarian-oriented folks being more nuanced than the caricature I described, were sincere.)

    I will do a bit more reading on your blog, I’ll tell you that much.


  515. hhhhh… no. You are quibbling and being asinine. People use the word “force‿ in a variety of different meanings. People use the term about “physical force‿ — clearly what you’re talking about — but they don’t regard that term as a redundancy.

    No, I’m not. People regard “force” as something active, something that hurts someone (or something). The Libertarian attempt to rewrite the term is ludicrious.

    Take, for example, intellectual property. Please explain clearly why purchasing, copying a game and selling those copies is “force” by any reasonable definition of the term. Attempting to redefine terms in order to win subsequent arguments just isn’t convincing.

    And while taking someone else’s unattended possessions doesn’t involve physical force, I think most people would still regard it as an “act of force.‿

    Really? How? Snatching a purse may be an act of force; picking it up while the owner’s attention is elsewhere and walking off with it is not.

    The legal theory is that “force is implied in every trespass quare clausum fregit … If a man goes upon another’s land without right, however peaceably or thoughtlessly, the law will imply force, and trespass will lie.‿

    So, let me see if I have this straight - you’re claiming that there exists a right to property prior to any social recognition of such right, that violating this right is “force” - and you’re using legal terms developed from American case law (and not universal) as proof?

    Interesting bits in the Wikipedia:

    Most jurisdictions do not allow “self-help” to remove trespassers. The usual procedure is to ask the trespassing person to leave, then to call law enforcement officials if they do not. As long as the trespasser is not posing an immediate threat, they cannot be removed by force.

    The unlawful interference with the goods of another is a trespass against his goods, and actionable in tort, usually as conversion or detinue.

    And from the definition from force:

    In the field of law, the word force has two main meanings: unlawful violence and lawful compulsion. Forced entry is an expression falling under the category of unlawful violence; in force or forced sale would be examples of expressions in the category of lawful compulsion.

    When something is said to have been done “by force,” it usually implies that it was done by actual or threatened violence (”might”), not necessarily by legal authority (”right”).

    That doesn’t seem to support your case. Admittedly, Wikipedia is not reliable; would you care to attempt to bolster this fient a little?


  516. “2) Since you seem to be a left-anarchist, there are two things you should know:

    “a) You do not have a monopoly on anarchist ideology. Anarchocapitalists are anarchists as well, as much as you leftist-anarchists wants to deny that fact.”

    Sure, “anarcho”-capitalists *call* themselves anarchists but it does not make it so. They defend forms of hierarchy (the capitalist firm). Anarchists are against archy (hence an-archy). The name gives it away, really. It is not too hard to comprehend. As the original post indicated, capitalist companies are dictatorships.

    “b) Oligarchy and wage slavery, even if these would be true in a libertarian or ancap society, is much preferable to the indiscriminate killings which took place in the time-honoured left-anarchist experiment of Spain in the 30’s.”

    You should really read about the labour history of the USA. Killings and beatings of strikers by private police was pretty common. But, of course, that was justifiable because the strikers “initiated force” against their bosses by refusing to follow their orders. Such is the nature of wage slavery and oligarchy.

    As for Spain, there was killings as people resisted the fascist coup of July 1936. Some were “indiscriminate killings” but most were against supporters of fascism and in revenge (for example, in the early 1920s, the bosses in Barcelona organised death squads to kill anarchist union organisers). From what I gather, the right-”libertarian” position on the Spanish anarchists is that they are should not have fought Franco as the few “indiscriminate killings” that resulted from doing so makes the Spanish Revolution a bad thing. Strange logic, I have to admit (and best not mention the bloody record of US labour relations in the 19th and early 20th centuries!).

    And talking of Facism, I really need to provide this quote from von Mises. It is from about 1927 and he stated that “cannot be denied that Fascism and similar movements aiming at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and that their intervention has, for the moment, saved European civilisation. The merit that Fascism has thereby won for itself will live eternally in history.” (Liberalism, p. 51). I should note that the Italian anarchists, like their Spanish comrades, fought fascism tooth-and-nail.


  517. Dunc

    Another way of dealing with Libertarians is to point out that their Libertarian Paradise already exisits - it’s called Somalia.


  518. Wei Zhu

    Brian Miller wrote:
    like to claim a “superior knowledge of history‿ based on your reading of books written by fellow lefties (as opposed to actual experience),

    As a scientist with an interest in history, I found this statement intriguing. I have to ask: where did you get your time machine that allowed you to learn history through actual experience? I would like to visit the time of Emperor GĿozǔ.


  519. Wei Zhu

    That’s also incorrect. I lived in the UK and Canada, and the tax burdens of both societies are considerably higher for “national insurance‿ than in the USA. The delta in UK national insurance tax and US tax was about four times the cost of private health insurance in the USA.

    While the tax burdens of the UK is higher than the US, it’s not because of universal health insurance. UK health care costs far less than US: 7.6% of GDP for the UK compared to 14.6% for the US (figures are from 2002.)

    And even funnier, most Britons who can get private health insurance do so, because the “universal system‿ that you’re so keen on is atrocious at delivering services. People don’t want to wait in line to see a GP with a four week wait, wait decades to get routine transplant operations, or die of a chronic condition because the government’s rationing system failed.

    It’s not as bad as you make it out to be (I’ve lived in the UK), but the UK has the worst universal health care system. The real problem with the UK health system isn’t that it’s universal (look at France’s wonderful system) but that reimbursement is done via capitation instead of fee for service, like many other universal health care systems.

    Why not make your comparisons against France, which has one of the better universal health care systems, despite spending less than half what the US does per capita? France not only has better outcomes (lifespan, etc) but more hospital beds and more physicians.


  520. bleah

    Phoenician —

    I agree with you on the intellectual property thing. I don’t believe in IP. I think what’s going on with patents, esp., is appalling. A lot of libertarians are against intellectual “property” actually, which mostly serves to enrich corporations.

    So, let me see if I have this straight - you’re claiming that there exists a right to property prior to any social recognition of such right, that violating this right is “force‿ - and you’re using legal terms developed from American case law (and not universal) as proof?

    No. I’d imagine that even pretty primitive humans had a concept of “mine” though - even if they didn’t apply that concept to land. I sorta think that creating things — tools, works of art, etc. — is part of the essence of what it meansto be human, and that’s why I don’t buy this distinction people here are drawing between property rights and personal rights.

    I cited the legal definition of force — which comes from English common law not American case law — to show that non-libertarians commonly talk of theft and trespassing as an act of force (not physical force, but force in the sense that you’ve deprived someone of their property). A lot of libertarians are pro-common law, which is not to say it is perfect.

    Basically I’m just defending us libs from your accusation that we’re somehow twisting the definition of the word “force.”

    While the Wikipedia article doesn’t directly support my case (my definition is from the ‘Lectric Law Dictionary), the example of a “forced sale” shows just how broad the term can be. Also “constructive force.” As commonly used the word “force” can include a lot more than just physical violence.


  521. durr

    Dang, late to the party again! (Long long weekend).

    Chris, and other pandagonians,
    I realize your target is the extremist libertarian but I do think you have some things wrong about this critter as well. I won’t go into it as I think there’s been enough contention already. But just a few points:

    Some of us didn’t get off the Rand bandwagon as we never even got on it. I wasn’t attracted to libertarianism by “The Virtue of Selfishnes” or John Galt’s Insufferable Inability to come to the point. I was attracted by the notion of grass roots or bottom up problem solving through voluntary cooperation and coordination. Since everything done by the state is based on coercion, I was attracted to non-state ways to approaching social needs. The market might be one form of this - when the market works best (leaving aside corporate dominance for now) but other forms can be NGOs, NPOs, churches, and a host of other sorts of voluntary associations.

    Anyway, we might be more in agreement than disagreement when we line up the issues and values. “Can’t we all just get along?”


  522. Riggald

    Brian said: “Sorry, I’m not a Democrat — I tend to go with the common, straightforward definition of words rather than tortured nuances.”
    ———–

    Interesting. I’d like to hear more. Such as your clear and easily articulated definition of successful.

    ———–
    Brian said: “When I talk about successful countries, I’m talking about countries that were successful ”
    ———–

    Ah, well, that makes your definition so much clearer.


  523. Riggald

    Brian said: ““superior knowledge of history‿ based on your reading of books written by fellow lefties (as opposed to actual experience)”
    ————–

    So you’re saying that it’s actual experience of history that provides knowledge of knowledge, rather than ‘book larnin'’? counts

    I think that we ought to be recruiting *much* older teachers of mediaeval and classical history then.


  524. As a longtime libertarian, I agree with just about everything you’re saying. Much of what you’re describing has been labeled by left libertarians as vulgar libertarianism - that is, using the language of liberty to explain away the oppression of supposed bulwarks of freedom like big business.

    If we could just convince libertarians that corporations ARE the State, that alone would move us all closer to a true freedom movement in this country.


  525. No. I’d imagine that even pretty primitive humans had a concept of “mine‿ though - even if they didn’t apply that concept to land.

    Quite true - but the salient point here is that this does not mean there is any such thing as a property right inherent in nature. Primitive humans also had a concept of the bigger, stronger person having a right to take from the weaker which was in tension with this idea of ownership. Usually it was resolved as “we have the right to take and the right to own - those others don’t”.

    I sorta think that creating things — tools, works of art, etc. — is part of the essence of what it meansto be human, and that’s why I don’t buy this distinction people here are drawing between property rights and personal rights.

    Your conclusion doesn’t follow from your premise. Even given that creating tools is an essential part of being human, (i) your tools are not you, (ii) your tools are ephemeral - they come and go and (iii) your right to use those tools has and always has been bounded in a social context. Property rights are not civil rights; at best they are instrumental goods in the pursuit of actual civil rights (property necessary for personal survival, for example), and at worst merely agreed tokens for economic convenience.

    I cited the legal definition of force — which comes from English common law not American case law — to show that non-libertarians commonly talk of theft and trespassing as an act of force (not physical force, but force in the sense that you’ve deprived someone of their property).

    In common usage, theft and burglary are not (necessarily) acts of force. Citing legal terms doesn’t change this - I also question how wide such usage is in various legal codes, given the Wikipedia comments on the matter.


  526. bleah

    Quite true - but the salient point here is that this does not mean there is any such thing as a property right inherent in nature. Primitive humans also had a concept of the bigger, stronger person having a right to take from the weaker which was in tension with this idea of ownership. Usually it was resolved as “we have the right to take and the right to own - those others don’t‿.

    Yeah, and those primitive humans also had a concept where it was okay to rape and beat people up. What is your point, exactly?

    Even given that creating tools is an essential part of being human, (i) your tools are not you, (ii) your tools are ephemeral - they come and go and (iii) your right to use those tools has and always has been bounded in a social context. Property rights are not civil rights; at best they are instrumental goods in the pursuit of actual civil rights (property necessary for personal survival, for example), and at worst merely agreed tokens for economic convenience.

    Allrights have been “bounded in a social context.” Some societies say you have a right to an abortion, others don’t. Some say you have a right to free speech, others don’t.

    I certainly disagree that property rights are “instrumental goods in pursuit of actual civil rights” — people really can have very very strong attachments to, say, heirlooms and such. I don’t see why my right to keep my grandfather’s pocketwatch from some bully should be any less important than my right to free speech. Both are worth defending. Even on communes people have their own toothbrushes …

    Regarding legal codes — I don’t want to quibble with you on this. I think I’ve shown that libertarians aren’t “redefining” the word but using it in an accepted legalistic way, although perhaps not in the common usage. If it really bothers you that much I’d be happy to restate the libertarian axiom in another way. Basically libertarians want people to be free from coercion and to be left alone to quietly enjoy their lives and property.


  527. bleah

    Phoenicians - Just thinking about this a little more — do you think that there are any rights “inherent in nature”? I sure don’t. We might talk about having a “right to be free from assault,” but that’s just shorthand for saying we think assault is unjust, contrary to human nature, and societies function better when assault is banned.

    The same for free speech rights and property rights, IMHO.

    You obviously place a different importance on the value of property rights than I do. Naturally I think my conception makes more sense, is more just and allows most people to be happier and more prosperous. But it isn’t that either of us are “right” or “wrong.”

    Rights — property or otherwise — are just man-made philosophical constructs we invent to express ideas. They don’t exist in nature, unless you think they are “granted to us by God.”


  528. hominidx

    I’ll just echo what Jeremy said:
    http://pandagon.net/2007/02/23/how-to-explain-things-to-libertarians/#comment-369204

    An amusing read, I agree on many points, but of course the follow up dog-piling made me think about how all Asians are really good at math.


  529. Studier of Political Philosophy

    Locke started the modern Libertarian movement, notvPierre-Joseph Proudhon.


  530. Yeah, and those primitive humans also had a concept where it was okay to rape and beat people up. What is your point, exactly?

    That citing them to establish a supposed “inherent” right to property is not productive.

    I don’t see why my right to keep my grandfather’s pocketwatch from some bully should be any less important than my right to free speech.

    Alas for your passionate comment, I’m not making the argument against that. Free speech is also not an inherent right - by any means. Indeed, it has had to be established and continues to be fought for every day in even the most advanced societies. My argument is against the assumption that property is an inherent right, existing prior to society.

    . Basically libertarians want people to be free from coercion and to be left alone to quietly enjoy their lives and property.

    As do liberals. T

    he problem is that liberals see “freedom” and “coercion” as complex items - people are coerced by their bellies and their health; people have their freedom circumscribed by fear, by ignorance, by poverty, by bad luck and by lack of security. Liberals do not regard government as a god; rather they see that, in line with historical experience, government can be a useful tool in securing real freedom in a complex world. They get frustrated with liberatarians because they seem them as priding themselves in adopting a facile and foolish simplification based on fantasy without reference to actual reality or experience.


  531. bleah

    people have their freedom circumscribed by fear, by ignorance, by poverty, by bad luck and by lack of security

    I don’t think that any except the most dogmatic of libertarians would deny this. But we don’t see it as a reason to enact what I’ll call “legal coercion” (to differentiate from the types of coercion you describe).

    If you want to look at “actual reality or experience” - the state’s utter failure in helping people whose freedom has been circumscribed by poverty is pretty well-documented. Most Americans understand that the “Great Society,” public housing, food stamps, SSDI, etc. etc. has been a disaster. Far from helping people (overall) it’s really created a huge underclass.

    People can have their freedom circumscribed by poverty, true, but also by a welfare state that encourages dependency and reduces incentives to work.


  532. I don’t think that any except the most dogmatic of libertarians would deny this. But we don’t see it as a reason to enact what I’ll call “legal coercion‿ (to differentiate from the types of coercion you describe).

    Which part of “government can be a useful tool in securing real freedom in a complex world” did you have problems reading?

    If you want to look at “actual reality or experience‿ - the state’s utter failure in helping people whose freedom has been circumscribed by poverty is pretty well-documented.

    Just the opposite, actually. Modern states have done an incredible amount to promote actual freedom due to poverty. Mass education, literacy, vaccination, public hygeine, research - and welfare.

    Most Americans understand that the “Great Society,‿ public housing, food stamps, SSDI, etc. etc. has been a disaster.

    A disaster by what exact metrics, please? Living standards, life span, infant mortality rates? Please be specific.

    Far from helping people (overall) it’s really created a huge underclass.

    Please define “huge” here. Now, welfare dependency may be a problem - I strongly suspect it looms far larger in your mind than the actual statistics call for. However, what this means is that there are always side-effects and problems associated with any solution.

    All in all, welfare states (the Great Society programs in the US) have been good for the citizens and society of states that have implemented them. Not an unmitigated good, or without problems, but good overall. Try actually learning from history, rather than participating in a libertarian echo chamber.


  533. drphilosopher

    “Libertarianism originated in the philosophy of a left-wing French political philosopher who also influenced Karl Marx.‿

    This is simply false. Where do you dig up this rubbish?

    It is funny how so many people think they are being oppressed by reality (hunger, cold, sore feet, etc.) but are perfectly happy to hand over control of their lives to supposedly benevolent government bureaucrats. Idiots!

    Give me liberty or give me death!

    Yours in Liberty,

    Darrell


  534. bleah

    Which part of “government can be a useful tool in securing real freedom in a complex world‿ did you have problems reading?

    Err, maybe you need to re-read what I wrote, and the comment I was responding to. Anarcho-libertarians like me are not against government services such as police, fire, roads, libraries, certain aid to the poor, etc. We just think they can exist and be funded without legal coercion, and would in fact be far more efficient for it.

    “A disaster by what exact metrics, please?” A disaster in terms of the people who get sucked up into welfare dependency and never get out … who never manage to make something of their lives … who live all their lives in the projects.

    By what standards or metric do you think welfare states have been good for citizens and societies? LBJ thought we were going to wipe out poverty, completely prevent it. Thirty years later, do you think we’ve come close?

    If you’re really interested in the statistics, read Charles Murray’s “Losing Ground.” Or better yet, go walk around a housing project and compare the lives of the people there to the immigrants who come to this country to work.

    How big is the underclass? I’m not going to venture to offer an exact figure, but if anything a much larger problem than people realize. Certainly in the millions. I think a lot of people saw that in New Orleans after Katrina. By underclass I should stipulate that I don’t mean “poor” or disadvantaged but people cut off from the basic building blocks of society: productive work, family, community.

    The underclass is essentially the creation of the welfare state (although the war on drugs certainly also played a role). Look at the destruction of the black family … slavery didn’t destroy black families; after Emancipation former slaves went to great lengths to be reunited with their loved ones. Now in black communities fatherlessness is epidemic. Liberals who created the welfare state should have to pay reparations, IMHO.


  535. By what standards or metric do you think welfare states have been good for citizens and societies?

    A drop in the number of people eating dogfood, perhaps? I refer you to this paper again.

    Anarcho-libertarians like me are not against government services such as police, fire, roads, libraries, certain aid to the poor, etc. We just think they can exist and be funded without legal coercion, and would in fact be far more efficient for it.

    They can, they were, they weren’t, That’s why the public took them over.

    By underclass I should stipulate that I don’t mean “poor‿ or disadvantaged but people cut off from the basic building blocks of society: productive work, family, community.

    I think we need some indication of just how big a problem this is first, and I would also like to see some backing as to your claim that “the underclass is essentially the creation of the welfare state”. The welfare state may play some part, but a considerable part of it has to include examining such things as the hollowing out of cities, the growth and consolidation of jobs into mega-corporations such as Walmart, the growth in income inequality since the eighties, drugs, racism, or tertiary education as an important stepping stone towards any real career. The use of one simple facile explanation is another example of the sloppy thinking that irritates people about libertarianism.


  536. And, bleah, check this story out.

    If the welfare state is responsible for “the underclass”, why has the number of severely poor Americans surged up by 26 percent from 2000 to 2005?

    What about the comment: “Severe poverty is worst near the Mexican border and in some areas of the South, where 6.5 million severely poor residents are struggling to find work as manufacturing jobs in the textile, apparel and furniture-making industries disappear“?

    And how exactly do you explain “With the exception of Mexico and Russia, the U.S. devotes the smallest portion of its gross domestic product to federal anti-poverty programs, and those programs are among the least effective at reducing poverty, the study found. Again, only Russia and Mexico do worse jobs“?


  537. francis

    “If the welfare state is responsible for “the underclass‿, why has the number of severely poor Americans surged up by 26 percent from 2000 to 2005?”

    Could it be, at least partly, that definitions of what constitutes ‘poverty’ is responsible for this? If at one time, the poverty line is described as making less than 5,000 a year, and then it is boosted up to 10,000 a year, you could expect to see a lot more people added to your poverty statistic.


  538. Could it be, at least partly, that definitions of what constitutes ‘poverty’ is responsible for this?

    Cite?


  539. Bleah:

    By what standards or metric do you think welfare states have been good for citizens and societies?

    Well, for instance a recent study showed that children have a much better life in the welfare states. I don’t have the link handy, but it studied parameters such as poverty, happiness, education, how well they got on with their parents and so on and on top of the list were countries like Sweden, Finland and Denmark whereas USA did poorly.

    I’d say that children’s happiness ranks pretty damn high in my list of “what societies should aim for” ranking.


  540. Gary B

    You can usually blow up a science/engineering Libertarian by noting that no long term research would be done in a Libertarian society — it just has no payback for the funder, but big payback for the freeloading adopter.

    Or, for every case where Government “can do no right”, there’s an internet or public health system.

    Finally, Libertarianism is built on the fine notion of “no coercion” … but who watches the watcher? Ah, everyone owns a gun…. better make that an H bomb.

    No, the best you can do is to expand the Founders best insight: balance of power. We could expand this in many more ways than exist now and it is the best that we can do.


  541. It amuses me that libertarians don’t really want to live in the way they propagandize. The British didn’t want to run their own country the way they ran Hong Kong before they handed it back to China; libertarians haven’t flocked to the allegedly functional anarcho-capitalist society in Somalia; and even Murray Rothbard gladly took a job at the tax-funded University of Nevada instead of living at the mercy of the market according to his own explicit principles. The libertarian philosophy just doesn’t work in the real world.


  542. Finlander

    Makis: “Well, for instance a recent study showed that children have a much better life in the welfare states. […] parameters such as poverty, happiness, education, how well they got on with their parents and so on and on top of the list were countries like Sweden, Finland and Denmark whereas USA did poorly.

    Those studies get printed here all the time (in Finland), so I’m well aware of them. But please realize that extenuating social conditions here in the Nordics are very different than in America. We live in a portion of the world that’s been isolated (largely by language barrier) form the rest of the world. It’s highly homogeneous, so there’s less tendency for self-segregation; most of America’s poverty can be traced to ethnicity—at least when considering relative proportions. There’s the ex-slave population, etc. Also the Nordics are sparsely populated. Finland has 5M, Sweden about 8M people, etc. You can’t compare them with the US.

    Another poster mentioned a lack of federal funding in the US….. I would recommend leaving social programs to individual States. The federal government is simply can’t oversee 300M people effectively. At most, there should be partially matched federal funding to help the states. But federal programs per se will not be ineffective in such a large country.

    I’m NOT one of those who believes in Libertarian theoretics; especially not at the extreme philosophical end. But the libertarian decentralization-of-power concept does make sense. But there should be government at those lower levels. You can’t just leave everything to be decided by corporations and wealthy individuals.

    Also, America should concentrate on better urban planning. Bike paths, public transit, well-built housing (instead of those cheap plastic boxes) will help for having a better society. I list many things, but that will require too much space here……


  543. >But please realize that extenuating social conditions here in the Nordics are very >different than in America.

    Well, Netherlands ranked quite high on that list, as well. And they don’t have the advantages you listed.


  544. bleah

    Phoenicians — doesn’t that article exactly support my thesis? We’ve spent trillions on anti-poverty programs, yet the problem is getting worse, not better.

    “What appears to be taking place is that, over the long term, you have a significant permanent underclass that is not being impacted by anti-poverty policies,” said Michael Tanner, the director of Health and Welfare Studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.

    The idea that people would be “eating dogfood” without anti-poverty programs is laughable. Illegal immigrants come here without speaking the language, without being able to work legally … and they manage to survive by working like hell. They’ll probably go on to have working-class kids and grandkids who go to college.

    It’s the people in the public housing, surviving on food stamps, who will have the kids who get pregnant at age 15 and who sire children with five different women. That is a total invention of the welfare state, which enables that type of behavior. It’s not Wal-Mart or “racism” or anything like that.

    I don’t deny the disappearing manufacturing jobs are responsible by some poverty, but by underclass I don’t mean poor. Someone living on $16,000 a year in America might be poor by U.S. standards, but by global standards they’ve doing alright. And if they just manage to finish high school, get married and delay having kids until age 30, their odds are very good they won’t stay in poverty.

    How do I explain that “With the exception of Mexico and Russia, the U.S. devotes the smallest portion of its gross domestic product to federal anti-poverty programs”?

    How do you explain that the U.S. has a unemployment rate half that of Europe, and a more vibrant economy?

    How do you explain the millions of disaffected youth in Europe, all the slackers who never get jobs ‘cause they can survive on the dole? How do you explain the Muslim extremists who aren’t integrated into society (see riots in France) vs. the much more comparably benign situation here — where immigrants are forced to work rather than survive on welfare?

    Personally, I’d say it’s because the U.S. devoted the smallest portion of its GDP to federal anti-poverty programs. But that’s just me.


  545. bleah

    You can usually blow up a science/engineering Libertarian by noting that no long term research would be done in a Libertarian society — it just has no payback for the funder, but big payback for the freeloading adopter.

    Uh, please. What a ridiculous statement. Ever heard of the Michael Milken Foundation? The George Soros Foundation, which researches public health initiatives. All the private money put into researching breast cancer? The Gates Foundation?

    Private foundations would play a much bigger role in a libertarian society. And while private universities wouldn’t get subsidizes for research, that doesn’t mean they woudln’t carry it out.

    Finally, Libertarianism is built on the fine notion of “no coercion‿ … but who watches the watcher? Ah, everyone owns a gun…. better make that an H bomb.

    Well, what’s to stop George W. Bush from canceling the 2008 election and appointing himself dictator? Who watches the watcher there?

    Power would be diffused in a libertarian society, so there’d be a lot of different watchers. There’d still be police departments, you just wouldn’t have to pay for ‘em if you didn’t want to.


  546. bleah:

    How do you explain the millions of disaffected youth in Europe, all the slackers who never get jobs ’cause they can survive on the dole? How do you explain the Muslim extremists who aren’t integrated into society (see riots in France) vs. the much more comparably benign situation here — where immigrants are forced to work rather than survive on welfare?

    Isn’t the US system similar, the people on dole are just in prison which is much more costly? USA has the, AFAIK, the highest percentage of it’s population behind bars in the world.

    More vibrant economy? Uh, sure. It’s easy to keep it that way when someone keeps on borrowing money. How much do you owe to China now? 1.5 trillion dollars?

    As for the slackers, yes, there are some. I think the same dudes in the US sell drugs and end up in prisons… part of the population simply is that way. If they don’t get money from the state, they get it some other way without having to work.


  547. “What appears to be taking place is that, over the long term, you have a significant permanent underclass that is not being impacted by anti-poverty policies,‿ said Michael Tanner, the director of Health and Welfare Studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.

    And then they quoted a liberal think tank saying the opposite - the “he said, she said” school of padding out a story.

    The idea that people would be “eating dogfood‿ without anti-poverty programs is laughable.

    You really have no idea of the history behind your social welfare system, do you?

    Someone living on $16,000 a year in America might be poor by U.S. standards, but by global standards they’ve doing alright.

    This comes down to relative vs absolute pay - but the threshold for extreme poverty is, IIRC, around 9,500 a year.

    How do you explain that the U.S. has a unemployment rate half that of Europe, and a more vibrant economy?

    You mean apart from having a lower productivity per hour than France, living off an unsustainable level of foreign investment, shoving a significant proportion of the unemployed off the statistics, and running a prison system which serves to soak off about 0.5% as prisoners and perhaps another 0.25% as warders?

    How do you explain the millions of disaffected youth in Europe, all the slackers who never get jobs ’cause they can survive on the dole?

    Overblown factoids - halfway between distortion and outright propaganda. Please provide statistical evidence showing the actual size of this “disaffected youth” (don’t forget to include proportions, and comparisons to teh US “underclass”…)


  548. bleah

    You seem like a real zealot for statistics Phoenicians. But you don’t need to be able to quantify something to know it exists. I can see you saying after the Watts riots, “Please provide statistical evidence showing the actual size of this ‘disaffected youth.’” If you don’t believe from reading the headlines that there’s more alienated youth in France than in the U.S., I’m not going to try to persuade you.

    Makis: We certainly have a lot more people in prison than Europe. But the total U.S. prison population is 2.2 million, compared to a total civilian workforce of 150 million. Even if you assume every single one of those prisoners was unemployed (a dubious assumption; many are nonviolent offenders who were just involved in the drug trade), then the US unemployment rate would still only be around 7%. Compare to 8-10% in western Europe.

    More vibrant economy? Uh, sure. It’s easy to keep it that way when someone keeps on borrowing money. How much do you owe to China now? 1.5 trillion dollars?

    Umm I don’t think you know what you’re talking about here. Yes the federal government is running a deficit. But running a deficit doesn’t make it “easy” to have a more vibrant economy, it makes it harder. The federal government has to borrow money that could be used more productively by the private sector for jobs and investments. You saw in the 90s when Clinton cut the deficit, the economy soared.

    As for the slackers, yes, there are some. I think the same dudes in the US sell drugs and end up in prisons… part of the population simply is that way. If they don’t get money from the state, they get it some other way without having to work.

    So you’re totally discounting the power of incentives? It’s just that part of the population is “simply that way” … they aren’t influenced at all by the choices that are offered to them? That seems pretty bizarre, but whatever…


  549. bleah

    A little more on incentives. We live in a very prosperous country … basically any able-bodied person who puts a little effort in can succeed. Get a job at McDonald’s; go to night school and get an associates degree; get a job as a barber or bank teller or hairdresser or a secretary… THEN get married, THEN have kids and THEN buy a house. There you go, the American dream.

    But for people who are on the bottom rung, getting that fast-food job while attending night school can look pretty intimidating versus just staying on welfare, living on public subsidies and staying where you are. It’s human nature.


  550. Finlander

    Makis: “Well, Netherlands ranked quite high on that list, as well. And they don’t have the advantages you listed.

    That’s a good point. I’ve lived in the Netherlands off-and-on because of work. Indeed it doesn’t have the ‘advantages’ of homogeneity, former isolation, etc. that I attribute to the Nordics. But it doesn’t have the self-segregation element like in the US either; historically, Holland is a very tolerant society. Also, the Dutch aren’t what I’d consider high-stress, culturally speaking. The whole American work-hard/play-hard ethos hasn’t caught-on (thankfully!). And, generally, Holland follows the normal European social model whereby education and healthcare is paid collectively by taxpayers. No doubt, it’s a contributing factor to the reported “happiness.”

    Few people know that the US actually has ‘free’ healthcare and education for those who can’t afford it. But, for those who earn (or own) slightly too much (perhaps lower-middle class persons), it’s neither ‘free’ nor affordable. Education must be paid-for out of pocket or with big loans, and medical fees will be collected via personal assets (if one’s employer or oneself doesn’t provide health insurance).

    I would argue that this contributes to a lot of stress in the US. For a large portion of the population, it’s a struggle to keep from slipping into a hole. It’s not pleasant for them, and in my opinion it causes lots of unnecessary hostility in the US. By the way, I have also lived there.

    And as I initially stated, any universal healthcare or education initiatives should be approached at the more granular State level. It’s the only way to maintain high levels of service. Waiting lines for healthcare are horrible.

    Makis: “Isn’t the US system similar, the people on dole are just in prison which is much more costly? USA has the, AFAIK, the highest percentage of it’s population behind bars in the world.

    Amazingly disgraceful, isn’t it? Since most are in jail because of drug offenses, I’ll be the first to put-on my Libertarian hat and follow the Dutch example: All drugs should be decriminalized. Emphasis on soft drugs. It’ll probably empty-out quite a few prisons.

    Phoenecian….: “You mean apart from having a lower productivity per hour than France…..

    I think most Americans take vacations at their work desks. Europeans have 4-, 5- or 6-weeks vacations; even lower-status workers. Makes sense to me. Productivity figures seem to prove it, but we need to realize that productivity has many attributing factors. Labor is only one of them. Capital investment in equipment is another. Materials are yet another, etc. If nothing else, I do believe it contributes to a happier and more motivated society. So it’s worth it, IMO.

    bleah: “How do you explain the millions of disaffected youth in Europe, all the slackers who never get jobs ’cause they can survive on the dole?

    I don’t think that “the dole” is the cause. One doesn’t earn very much money that way, so purchasing nice things like home electronics is seriously hindered. But I do think there’s a problem. The loss of manufacturing and practical jobs—ones that don’t require lots of education—have gone away for now. Not everyone is suited to…..well, to wear a suit :-)

    Of course, there’s also the service sector…. That’s where the high-tax/low-consumption economy hurts us; especially here in the Nordics. That segment of the economy is rather anemic and overpriced—e.g.—restaurants are largely empty. Not enough jobs there as a result. And we also have central wage agreements that need to be made more flexible, to allow varied working hours, etc. Our minimarkets close at 21:00 during tourist season. How dumb is that? Also, nobody starts businesses here anymore. Everyone goes straight to low-tax eastern Europe. The jobs go there too. We’ll need to come to grips with these things eventually. I’d rather see it done sooner, rather than later.

    Believe it or not, there’s actually high EMPloyment at the corporate level, but those workers aren’t usually the ones who’d cause problems if they were to become unemployed.


  551. You seem like a real zealot for statistics Phoenicians.

    That’s right - I’ve been proven wrong with statistics before.

    But you don’t need to be able to quantify something to know it exists.

    That’s what the Scientologists and Creationists say, too.

    If you don’t believe from reading the headlines that there’s more alienated youth in France than in the U.S., I’m not going to try to persuade you.

    Gee - a headline on US Today, hmm? How persuasive. You do know the difference between an anecdote and data, right?

    Let me see - how would you look at “alienated youth”? What would be an indicator?

    Should we look at youth suicide rates, perhaps?

    “How much do you owe to China now? 1.5 trillion dollars?”

    Umm I don’t think you know what you’re talking about here. Yes the federal government is running a deficit.

    Er, you *do* know what a trade deficit is, as opposed to a budget deficit, right? You know, in between telling other people they don’t know what they’re talking about…

    We live in a very prosperous country … basically any able-bodied person who puts a little effort in can succeed.

    Although, strangely enough, the statistics say otherwise - income mobility is becoming less flexible in the US over time, and now lags behind a couple of Western European countries.


  552. For what it’s worth, I reply to this post with one of mine.


  553. The Future Chances for Liberty…

    Jacob Sullum reveals some bad news (although not that surprising): nanny statists are found in both the Republican and Democratic Parties.
    Although Democrats frequently are portrayed as meddling do-gooders eager to save you from yourself, they are no…


  554. Bleah:

    Makis: We certainly have a lot more people in prison than Europe. But the total U.S. prison population is 2.2 million, compared to a total civilian workforce of 150 million. Even if you assume every single one of those prisoners was unemployed (a dubious assumption; many are nonviolent offenders who were just involved in the drug trade), then the US unemployment rate would still only be around 7%. Compare to 8-10% in western Europe.

    But suddenly the gap doesn’t look that big anymore, does it? J

    Bleah:

    Umm I don’t think you know what you’re talking about here. Yes the federal government is running a deficit. But running a deficit doesn’t make it “easy‿ to have a more vibrant economy, it makes it harder. The federal government has to borrow money that could be used more productively by the private sector for jobs and investments. You saw in the 90s when Clinton cut the deficit, the economy soared.

    Effectively China and Japan have given you a total loan of around 2 trillion dollars. A lot of this money has gone into paying wars. And this money has gone to weapon’s manufacturers (which are located in the US), wages and to subcontractors (Halliburton etc). I bet you could boost the EU economy if someone gave us 2 trillion dollars to spend.


    Bleah:

    So you’re totally discounting the power of incentives? It’s just that part of the population is “simply that way‿ … they aren’t influenced at all by the choices that are offered to them? That seems pretty bizarre, but whatever…

    Well, I don’t know how well you know these people. I have met some and know what makes them tick. Or not, in this case. Many of them (and there really aren’t that many) just don’t want to work eight to five. I would almost go as far as to say they are unable to do that. If forced to work (and usually you are required to take up a job if offered by the agency) they just slack at the workplace. Many of these would rather do something like push soft drugs or do similar if the only other choice of making a living was to work.

    And that US Today article doesn’t prove anything. It’s not like there hasn’t been protests in the US is it? Besides, French are very keen on those things. It doesn’t require much to get a couple of million Frenchmen to protest against something.

    One of the main problems in Europe are the immigrants who don’t integrate into the society. They live among themselves and unemployment rates are very high. This situation is very much comparable to the slums in major US cities and many of the reasons are the same as well.


  555. Don Jones

    I don’t deny the disappearing manufacturing jobs are responsible by some poverty, but by underclass I don’t mean poor. Someone living on $16,000 a year in America might be poor by U.S. standards, but by global standards they’ve doing alright.

    Comparing dollars directly across cultures is meaningless, because $16,000 would make you well off in a third world nation but wouldn’t be enough to pay for the cheapest housing in major US cities. You might attempt to argue that the person could move to the third world country to improve their situation, but of course, they wouldn’t be making anywhere near $16,000 a year there for the same job.


  556. bleah

    Phoenicians - Well, I feel like when I do cite statistics you tend to dismiss them. Like the US unemployment rate being half that of Europe’s. I mean I’m sure that the US does “shov[e] a significant proportion of the unemployed off the statistics” but I have no reason to think that it does so more than European countries like France.

    And the crowds at these French protests were estimated at 500,000. To me that is not an anecdote but evidence. However to each their own.

    Er, you *do* know what a trade deficit is, as opposed to a budget deficit, right? You know, in between telling other people they don’t know what they’re talking about…

    But your comments was, How much do you owe to China now? 1.5 trillion dollars? The trade deficit isn’t “owed,” it’s paid for. All it means is that we buy a lot more stuff from them than they buy from us. It’s not a bad thing or something to be concerned about … it’s really a function of how poor most Chinese are, that they can’t afford US products.

    I just played around with the Times income mobility graphic from their series on class; it is interesting. But I don’t think that the statistics say contradict what I’m saying. The key phrase in my point was that anyone able-bodied who “puts a little effort in” can succeed (or at least, become middle-class).


  557. I admit I haven’t read Cyberselfish, but you may find this review of it enlightening.


  558. Er… US treasure securities are “trade deficit”?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._public_debt

    And so what there were 500,000 protestors? One event is just an anectode and the reason for that protest was that the government wanted to change the laws regulating working conditions. It would have made it much easier for companies to sack young employees and naturally people affected protested. And as I said, the French like their protests.


  559. Phoenicians - Well, I feel like when I do cite statistics you tend to dismiss them. Like the US unemployment rate being half that of Europe’s.

    A slight overstatement, but one that can be lived with. My point about US stats was that teh US is more aggressive in bumping people off teh unemployment rolls whether they have a job or not.

    But your comments was, How much do you owe to China now? 1.5 trillion dollars?

    Actually, it was someone else who made that comment - I’m not sure of teh actual figure.

    The trade deficit isn’t “owed,‿ it’s paid for. All it means is that we buy a lot more stuff from them than they buy from us. It’s not a bad thing or something to be concerned about … it’s really a function of how poor most Chinese are, that they can’t afford US products.

    Oh dear.

    It’s “paid for” in the same way a credit card debt is “paid for” - the Chinese hold interest bearing claims over Americans (mainly Treasury Bills). You buy now, you both pay later AND pay interest. That’s fine if it’s a one off - if you’re continually drawing on your credit card, getting deeper and deeper into debt, you’re in trouble.

    And it is not a function of how poor the Chinese are - we live in a world of floating exchange rates. It’s a function of a mismatch between American investments and domestic savings. Go read Paul Krugman’s _Pop Internationalism_ and get back to us.


  560. Ah, ok. I now realised what this trade deficit talk is. It doesn’t change my point. Effectively, US has run a massive trade deficit which I could argue is the same as “getting loads of stuff for free” just because other countries (China in particular) has allowed it.

    Let’s say you and I both have our own “currencies” which we can make ourselves. We use these currencies to pay different services to each other. Consider the scenario where I do a lot more for you than you for me. So I get a bigger and bigger stash of your notes (you just print new ones every time you need). It only works as long as I accept those notes. If I feel your deficit grows too big I can refuse to deal with those notes any more, or even start selling your notes to others. But because I have so many they are not worth that much. But this also means the notes you own and make loose value.

    If the value of the dollar drops dramatically it would lead to massive problems in the US. Price of oil for instance would soar, as would any other imports, which would lead to a drop in people’s living standards.


  561. Ah, ok. I now realised what this trade deficit talk is. It doesn’t change my point. Effectively, US has run a massive trade deficit which I could argue is the same as “getting loads of stuff for free‿ just because other countries (China in particular) has allowed it.

    And you’d be wrong - the bank doesn’t give you money for free, and foreign countries don’t give you stuff for free.

    Let’s say you and I both have our own “currencies‿ which we can make ourselves. We use these currencies to pay different services to each other. Consider the scenario where I do a lot more for you than you for me. So I get a bigger and bigger stash of your notes (you just print new ones every time you need). It only works as long as I accept those notes. If I feel your deficit grows too big I can refuse to deal with those notes any more, or even start selling your notes to others. But because I have so many they are not worth that much. But this also means the notes you own and make loose value.

    Jesus H Christ on a Pogo Stick at the Davos Conference. Have you ever heard an old proverb about grandmothers and sucking eggs? Do you see me lecturing you about how these “letter” thingies can be used to form “words” with which people can “communicate”?

    Go *read* _Pop Internationalism_. It’s the most readable explanation of the realities of foreign exchange I’ve seen in a very long time spent reading economic texts, and I think it would fill in a few gaps you seem to have based on your comments above.


  562. bleah

    It’s “paid for‿ in the same way a credit card debt is “paid for‿ - the Chinese hold interest bearing claims over Americans (mainly Treasury Bills). You buy now, you both pay later AND pay interest. That’s fine if it’s a one off - if you’re continually drawing on your credit card, getting deeper and deeper into debt, you’re in trouble.

    But that’s not the trade deficit, that’s the budget deficit, no? The trade deficit just stems from the US importing a lot of consumer electronics, textiles, etc. from China. It’s just stems from the US being an affluent society with a lot of conspicious consumption.

    The Treasury Bills - that’s back to the budget deficit. What you say is right, we are getting deeper and deeper into debt. But running a budget deficit doesn’t help the economy - it just allows the government to spend money without raising taxes. (Okay, you could argue that a some federal spending does help the economy - on research, infrastructure, job training, education, etc. I’d argue that those things could be done more efficently by the private sector, but whatever…)

    I mean look if we hadn’t gone to war in Iraq we’d probably be running a budget surplus by now. The budget deficit is a tricky problem, but only in the same political sense like Medicaid and Social Security are tricky problems. There are a lot of obv. solutions, it’s just a question of summoning the political will to fix them.


  563. Finlander

    bleah: You saw in the 90s when Clinton cut the deficit, the economy soared.

    Wasn’t it the Republican congress that denied him the ability to spend any money? I sort of remember some publicity stunt of shutting down the government…. Remember that Newt guy?

    Anyway, with Iraq, it looks like the Republicans have undone anything good they’ve achieved previously.


  564. But that’s not the trade deficit, that’s the budget deficit, no?

    The trade deficit is an excess of claims over American assets by the Chinese againt Chinese assets by Americans. These claims can be corporate or public debt; Treasury Bills are a major holding, especially for the Chinese central bank. The budget deficit is financed by selling Treasury Bills; that you also run a trade deficit means many of these Bills will be held by foreigners (and thus represent a continuing drain from the economy).

    It’s just stems from the US being an affluent society with a lot of conspicious consumption.

    No, because exchange rates float. It stems from the US economy needing to invest more than the domestic economy saves, and thus needing to import capital - which is the same as running a trade deficit. The budget deficit doesn’t help - it represents an additional drain on domestic savings.

    But running a budget deficit doesn’t help the economy - it just allows the government to spend money without raising taxes.

    True, but your more difficult problem is the trade deficit. The budget deficit does represent a lack of political will (recommend reading _The Education of David Stockman_ if you get the chance), but the trade deficit represents fundamental imbalances in the national economy and expectations. Of course, my country has it worse.


  565. Phoenician:

    And you’d be wrong - the bank doesn’t give you money for free, and foreign countries don’t give you stuff for free.

    Er, well, that was the point, sort of. So far USA has had the tap open, so to speak. That’s why the economy is booming, although it looks like the boom might be soon over.

    As for the explanation I gave, it wasn’t for you, it was for bleah.


  566. As for the explanation I gave, it wasn’t for you, it was for bleah.

    My mistake, then.


  567. Rebecca Emmons

    Carl Rennie Feb 23rd, 2007 at 7:21 pm said:

    “I’ve always thought that being exposed to alternate viewpoints is essential to understanding your own. The Christian hatred of heresy and blasphemy seems to like the epitome of this; for some reason, the “one true faith‿ is too weak to withstand broader knowledge, but the “falsehood‿ of atheism is strong enough to stand up against constant attacks.”

    I get rather annoyed at the assumption so casually thrown around that Christians are incapable of hard or rational thought, and that they run skittering into the shadows whenever the light of reason is shined on their benighted beliefs. Really, it’s tiresome. Granted, I did not grow up in a traditional Christian home - i.e. my religion did not break off from any existing group - if you want to know more about origins and beliefs, check out http://www.mormon.org and don’t be afraid to read the Book of Mormon.

    As Latter-day Saints we believe in continuing revelation - that God has not finished speaking to man and He has not revealed everything there is to know. That means there’s always more to learn. Developments in science are welcome and accepted, and you will find Mormons in every field, and generally excelling in every field. (There are lazy and indifferent Mormons, too; but that’s human nature in any organization. I digress.) I’ve been encouraged from an early age to learn all I can, to get as high an education as I can (I’m getting my bachelor’s at Bryn Mawr College - how’s that for intellectual credit), and to continue learning and developing myself throughout my life. That is not unique to my family, but rather top-down counsel from church leadership. However, we are also to balance everything we learn in the world with what we have learned from church and our personal religious studies. We are taught how to recognize truth from falsehood, and it generally involves prayer and careful soul searching. This is not about fancy mental gymnastics to make our faith always right, but to see if what the world teaches is true (and to what extent - that’s very important). Basically, anything that is good is of God; it remains to determine whether an idea or development really IS good. Those times I have doubted some tenet of my faith and its applicability to myself are the times that I have really struggled to understand it and even to challenge God about it. Those are the times I’ve learned the most.

    It is VERY possible to be a devout Christian AND a hard-thinking, reasonable person who can accept further enlightenment and secular discoveries. It goes along with the belief in continuing revelation - if we can accept that what is written in the Bible is true, but not complete, then it is easier to accept scientific and other discoveries. Blind faith is not a tenet of Mormonism. Those who say otherwise are fooling themselves and others. I can’t speak for all Christianity, but I DO know many intellectually rigorous and faithful Christians, so please cut the nonsense about “Christianity [or Christians] not standing up to intellectual rigor”.

    As for atheism, you could always read C.S. Lewis’s “Mere Christianity” for how he reasoned his way OUT of atheism. (”The Abolition of Man” is also an excellent book, about education and morals and relativism, but I digress again…)

    I’m not a troll searching for evangelizing moments - I found this site because it was linked from the Critiques of Libertarianism website. http://world.std.com/~mhuben/wspq.html My government instructor had us take the World’s Smallest Political Quiz as a homework assignment and guess what? Turns out I’m Libertarian!! Which was rather surprising news to me…. And I found the discussion very interesting on this site. The first Libertarian I met was a frosh at Bryn Mawr who was from a rather liberal Massachusetts family. She spoke very highly of Ayn Rand, etc. I’m not sure what relation this has to politics if anything, but I tended to avoid personal topics (such as religion or politics) after one conversation we had where she accused me of approving of clitoridectomies because I thought it best people not have sex until they were married. Rather bizarre non sequitur. Still haven’t read Ayn Rand, but I figure it’s something I ought to, just to know what she says.

    Kudos to tzs with his post on Feb 23rd, 2007 at 5:45 pm about historians being cynical. Historian here really appreciates the “not AGAIN…!” humor.

    That’s all. Sorry about the novel.


  568. rhizome31

    “How do you explain the Muslim extremists who aren’t integrated into society (see riots in France)”

    As a French man who was living in France at that time I would like to say that riots in France were not the fact of Muslim extremism. It was indeed related to a problem of integration into the society, but among rioters there were Muslims, Christians and probably mostly Atheists. France is not free of Muslim extremism, but these riots simply had other reasons.


  569. Anus McButtcheeks

    Some people would call it a dictatorship. But many of us call it “the workplace.‿ Somehow, Libertarians never seem to object to restrictions of Liberty done by The Boss. “You can always get another job,‿ they say, as if that answers anything, as if the class of people who can leave a job blithely isn’t the same class that’s most likely to be able to pick up and move away from a conventional, state-based dictatorship.

    OK so members of this class of oppressed people ground under the heels of the rich are working in their sweatshop (after having their urine properly examined, of course), and all of the sudden the Corporate Propaganda Officer announces over the loudspeaker that due to budget constraints, salaries will be reduced from five dollars an hour to fifty cents an hour, starting now. All the employees have left before he can finish the rest of the announcement.

    But wait! I thought these people COULDN’T leave these jobs! They are FORCED to be there! They are members of the class of people who can’t pick up and move away from the corporate dictatorship! How can this be?

    Well we’re faced with two choices (and unlike those present all throughout your discussion, this is an actual dilemma, not a false dilemma): either a) the employees will leave after the announcement that they will be paid fifty cents an hour, or b) they will not leave; they stay making 1/10th of what they were previously.

    if a) is true and they leave, then your statement that poor people cannot leave their job is false.

    if b) is true and they do not leave, then we are forced to conclude that people will stay at a job even though they now make less than the cost of the amount of gasoline required to get them to work and back home, making their job a net loss.

    if b) is true, why on earth would a corporation bother to pay its employees anything above what it absolutely had to as required by the government? I’m assuming you believe we have a grossly huge number of poor in this country (poor who somehow manage to have cable TV, by the way - as an aside, The Economist magazine did an absolutely fascinating article titled “The Poor” on Dec 20th 2005, where they compared the life of an absolutely dirt-poor US “mountain man” with the life of one of the most prestigious surgeons from the Congo. I’ll save you the suspense: the unskilled man from the US, who you would regard as needing to be saved, lives better than the highly skilled man half a world away. I’m not denying that we should help those with the lowest incomes in this country; I am, however, saying that our poor have it pretty damn good compared to the rest of the world.) If b) were true and the employees stayed for the 50 cent an hour salary and continued to work there, they would eventually run out of money and not be able to come to work. If b) were true, it requires believing that the employees are so firmly ground under the heels of the corporation that they don’t realize they can get more elsewhere because realizing that you can make 10x as much as you currently do if you take a job with the company down the street tends to make people leave, no?

    Personally, I think most reasonable people would conclude from this (actual) dilemma that b) is false, and therefore a) must be true (since they are mutually exclusive and exhaustive).

    But wait, if a) is true then the assumption that they cannot leave and are forced to be wage-slaves for the Corporation must be false! Rut-roh.

    And as corporations extend their control to people outside their employ, with DRM

    Yes, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been forced by gunpoint to buy something with DRM restrictions on it. What are you going to write about next - the tyranny of the Hollywood studios for requiring you to have a DVD player before you can watch the movie you bought?

    DRM is one of the few places where the government can possibly protect certain rights for its citizens (not, mind you, the right to free movies and music), but it’s not like being herded on the train to Dachau, OK? Give it up.

    and increasingly prevalent, shameless propaganda

    Exactly - that is why I no longer go out on the highway. I’m sick of having to obey all those billboards. I mean, Christ, going to work was costing me $20,000 a day! Between buying food at every restaurant advertised, to buying lottery tickets after I see the “Powerball Ticker” billboard, then I have to buy a Harley because that’s advertised too - it never ends! And personally, you know, I didnt want to say this in case they happen to be watching, but sometimes I pass by two billboards for two different radio stations, and honestly I don’t know what to do! So recently I’ve been carrying around a small transistor radio that I put in the passenger seat so I can tune into both stations at once.

    Oddly enough, you seem to think that “shameless propaganda” only applies to corporations. Of course plain ol’ human beings would NEVER solicit you to buy their goods or services, or otherwise try to get you to do something that they want you to do. And certainly governments never do that either. Only corporations.

    and their own armed forces

    A security company? Jesus Christ, you couldn’t do better than that? I figured you would have at least linked to the military action in Guatemala on behalf of the banana industry.

    Of course, it was beyond your scope to mention that every Libertarian I’ve ever met disagrees with government intervention on behalf of business as well as private companies having the right to detain, taze, or shoot people without first being properly licensed to do so (meaning that an unbiased committee has deemed that they would use those rights conscientiously and justly). Or of course we could just do away with all private security companies and you could trust your life to the public police force in all cases. But like the saying goes, call for a police car, an ambulance, and a pizza and see which one shows up first.

    But that explanation takes oh so much more time to read - best to boil it down to a clever little phrase like “[corporate] armed forces”. I mean, it’s not exactly true…well, it’s not at all true, but it’s so easy to remember.

    and even co-optation of the nominal forms of governmental authority,

    Again, this is not a libertarian argument. This is an area where libertarians would agree with those on the left - business and government do not mix.

    the truth of our next useful sentence becomes ever more manifestly clear, that sentence being:

    “Corporations are governments.‿

    Which is, of course, the libertarian socialist criticism of Libertarianism in soundbite form. I’ve never known a Libertarian to be able to answer that one without changing the subject completely, usually to a defense of Guantanamo from a Libertarian POV. At which point they’ve been made incapable of influencing anyone who’s not a fellow Libertarian, which means you can get on with your life. Try it and see!

    You haven’t met many Libertarians then. My experience with Libertarians is a bit limited, but most that I know would slice your argument to ribbons, and rather handily, for a very simple reason: your statement “corporations are governments” is entirely meaningless. According to your definition, EVERY social organization is a government. I’m guessing you could have figured that out; you seem reasonably intelligent. But then again, criticizing families (which are, if you want to be technical, essentially private dictatorships) just doesn’t have the same ring to it as criticizing Big Evil Corporations.

    Before you rush to your keyboard to pound out a heated reply and press the user-configured hotkey that immediately CCs an email to Noam Chomsky, understand that I get your argument. It goes like this “Libertarians hate government. Libertarians like corpoations. Corporations are governments. Therefore, Libertarians hate corporations! OH MY GOD MY MIND HAS BEEN BLOWN.” The flaw here, as in most arguments that sound too clever to be true, is in the premise. Libertarians do not hate government - just because you understand economics doesn’t mean you hate governments, and every libertarian who makes any sense at all realizes there is a role for government in society. What libertarians disagree with is unnecessary coercion. A government (as in a meaningful definition of “a state”, not a meaningless term for “any group of two or more people”) gets people to do things by coercion - at the end of the day, you pay your taxes not out of any sense of altruism (anyone ever pad their tax bill unnecessarily just to make sure the government has a little extra to pave the roads?) but because if you don’t, you get sent to the pokey and they take away all your Howard Zinn autographed first editions. Now, coercion is often very necessary, but sometimes it is not (e.g. enforcing laws prohibiting the possession of drugs by adults, sodomy laws, eminent domain, etc.). Libertarians disagree with these cases where government forces people to do things (or prohibits them from doing things) unnecessarily.

    Corporations differ from this in that a corporation can not force you to do something. A company must provide you some sort of value - otherwise, they don’t get your resources. If BigEvilStarbucksCo doesn’t make good enough coffee for your tastes, they don’t get your five bucks. If you know they make their employees work 18-hour days with electrodes on their genitals that shock them whenever they take too much time on a bathroom break, they’re probably not going to get your labor. Either way, under no circumstances will the BigEvilStarbucksCo break down your door, throw you against the wall and take all your stuff. The only way they can do that unjustly is if they partner with government (a scenario which I’ve already mentioned Libertarians vehemently disagree with).

    One of the first few comments said “I’ve come to the conclusion is a Libertarian (with the big L) is someone who has never had to live in the real world.” A very interesting charge, firstly because it’s been my experience that it’s rather the opposite - the most successful graduates of the real world I know could nearly all be described as some flavor of libertarian; by contrast, every socialist I’ve ever met has been to a large extent someone who has never had to live in the real world. And secondly because I’ve personally found that the more I read of these critiques on Libertarianism, the more I become convinced that the authors of these critiques have never in their lives run a company. If they had, they would (as I do) laugh their asses off at the idea that corporations have total dictatorial power over their employees, because they would know full well that if you pay your employees less than they can get elsewhere, you are not going to have a staff for very long. They would know full well that most of the time when an employer requires a drug test, the actual reason they are doing so has to do with government (either a government requirement, or a tax break provided by government to discourage people from using drugs by making them essentially unemployable) - the rest of the time the employers themselves have in their experience negatively correlated certain drug use with performance on the job, and are acting on what they believe will get them the best return on their money (just as you do when you tell Employer A that Employer B offered you $5 more an hour, and if he can’t match that then you’re going to accept Employer B’s offer - but somehow it isn’t a crime when you try to get the best return on your resources, only when corporations do). Drug tests are expensive, and there are tons of professions where if a mandatory drug test were to be applied, you will lose practically your entire labor pool (this is most likely why record companies do not require drug tests before they will sign a contract with a jam band). The idea that employers demand urine as a sign of submissiveness is nothing more than a transmission from Planet Chomsky.

    So just to be sure that you don’t think I’m disagreeing with you because you have a viewpoint contrary to my own, I’m letting you know that I disagree with you because you are simply wrong. Sometimes your premises are sound, but your logic is flawed, and sometimes your logic is sound, but your premises are flawed. Nevertheless, your entire essay is basically one fallacy after another under a snazzy, attention-grabbing title, presumably in the hopes that you will get your work out there among the reddit-and-digg crowd.

    Might I suggest next time writing something along the lines of “The Top 10 Secret Tweaks to Speed Up Windows XP Released on 9/11 That the Government Doesn’t Want You to Know About [with AMAZING pic]”?


  570. It seems apropos that the last libertarian commenter on this thread was named Anus McButtcheeks.


  571. Anus McButtcheeks

    It seems apropos that the last libertarian commenter on this thread was named Anus McButtcheeks.

    A scorching critique of my argument. I have never had my line of reasoning picked apart so skillfully before. Now I am faced with quite the dilemma: do I officially concede or do I go for a retort? If the retort, which one? “You smell” seems appropriate, but I cannot really smell you, since this is the internet. “You are not the boss of me” doesn’t really hit the mark, and it has connotations that those sympathetic to the essay’s author would certainly latch on to. Perhaps I could elaborate on how I am analogous to rubber, whereas you are rather glue-like in nature.

    Nah, you’re just a douchebag. :)


  572. A scorching critique of my argument.

    You made an argument? I stopped reading after you set up the second straw-man, went wild with a rhetorical samurai sword like a demented spastic, and nearly dislocated your shoulder patting yourself on the back about your intellectual warrior prowess.

    An argument, dear chap, requires you engage with an opposing perspective. What you were doing was public masturbation - one person, sad, and ignored by your betters.


  573. Anus McButtcheeks

    A scorching critique of my argument.

    You made an argument?

    Yes. I responded to Mr. Clarke’s errors - firstly that corporations have workers in a stranglehold where they cannot quit their jobs; I showed that this is false through proof by contradiction.

    I explained that DRM does not, in fact, “extend [corporations’] control to people outside their employ” because people are not forced to buy items with Digital Rights Management, and any problems people have when they DO buy media with DRM are due to an improper collusion between business and government (which libertarians would be opposed to along with Mr. Clarke)

    Thirdly, Clarke alleged that another way corporations “extend control to people outside their employ” is through “shameless propaganda” (meaning “advertising”). I showed that this is false since you are not forced to buy the item advertised (noticing a theme here?) Mr. Clarke would have a point if he could show that certain forms of advertising “hotwired” the human brain into reflexively seeking out and purchasing the product advertised (which would make advertising into a rather creepy form of mind control), but to the best of my knowledge it is not, and I showed this by contradiction, explaining how if advertising were immoral in this way, I would never be able to make it to work without dropping twenty grand on the items advertised to me. Advertising is no more controlling people than another human being offering you a glass of lemonade for a nickel - you are free to either accept it or not. (interestingly enough, Clarke didn’t see fit to mention the organization that actually CAN “extend control” to people who don’t want to be controlled - government).

    Next, I showed Clarke was wrong again in asserting that corporations again “extend control to people outside their employ” via security companies. I honestly thought the link was going to refer to immoral military actions on behalf of US industries (again, an issue on which Libertarians would side with Mr. Clarke, thus defeating the point of the essay) - however, the link referred to what is apparently just a plain old private security company. A private security company only has jurisdiction to protect the people and property of those who have employed them; they no more “extend control to people outside their employ” than UPS does because its truck is on a public highway and in front of a car driven by someone who does not work for UPS.

    Then I explained once again that Libertarians are against business colluding with government, and are not blindly pro-anything that has to do with corporations.

    Next, I showed why Mr. Clarke’s assertion that “corporations are governments” is not an argument against libertarianism. This is because corporations are “governments” only in the absolute broadest sense of the term, in which any group of >= 2 people is a government because they operate in some sort of power dynamic toward each other. In this sense, Clarke’s claim can hardly be taken seriously because if corporations should be dismantled because they are unlawful governments, so too should families, which are essentially unaccountable private dictatorships according to this view.

    Then I reminded Mr. Clarke that I understood where he intended his argument to go: “1. Libertarians hate government 2. Libertarians love corporations. 3. Corporations ARE governments. 4. Therefore, Libertarians hate corporations. 5. Contradiction between #2 and #4″ just so he (or you) couldn’t accuse me of deliberately misunderstanding his intention.

    Lastly I offered a personal comment on how I have never seen someone who has run a business have Mr. Clarke’s point of view, not because they’re all in cahoots with some huge corporate conspiracy (the vast majority of businesses fail, after all), but because they know full well that the process of employing somebody is a mutual exchange - if it weren’t, there would be no incentive to pay anyone a cent higher than minimum wage. I also explained that employer-mandated drug tests are not the force of tyranny Mr. Clarke believes they are, but rather often exist in the first place because of government meddling, and either way are still a mutual exchange between employer and employee.

    I stopped reading after you set up the second straw-man, went wild with a rhetorical samurai sword like a demented spastic, and nearly dislocated your shoulder patting yourself on the back about your intellectual warrior prowess.

    I offered a set of points in the first post, and in this one even clarified all of them point-by-point so that you could understand them. You have offered a very creative colorful ad hominem with absolutely no content other than to accuse me of having set up two strawmen (with no attribution).

    Then again, it’s just so much easier to reply to an argument with the My Cousin Vinny defense: if you just get up and say “everything that guy said was bullshit, and those who are better than him agree”, you don’t have to do any work, and the beauty part is you can actually get people to agree with you without their requiring any further explanation.

    An argument, dear chap, requires you engage with an opposing perspective.

    I agree with you that by your definition, it was not an argument. I did not engage with an opposing perspective, because Mr. Clarke offered up nothing of the sort - the only valid points he made are points that actually coincide with the Libertarian viewpoint.

    What you were doing was public masturbation - one person, sad, and ignored by your betters.

    And what does that imply about you?


  574. True, but your more difficult problem is the trade deficit. The budget deficit does represent a lack of political will (recommend reading _The Education of David Stockman_ if you get the chance), but the trade deficit represents fundamental imbalances in the national economy and expectations. Of course, my country has it worse.

    This excellent post is also highly relevent.


  575. You have offered a very creative colorful ad hominem with absolutely no content other than to accuse me of having set up two strawmen (with no attribution).

    “OK so members of this class of oppressed people ground under the heels of the rich ”

    “But wait! I thought these people COULDN’T leave these jobs! They are FORCED to be there!”

    HUUHHHNHH!!


  576. “But wait! I thought these people COULDN’T leave these jobs! They are FORCED to be there! They are members of the class of people who can’t pick up and move away from the corporate dictatorship! How can this be?”

    Much the same can be said of a democratic state. Taxes are totally voluntary as no one forces you to remain a subject of a specific government. I have yet to meet a right-wing “libertarian” who makes that argument, but there is no reason why they should not.

    All in all, right-wing “libertarianism” is about justifying private tyranny. It denies the fact that economic power exists and that voluntary association does not mean that there is freedom within the organisation. It also fails to note that most people have little choice in having a job and instead concentrate on them being able to change jobs (i.e. masters). A bit like someone saying that dictatorship would be fine as long as people could leave a specific state and join another.

    This can be seen from right-wing “libertarian” thinker Nozick, who not only defends voluntary dictatorship about also voluntary slavery. Genuine libertarians (i.e. people like Proudhon, Bakunin, Chomsky etc.) have all stressed that freedom within an association is just as important as freedom to join and leave an association. This becomes obvious once you take into account economic inequality and power. Freedom is more than the freedom to pick a new master.


  577. mark

    I have to disagree that hard science necessarily makes one arrogant and believing that one knows just about everything. I think this arrogance is pretty much a libertarian characteristic. I say this because actual libertarians seem to believe they know much more than physical scientists when the scientists are saying things they don’t want to hear. Libertarians and anti-regulation conservatives think the “science” of economics (perhaps a very narrow far right economic ideology) is the only perfect science, and that all other science is imprecise in comparison, and irrelevant to society.

    For example, to free market libertarian types, nearly all professional climatologists are a bunch of socialist idiots who are just making up things like global warming for funding, or because they don’t like to think for themselves, or for some vague nefarious purpose. Usually the libertarian saying something like this has never known an actual hard scientist and knows nothing of climatology. Same thing if you try talking to a libertarian about concerns about peak oil, environmental damage, government research, etc. Or if a medical doctor speaks negatively about insurance companies and our over-priced healthcare system. In these instances actual expertise doesn’t matter, a libertarian apparently is an expert on everything. I guess my point is libertarian ideology is if anything anti-scientific. Maybe undergrad science students and computer geeks, webmasters, and programmers are attracted to libertarianism, but I doubt many accomplished physical scientists (as opposed to economists) are swayed by it.