# I Pit Libertarians who don't even know the implications of their "philosophy" **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 28, 2011, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533 "2011-05-28T06:06:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![D\_Odds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/d_odds/32/2882_2.png) [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/101 "2011-06-01T00:33:38Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > But the current regulations don’t play out the say you think they do. The health department will inspect before issuing a license, but there is nothing stopping him from fucking up his first night. There are no government inspectors in the kitchen, no state or federal employees making sure he cools food fast enough, or cooks chicken to 165, or even if he washes his hands. > > And beyond that there are so many factors out of his control. What if the source of the outbreak is peanut butter, deli meats, tomatoes, or spinach? All products he handles the way the government tells him too, but still spread disease and kill people. And it would be worse if all this stuff wasn’t tracked. You would have much more difficulty pinpointing outbreaks and defending against them My entrepreneur at least had to learn about food safety before opening in a regulated environment. I am not proposing that he is purposefully ignoring safety, just that he was ignorant of it before opening his new business. > [@](#): > > What if the city fails to monitor the drinking water and that’s what makes people sick? Or what if an angry employee sabotages production? What if pigs develop stripes and hunt zebras? I have no idea what the fuck you are talking about. We are noticeably safer in a regulated environment than an unregulated one, because the market doesn’t have enough power to police and protect consumers. Safer != inoculated from all harm. > [@](#): > > People in developing countries also make fun of Americans for living in sterilized environments that means anything they eat makes them sick. So you’ll frequently hear it mentioned that the Philipino family has a digestive track that allows them to tolerate less clean foods. That is so true. Except they don’t make fun. They are much happier about a cleaner food supply so that even their stronger system doesn’t get sick as often, especially children and the old who are more vulnerable. They also adapt their cooking techniques. Rare meat is a virtual unknown in the Philippines. Fish is cooked until it is so dried out you must cut it with a knife. > [@](#): > > Long story short, you’re not as safe as you think you are. Long story corrected - we are considerably safer than we would be without the oversight. And personally, I eat raw fish and loved unpasteurized cheese when I had it. ETA: Or what **Little Nemo** said. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/102 "2011-06-01T00:38:47Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > In one of the libertarian threads I made a rather long post about what it would take to safely order a sandwich in a libertarian country. (No food inspectors, that sort of thing.) I don’t recall much of a response to that one, either. Actually, chance are there will be a ton of food inspectors, people who will try to get consumers to pay them to rate the safety of their food. Great market opportunity. Now, the average consumer looking at who inspected the food will not know that the inspectors are a subsidiary of the company being inspected, or set up by morons, or a real one. Every candidate in California is endorsed by a teachers group and a police group and a firemans group. Some of them may consist of five teachers and some of 500,000, but who reading the ballot has time to look it up. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/103 "2011-06-01T01:40:19Z")
Since the U.S.A. is the land where nut-case Libertarian rhetoric thrives, I think most of the posters in this thread are applying remarks to U.S.A. And in the U.S.A. food safety is not a big problem. (Why not? Partly due to government standards and inspectors. Yes, these standards and inspections aren’t _perfect_ but only the nut-cases claim that an imperfect system must be abandoned altogether.) Since the food safety discussion was more of an explanatory tangent than a real issue, I want to thank **Voyager** for injecting a note of sanity: > [@Voyager](#): > > You’d think that it wouldn’t be beneficial for banks to issue loans to people who clearly wouldn’t be able to pay either… > First, some managers have criminal mentalities, and, just like common criminals, are sure they won’t get caught… > Libertaria might have a chance of working if the fuckers got flogged to near death and so much of their money taken that they are made homeless. Not going to happen, because they’ve got the power, but it would be nice. > > Remember, the people who nearly destroyed the financial system, put millions out of work, millions more out of their homes, and caused untold damage around the world - are all sitting pretty today. And the libertarian wing of the Republican party is doing its best to stop any laws that would help keep it from happening again. Given the choice of hundreds of salmonella deaths or the toxic poison that still lingers in our unregulated financial system, I think the former would be much preferable. I’d _ **love** _ to hear the Libertarian take on the recent financial crisis. I suppose the industry wasn’t deregulated _ **enough** _ ! 😃 Oh, let me guess. In Libertopia we needn’t wonder about financial institutions like AIG which suffer losses in the hundreds of billions. Customers will then just move their business to a different institution. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![emacknight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ec8ea/32.png) [@emacknight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emacknight)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/104 "2011-06-01T02:26:25Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Actually, chance are there will be a ton of food inspectors, people who will try to get consumers to pay them to rate the safety of their food. Great market opportunity. Exactly. If food safety is important people will pay for it. So there will be a market for private food inspectors the way we have private safety ratings for cars and {gasp} investments. Those agencies will have to build a reputation, and if they are found to be a subsidiary of the food conglomerate that will impact their reputation. Turns out, the government has the same problem. I’ve been in the food industry long enough to know the government sucks at it, and partly because they’re at the whim of voters and the political system. They probably should have said a long time ago that factory produced beef and chicken is too risky for human consumption. But imagine the fallout. _Omnivore’s Dilemma_ made fun of a Senator from South Dakota that had the gall to suggest Americans should eat less beef based on health concerns, he wasn’t re-elected. This idea that everyone would get food poisoning just highlights the blind faith people have in the government regulatory industry. The banking industry collapsed because people were stupid about their investments, and those are the same people that get sick. They put trust into things that should never have been trusted, they couldn’t be bothered to fact check or do a simple credit check or verify income. Anyone that “lost money” in the crash should have known that was part of the risk of investing. From top to bottom the whole system was a mess of people that couldn’t be bothered reading the fine print. The rating agencies should not have been trusted to the point they were, which makes me wonder why they are _still_ trusted, can anyone answer that? Mortgage lenders should have checked their clients, and the clients should have checked their banks. Meanwhile investors were LOVING the returns. How many people independently said, “no, the market is up too high, I really should be in something safer.” Hell no, people LOVED seeing their portfolio climb. They loved that their house value tripled in a couple of years. Those people could have willingly sold it for less, why didn’t they? > [@septimus](#): > > Since the U.S.A. is the land where nut-case Libertarian rhetoric thrives, I think most of the posters in this thread are applying remarks to U.S.A. > > And in the U.S.A. food safety is not a big problem. (Why not? Partly due to government standards and inspectors. Yes, these standards and inspections aren’t _perfect_ but only the nut-cases claim that an imperfect system must be abandoned altogether.) Isn’t that exactly what you’re trying to do here? Find the imperfections in Libertarian philosophy, then use perfection to be the enemy of good? There _might_ be more food poisoning in Libertania, but remember that there is still plenty of it in a heavily regulated society. Glass still shows up in the proverbial burrito. But with regulation that is supposed to save us comes the addition of bullshit like bans on raw milk cheese and horse meat that is done for entirely political reasons without helping anyone. The difference is that in a libertarian environment you can’t pawn off your responsibility on the government then run around like nothing will go wrong. You might actually have to take responsibility for your own actions. That means verifying for yourself is a restaurant practices safe food handling, if a car is built with safety features, if an investment isn’t full of crap. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/105 "2011-06-01T02:36:48Z")
Um, dude? Lack of government regulation of the meatpacking industry is what gave us _The Jungle_. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Odds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/d_odds/32/2882_2.png) [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/106 "2011-06-01T02:43:08Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > This idea that everyone would get food poisoning just highlights the blind faith people have in the government regulatory industry. The idea that no one would get food poisoning highlights the blind faith libertarians have in a unregulated free market. > [@](#): > > The difference is that in a libertarian environment you can’t pawn off your responsibility on the government then run around like nothing will go wrong. You might actually have to take responsibility for your own actions. That means verifying for yourself is a restaurant practices safe food handling, if a car is built with safety features, if an investment isn’t full of crap. There is nothing wrong with putting some more onus on people to be responsible for their choices. Libertarian ideology just takes that much too far. I’m all for less government intervention; I’m not for almost no government intervention. ---
**Author:** ![emacknight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ec8ea/32.png) [@emacknight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emacknight)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/107 "2011-06-01T02:43:58Z")
> [@D\_Odds](#): > > What if pigs develop stripes and hunt zebras? I have no idea what the fuck you are talking about. We are noticeably safer in a regulated environment than an unregulated one, because the market doesn’t have enough power to police and protect consumers. Safer != inoculated from all harm. > **[Walkerton E. coli outbreak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_Tragedy)** > > The Walkerton E. coli outbreak was the result of a contamination of the drinking water supply of Walkerton, Ontario, Canada, with E. coli and Campylobacter jejuni bacteria. The water supply was contaminated as a result of improper water treatment following heavy rainfall in late April and early May 2000, that had drawn bacteria from the manure of nearby cattle used to fertilize crops into the shallow aquifer of a nearby well. The first reported case was on May 17. The contamination caused gastroe... People took it for granted that government regulation would make their water safe. So no one thinks twice before turning on the tap. Remove that regulation and the claim here is that everyone will die. But the reality is that instead everyone will have to take responsibility for their own water safety. They can’t just make the blind assumption it’s safe, they’ll get filters or boil or bottle. It’s the blind faith in regulation that leads to financial crises and massive outbreaks of food poisoning. Safer != inoculated from all harm So in both systems there will still be plenty of harm. What is it like buying a sandwich in a regulated society? The meat is tainted with listeria, the lettuce and tomato are covered with salmonella, the cook washed his hands with dirty water. But thank god the government makes sure no one has raw milk cheese. The other threads in GD made a big deal about orphanages and kids dieing in the streets, but then ignore how many kids die in foster care. At some point you’ll need to evaluate the regulatory system you put so much faith in. And we haven’t even started with the failures in the TSA. All the joys of being at the airport are \*reactions \*to massive fuck ups the regulatory system couldn’t comprehend. Seriously, no one thought liquids might be a problem? You know after the underwear bomber they still couldn’t be bothered to check people’s underwear, but we all got to sit quietly with nothing on our laps for the last hour of an international flight. Libertarian philosophy is fun to laugh at, but do it long enough and you’ll have to answer questions about the alternatives. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/108 "2011-06-01T02:50:34Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > But the reality is that instead everyone will have to take responsibility for their own water safety. They can’t just make the blind assumption it’s safe, they’ll get filters or boil or bottle. Remember kids, in Libertopia you’ll need to carry chemical testing kits to check for adulteration in your food and water. It’s not a bug, it’s a _feature_! ---
**Author:** ![emacknight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ec8ea/32.png) [@emacknight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emacknight)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/109 "2011-06-01T02:52:39Z")
> [@D\_Odds](#): > > The idea that no one would get food poisoning highlights the blind faith libertarians have in a unregulated free market. That’s the straw man people keep telling you about. Libertarians don’t say there won’t be food poisoning. What they say is that there currently is food poisoning, even though a lot of money id being thrown at the problem. Solution? More money. After that, more money. Frankly, if you go through the list of regulatory failures, I’m pretty sure you’ll find someone that will eventually say, “It would have worked if there was more money.” So it seems that may be the horrible, yet unacknowledged flaw, in the pro-regulatory stance. It will never ever have enough funding. > [@D\_Odds](#): > > There is nothing wrong with putting some more onus on people to be responsible for their choices. Libertarian ideology just takes that much too far. I’m all for less government intervention; I’m not for almost no government intervention. Exactly, which is why it is not about _no_ government intervention, it’s about minimal. It’s about starting with personal responsibility and working from there, instead of starting with the assumption the government can save us–if only it had more money. It is entirely possible that certain regulation can make people more free. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Odds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/d_odds/32/2882_2.png) [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/110 "2011-06-01T03:12:41Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > This idea that everyone would get food poisoning just highlights the blind faith people have in the government regulatory industry. > [@D\_Odds](#): > > The idea that no one would get food poisoning highlights the blind faith libertarians have in a unregulated free market. > [@emacknight](#): > > That’s the straw man people keep telling you about. Libertarians don’t say there won’t be food poisoning. What they say is that there currently is food poisoning, even though a lot of money id being thrown at the problem. Solution? More money. After that, more money. You didn’t follow the bouncing ball clearly laid out for you. You posted the straw man, I mocked the straw man, then you posit that I’m posting the straw man. As a great philosopher once said, “Whatcha talkin’ about, Willis?” Everyone, raise your hands if you followed that exchange. That said, you are right. People in general expect too much of government, except when it comes time to pay for it. And politicians pander to those people. That said, there is a societal benefit to have one body do the work to maintain a high standard of food quality, freeing up individuals so that they don’t have to research every brand on the supermarket shelf. By the way, I said _almost no government intervention._ Rational people with a libertarian bent realize that maybe you could cut 10% or 20%, maybe even 30%. Irrational libertarians start at 80% and work up. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/111 "2011-06-01T03:25:58Z")
And now a Libertarian comes out of the woodwork to show his true colors: > [@emacknight](#): > > The banking industry collapsed because people were stupid about their investments, and those are the same people that get sick. They put trust into things that should never have been trusted, they couldn’t be bothered to fact check or do a simple credit check or verify income. > > Anyone that “lost money” in the crash should have known that was part of the risk of investing. From top to bottom the whole system was a mess of people that couldn’t be bothered reading the fine print. During the housing bubble there were many Americans who lost their savings by buying a house they couldn’t afford. These were not slick speculators who took a calculated gamble and lost. These were often high school dropouts with only a vague understanding of finance who were actively deceived by bankers and brokers. To say that these high school dropouts “should have known better” is to admit that “Libertarianism” is nothing but love for a caveat-emptor laissez-faire Dog-eat-Dog “Utopia” of Greed. Just as card sharks thrive on bad poker players, “Libertarian” businessmen delight in the stupidity of the masses. Thank you, **emacknight** , for showing up and helping us make our case. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/112 "2011-06-01T03:39:03Z")
It would be enormous comfort to doctrinaire vegetarians if people had to slaughter and process their own meat. Tofu recipes would be all the rage. Note to self: as the libertarian jugguernaut gains momentum towards world domination, get heavily invested in soybean futures. ---
**Author:** ![randomface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/5fc32e/32.png) [@randomface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/randomface)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/113 "2011-06-01T03:40:56Z")
And what exactly happened to the brokers and bankers that tricked people into taking out loans they shouldn’t have? Didn’t the government bail them out? ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/114 "2011-06-01T03:50:54Z")
I _like_ Libertarians, it’s like watching Bizarro-World Marxists. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/115 "2011-06-01T03:55:41Z")
> [@randomface](#): > > And what exactly happened to the brokers and bankers that tricked people into taking out loans they shouldn’t have? Didn’t the government bail them out? Uh … I’m not sure which side of the fence you’re on… Are you trying to argue that American government having right-wing policies that kowtow to the philosophy of Greed is an argument against rational governance? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![randomface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/5fc32e/32.png) [@randomface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/randomface)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/116 "2011-06-01T04:11:48Z")
I’m saying that you can’t point to the crisis as a failure of a free market if everything about the crisis has the fingerprints of government intervention, including a reward of the bad actors by the government afterward. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/117 "2011-06-01T04:47:02Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > Exactly. If food safety is important people will pay for it. So there will be a market for private food inspectors the way we have private safety ratings for cars and {gasp} investments. Those agencies will have to build a reputation, and if they are found to be a subsidiary of the food conglomerate that will impact their reputation. Turns out, the government has the same problem. I’ve been in the food industry long enough to know the government sucks at it, and partly because they’re at the whim of voters and the political system. They probably should have said a long time ago that factory produced beef and chicken is too risky for human consumption. But imagine the fallout. _Omnivore’s Dilemma_ made fun of a Senator from South Dakota that had the gall to suggest Americans should eat less beef based on health concerns, he wasn’t re-elected. > > This idea that everyone would get food poisoning just highlights the blind faith people have in the government regulatory industry. > > There _might_ be more food poisoning in Libertania, but remember that there is still plenty of it in a heavily regulated society. Glass still shows up in the proverbial burrito. But with regulation that is supposed to save us comes the addition of bullshit like bans on raw milk cheese and horse meat that is done for entirely political reasons without helping anyone. The difference is that in a libertarian environment you can’t pawn off your responsibility on the government then run around like nothing will go wrong. You might actually have to take responsibility for your own actions. That means verifying for yourself is a restaurant practices safe food handling, if a car is built with safety features, if an investment isn’t full of crap. To keep it fair, we’ll ignore history here. So what you’re saying is the food industry is in terrible shape because government regulation doesn’t work. And in a situation where there is a problem, the solution arises because of market forces. So where are the private food inspection agencies? The ones that arise to address problems in the food industry? According to you, the problems exist now. So where is the free market solution? Either the government is doing an adequate job and there’s no need for private food inspectors; or the food industry is suppressing the development of private food inspection; or solutions don’t just arise spontaneously even when there is a need for them. Any of which is evidence that the premises of libertarianism aren’t true. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/118 "2011-06-01T06:06:40Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > Not to jump on the small l side here, but wouldn’t food safety be regulated just fine by the market? Nothing could be worse for business than killing 4 or 5 patrons. Why would it be beneficial for a business to cut corners? Other posters provided answers, but there’s a much simpler one. They cut corners expecting nothing serious will happen. It’s not a perfectly rational decision to drive while impaired. However, plenty of people will nevertheless do that expecting that they won’t be killed nor kill anybody. Even with regulations in place, it’s not particulary rare that a food producer or provider will cut corners. And this despite the risk of being fined, temporarily closed, tarnishing the company’s reputation. And despite the risk of having customers actually die, the company going bankrupt and themselves ending in a jail. Removing food regulation and controls will result in what you would expect on the roads if there wasn’t any cop to enforce driving regulations, DUI, etc… People aren’t perfectly rational, never were, will never be (and corporations are ran by people). Plus, there are situations where taking risks _is_ the rational thing to do if you think only in terms of bottom line, especially short-term bottom line. ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/119 "2011-06-01T06:52:43Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > What I am saying is that the market has built-in mechanisms to keep restaurants from killing their customers. And what I’m saying is, you’re awfully cavalier about the prospect that people might die before anyone notices a problem. What makes you think _you_ won’t be the one dying? Do you test all your water every time you bathe or drink? Do you inspect the kitchens when you eat out? Do you interview the grocery or restaurant workers? Do you know what goes on at your meat slaughtering plants? Do you know who picked your lettuce? Do you test all the fabric in your home to make sure it’s not asbestos? Do you test all the paint to make sure there’s no lead? Do you test your bandaids to make sure they’re sanitized? Do you test your aspirin to make sure it matches the chemical composition it should? Are you planning to start? > [@jtgain](#): > > If I open a restaurant, I’ve invested a lot of time and money into growing my business. Why would I want to do something like feed my customers maggot-infested meat to save a few bucks when the downside is their deaths, bad publicity, loss of customers, and a possible huge lawsuit? You mean, like, why would a baby formula maker put melamine in its products just to save a few bucks? Or here’s a case closer to home: in 2008, Peanut Corporation of America sent out peanut butter even though they knew it had tested positive for salmonella. They “retested” it and a month later, a massive salmonella outbreak occurred which killed nine people and injured almost 700 more. A few weeks prior to the outbreak, the FDA had become interested in a shipment of contaminated peanuts which originated at the plant and which was denied entry into Canada. After the outbreak, FDA inspectors went to the Georgia plant and found, > [@Wiki article](#): > > … that the company had information that its peanut-butter products were tainted with salmonella but shipped them anyway after “re-testing” them. This occurred at least 12 times in 2007 and 2008. FDA inspectors also found mold growing on the plant’s ceiling and walls, foot-long gaps in its roof, dead insects near peanuts, and holes in the plant big enough for rodents to enter. Inspectors found that the company also did not clean its equipment after finding contamination, and did not properly segregate raw and finished products. It later came to light that the company owner, Stewart Parnell, had been lying about the safety of his products and complaining that the testing was costing him money. So the answer to your question, jtgain, is “short term greed and selfishness”. It also came to light that FDA inspectors had not been at that plant since 2001. This is evidence of what happens when the FDA inspectors turn a blind eye for a couple years. What evidence do you have that says the situation would be improved if we got rid of inspectors altogether? Cites: > **[Peanut Corporation of America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peanut_Corporation_of_America)** > > Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) was an American peanut-processing business which is now defunct as a result of one of the most massive and lethal food-borne contamination events in U.S. history. > PCA was founded in 1977 and initially run by Hugh Parnell with three sons, including Stewart Parnell. The company was sold in 1994–1995 with Hugh Parnell retiring and Stewart Parnell and others remaining with the new company as consultants. In 2000, PCA was bought back by Stewart Parnell in a priva... [http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2009-01-30-peanuts-returned\_N.htm](http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2009-01-30-peanuts-returned_N.htm) [http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2009Jan30/0,4670,MEDSalmonellaOutbreak,00.html](http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2009Jan30/0,4670,MEDSalmonellaOutbreak,00.html) > **[404 Not Found | 11alive.com](https://www.11alive.com/error/404?storyid=126310)** [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/health/policy/12peanut.html?hp](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/health/policy/12peanut.html?hp) [http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=anHgQNdceh8o&refer=us](http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=anHgQNdceh8o&refer=us) > **[Senators rebuke federal regulators in peanut-borne salmonella outbreak](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-feb-06-na-peanut-fda6-story.html)** > > Senators rebuke federal regulators in peanut-borne salmonella outbreak ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2011, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533/120 "2011-06-01T07:58:32Z")
> [@randomface](#): > > I’m saying that you can’t point to the crisis as a failure of a free market if everything about the crisis has the fingerprints of government intervention, including a reward of the bad actors by the government afterward. The U.S.government has a fair amount of regulatory apparatus in place for banks and financial markets. Just so we can be clear about our areas of agreement and disagreement, in general terms would you prefer to see that regulatory apparatus strengthened or weakened? For the pre-crisis period one can point to regulators and economists giving strong warnings about the dangers of, e.g. unregulated derivatives trading, but the G.W. Bush Administration insisted on absolutist “libertarian” and deregulation dogma. (Yes, other players including Clinton may have helped feed the frenzy, but G.W. Bush and cronies carried deregulation to absurd extremes.) The post-crisis rewarding of corrupt bankers and institutions is a separate matter. The fact that some big investment banks (Lehman, Bear Stearns) were happily zeroed out while other bankers are now richer than ever suggests that there was corrupt hanky-panky involved but, unless your point is that “government is often corrupt and therefore should be abolished” I don’t see this as relevant. To refuse all government support and allow Wall Street to collapse would have been irredeemably irresponsible. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-libertarians-who-dont-even-know-the-implications-of-their-philosophy/583533.md?page=7)