Libertarian wing of the Republican party?

Great Debates
41

Okay, so now the subject is turning into a criticism of Libertarianism.

And the most just government is the one that governs least. :slight_smile:

Marxists would argue that a ‘just’ society is one in which the government controls all aspects of the economy and doles the proceeds out ‘fairly’. I wouldn’t call that the best government. All that shows you is that your idea of what is ‘just’ is not likely to be the same as someone else’s. So therefore, government just becomes an implement of coercion to force YOUR ideas of justice on everyone else.

For example, I think that it is just that if I create something on my own, I be allowed to keep what I created. My right to my own property is critical to my notion of justice.

Your notion of justice is that if I’m so good at making things that I start to live demonstrably better than others, the government should take some of it away from me and redistribute it to others to be ‘fair’.

The difference between us is that I’m not imposing my desires on anyone else. You are.

Forced egalitarianism in a world of unequal ability and unequal work ethic is the antithesis of justice, as far as I’m concerned. I believe we should all be equal in terms of how the government treats us. That’s true equality. You believe that the government should treat us unequally in order to counteract our natural differences and force an equality of outcome. I find nothing at all just about that.

The have-nots have done better under Capitalism than they ever did under Socialism or Communism.

Nonsense. I know a lot of Libertarians, and a lot of big-government Liberals. Almost without exception, the Libertarians I know came from disadvantaged or lower-middle class backgrounds. The Liberals I know come from upper-middle class backgrounds. That may be different where you are, but there’s nothing about Libertarianism that is even remotely aristocratic, other than perhaps in the sense that Libertarians tend to believe that they can do just fine without the help of the government, whereas other people may feel that they are trapped in their circumstances and need government to help them.

Really? Wouldn’t you say the U.S. Constitution, and the way it was enforced for the first 100 or so years of the U.S. was a pretty Libertarian document? Wouldn’t you say that Hong Kong had been a pretty Libertarian place for the first 50 years of its existence as a British colony? (the British governor had an explicitly Laissez-Faire policy towards the Hong Kong Economy). To this day, you can start a business in Hong Kong by simply renting out a place and paying a nominal fee for a business license. There are very, very few regulations involved.

This is nothing more than a sneer. I could flip it right back at you - Liberalism just sounds good to people who don’t want to believe that they are responsible for their own choices and want a big government to be their mommy, protecting them from the big bad world. Or at the least, they think that other people are incapable of leading their own lives and need a big-government mommy to protect them from the real world. Therefore, they need to be told where they can work, and for how much, and which products they can buy, and how much they can pay people for jobs, and who they can trade with, and what recreations they may enjoy, and how much safety equipment they must wear, and what kind of weapons they can own, and what kinds of things they can say in public, and what beliefs they must hold, what kinds of transportation they can use, what kinds of dwelling they should live in, how much they can leave their children when they die, what kinds of medicines they can take, what testing for safety or usefulness must be done on the products they buy, who they can or can’t hire for a job, how much property they can keep, and the list goes on. And on. And on…

I think you can find a wide swath of agreement among libertarians - fewer regulations, lower taxes, smaller government. Where you’ll find widespread disagreement today is in areas like what the proper role of government is in regulating markets or defending the country. The Iraq War split libertarians right down the middle, for example.

42

And this differs from the present state of affairs how?

43

You see a meaningful difference between plutocrats & libertarians. I see them as much the same, for they are much the same in effect.

You can have a large, blatantly corrupt gov’t which explicitly empowers the rich through positive law; a small, subtly corrupt gov’t which blithely empowers the rich through positive law, then says it has to, 'cos the public sector isn’t strong enough on its own; or a puny, useless piece of crap “government” that refuses to recognize its own authority, so no one else recognizes it, & wealth & organized crime become the dominant power centers. In any case, the government becomes servile, & the wealthy hold power. All tax-cutting policies end up there, & they only get there quicker if the government tries to be a little bit socialist (see Hilaire Belloc’s The Servile State).

But we don’t have to reach the point of the government being too destitute to govern, for libertarianism in intent to become plutocracy in fact. We just have to tell people over & over again that the government is eveil, & only private institutions can be trusted. Come to my corner of the Bible Belt to see it.

In the real world, hard Libertarians are fellow travelers & useful idiots to plutocrats. Until one wakes up & realize that some institution that isn’t beholden to the bottom line has to have the authority to stop corruption & the arbitrary abuse of financial & social power, & the best choice to do that is the state, one is naturally & selfishly inclined to vote for the person who says, “Hey, I’ll leave you alone,” even if that person once in office mainly wants you not to see what he’s doing.

44

Both groups have always struck me as fundamentally similar in attitude, if not in the details of their platforms. Greed, sociopathy, and contempt for the helpless. That’s why libertarians align themselves with the Republicans; they are the same sort of people.

I second this.

A myth IMHO; I think people believe it because we seem to have a cultural predjudice that evil is more effective. It’s the egalitarian democracies that tend to be more efficient and effective. It’s the authoritarian governments that tend to produce less wealth, accomplish fewer goals, be more corrupt and less competent.

And no, I don’t think that supports the libertarian position; they are too absolutist.

I agree with all of this. Given real power, they would quickly either have to drastically chance their philosophy to fit the real world, or ride the country down into collapse or tyranny.

Communism, yes, but socialism ? Highly debatable. How is someone who can’t get medical care doing better ? How is/was a slave better off ?

I agree with this too.

45

Its interesting that you agree with 'luci and claim to once have been a libertarian…and yet seem to know very little about the subject ('luci, of course, has the excuse of being a blind ideologue who is immune from actually having to learn about a subject he is expounding on :stuck_out_tongue: ). Maybe instead of giving up on it in the 80’s you would have been better served learning a bit more about the subject first.

Equating how (crony) capitalism worked in the US in the 19th and early 20th century to ‘libertarianism’ is sort of like equating communism to, oh, I don’t know…say liberal democracy. The superficial similarities ( :dubious: ) are only there for either someone who hasn’t a clue what they are talking about, or someone who is deliberately trying to mislead or oversimplify in order to mislead the ignorant.

Its (not so surprising) that the focus has shifted from the question of the OP to an attack now on a strawman vision of what (L)liberatrianism is. The reason I bring this up is, of course, that it actually impacts the OP (you know, the actual question we were supposed to be debating?)…the Republican party (at least pre-Bush II) was a better fit for most libertarians because the liberal wing of the Dem’s is pretty much anathema to them on several levels. Nanny government, social engineering, big gubberment, misguided economic policies that lead us into the '70’s, etc…its no big mystery why in the past libertarian’s would hold their noses and vote Republican. Similar to how a lot of Green’s held THEIR noses and voted Democrat in the past.

We are pretty much beyond that, with both parties being pretty much (from my perspective) alike with minor variations on the whole ‘Nanny government, social engineering, big gubberment, misguided (and stupid) economic policies’ etc etc theme.

-XT

46

How about: That government is most just which governs least. :slight_smile: But I’m only half-kidding there, and that is essentially what this thread is about. We don’t really care what your vision of government is, at least not in this thread. You are not a libertarian. In this thread, we’re asking where the libertarians fit best-- with the Pubs or the Dems. The fact that you don’t like libertarianism has absolutely nothing to do with what we’re talking about.

Libertarians don’t care about justice except in as much as we keep government coercion to a minimum. So you could have all the “justice” in the world, but if it involves government coercion, we’re not interested.

47

As for the U.S. Constitution being libertarian: Yes, it is, on a Federal level, in that it allows states to govern locally; but it’s not Libertarian with a capital L.

[digression]I’m really harsh on Libertarians, I know. But I sympathize with some of what Libertarians say. I largely agree that a person should own the fruits of his own labor. I just think that things like collective bargaining do a better job of making that happen.

Like most Americans, I’m small-l libertarian, in some matters. I don’t favor excessive regulation. But I do believe, absolutely, in environmental regulation. As far as I can tell, that excludes me by definition from both the classically liberal Republican “right” & the Libertarian movement, & I think that’s hellishly foolish, so I curse them as evil. If I’m wrong, & I can be both a serious conservationist & a “libertarian,” then correct me. Maybe it’s just the psycho Reagan-Limbaugh-Dodson environment I grew up in.[/digression]

But the thing is, there are a lot of people like me, who were libertarians, or even anarchists, when they were teenagers, then found themselves saying, “There oughta be a law…” enough times that they realized they didn’t really buy into the anti-law, anti-government, antinomian, Libertarian model. So Libertarians don’t have that much support in the end. And in a democracy, you have to win the coalition you can get. You’re not going to really get an ideal Libertarianism, ever.

So you can a) whinge about it; b) get liberty for yourself, & make a devil’s bargain with whomever will leave you alone; c) get some adulterated form of “libertarianism,” which may really be plutocracy; or d) try to gain as much liberty for people in general as you can. If you don’t recognize this reality, it’s tempting to fall for a version of choice b) or c) under the delusion that “it’s a step toward Libertarian government”–& the GOP has tailored its message to give that impression. Choice a) is ineffectual. Few actually grab choice d), & it’s hard.

So libertarian impulses are useful to plutocrats. Big shock. I was raised in a wonderful :rolleyes: Reaganite mix of libertarianism & religious conservatism, & I saw Christian churches get swallowed up by Ralph Reed’s propaganda to vote GOP even against their own interests. That’s what the GOP, the party of big-party-ism, does.

And that’s why you’ll never have a majority in yourselves.

48

You’ll find plenty of green Libertarians (big L? small L?), as many feel the harm to your neighbors warrants preventative coercion, the same way that launching Katusha rockets into random directions would warrant intervention.

49

Probably true, but let me elaborate because I didn’t phrase that very well. I actually meant to use quotes around “justice”, because that term has come to mean much more than what libertarians accept. Libertarians do care about justice, but we don’t think equality of outcome is a measure of justice. We don’t want to see theft or murder, but we don’t consider economic inequalities to be a de facto indication of some fundamental injustice.

At any rate, I personally have no illusion that a libertarian state will ever be seen, but I prefer to see us move in a libertarian direction when possible and to consider libertarian solutions to problems instead of just always assuming that a new government agency is needed every time someone discovers some new social ill. For example, I would rather see mandated retirement accounts than the present Social Security system. I’d rather see mandated 401k-type plans for health insurance than a government run health care insurance agency. Hell, I’d rather see mandatory charitable giving rather than state operated welfare.

50

What I saw in the 80’s and early 90’s was an ideology that put human liberty as the highest good but resolutely refused to acknowledge any threats to liberty that weren’t the result of governmental intervention. For all practically purposes libertarianism in the contemporary United States is purely ANTI-STATISM … as you say, an opposition to “nanny government, social engineering, big gubberment, misguided economic policies …”

This willful blindness of many libertarians toward the sins of non-governmental actors is what led to my eventual disaffection with the ideology. By defining libertarianism as anti-statism the practical result was a series of policies that had the trappings of advancing individual liberty for all but in practice benefitted only corporations and the wealthy.

You can say “well, libertarianism isn’t crony capitalism”. But I would counter that human nature being what it is, libertarianism invariably leads to crony capitalism, just as communism invariably leads to tyranny.

In my personal experience most contemporary self-identified libertarians are what my wife calls the “more take-home-pay-for-me crowd” – the people who will always vote to cut taxes no matter what. It doesn’t matter if the roads are full of potholes and the elementary school classrooms are overcrowded and there aren’t enough cops on the streets … as long as they pay less to the “gummint” they’re happy. They don’t give much thought to the wider implications of the ideology in terms of social issues or human rights, they just hate writing checks to the IRS. So, since the Republican party has made itself the party of “all tax cuts are good” it’s not surprising they’ve attracted a large contingent of these lumpenlibertarians.

51

We also tend to think that charity should be a private matter, and not one to be meted out with the coercive power of the state.

We also tend to be more wary of unintended consequences when attempting to meddle in the market. We’re much better at understanding that the market is nothing more than a representation of the collective desires of the people, and attempts to coerce the market by government edict generally end up being counter-productive or at best useless. We have no faith in central planning, and no belief that a few elected officials are in any way competent to manage the complexity of a modern economy or understand the potential consequences if they do.

To me, what it boils down to is that laissez-faire should be the default position, and that it should be up to the proposers of legislation to prove that the particular problem they want to attack is immune from the forces of the market, or that there is some valid reason why the free market cannot do what they want and what the people voted for. But today, it’s just assumed that problem=need for government.

Also, there should be significant reform in the way that government agencies are killed off. Because the damned things are virtually indestructable once they get started. A big problem with government efficiency is that it doesn’t shrink back when it has served its purpose or when the nation can no longer afford it. Businesses rise and fall with the business cycle - government just keeps growing.

Relating this back to the OP - I just believe that Republicans are bad at checking the size of growth of government, but the Democrats are worse. And Democrats are also likely to want to expand government through increased regulation to a greater degree than are Republicans.

52

Please be assured that I regard my reasoning abilities to be the equal to your own. However immodest that may sound.

53

I agree, and I don’t think it’s at all immodest. I like reading your posts, and wish more of them were substantive.

54

Your example is a shining beacon to us all.

55

I don’t know whether you thought I was being sarcastic or what, but in any case, I meant it. I actually agree with much of what you say as well. And I think that’s partly because you base your worldview on certain rock solid ideals. Like justice, for instance, when you said on the first page that a good government is a just one. I do agree with that, and I would personally question the ethics of anyone who disagreed with it. Where we part ways is in the extrapolations of those same principles, which we share, into their applications. And there, I do disagree with you on most things. However, your contributions are very important to your side because you are a very good writer. The same quality that makes your terse drive-bys so clever makes your more substantive writing an enjoyable read. Sometimes, it is tedious just to drag the eyeballs across what some people have written. And I’m sure my own writing fits that bill; I’ve always acknowledged that my expository skills are weak. But I think your writing reflects your clairty of thought and reason. Therefore, don’t be shy or modest about your abilities, and don’t think that they don’t impress even those who don’t align with you. I think you’re wrong about a lot of things, but I can’t help envying how you express yourself.

56

I agree with Liberal…besides, you are such a droll fellow, Mr. Tooie. :stuck_out_tongue: While I don’t often agree with you 'luci, I have to admit that I sometimes wander into threads just because I notice that you were the last poster…and I’m curious to see what you’ve writen. When you take the time to actually look into an issue and to do more than a droll one liner your posts are as enjoyable to read as anyone on this board…IMHO, FWIW and all that. :stuck_out_tongue:

-XT

57

It’s “Toohey”, XT.

P.S.: You know you’re a *really *bad speller when you get corrected by me!

58

Boy, once Ayn Rand has sunk her fangs into your mental jugular, it takes a long, long time to get over it. I know of what I speak, I recovered from objectivism only by massive application of sex, drugs, and rock 'n roll, a program that was my intellectual salvation, but might assassinate men of…mature years.

To this day, I cannot decide whether or not Ms. Rand was a worse novelist or political thinker, not until Newt Gangrene’s 1945 have innocent words been so maliciously deployed, nor has anyone displayed such a shallow understanding of what constitutes a “character”. Hers are cardboard cutouts against a Hanna-Barberra background, her men are manly men, her women, slightly less manly. She is determined to annihilate any hint of a spiritual dimension, as such, her “people” are nothing more than adding machines constructed from meat. Her philosophy is as soulless and wretched as the Marxism she so shrilly despised.

Which is to preface a point: I consider the comparison to “Toohey” a calculated insult, and no amount of smilies pasted thereon will render it a hearty jocularity. If that matters to you, it matters, if not, so be it.

59

:smack: Yeah, I can’t spell my way out of a paper box…thanks for the correctly John. :slight_smile:

Why you think I’d insult you after saying how much I like reading your posts is beyond me. Which is to preface my own point: No, I don’t consider it a calculated insult, or even an uncalculated one. If YOU think its an insult however, if you are really that thin of skin, then I will refrain in future.

It WAS supposed to be a ‘hearty jocularity’…I just didn’t realize you didn’t see it that way.

-XT

60

Back to the matter at hand. Balderdash, sir, tommyrot! There never has been anything remotely similar to a lazy fair economy, the marketplace is not free, and never has been, it has always been subject to the manipulation of the powerful, by gold, iron, or law. Without regulation, it is a genteel form of savagery, as demonstrated by such unworthies as Mr. Carnegie’s mad dog, Mr. Frick. Witholding a rice bowl is a form of violence directly equal to pointing a gun, there is no innocent means of enslaving your fellow.

As far as ignorance of unintended consequences, surely the great trusts of the Gilded Age teach us doleful lessons about the poisonous influence of monopoly. And is not monopoly the end product of unfettered capitalism, the bigger you are, the lower your costs, the bigger you get? Unfettered capitalism does not grow, it metastacizes.

We will have regulation of business, either by the government of the people, or the government of the wealthy, or some hodge-podge of both such as our current state of affairs.

So long as the government is the creature of the people’s will, I don’t care so much how big it gets. Don’t care how big my dog gets, long’s I can feed him, he comes when I call, and he sics who I tell him to.