questions about libertarianism

[Arnold_Winkelried]

Well Libertarian, I am sure I was needlessly confrontational in the other thread also. I’m sure if I look there I can find some statements of mine that I should apologize for also, but I don’t want this to turn into a big lovefest where a wisecracker comes in and advises us to “get a room”.

As far as acknowledging who really owns the property in these borders - Yes, it seems clear to me that the state has ultimate authority over my private property. But you know what? That doesn’t bother me. As I mentioned before, by my choosing to live in the USA I implicityl accept the contract that I will submit to its laws. Other people are in the same case. There is no coercion in this society. So I may as well call it Libertaria.

[Liberal]

Arnold

As I mentioned before, by my choosing to live in the USA I implicityl accept the contract that I will submit to its laws.

Well, you have precious little choice, except to abondon your — er, their — property.

I would assume, of course, that you will apply the same principle to small businesses in the Bronx who tacitly accept the terms of organized crime extortionists by not moving their business to Montana.

Other people are in the same case. There is no coercion in this society. So I may as well call it Libertaria.

As you wish. Unfortunately, you’re stuck with the following statement:

But you know what? That doesn’t bother me.

When you extend that statement to say, “But of course, I think you should decide for yourself whether it bothers you,” then you will have arrived in Libertaria.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

*Originally posted by Libertarian *
Well, you have precious little choice, except to abondon your — er, their — property.

False statement. I can sell my property, take the capital and leave this land of oppression. There is no law to prevent a peaceful, honest US citizen from leaving its borders. Even assuming that you need to abandon your property, does this mean that you value your property above your freedom?

It seems to me that you are arguing “it is too difficult for me to abandon the privileges and economic advantages I enjoy in this country.” The same argument that opponents of Libertaria use to explain that the poor will have in Libertaria to fully benefit from their “freedom.” Again, to give the Libertarian answer, if you think it is too difficult for you to abandon these privileges, in effect you are choosing to remain here. I see no coercion.

When you extend that statement to say, “But of course, I think you should decide for yourself whether it bothers you,” then you will have arrived in Libertaria.

Yes, you should decide yourself whether or not it bothers you, and if it does, you should rescind your implicit contract with the government by removing yourself from its reach.

[Liberal]

But Libertaria is not a nation-state, Arnold. It makes no claims to own your land or to hold eminent domain over it. To secede from Libertaria, you need only withdraw your consent to be governed upon completion of your obligation. And you don’t have to abandon — er, sell — your land. You stay right where you are. After all, you own it.

For a brief and shining moment, it did seem that America would have a libertarian government:

[/quote]
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

— Adopted in Congress, July 4, 1776

[/quote]

If it had been written by you, would it have said, “…whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to leave”?

[manhattan]

*Originally posted by Libertarian *
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

Uh, that would be the collective governed, not each individual. That’s why the several states declared independence from the crown and assumed jurisdiction to pass laws governing their citizens.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

*Originally posted by Libertarian *
But Libertaria is not a nation-state, Arnold. It makes no claims to own your land or to hold eminent domain over it. To secede from Libertaria, you need only withdraw your consent to be governed upon completion of your obligation. And you don’t have to abandon — er, sell — your land. You stay right where you are. After all, you own it.

I remember reading that Libertaria can have any form of government it chooses. And anything can happen as long as the citizens of the country freely consent to it. As we have seen before, Libertaria does have authority over my private property, in that the enforcers of Libertarian can obligate me to turn over part (or all) of my property in case of a breach of contract. You say “a libertarian has freely contracted for that, so it’s not coercion.” Do you not see that by living in the United States, you are agreeing to an implicit contract with its government in that your private property is subject to its rules and administration? If you disagreed with those rules, why did you acquire property in a place subject to those rules? The choice was yours.

If it had been written by you, would it have said, “…whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to leave”?

No, I would have written the same thing. Its is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it. However, the method provided for by our laws are that such a decision cannot occur unilaterally by one person, but must be by majority decision. Therefore, all you need to do is change enough hearts and minds to convince people that they must join you in an effort to modify the necessary laws.

[Liberal]

Okay, so you would have said, “the Right of the Majority of the People”. Is that it?

[Arnold_Winkelried]

I would have said “the Right of the People”
[list=A]
[li]subject to them being of an age where they are deemed to be adults not subject to the tutelage of their parents[/li][li]subject to them not being under an adverse judgment rendered by their government (think of the libertarian who wants to rescind the contract to avoid compensating someone that has been coerced)[/li][li]NOT subject to considerations of gender or race[/li][li]subject to the decision mechanisms set forth in the attached document, and to whom all signers (entrusted by their constituents to represent their interests) honestly and peacefully consent, free of coercion[/li][/list]
etc…

But then that would be a lot harder for school-children to memorize. Of course, it would have been perhaps more clear to have a contract setting out the full set of laws that would be part of the USA code, and then include a provision forbidding to add any new law, but I assume that the writers of the constitution were concerned with the “big picture” (similary to the libertarian claiming “freedom from coercion” is the only law) and not all the minute details.

[pldennison]

Kimstu:

I think societies work better when there’s an underlying assumption of mutual responsibility and obligation connecting everybody, that is, when at the most fundamental level we’re all “us”.

Isn’t that at least as pie-in-the-sky as anything you could possibly critique under Libertarianism? If critics are going to attempt to argue based on the features, failures and successes of past societies, might I point out that nearly all societies have been founded on some feature that made them different from everyone else? Whether it’s skin color, religious belief, place of origin or some other identification, the fundamental us-ness only ever occurs at very local levels. It is never universal, and in this respect, I at least think you would concede that Libertarianism is no worse than any other system. In fact, I think it’s better, because you can be “us” with whomever you mutually agree to do so.

Sounds appalling, but do you have a cite for it so that I’m sure I understand the details? It seems so improbable that a city could force a citizen to do something like this in the absence of any legal justification for it at all, and I’m sure that if they did then he could make a hell of a case against them.

I think most of us can agree that the government can always come up with a justification. After all, ultimately, it’s their land, innit? The justification used, IIRC, was an “eyesore” law of the type that prevents one from keeping cars on blocks in their front yard and whatnot. I am looking for a cite, but the Cleveland Plain Dealer database is a piece of crap.

Well, no: it would be unthinkable only in a context of Libertarians who’d all signed the same government contract with no restrictions on lawn care.

Why would a government which exists only at the pleasure of the governed, and exists only to protect your rights with regard to your person and property care what you do with your lawn? It isn’t theirs, it’s yours, and as long as you are not harming anyone else, they have no recourse to require anything of your lawn.

If this man were living peacefully and honestly in a Libertarian neighborhood but hadn’t signed up for governance, then his Chemlawn-junta neighbors could do anything they chose to his property and he’d have no legal recourse whatsoever.

I hate to be cynical, but he could do whatever he wanted to them. He could, in fact, shoot them if they touched his lawn. The fact that he did not engage a government to protect his rights does not mean he doesn’t have any. If he felt he could best protect his rights by himself, I would be wary of messing with him.

But on the face of it, the numbers at least suggest strongly that people do not automatically take advantage of less taxation to increase their charitable contributions, and I would be very hesitant to adopt a Libertarian government that assumed they would.

But should we then require people to be charitable by force of law? I tend toward the socially liberal, as I’m sure you do, and we probably both have scoffed at the “I don’t want my tax dollars paying for perverted art, or abortions, etc.” argument, but don’t you think there is some substance to it? Shouldn’t they be a matter of choice? At the risk of sounding even more cynical, if “society” tend not to support some charitable causes, then they obviously don’t value the goals of those causes. Society, remember, is not an entity, and does not have preferences (in the economic sense); society’s preferences are the aggregate preferences of its individuals. If those individuals clearly do not value X, Y or Z, why should they be required by force of law to support X, Y and Z?

Because the fact is, people don’t leave other people alone nor do they want to: humans are social animals and are basically stuck with mutual interaction and interference.

I agree. 100%. But they should not be forced into mutual interaction and interference with those they do not want to. Shouldn’t individuals be free to make those decisions themselves? Let’s say, for example, we live in a society where my money is taken out of my paycheck and given to Pat Robertson. Isn’t that a choice I should be allowed to make on my own, rather than someone else making it for me?

So Libertarians come along and say, “Government should leave people alone!” and non-Libertarians respond with a host of questions about then how will we do this and how will we do that and how will we do the other.

And the Libertarians respond that that’s up to the individual decisions of peaceful honest people, and everyone else dismisses them as silly utopianists—because they’ve refused to tackle the fundamental social question, “How shall we live together?” Saying “we should answer that question without involving government” isn’t an answer.
[/quote]

I think it is an answer. Are you asking us to build a whole society from the ground up? Because that’s a hell of a thing. Not having done it before, I can only hypothesize as to the answers. But I feel that people are in general smart enough, and clever enough, far more than beaueaucracies are, at solving those problems.

Unfortunately, I think the question that’s really being asked, most of the time, is, “How can we keep the United States exactly as it is now, with all of the entitlements and all of the government programs and all of the welfare and all of the ‘public’ lands and goods, except with Libertarians in charge?” I, personally, don’t feel that’s a fair question. The whole point of the Libertarian approach is to eliminate some of those things and instead let individuals concoct their own answers.

You can’t just say “take government away and society will work better,” you’ve got to show a society working well enough that people realize that government is redundant.

Well, thanks for placing us in a Catch-22 situation. I cannot accept responsibility for the minds of people who feel that suborning their own will to that of the government is the best way to do things, and are not in a position to be convinced otherwise.

It’s actually kind of a beautiful dream. But you’ll never do it, and you know why? Because you don’t have an answer to “How shall we live together?”, or at least no two of you have the same answer.

OK–do any two of you, which is to say you, Kimstu, together with Daniel, Jeff, Gadarene, and Arnold, have the same answer? I’m really curious. I’ll bet you don’t. Why would you expect complete, mind-melded consistency among people of like philosophy, especially in regards to a hypothetical society, when you yourself cannot achieve that consistency between two non-Libertarians? How fair a condition is that?

All you can agree on is that we should stop using government to decide how we’ll live together. And since that leaves the fundamental question of society unanswered, the vast majority of those who have come to a mature acceptance of the centrality of society will ignore you and go on tinkering with government.

Society is made up of nothing but individuals, Kimstu, but you are free to continue to believe otherwise. Society is not central, except to the extent it benefits individuals. You apparently feel that individuals are not central, except to the extent that they benefit society. I cannot imagine a more horrible way to think, that individuals are irrelevant except that they serve the “greater good.”

Tinker away, though. Be my guest. You apparently don’t trust individual people enough to devise solutions to injustices, unless they claim to be your leaders.

[Kimstu]

Libertarian: *For a brief and shining moment, it did seem that America would have a libertarian government: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, […]” *

I think it’s significant that this language appears in the Declaration of Independence at the commencement of the American Revolution, and not in the Constitution written some years later by many of the same people, which includes among the government’s stated goals (in addition to such Libertarian classics as “providing for the common defense” and “securing the blessing of liberty”) such un-Libertarian “Nannyisms” as “forming a more perfect union” and “promoting the general welfare.” Rebels by their nature tend to be more libertarian than founders—even if they happen to be the same individuals.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

*Originally posted by pldennison *
OK–do any two of you, which is to say you, Kimstu, together with Daniel, Jeff, Gadarene, and Arnold, have the same answer? I’m really curious. I’ll bet you don’t. Why would you expect complete, mind-melded consistency among people of like philosophy, especially in regards to a hypothetical society, when you yourself cannot achieve that consistency between two non-Libertarians? How fair a condition is that?

And that’s why majority rule (or some variant thereof) is necessary. Because a society that claims that “nothing can ever happen without the unanimous consent of all governed” is very likely to be unable to make any decisions at all.

[Kimstu]

Phil replied to me:

“If this man were living peacefully and honestly in a Libertarian neighborhood but hadn’t signed up for governance, then his Chemlawn-junta neighbors could do anything they chose to his property and he’d have no legal recourse whatsoever.” *I hate to be cynical, but he could do whatever he wanted to them. He could, in fact, shoot them if they touched his lawn. *

True, but I don’t think that that is necessarily a better resolution than the one he’s got now.

*But should we then require people to be charitable by force of law? *

Well, if our society’s mandate for how we shall live together includes charitable actions, then yes, that’s part of the package.

*I tend toward the socially liberal, as I’m sure you do, and we probably both have scoffed at the “I don’t want my tax dollars paying for perverted art, or abortions, etc.” argument, but don’t you think there is some substance to it? Shouldn’t they be a matter of choice? At the risk of sounding even more cynical, if “society” tend not to support some charitable causes, then they obviously don’t value the goals of those causes. Society, remember, is not an entity, and does not have preferences (in the economic sense); society’s preferences are the aggregate preferences of its individuals.
*

Except that the foundational document of our society, the Constitution, states some preferences—mandates, really—about what the society as an entity should try to do. All your arguments about how government fails or perverts those mandates do have merit, but I don’t think they override the basic obligations that those mandates place on citizens.

“humans are social animals and are basically stuck with mutual interaction and interference.” I agree. 100%. But they should not be forced into mutual interaction and interference with those they do not want to.

Up to a point, I quite agree. But I don’t think it’s either possible or desirable to make such “freedom of non-association” absolute.

“You can’t just say `take government away and society will work better,’ you’ve got to show a society working well enough that people realize that government is redundant.” *Well, thanks for placing us in a Catch-22 situation. I cannot accept responsibility for the minds of people who feel that suborning their own will to that of the government is the best way to do things, and are not in a position to be convinced otherwise. *

Well, we don’t see it as “suborning our wills”, we see it as making compromises (on some things, not all) for mutual advantage. It’s no use just saying you won’t deal with that, if that’s the belief of the people you’ve got to convince! Would you really rather continue as a minute and ineffective splinter party than actually persuade people to help create a society that’s more to your liking?

“Because you don’t have an answer to `How shall we live together?’, or at least no two of you have the same answer.” *OK–do any two of you, which is to say you, Kimstu, together with Daniel, Jeff, Gadarene, and Arnold, have the same answer? *

Oh, I’m sure we have differences on lots of specific laws, but we all accept the basic structure of our existing Constitution and laws as guidelines for the interactions of the citizens. You seem to be saying, on the other hand, that it should all be taken away (except for minimum defense and contract enforcement) and replaced with voluntary contractual obligations. That leaves most of the answer to “how shall we live together?” blank.

I understand that you consider that to be not a bug but a feature! All I’m trying to say is that most people don’t object to having government carry out some of society’s functions, and we are not interested so much in “should government be doing these things?” as in “what should society do and how should it do it?” You’re refusing on principle to answer that question

*You apparently feel that individuals are not central, except to the extent that they benefit society. *

No, no! Gosh, what a thing to say to a card-carrying ACLU member. Individuals, who are indeed central, exist in an intricate web of rights and mutual obligations that constitutes society.

[pldennison]

Arnold:

And that’s why majority rule (or some variant thereof) is necessary. Because a society that claims that “nothing can ever happen without the unanimous consent of all governed” is very likely to be unable to make any decisions at all.

Whew–we’re lucky that Libertarians don’t say that! They say that government can do nothing without the unanimous consent of the governed. For those who want the government to do everything, I can see how this would be anathema. If, on the other hand, you aren’t reliant on the government to solve your problems, it’s a non-issue.

No, lots of things can happen without the unanimous consent of the governed–because people are free to enter into relationships and solve their problems without the government’s interference, approval, or involvement. Please, when offering critiques, at least try not to mix the metaphors. A Libertarian society would claim no such thing.

Kimstu: I found some cites, but I cannot link to them as they are at a subscription site. I will publish some excerpts here. I got the city wrong (Lyndhurst is just the other side of Shaker Heights, but equally affluent), and apparently, in the judgement of some, his lawn was “unkempt.” :

"LYNDHURST

GARDEN BATTLE CONTINUES

City Council members pointed out at their meeting Monday that the home of Arnold Gleisser on S. Barton Rd. was not among the stops on the city’s recent garden tour sponsored by the Lyndhurst Garden Club.

Gleisser, a longtime environmentalist, is battling the city, which has responded to complaints from neighbors that his organic, pesticide-free yard is a public nuisance.

His front yard has no grass and is filled with pachysandra, myrtle, ivy and junipers, plus two pear trees and raspberry bushes. He keeps only a push mower to cut the city’s tree lawn in front of his house.

The city is awaiting a real estate appraiser’s opinion on whether the yard is affecting property values before considering legal action."

METRO

GARDENER SUES LYNDHURST TO SAVE FRONT-YARD PATCH
JESSE TINSLEY PLAIN DEALER REPORTER

11/20/1998
The Plain Dealer Cleveland, OH

FINAL / ALL
2B
(Copyright © The Plain Dealer 1998)
Organic gardener Arnold Gleisser has taken the city to court over his front-yard garden.
In a suit filed this week, Gleisser asked the Common Pleas Court to throw out the Lyndhurst ordinance that would force him to uproot his garden of English ivy, myrtle and pachysandra.

Gleisser, who moved into his South Barton Dr. home in 1972, has cultivated the vegetation - including pear trees and raspberry bushes - for years.
Gleisser’s suit challenges the validity of the ordinances that in effect require him to remove the plantings from his front yard.

The ordinances require that exterior property be kept free of junk, rubbish, cars without license plates, weeds and other nuisances.

“This is a catchall ordinance,” Gleisser said. “If they can use this against me and my yard, it could be used against anyone’s yard. What if you plant a tree, shrubs or ground cover that City Hall doesn’t like?”

Gleisser, a retired school teacher, hardly considers his pesticide-free and “environmentally friendly” garden a weed patch and is asking the city to clarify the ordinances.

Last month, Gleisser received a notice from the city asking him to “restore your exterior property area to a condition which lends itself to being neat, orderly, kempt, and maintained condition.”

Gleisser said he feared the city would remove his plants without permission. But on Nov. 12, a judge issued a restraining order prohibiting the city from taking action until after the suit is settled.

Councilman Dale Fisher said he had not seen the lawsuit, but that the city’s law director would review it. But he said it comes down to each side’s definition of beauty.

“Beauty is a matter of interpretation,” said Fisher. “Most people want a green lawn with trees and bushes in appropriate places. He is more into natural-growing foliage. Nothing in his yard conforms to anything in the neighborhood.”

Several months ago the city hired an independent real estate appraiser to study property valuation on North Barton Dr. and South Barton Dr., where Gleisser lives.

“The independent study concluded that the valuations on South Barton were several thousand dollars lower than the ones on North Barton. The only conclusion they came up with was this one yard, which stands out,” Fisher said.

METRO

LYNDHURST MAN PLANS TO TAME FERAL GARDEN
ANDREA SIMAKIS PLAIN DEALER REPORTER
04/28/1999
The Plain Dealer Cleveland, OH

FINAL / ALL
4B
(Copyright © The Plain Dealer 1999)

With his thick white hair, mud-caked dungarees and plastic yellow gloves, Arnold Gleisser looks more like Captain Kangeroo’s longtime sidekick Mr. Greenjeans than a thorn in the side of the city.
Yesterday, Gleisser was on his hands and knees, pulling up clumps of long grass from his yard on S. Barton Rd. in deference to a court order Common Pleas Judge Mary Boyle issued April 23.
Depending on where you stand, Gleisser is either an ecology hero or a public nuisance. Neighbors complained that the lush, organic garden he has cultivated in his front lawn is an eyesore. But for Gleisser, a retired mathematics teacher who will turn 70 in May, his botanical efforts are the only environmentally sound way to keep a yard - he refuses to use weed killers and makes his own compost from leaves. When he’s not tending to his garden, Gleisser rings doorbells, stumping for various Earth-friendly causes.
While Judge Boyle recognized that Gleisser was an “active environmentalist,” she ruled that he had to keep his prodigious plantings - peonies, irises, zinnias, marigolds, raspberries, pachysandras, myrtle, ivy, rose of Sharon bushes and fruit trees - pruned and trimmed.

Gleisser must have his yard in shape by June 24, or face a contempt charge.

“I’m not anxious to go to jail and be a martyr for this,” he said, gesturing to his feral plot dotted with violets and tulips bobbing in the April breeze.

In October, the city notified Gleisser that his garden violated Lyndhurst ordinances that require front yards to be free of junk, rubbish and unsightly weeds.

City officials later produced a study to bolster their claims that Gleisser’s yard was bringing down the property values on S. Barton Rd., a neighborhood of identical, manicured lawns. While he admits many of his neighbors aren’t “wild about” the front yard, Gleisser said his natural landscaping spoils neither the soil nor area real estate, and paid for an appraisal to prove it.

Gleisser filed a suit asking that the court protect his property; he feared city laws would allow Lyndhurst to plow under his organic garden.

Now that the city and the gardener have reached a court-sanctioned agreement, Gleisser can grow whatever he wants in his yard, Law Director Rick Carbone said. “We are not in any way telling him what to plant there. We’re not making him use pesticides or anything like that. All we’re saying is we want the yard maintained.”

City Councilman Marty Puin is less diplomatic. “It took a court to order him to clean up that mess on his property,” he said. “He says he does this in the name of the environment. It’s not about organic gardening, it’s about being unsanitary and just plain kooky.”

A city building inspector will survey Gleisser’s garden come June. "We may go out there and say, `This is great,’ Carbone said. “Or we may find the yard is still in violation of the ordinance, but we’re hoping it doesn’t come to that.”

So does Gleisser. Instead of battling the city over his organic green thumb, “I’d rather be knocking on doors fighting against nuclear waste,” he said.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

*Originally posted by pldennison *
Whew–we’re lucky that Libertarians don’t say that! They say that government can do nothing without the unanimous consent of the governed. For those who want the government to do everything, I can see how this would be anathema. If, on the other hand, you aren’t reliant on the government to solve your problems, it’s a non-issue.

Actually, in the “Ask the Libertarian” thread, Libertarian (the poster) had said that, for example, in his idea of a libertarian government, the arbiters (e.g. the judiciary) will be chosen by majority vote. How is that unanimous consent?

To give you another example (from a question I asked him), when a citizen signs a contract with the Libertarian government, do all the other citizens have to approve the contract that the new person is signing? Who decides if a person is allowed to join Libertaria? Do all the contracts have to be identical to each other, or can modifications to the contract be done for a new citizen? Who makes that decision?

If one wants the government to do anything, it is necessary to realize that it is impossible to make decisions of any importance if unanimous consent of everyone involved is required.

As far as “relying on the government to solve my problems” - that is a course of action taken by the great majority of people in their everyday lives. If I want a machine to propel me over the roads, I could go ahead and design my own automobile and build it from scratch. But it is unrealistic for me to do so, which is why I entrust someone else with constructing my car, and amongst the choices possible I will find the one that meets my needs. If I want to devise a set of rules to govern a large group of people to which I belong, I could attempt to devise the rules myself, or find someone else more expert in that area and upon whose judgment I have sufficient confidence to rely and ask that person to choose those rules for me, with the knowledge that I may not necessarily agree with the full set of rules and may want to modify some later on.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

By the way, pldennison, your critique was well-taken. My sentence was stated incorrectly, I should have said «Because a society that claims that “the government that makes no decisions without the unanimous consent of all governed” is very likely to be unable to make any governmental decisions at all.»

[TampaFlyer]

It seems like Libertarianism is the only political philosophy which its detractors expect to be able to solve all of humanity’s problems.

I’ve never heard someone ask a question like “Please explain how life would be perfect under a conservative [or liberal or whatever] government.” I also don’t see people expecting all conservatives to agree on every issue.

[pldennison]

I can’t help but think, Arnold, that you’re trying to have it both ways. On the one side, you (along with Daniel and Jeff and Kimstu) argue that, left alone to make their own decisions, people are greedy, uncharitable, selfish, base, and horrible. If we do not pass law after law after law restricting how people may live their lives, we will have instant slave labor and a permanent underclass and all sorts of labor- and environment-related tragedies. Yet, from this same group of people, you are astoundingly eager to choose:

. . .someone else more expert in that area and upon whose judgment I have sufficient confidence to rely and ask that person to choose those rules for me . . .

Boy, those people must be rare indeed! How lucky you are to find them.

Let me ask you (and everyone else) one very simple, easy-to-answer question: What single individual is the most qualified to make decisions concerning how your life should be lived, both for yourself and in relation to other people?

[Danielinthewolvesden]

*Originally posted by pldennison *
**Daniel:

Why do you feel the need to resort to personal attacks?

Oh, let’s see, maybe because I return like for like? Starting on page 1 of this thread, we have seen the following, unprovoked, >1
(Note: When someone does come out with sixguns blazing, Daniel suddenly becomes a shrinking violet.)>2

You simply toss straw man after straw man and refuse to agree on commonly-defined words like “initiate,” “retaliate,” “coerce” and “volunteer.”>3

Take, for example, something that occurred in Shaker Heights, an affluent Cleveland suburb, last year. >4

s basic services could very well be cheaper. >5
**

>1. I have never PERSONALLY attacked YOU. I have issued a challenge to ALL libertarians, which, therefore is not by definition, “personal”. This appears to be another “Humpty Dumpty” definition.

>2. Absolute, I am running away from any confrontation here, refuse to post responses, and have not posted here since my challenge. It is well known here at the SDMB that DITWD shys away from any contentious debate. :rolleyes:

>3 I’d be happy to agree on “commonly” defined words, but I have a problem. See, I want to use the Dictionaries definition, which most of us use, and not the “libertarian” definition, which was apperentyly written by Humpty Dumpty. “Coercion is not “coercion”, once you have signed a contract.” As if one cannot 'coerce" someone into fulfilling the terms of a contract- happens everyday in civil court. If someone fails to obey a Law, you are using “coercion”, but if someone fails to obey a 'contract" you are just “retaliating”. Uhhuh, pull the other one, it’s got bells on. :rolleyes:

>4 And if they could prove in a court that he was lowering their property values, thus “damaging” them? Is that not the “free market”?

>5. “COULD very well be cheaper”. It is very hard to eat “could”. And they COULD be a LOT cheaper, but if your income is 0, as you are disabled, you still can’t afford them. And like I have said, in those nations with ZERO personal taxes, the natives are NOT known for their charity.

And I agree with Kimstu: I support the Constitution. That’s MY “contract”, and I am happy with it.

[Danielinthewolvesden]

*Originally posted by pldennison *
[ argue that, left alone to make their own decisions, people are greedy, uncharitable, selfish, base, and horrible. If we do not pass law after law after law restricting how people may live their lives,
What single individual is the most qualified to make decisions concerning how your life should be lived, both for yourself and in relation to other people? **

For the freaking tenth time, WE have never ascribed those things to “people”, just SOME people. We do NOT need to be protected from MOST people, just a few.

And in answer to you question: how MY life? Me. In releation to other people? I’m gonna ask them, I’m not arrogant enuf to assume that I can decide what other folks want out my my relationships with them, without some input.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

*Originally posted by pldennison *
I can’t help but think, Arnold, that you’re trying to have it both ways. On the one side, you (along with Daniel and Jeff and Kimstu) argue that, left alone to make their own decisions, people are greedy, uncharitable, selfish, base, and horrible.

And as I pointed out to you before, you’re trying to have it both ways too. You’re assuming that the corrupt, inept and dictatorial government officials (the same ones criticizing the ecologists’ lawn in the example above) will be entrusted to head the corporations with which I will be doing daily business, and that they will become benevolent and fair?

Let me ask you (and everyone else) one very simple, easy-to-answer question: What single individual is the most qualified to make decisions concerning how your life should be lived, both for yourself and in relation to other people?

I will repeat what I said before - myself with the aid of experts. What’s the best way for me to get a car? For me to choose a car that fits my needs, but designed and built by someone else because I have no idea how to build a car. How should I choose a house to buy? By having someone else to build it for me, and by relying on safety standards set by an independent organization (in my case largely the government), because I don’t really know all the intricacies involved in building a house.