# Rand Paul's interview on Rachel Maddow - A real Libertarian meets the real world **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 20, 2010, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157 "2010-05-20T18:07:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/261 "2010-05-22T00:35:44Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > Do you get it? Do you get the point? If you have a point to make, would you please, please, just make it already. Challenging everyone else to make your argument for you is tiresome. > [@](#): > > How about cars? Would no cars be sold if there weren’t airbag legislature? Would factories in Michigan and Tennessee sit idle, with workers twiddling their thumbs,… Consumer protection laws do not exist to enable business owners or factory workers, they exist to protect consumers. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/262 "2010-05-22T00:43:01Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > What might happen next? I would imagine that we would go back to the situation that spurred the public outcry and demand for government intervention in ensuring food safety. This is certainly an odd hobbyhorse to ride into town on. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/263 "2010-05-22T00:46:30Z")
> [@Dante\_Fevah](#): > > If you were only as honest as you are ignorant. You will not do this, again, in Great Debates. Leave the personal insults in the BBQ Pit. [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![IdahoMauleMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71c47a/32.png) [@IdahoMauleMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IdahoMauleMan)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/264 "2010-05-22T00:49:29Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > If you have a point to make, would you please, please, just make it already. > > Challenging everyone else to make your argument for you is tiresome. > > Consumer protection laws do not exist to enable business owners or factory workers, they exist to protect consumers. Why can’t you protect yourself, by simply not buying what is acceptable to you? You retain 100% control that way. Then the auto manufacturer will go bankrupt because no one will buy their cars. That is, if everyone else has the exact same preferences as you. They may, or they may not. For those that do not, unfortunately, in the current world they will be forbidden to conduct business as they see fit, just like lettuce buyers who do not care if the FDA stamps ‘approved’ on lettuce. I cannot buy a new car like my treasured 1970’s Mercedes Benz diesel anymore, even though it still runs fine at 350,000 miles. It would be illegal to manufacture such a car today. But amazingly, there are still many of those on the road and drivers like them just fine. You seem to think that by signing over the rights to what is, or is not, acceptable in an automobile, or in food packaging, or decisions about who can do voluntary business with whom (the point of the OP) to a government employee your life is being made better than if you hadn’t signed over those rights. You are deluding yourself if you think that is the case. You are trading liberty for security. You will get neither. ---
**Author:** ![IdahoMauleMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71c47a/32.png) [@IdahoMauleMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IdahoMauleMan)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/265 "2010-05-22T00:53:39Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > I would imagine that we would go back to the situation that spurred the public outcry and demand for government intervention in ensuring food safety. > > This is certainly an odd hobbyhorse to ride into town on. Nope. We’re doing just fine. Thanks for the reply. Let’s keep going here. Let’s imagine there was indeed a public outcry. And even better, let’s imagine it was splashed all over the Internet in today’s world…unlike the Upton Sinclair world of the early 1900s. But the citizenry also simultaneously said ‘Our Constitution forbids the Government from getting involved in these private transactions’. No new laws will be made. And the politicians agreed. They did nothing. What might happen next? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/266 "2010-05-22T00:59:23Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > What might happen next? Jesus Christ would ride up on a Harley and give me a blow job? Did I guess right? Enough with the Socratic method. Instead of trying to rhetorically coax your points out of us with leading questions, just make your argument. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/267 "2010-05-22T01:02:59Z")
Public vomitoriums? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/268 "2010-05-22T01:04:26Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > You seem to think that by signing over the rights to what is, or is not, acceptable in an automobile, or in food packaging, or decisions about who can do voluntary business with whom (the point of the OP) to a government employee your life is being made better than if you hadn’t signed over those rights. And it is, in the sense that we can eat fresh lettuce and strawberries and ice cream from commercial vendors with a very low risk of getting sick from them. > [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > You are deluding yourself if you think that is the case. Simply repeating this absurd claim isn’t going to convince anybody that it’s true. Yes, it is generally agreed that life **IS** better in many ways in a society where citizens have reasonable assurances of basic product safety. If you are so divorced from reality that you persist in refusing to admit that unremarkable fact, we’re not going to suddenly start believing you; we’re just going to go on laughing at you. > [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > You are trading liberty for security. You will get neither. You are pulling pompous and unrealistic libertarian platitudes out of your ass. You are impressing nobody. > [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > Let’s imagine there was indeed a public outcry. And even better, let’s imagine it was splashed all over the Internet in today’s world…unlike the Upton Sinclair world of the early 1900s. > > But the citizenry also simultaneously said ‘Our Constitution forbids the Government from getting involved in these private transactions’. No new laws will be made. And the politicians agreed. They did nothing. > > What might happen next? We’d change the Constitution so that it no longer contained such ridiculous constraints on reasonable legislation. We’ve changed the Constitution several times for arguably much less important reasons. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/269 "2010-05-22T01:14:52Z")
Incidentally, I’d like to point out that there’s significant variation on libertarian positions. Not everyone wants to disband the FDA and privatize roads and all that. ---
**Author:** ![Yookeroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yookeroo/32/323_2.png) [@Yookeroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yookeroo)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/270 "2010-05-22T01:27:43Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Before we go further, let me just say that although I disagree with you on this, I’m not going to say you are objectively wrong. Your argument makes sense, based on the assumptions you are making. > > I make different assumptions, namely that private property is the same-- be it a house or a lunch counter. Rand Paul thinks so, too. > > Neither of those two views is radical or outrageous. No? Are you sure? Given Rand’s floundering, I’m guessing his views might be considered pretty radical. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > What does that have to do with inspections? I live in CA. Street vendors get inspected by the health department. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/271 "2010-05-22T01:38:54Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > I cannot buy a new car like my treasured 1970’s Mercedes Benz diesel anymore, even though it still runs fine at 350,000 miles. It would be illegal to manufacture such a car today. But amazingly, there are still many of those on the road and drivers like them just fine. I remember those, they were manufactured in a country with much stricter regulations on cars and ran on diesel because the govt chose to raise fuel prices and cars with good gas/diesel mileage sold well. Of course that was a bad period for US car manufacturers, because in contrast to the rest of the industrialized world the US had low gas prices so foreign made cars made huge inroads during the gas crisis in the 70s. Great example of Libertarianism. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/272 "2010-05-22T01:40:50Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > Why can’t you protect yourself, by simply not buying what is acceptable to you? You retain 100% control that way. Because babies have to die before I can know that Acme Infant Formula is adulterated with melamine. You seem OK with that. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/273 "2010-05-22T01:58:24Z")
> [@DanBlather](#): > > No, I realize that, it’s that many conservatives pretend to be libertarian because it allows them to oppose the Civil Rights Bill without being racist, or have a principled stand against taxes even though they really are just sock puppets for the rich. > > I want to see the look on conservatives’ faces when Rand Paul tells them he wants to legalize prostitution and gambling and let gay people marry. Never happen. Being the eternal optimist, I see it this way, “I am for small government and less government interference/intrusion into my life and my ability to do things I want to do… But I want MORE government interference in YOUR life, to control or outlaw whatever it is, that I don’t like.” ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/274 "2010-05-22T02:04:11Z")
He can have my hamster porn when he can pry it from my cold, dead hand! ---
**Author:** ![Dante\_Fevah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Dante\_Fevah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante_Fevah)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/275 "2010-05-22T02:05:50Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > You will not do this, again, in Great Debates. > > Leave the personal insults in the BBQ Pit. > > [/Moderating] I apologize. Where I come from ‘ignorant’ is not an insult. It is a descriptive term. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/276 "2010-05-22T02:06:30Z")
> [@The\_Hamster\_King](#): > > …Enough with the Socratic method. Instead of trying to rhetorically coax your points out of us with leading questions, just make your argument. He’s not trying to make an argument. He’s just trying to distract us from His Boy’s catering to racism. Or His Boy’s\* stupidity\*, because he really doesn’t want to cater to racism. Time to mention His Boy’s [even newer idiocy](http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/7015955.html)! > [@](#): > > Kentucky’s Republican Senate candidate Rand Paul criticized President Barack Obama’s handling of the Gulf oil spill Friday as putting “his boot heel on the throat of BP” and “really un-American.” > > Paul’s defense of the oil company came during an interview in which he tried to explain his controversial take on civil rights law, an issue that has overtaken his campaign since his victory in Tuesday’s GOP primary. > > “What I don’t like from the president’s administration is this sort of, ‘I’ll put my boot heel on the throat of BP,'” Rand said in an interview with ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “I think that sounds really un-American in his criticism of business.” Somebody ought to remind him about that original Tea Party. ---
**Author:** ![Dante\_Fevah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Dante\_Fevah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante_Fevah)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/277 "2010-05-22T02:08:45Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > He never actually said otherwise. His original statement was that he supported the Civil Rights Act but didn’t like the one section banning private discrimination, and he never said that he’d try to overturn the law. It’s one thing to criticize the guy for the positions he takes. It’s another thing to criticize him for positions he doesn’t take. If a man makes a case the he is a principle man, and he then points out that he is opposed to something on principle, most people would assume this is being made an issue, being pointed out by, the principled person as a principled stand. Why would somebody be in error assuming the principled person wants to correct the injustice? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/278 "2010-05-22T02:14:52Z")
> [@IdahoMauleMan](#): > > Why can’t you protect yourself, by simply not buying what is acceptable to you? You retain 100% control that way. > [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Because babies have to die before I can know that Acme Infant Formula is adulterated with melamine. You seem OK with that. The very fact that an adulterated product can reach the market and harm people is evidence that regulation does not work. If regulation is not 100% successful, it fails. The formula was probably fine, the parents didn’t follow directions giving it to their infants. And lots of incredibly beneficial products aren’t allowed on the market because of nanny-state intrusions, like raw milk for baby formula. It’s all a lie about tuberculosis caused by raw milk, it’s natural and therefore healthful. If we allow government to tell us we can’t buy Melamilk or Bovine-In-The-Raw, pretty soon we’ll be on the slippery slope to One World Government!!! :eek::mad:😕:smack::(:eek: ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/279 "2010-05-22T02:18:18Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > The very fact that an adulterated product can reach the market and harm people is evidence that regulation does not work. If regulation is not 100% successful, it fails. The formula was probably fine, the parents didn’t follow directions giving it to their infants. And lots of incredibly beneficial products aren’t allowed on the market because of nanny-state intrusions, like raw milk for baby formula. It’s all a lie about tuberculosis caused by raw milk, it’s natural and therefore healthful. If we allow government to tell us we can’t buy Melamilk or Bovine-In-The-Raw, pretty soon we’ll be on the slippery slope to One World Government!!! :eek::mad:😕:smack::(:eek: Yeah!! And going along with that, you know who else liked boot heels on throats and one world gubmints!?!?! Do ya ! ? ! ? ! ? ! /:=D ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2010, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157/280 "2010-05-22T04:05:44Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > He can have my hamster porn when he can pry it from my cold, dead hand! Hamster porn for everyone! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-pauls-interview-on-rachel-maddow-a-real-libertarian-meets-the-real-world/540157.md?page=15)