:dubious:
Smaller government I’ll give you, but up here in happy liberal town, legalization of drugs and prostitution is very much identified with the left.
As for free speech, I’d say that varies depending on the speech ;). Mr. Idiot Liberal may be inclined to want to censor Huck Finn for use of the word “nigger”, while Ms. Moron Social Conservative is perhaps more apt to want to censor Judy Blume for mentioning menstruation. A bit of a wash if you ask me :).
You know, although I don’t think that political labels are much use, your assertions in this post are pretty inaccurate, and the suggestion that left-wing rhetoric is merely watered-down Marxism is inaccurate to the point of being offensive. I’ll agree that the principle of small government is not supported by most ‘lefties’ / ‘liberals’, but legalization of drugs and prostitution are strongly supported by many ‘left-wing’ groups. And no lefty is against ‘free speech’ - this is a stupid thing to say.
Now come on, do you want people to say that they believe in something, but that they’re not sure, and that the opposition has a good point? If saying that you’re right and the others are wrong is a bad thing, then you’d going to be getting angry at every political party in the world…
As a libertarian, I have thought about this question somewhat myself. It basically comes down to the fact that each party is going to try to erode the constitution and limit your individual rights in one way or another. The one sure way to limit their ability to create mischief is to limit the amount of money they have to spend. It’s like draining the gasoline from a car. The less you leave in the tank the less distance it will be able to travel. It’s true that they can pass any law they like, but with limited resources they have to decide which laws they will enforce and which they will ignore.
The other way to look at it is that the time you spend working to pay your taxes is time that you are a slave working on the government’s plantation. The leash may be a little longer, but the fruits of your labor are still taken by force.
There are few protections of our economic rights left in the constitution. They were mostly stripped with the advent of the New Deal and the greens are succeding in making an end run around the rest. There is no economic crime that the government can’t commit (any private executive running a pyramid scheme like social security as a retirement plan would rightfully be doing a perp walk). The judiciary still provides protections for our social rights (even finding them hidden in penumbras or foreign constitutions when necessary) but it is solely up to the voter to preserve our property rights and economic freedoms.
I was speaking of liberal philosphy in general. Clearly there are people who disagree with certain aspects of that philosophy, as we have three possible examples right here. But I’ll have to maintain that free speech and the legalization of drugs and prostitution are not compatable with liberal thinking.
In order to support legalization of drugs, one would have to accept the doctrine of personality on some level. In other words, you’d have to accept that individuals are ultimately responsible for their actions and the consequences thereof. Liberal philosophy rejects this notion. You need not look any further than the liberal view of the tobacco industry. If you believe that they’re evil for selling a dangerous product and should be held liable for the negative effect it has on people who choose to use it, how can you support the legalization of more dangerous drugs? Most liberals I have met want to ban all tobacco products outright. Clearly this is a step away from legalization of drugs. If this is not a commonly held liberal belief then I’m sorry for the confusion. But even if that’s not the case, I don’t see how legalization of drugs is compatable with liberal philosphy.
However, with respect to to legalization of prostitution, I will hold my ground. Feminists believe that prostitution is oppressive to women and will never support it’s legalization. And since feminism is an integral part of liberal philosphy, there can never be widespread liberal support for legalization. I’ve met at least one liberal in real life who did, and some of the replys I got to my first post seemed to indicate support, but that changes nothing. Any liberal politician who supported legalization would be ostracized by their party and be un-electable.
I’m also going to hold my ground with respect to free speech as well. I can’t count the number of times that I’ve enumerated the Clinton administration’s attacks on free speech on these boards. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Campus speech codes are such a blatant violation of free speech that the ACLU defends students accused of violating them. Pornography, like prostitution, is deemed oppressive to women and can never be supported. Outright censorship like Tammerlane mentioned is another example.
To respond to some specific comments:
I totally agree but I’m not sure how that is a response to my comments. You are aware that libertarians are strongly in favor of seperation of church and state? A public school teacher leading a prayer of any sort to any god or gods is a violation of this.
We’re comparing liberals and libertarians, not liberals and social conservatives.
I never used the term “lefties” and never would, as it’s condescending, just like when liberals use “pubbies” to refer to Republicans.
No, it isn’t. Free speech is continually under assault by both the left and the right. I have met many liberals, both in real life and on these boards, who have major problems with free speech.
One can recognize the validity of opposing viewpoints and still disagree with them. For example, I can understand why many people oppose abortion, as it’s clear that a fetus is just as alive as any other human being. However, I still think abortion should be legal for various reasons that I won’t go into right now (to avoid a hi-jack).
No, that’s not what I said. It goes beyond saying the other guy is wrong; the problem is that if you disagree with liberal philosphy you’re a bad person. The liberal view is the only correct one, so if you disagree with it, you must either be incredibly ignorant or uniformed, or have some sinister ulterior motive, or be just plain evil. Certainly not every liberal is that jingoistic, but if you read some GD threads you’ll encounter the attitude I’m refering to very quickly. I suppose it’s more of a characteristic of fanaticism than liberal philospophy per se (there are plenty of jingoistic conservatives), but as liberalism is an inherently fanatical belief system (as is the belief system of the religious right), it is not unusual to encounter jingoistic liberals.
To clarify, left-wing and lefty are hardly terms of abuse in Australia, where I live, and I use them to describe some of my own views (the problem with ‘liberal’ is that the Liberal Party is the socially conservative party).
If you’re defining liberals in the usual sense, the half (ish) of the US population that hold somewhat somewhat more liberal views, then I would say that the notion that liberals want to ban tobacco is ridiculous. Give me evidence suggesting that this is a Democratic Party principle, or at least a principle of quite a few of the more liberal Democratic politicians. Same with your claim that liberals are against legalisation of prostitution and drugs, nad your claim that they are against ‘free speech’. Be careful with those blanket statements!
If it helps, I suppose I would define a ‘liberal’, or in Australian parlance a ‘lefty’, as someone who is what used to be called a ‘progressive’ on many social issues. Gays want to marry? Sure. War? Not good. Education? Health care? Sure, we should probably spend more money on those. Abortion? Sure. Capital punishment? The way of the past. And so on…hope that helps clarify.
Oh, and they are very compatible with conservative thinking?
Do you think Bush and Ashcroft and their ilk will ever legalize drugs and prostitution? Or will any other Republican president for that matter?
Again, the same holds for conservatives polititicians.
On this issue libertarians share more with liberals than with conservatives.
No, the point of the OP was to ask why libertarians vote Republican. If the things you don’t like about liberals are shared by conservatives, then why pick them?
I think this is a myth perpetuated by the Right. Even in this thead we see
and this is not an isolated case. Many Republicans in the media and on this board doubt the intelligence of liberals, so this is in no way one-sided.
To summarize, for all the points you mentioned (against legalization of drugs and prostitution, against free speech, condescention of the other side) both sides are “guilty” in their own way.
One issue where liberals and libertarians agree on is separation of church and state. One issue where conservatives and libertarians agree on is smaller government, but as I have mentioned before, in practice Republicans do not make government smaller, so what’s the point?
In any case, it seems to me that the overriding reasons for libertarians voting for Republicans are taxes and gun control.
Just to expound a little on this one, since the myth pisses me off, here is a very unscientific survey using Google:
Results 1 - 10 of about 173,000 for conservatives stupid.
Results 1 - 10 of about 255,000 for republicans stupid.
Results 1 - 10 of about 202,000 for liberals stupid.
Results 1 - 10 of about 322,000 for democrats stupid.
Total:
524,000 for liberals/democrats stupid
428,000 for conservatives/republicans stupid
The above numbers are not scientific in any way, especially since the content of these pages may sometimes be the opposite of what the search term inteded. However, if you look at the top 10 results for each search, the spirit of the results is mostly in line with the search term.
And the results are certainly in line with my experience.
Hmmm…
So:
[ul]
[li]Liberals are commies.[/li][li]Liberals don’t believe in freedom of speech.[/li][li]Liberals don’t believe in personal responsibility.[/li][li]Liberals are fanatics.[/li][/ul]
And, last but not least:
[ul]
[li]Liberals demonize their political opponents as being “evil” or having “sinister ulterior motives”… [/ul][/li]…You know, stuff like arguing that people who disagree with them are Communistic fanatics hellbent on destroying freedom of speech and the idea of personal responsibility.
Do you even know where the terms Right and Left came from? Didn’t your high school civics teacher draw that little scale with total Free-Market Capitalism on the far right and…drumroll…Communism on the far left? Saying that “left-wing rhetoric” is watered-down Marxism is really quite accurate.
And to all you Libertarians that can’t decide whether to vote Democrat or Republican: Have you ever thought about voting Libertarian?
They come from the seating arrangements in the French National Assembly in 1789, during the opening phases of the French Revolution. The conservatives–also known as “monarchists”–were seated to the right, while the radicals–also known as “republicans”–were seated to the left. The “leftists” believed in such radical ideas as that “[m]en are born and remain free and equal in rights” and that “property is an inviolable and sacred right”.
Karl Marx was born in 1818; he and Friedrich Engels published the Communist Manifesto in 1848.
:dubious: I don’t think that’s where today’s Right and Left terms come from.
Well, it doesn’t really matter what you think, that is where the terms “left” and “right” (in their political sense) come from.
Of course it’s certainly true that those terms–and also the term “liberal”, or for that matter “conservative”–have undergone a lot of evolution over time.
It’s also true that there are as many different kinds of “leftists” and “liberals” out there as there are “rightists” and “conservatives”; arguments that stem from lumping all American liberals in with Trotsky, or all American conservatives in with Latin American death squads, are invariably silly.
We’re both right. You’re right about the origin, but I’m right about how and why they’re used today. Cite.
You learn something new every day.
The notion of a libertarian choosing a Republican because of lowered taxes is very misguided. The Republican presidents have consistently outspent Democrats since at least 1980, and spending is really the most important issue in regard to fiscal responsibility. Bush can lower taxes all he wants, but someone is going to have to pay for his budget eventually, and it’s going to come either via future taxes or the mint’s printing press. Either way, we’ll pay for it.
Also, not to disparage Clinton’s relative fiscal conservatism compared to Bush, but I’d like to debunk the myth that Clinton ever had a budget surplus. If you check the values of the total federal debt year by year, you will find that it never decreased during his term. The so-called surplus was a result of accounting chicanery that IIRC involved counting social security tax receipts without counting social security obligations.
As a libertarian (with a small “l”) myself, I try to rate each candidate as to how freedom-minded they are without paying much attention to party. For example, I’ve been very impressed with Democratic Senator Robert Byrd lately for his anti-war speeches, even though he has also been known as the King of Pork. I respect Democrat Russ Feingold for not voting for the Iraq war. I had the great opportunity to live in Republican Rep. Ron Paul’s district in 2000. I’m thrilled to have voted for someone who opposed both wars and who voted against the Patriot Act.
Unfortunately, the chance to vote for a major party candidate and feel good about my choice is very rare, which is why I usually vote for the Libertarian candidate or occasionally some other 3rd party.
Yes, yes I have thought about doing that. And, oddly enough I have voted that way too.
I’m a registered Libertarian who often, but not always, votes that way. Maybe 40% L, 40% R, 20% D.
Part of my own thinking is that social issues are, IMO, less prone to governmental influence. Gay Marriage, for instance, is ultimately going to happen (or not happen) based on fundamental cultural changes, not because of some bill or another. We can elect Pubs for the next ten years and I don’t think they’ll be able to overturn Roe.
I would prefer a government that didn’t try to stand in the way of these social changes, but in the long run, it won’t matter.
I think that is in fact the origin of “Left” and “Right”. Maybe not precisely the way he put it… but I remember it being a conference in the 1700’s.
Are democrats in fact "very liberally fiscally" as one post put it ? Clinton had money leftover... while Bush is going deficit wild. Ok... so Bush is not your regular Republican as taxes go. Is there really a tendency for Democrats to overspend is social costs ? Or is it more of a myth ? Or is Republican "low taxes" that are a myth ? To me it seems no US politician likes raising or overspending taxes... (until 2000 at least).I think it’s mainly because, just like the Democratic party, the Republican party is not a homogenous entity, and has several different sub groups.
Right now I could label the two largest subgroups:
The Neo-Conservatives (Politicians like Cheney, Wolfowitz, Powell, Ashcroft)
The Conservatives (Politicians like Reagan, Bush I & II, Scalia, Rehnquist, Frist)
and some fringe groups:
Libertarians - These are the Pubby libs that side with mostly the Conservative republicans. Some Neo-Con positions appeal to them (Neo-Cons are mostly ambivalent towards social matters). Libertarians are all for social freedoms, but taxation is something that hits EVERYONE. While religious issues/gay marriage et cetra may be points that Lib disagrees with the rest of the party on, the taxation issue is one that hits them PERSONALLY.
Religious Right - They don’t really need any introduction.
Of course it can be broken down further, and most individuals have stances that would speckle them amongst many of the different Republican groups.
I’m a strong leaning libertarian (little “l”).
The choice for me is easy. Which is more un-desirable, and which is more likely to occur? With our current constitution, and public sentiment, I think it is very unlikely that the societal controls that the conservative right typically support would ever be implemented. However, I do not see such safeguards preventing the agenda that the liberal left supports from being implemented.
I do not believe that separation of church and state is ever going to go away. Nor freedom of speech, or the fifth and eighth amendments. However, I see it as a likely scenario where I’m forced to pay for socialized medicine, my taxes fund programs I find useless, and control over government spending disintegrates and my tax bill used to balance the budget. It is happening now. Someone decides that I should pay more than the next guy. That because of what I’ve earned, I owe more than the next guy. That situation is likely, and real. The chance of losing freedom of speech, and having a “Christian-ified” police state is remote.
While I find both traditional sides of the political spectrum (left and right in the U.S.) to have both desirable and undesirable goals, the chance of the undesirable goals of each party being implemented in this country are not the same. I hardly fear what the right may do should they come into greater power (as they are now, although certain national security issues have been bothering me…i.e. Patriot Act). I greatly fear what the left may do should they come into power.
Easy choice for me. I will say that both sides have failed when it comes to reducing government and limiting it’s power.
All the things you mention about what might happen if the left came into power relate to one thing: higher taxes.
And it seems that these are the things that you fear might happen if the conservatives ever implemented their agenda.
So, if I understand you correctly, you are voting for a party whose wish-list includes things like removing the separation of church and state, and turning the U.S. into a “Christian-ified police state”, because this is unlikely to happen, while you do not vote the left because you likely will pay higher taxes.
Personally, voting for someone with scary long-term goals that have a very small chance of being fullfilled is much worse than voting for someone who a non-scary-but-undesirable goal that has a higher chance of being fullfilled. Of course, that’s just personal preference.
How much money per year are you paying less in taxes due to the recent tax cuts? $1,000? More? Is that sum enough to justify voting for a party with some scary long-term goals you fundamentally oppose?