[Rich]

Governments obtains its malign power from the perception that it has authority to initiate force against people working and acting peacefully. That power, like the ring in the Lord of the Rings, is inherently corrupting.

The creator of Lord of the Rings is a perfect example of the utter vacuity and intellectual bankruptcy of Libertarianism. He did absolutely nothing to oppose the actions of the British state in the world wars. He fought in WWI and wanted to be a cryptographer in WWII. He never lifted a finger to oppose the genocidal bombing of Germany by Bomber command. He a was a sympathiser with Franco. That's the fantastic thing about Libertarianism, a Libertarian is freed from all individual responsibility. Its always government's fault, but the libertarian is free to support authoritarian government when ever its convenient. From slave owner Thomas Jefferson through fascist employed Mises to Bridge to Nowhere backer Sarah Palin its the same old story.

[Nunt]

Well I guess the persons you talk about there aren't very good libertarians then. But what has that got to do with libertarianism?

You keep bringing up Jefferson and his slave holdings. But to me that has very little meaning. I don't live in the US so the historical figure has little importance to me. The kind of libertarianism that I support has nothing to do with the crimes of a person living far away and centuries ago. I don't need to defend Jefferson, I don't care to defend him. It's just not relevant.

[Eran]

Force, and its counterweight control of force, are part of human nature. An organizational structure built on the idea that this problem can be solved through purely voluntary means is untenable - and worse, is ideally suited for co-optation by the the plutocracy.

I'm not sure what you mean. Democracy and Constitutional Democracy in particular are organisational structures built on the idea that the problem of the use of force can be solved through specific institutional arrangements.

Anarchists such as myself believe that the problem can obtain a much better solution through the complete elimination of the institutional authority to initiate force, while retaining a polycentric arrangement whereby force may be used defensively.

The power of the plutocracy is problematic precisely when the authority to initiate force is entrusted to a small number of corruptible human beings. That power is of great value and tends to be abrogated to serve the interests of the powerful members of society - plutocracy in a commercial society, party apparatchiks in a political society, warlords in a military society.

Anarchism fundamentally breaks from all those traditions by categorically abolishing the institutional justification for initiation of force.

Government is not the problem. Government is not the solution. Government is a means. What it is a means to is up to you.

Characterising government as a means (presumably means to solving problems) is substantively the same as claiming that government is the solution to those problems. What government ends up as means to is certainly not up to me. I have zero power to affect government policy. I have much power in affecting my personal policies which have a large, though not large enough a role in shaping my life.

And sometimes government is a critical and necessary means to achieve ends that are central to any society's survival. This is the bottom line, and it's the reason why I am a statist.

That would be a good reason to be a statist, if it were true. I would argue that if certain ends are "central to a society's survival" then government isn't really necessary, as members of the society would pull together and cooperate voluntarily to achieve those ends.

He never lifted a finger to oppose the genocidal bombing of Germany by Bomber command.

Could you please point out to prominent figures of the time that did "lift a finger to oppose the genocidal bombing of Germany by Bomber command"?

To be clear, I agree with you that the bombing was indeed a war crime of the first degree. However, it appears to have been very popular at the time.

[Joe Liberty]

Well I guess the persons you talk about there aren't very good libertarians then. But what has that got to do with libertarianism?

You keep bringing up Jefferson and his slave holdings. But to me that has very little meaning. I don't live in the US so the historical figure has little importance to me. The kind of libertarianism that I support has nothing to do with the crimes of a person living far away and centuries ago. I don't need to defend Jefferson, I don't care to defend him. It's just not relevant.

Rich is utterly clueless when it comes to libertarianism in general, and Jefferson in particular. I think a libertarian dropped him on his head when he was a child.

[quetzalcoatl]

Well I guess the persons you talk about there aren't very good libertarians then. But what has that got to do with libertarianism?

You keep bringing up Jefferson and his slave holdings. But to me that has very little meaning. I don't live in the US so the historical figure has little importance to me. The kind of libertarianism that I support has nothing to do with the crimes of a person living far away and centuries ago. I don't need to defend Jefferson, I don't care to defend him. It's just not relevant.

It can be next to impossible having any sort of coherent discussion with libertarians...at least some of them. Libertarianism, despite its hermetic nature, has a particular social and historical context. It was not deduced fully formed from first principles as often claimed, but is on the main line of Western liberal political philosophy. As such it must be analyzed in historical context. Jeffersonian republicanism is a critical stage in the development of liberal political philosophy, of which Libertarianism is a kind of denouement.

[Rich]

Google Libertarian Presidents. First is the the Wiki entry for the Libertarian party, 2nd hit a Libertarian ranking of the United States Presidents. Who do we find rated as the most Libertarian President? Yes its our old friend:

I must go into the Presidential chair the inflexible and uncompromising opponent of every attempt on the part of Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia against the wishes of the slaveholding States, and also with a determination equally decided to resist the slightest interference with it in the States where it exists.

But really there current practice is no different day from their historical allegiances. What is the greatest infringement on liberty by the United Sates government today: Guantanamo Bay, extraordinary rendition and drone strikes. No of course not its Obamacare.

However I do think that the Libertarians are on to something with the non aggression principle. If you listen to Hitler's speeches a lot of them are basically claiming the high ground of non aggression. Even ISIS can be seen as non aggression, as the world belongs to God it is the infidel that are the usurpers. Perhaps every moral system has some concept of non aggression within it. The point is that morality is still utterly relative. most people are not really conformable with that proposition. Because a morality that is relative is in a sense no morality at all. To say morality is relative is in a sense to say there is no morality at all. There are a substantial number of people that if you put the question directly will accept that morality is relative, but then just carry on ideologically politically as if its not. A bit like the Atheists who want to abolish the Christian God but just presume they can unquestioningly carry on using the liberal Christian morality system although the foundation of it has gone and its just hanging in the air so speak.

[Voluntarism]

But really there current practice is no different day from their historical allegiances. What is the greatest infringement on liberty by the United Sates government today: Guantanamo Bay, extraordinary rendition and drone strikes. No of course not its Obamacare.

If you read the daily blogs on various liberty loving websites, you will see that the whole raft of government misuse and abuse of privileges are constantly raised: Guantanamo Bay, the police state, foreign invasions, asset forfeiture laws, NSA spying, anti-free speech legislation, crony capitalism, prohibition etc etc. You simply have to note the plethora of issues that Ron Paul discussed between, say, 2011-2013 to see this. Something like Obamacare may of course get some extra prominence just like any current affairs issue - particularly if there is a higher likelihood that a concerted campaign may prevent the new legislation.

[Rich]

You simply have to note the plethora of issues that Ron Paul discussed between, say, 2011-2013 to see this.

Unless I'm mistaken, Ron Paul doesn't even support patent abolition, hell he doesn't even support software patent abolition. You see software patent abolition is a moderate achievable policy, that could get support from the left. But of course that would challenge powerful corporate interests which Libertarians have no interest in doing. Yes I know "in principle", in the abstract in the Libertarian never never land, corporate and rich peoples interests would be compromised, but in the real world, in the here and now they never are.

Something like Obamacare may of course get some extra prominence just like any current affairs issue - particularly if there is a higher likelihood that a concerted campaign may prevent the new legislation.

You see the truth is that humanity is fundamental immoral. I mean by that that the vast majority of humanity don't live and most certainly don't vote by the principles they claim to support. In their politics most people are deeply hypocritical. Politicians and political activists of all stripes compound this situation by constantly telling the majority of the people that they are moral and that all our problems are caused by some immoral other, whether it be capitalists, government, immigrants, welfare bums, extremists, haters etc etc. So there is large a number people that don't like Obamacare who have no problem with American support for terrorists like the Bahrain regime, Guantanamo, drone strikes etc, or if they do have a problem its only because the c**nts might have to pay some taxes for it. Libertarians pander to these peoples prejudices.

Libertarianism suffers from two fundamental and absolute irresolvable issues. First that there is no agreement on what constitutes aggression and in particular there is no absolutely no agreement on what constitutes legitimate property. But secondly that even when there is common agreement people mostly throw out non aggression as soon as it becomes slight inconvenient, as soon as there is significant net benefit from committing aggression. Yes at a local, personal level, there are taboos, most people won't commit murder in ordinary life just because they can gain from it and almost certainly get away with it. Although if there's no chance of getting caught how would we eve know. But at a wider political level there is no principle. So if in 1939 you asked people whether fire bombing and nuking cites was an act of aggression, I'm sure the overwhelming majority would have said yes, but when it came to it the overwhelming majority of people in Britain and America said fuck it look its only a couple of million people we're wasting lets so it any way. Once the war is over we can always condemn it and blame it on our evil leaders who led us astray, or better still just carry on like it never happened.

There was no movement against city bombing in Britain or America. This is a problem because most Libertarians seem to be arguing that the mass of the people are essentially unconscious Libertarians who have been hood winked by minority of evil Statists into supporting government. that the majority of the population are natural non aggressors and it is only evil government that allows a few evil types to dominate. They are not.

[quetzalcoatl]

There was no movement against city bombing in Britain or America. This is a problem because most Libertarians seem to be arguing that the mass of the people are essentially unconscious Libertarians who have been hood winked by minority of evil Statists into supporting government. that the majority of the population are natural non aggressors and it is only evil government that allows a few evil types to dominate. They are not.

The tribal social evolution of the human species will always hold sway. In practice this means that the vast majority of people are followers (statists), and will defend the current social order. Not even the Great Depression was able to shake this faith.

So let's assume that somehow we are able to institute a genuine libertarian order. This means that there will be a subsurface current aligning people into warlord/fighter communities. This current is particularly insidious because it is non-rational (and deeply embedded) template for human social interaction. This template has historically trumped other modes of social organization, unless these other modes are constantly reinforced through propaganda and strong police enforcement (using "police" as a metaphor for all state force actions). The tribal model is an evolved social template, and governments are simply various attempts to scale this model up for large numbers.

What does this do to Libertarians? It simply pits the vanishingly small number of agonistic self-directed individuals against the statist-template majority. Can they win? Yes, but only if they employ force and aggression. The favored libertarian strategy is to defend the use of force by calling it something else, and declaring it to be voluntary.

Madness, I say.

[Eran]

What does this do to Libertarians? It simply pits the vanishingly small number of agonistic self-directed individuals against the statist-template majority. Can they win? Yes, but only if they employ force and aggression. The favored libertarian strategy is to defend the use of force by calling it something else, and declaring it to be voluntary.

Libertarians have no chance of winning using force. After all, the use of force is the speciality and strength of political, government actors.

Libertarian ideas can only win the way they had in the past - through education, persuasion and cultural shift. Like the one that took religion out of the domain of legitimised government action. Without violence.

[Rich]

Libertarians have no chance of winning using force. After all, the use of force is the speciality and strength of political, government actors.

Libertarian ideas can only win the way they had in the past - through education, persuasion and cultural shift. Like the one that took religion out of the domain of legitimised government action. Without violence.

Interesting view. Now first of all its not true, much religious control was removed through the use of extreme violence the ending of Aztec theocracy for example. But it is also important to recognise that Christianity is itself a somewhat secular religion. So for example the Romans had an anathema against religious human sacrifice which was inherited by Christianity. It was the extreme militarism of the Roman Empire that eliminated much pagan theocratic practice long before it became Rome became Christian. The Romans of course had no problem with human sacrifice for entertainment and those strong values have continued. So for example 16th and 17th the century Europe abhorred human sacrifice for religious purposes but was quite OK with the mass murder indeed the holocaust of West African Blacks so as Europeans could eat cake. (the sugar trade). And again more recently while no reasonable person could deny America's right to murder over a million Iraqis under sanctions so Americans have cheap gas and drive their SUV's, we were rightly outraged when Al Qaeda wasted 3000 Americans on 9/11 in a religious cause.

The examples of violence go on. Japanese Shinto was only tamed thorough the dropping of nuclear weapons. The Brahminists civilised to some degree by the Mohguls and then the British Empires. Judaism required extreme force by the Romans.

Christianity and Marxism which is arguably an Atheistic Christian sect have been the exceptions.

[Eran]

Now first of all its not true, much religious control was removed through the use of extreme violence the ending of Aztec theocracy for example.

You missed my point. My point was that the modern separation of church and state was accomplished without bloodshed. Not in the United States (where it was adopted by a peaceful constitutional amendment) nor in England (where it crept gradually over the past few centuries).

[Nunt]

It can be next to impossible having any sort of coherent discussion with libertarians...at least some of them. Libertarianism, despite its hermetic nature, has a particular social and historical context. It was not deduced fully formed from first principles as often claimed, but is on the main line of Western liberal political philosophy. As such it must be analyzed in historical context. Jeffersonian republicanism is a critical stage in the development of liberal political philosophy, of which Libertarianism is a kind of denouement.

That may be true if you want to study the libertarian movement from an acedemic point of view. The historical-philosophical origins of my ideas don't validate or invalidate them.

So let's assume that somehow we are able to institute a genuine libertarian order. This means that there will be a subsurface current aligning people into warlord/fighter communities.

This is not something libertarians are proposing and is just a straw man.

Libertarianism suffers from two fundamental and absolute irresolvable issues. First that there is no agreement on what constitutes aggression and in particular there is no absolutely no agreement on what constitutes legitimate property. But secondly that even when there is common agreement people mostly throw out non aggression as soon as it becomes slight inconvenient, as soon as there is significant net benefit from committing aggression. Yes at a local, personal level, there are taboos, most people won't commit murder in ordinary life just because they can gain from it and almost certainly get away with it. Although if there's no chance of getting caught how would we eve know. But at a wider political level there is no principle. So if in 1939 you asked people whether fire bombing and nuking cites was an act of aggression, I'm sure the overwhelming majority would have said yes, but when it came to it the overwhelming majority of people in Britain and America said fuck it look its only a couple of million people we're wasting lets so it any way. Once the war is over we can always condemn it and blame it on our evil leaders who led us astray, or better still just carry on like it never happened.

There was no movement against city bombing in Britain or America. This is a problem because most Libertarians seem to be arguing that the mass of the people are essentially unconscious Libertarians who have been hood winked by minority of evil Statists into supporting government. that the majority of the population are natural non aggressors and it is only evil government that allows a few evil types to dominate. They are not.

These issues are not really limited to libertarianism but are issues for any political ideology. It is true that some people (maybe a lot of people) would be willing break the rules of a just society in order to gain from it. This may happen in a libertarian world, but may just as well happen in today's social-democratic nations. Your example of the firebombing illustrates this: when the spirit of the time allowed these firebombings did occur. I am not sure why you would use such an example to illustrate a problem exclusively with libertarianism as the nations doing the firebombing were definatly not libertarian nations.

So yeah, people will use aggression when it benefits them (someone might want to solve an arguement by killing the other person). But few people would support that such behavior becomes the accepted norm. So I may want to cheat on occasion, but would prefer that in general nobody cheats. So we need to create strong societal norms that limit and punish cheating. Even when the norm becomes inconvenient for someone, public pressure must make him follow the norm.

Of course, the ideal is that people internalize these norms and follow them because they believe its the right thing to do rather than something they must follow to avoid punishment. People following internalized norms do happen a lot.

[nucklepunche]

Unless I'm mistaken, Ron Paul doesn't even support patent abolition, hell he doesn't even support software patent abolition. You see software patent abolition is a moderate achievable policy, that could get support from the left. But of course that would challenge powerful corporate interests which Libertarians have no interest in doing. Yes I know "in principle", in the abstract in the Libertarian never never land, corporate and rich peoples interests would be compromised, but in the real world, in the here and now they never are.

I think a position like this is one example where I think the mainstream, including many on the left, have learned from libertarianism. It seems a coalition of people on the left and libertarian right are questioning how far this patent thing has gone from the founders wanting it to encourage innovation and limiting it to 14 years only (which I think is a general principle we should fall back on). However as far as the "libertarian" influence on the GOP it seems to stop at issues like this.

Case in point Keystone Pipeline which was built with eminent domain and threatens property rights of numerous farmers in case oil spills, yet Republicans are lining up behind it. Granted Obama's refusal to commit to it is based on purely political motives of appeasing environmental ideologues while not appearing too anti-business, but still Republicans are the hypocrites on this one. So Republicans are all for "free markets" when it comes to cutting things that help the poor but not if it helps the rich.

Something like Obamacare may of course get some extra prominence just like any current affairs issue - particularly if there is a higher likelihood that a concerted campaign may prevent the new legislation.

You see the truth is that humanity is fundamental immoral. I mean by that that the vast majority of humanity don't live and most certainly don't vote by the principles they claim to support. In their politics most people are deeply hypocritical. Politicians and political activists of all stripes compound this situation by constantly telling the majority of the people that they are moral and that all our problems are caused by some immoral other, whether it be capitalists, government, immigrants, welfare bums, extremists, haters etc etc. So there is large a number people that don't like Obamacare who have no problem with American support for terrorists like the Bahrain regime, Guantanamo, drone strikes etc, or if they do have a problem its only because the c**nts might have to pay some taxes for it. Libertarians pander to these peoples prejudices.[/quote]

Indeed. Most voters have a lot of cognitive dissonance going in. In fact very few people are truly principled all the time. Look at the people who condemn the welfare state while they have their hand out for Social Security and Medicare. The primary election in Mississippi was interesting in that it played the perfect example. Mississippi prides itself on being "conservative" so I think based on the rhetoric McDaniel thought he was a shoe-in, that is until people thought the government projects Cochran brought to Mississippi were under threat. You see ideology is well and good but as soon as material benefits are threatened it goes out the window. The same thing is true of McConnell in Kentucky. Even the presence of Rand Paul did not help because Rand Paul (if you notice) is much more careful than his father about going after the popular aspects of government.

In the end I always said that the most ideologically committed members of the Tea Party and libertarians are wasting their time. No matter how much the general public responds to libertarian rhetoric, no matter how "in theory" sympathetic they may be to it they will never win. Time and time they are confused because people vote based on abstract rhetoric yet when push comes to shove the public rejects it in actuality. The reason why is because Americans simply are not ideological. We are a nation that is rhetorically conservative yet operationally liberal. We love to talk about small government but we love government programs even more.

I've often said that the difference between Republicans who want the GOP to be a competitive political party and those who are in indeological fantasy land is that realistic Republicans accept that some things are on the table but others are not. Social Security and Medicare can be reformed, but the fact that government has a role in this is not going away.

Libertarianism suffers from two fundamental and absolute irresolvable issues. First that there is no agreement on what constitutes aggression and in particular there is no absolutely no agreement on what constitutes legitimate property. But secondly that even when there is common agreement people mostly throw out non aggression as soon as it becomes slight inconvenient, as soon as there is significant net benefit from committing aggression. Yes at a local, personal level, there are taboos, most people won't commit murder in ordinary life just because they can gain from it and almost certainly get away with it. Although if there's no chance of getting caught how would we eve know. But at a wider political level there is no principle. So if in 1939 you asked people whether fire bombing and nuking cites was an act of aggression, I'm sure the overwhelming majority would have said yes, but when it came to it the overwhelming majority of people in Britain and America said fuck it look its only a couple of million people we're wasting lets so it any way. Once the war is over we can always condemn it and blame it on our evil leaders who led us astray, or better still just carry on like it never happened.

Ideology really is a luxury of those who are living in relative material prosperity and peace. It is not a luxury people have in times of poverty and crisis.

There was no movement against city bombing in Britain or America. This is a problem because most Libertarians seem to be arguing that the mass of the people are essentially unconscious Libertarians who have been hood winked by minority of evil Statists into supporting government. that the majority of the population are natural non aggressors and it is only evil government that allows a few evil types to dominate. They are not.

Exactly. I know a few Tea Party/libertarian types and for the most part they generally believe everybody really agrees with them deep down. For instance I've heard it said that libertarians can win by making alliances with the left on social issues and the right on economics. Yet I've often said as nice as those theoretical alliances may sound wait until the general election when it is all decided. Lets say Rand Paul wins the GOP primary by getting a few civil libertarian leftists to register Republican or cross party lines and vote for him over other candidates. Great, but in the end very few people ultimately vote on such matters in the end. Most average voters are much more focused on bread and butter issues.

All I can say is if Rand Paul in this theoretical matchup with say, Hillary, might win but only if he stays away from the libertarian stuff about getting rid of Social Security and Medicare. So as unpopular as Hillary might be if he runs full bore she will be able to say, "Rand Paul wants to get rid of Social Security and Medicare and leave old and sick people to fend for themselves. Rand Paul wants to end federal funding for education which will mean your local property taxes will go sky high (which is a tactic Cochran used against McDaniel)." In the end you will see Rand Paul defeated handily much like Goldwater, who ran on an unapologetically libertarian/conservative platform. Reagan only won 16 years later because he backtracked and vowed to protect Social Security, downplayed his previous opposition to Medicare and basically scuttled all the libertarian stuff in favor of popular rhetoric appealing to general principles about making America feel good again etc.

I would really like to see an ideological test case to put down this myth of a conservative electorate once and for all (as if 2012 didn't prove that). I would like to see Rand Paul running on a full bore libertarian platform versus Elizabeth Warren running on her platform without apology. I think Warren would lose to a Chris Christie because he would keep the conservative rhetoric while promising to protect Social Security etc. But when its all out in the open I daresay America will vote for the true left over the true right, because in the end rich people pay most of the taxes anyway, but whether or not you get your Social Security check is much more important than making sure the food stamp surfer doesn't get his (and if you don't know who that is, look it up).

[Joe Liberty]

But when its all out in the open I daresay America will vote for the true left over the true right, because in the end rich people pay most of the taxes anyway, but whether or not you get your Social Security check is much more important than making sure the food stamp surfer doesn't get his (and if you don't know who that is, look it up).

I don't think it has anything to do with the rich paying most taxes anyway. The middle class is fairly well insulated from the totality of their tax bill by things like payroll witholding. And any taxes slapped on retailers are passed on to the consumer.

I agree with your conclusion, but I think it's because the left promises "free" goodies. Teach a man to fish and he can feed himself. Promise him somebody else's fish and he'll vote for you.

[Rich]

Teach a man to fish and he can feed himself.

What so he can break fishing regulations and further deplete our ravaged European fish stocks?

[AFAIK]

Doesn't education make up a significant portion of the national budget? Wouldn't state subsidised tertiary education count as 'teaching a man to fish'?

[Pants-of-dog]

Well, giving a man the freedom to teach himself how to fish is even more libertarian.

[Joe Liberty]

Teach a man to fish and he can feed himself.

What so he can break fishing regulations and further deplete our ravaged European fish stocks?

Okay, that was funny.

Doesn't education make up a significant portion of the national budget?

The Department of Education does. I don't confuse that with education.

Wouldn't state subsidised tertiary education count as 'teaching a man to fish'?

Well, let's see where that's gotten us: gov't subsidies have caused college costs to skyrocket, which in turn has burdened a lot of people with a lot of debt. Many of them had no business going to college in the first place, but what the hell, it's somebody else's money and it's been guaranteed, so where's the incentive to spend it wisely? State subsidies are shiny and awesome in theory but they tend to mask underlying issues instead of fixing them (such as cost, accountability to the customer, whether I should actually go to college at all, is the degree I'm choosing worth the money it's going to cost) and add even more complications (politicized curriculum, barring access to gov't loans based on arbitrary criteria like prior drug use). They only serve to make things worse in the long run.

[Truth To Power]

But when its all out in the open I daresay America will vote for the true left over the true right, because in the end rich people pay most of the taxes anyway,

No, they do not. Most taxes are paid by middle class working people, not the rich. Even income tax, which is progressive, gets almost all its revenue from working people of no great means, and the super-duper uber-rich actually pay a lower rate of income tax than the merely rich. The notion that the rich pay most of the taxes is absurd, a concoction based on claiming that the measure of wealth is not wealth but income.