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[Stinkles]

too selfish

Not possible in an Objectivist view.

 

[SA-X]

What about the social side?

The Libertarian Party has a cute little test that purports to divide American politics into four quadrants. There's the economic dimension (where libertarians ally with conservatives) and the social dimension (where libertarians ally with liberals).

I think the diagram is seriously misleading, because visually it gives equal importance to both dimensions. And when the rubber hits the road, libertarians almost always go with the economic dimension.

That's not really a fair criticism. Its not like the democrats are social libertarians. Sure they're pro choice, but they're also pro gun control, and most are against gay marriage and drug legalization.

I'm sure for a lot of libertarians the social and economic sides are equally important, but they don't get any social libertarians to vote for.

 

[Stinkles]

That's not really a fair criticism. Its not like the democrats are social libertarians. Sure they're pro choice, but they're also pro gun control, and most are against gay marriage and drug legalization.

I'm sure for a lot of libertarians the social and economic sides are equally important, but they don't get any social libertarians to vote for.

There are a lot of pro-gun liberals, tons of pro marijuana legalization liberals, tons of catholic pro-life liberals and plenty of pro gay-marriage liberals. One of the reasons the party is often self-defeating is that it genuinely is a big tent. That's the main reason I identify with it "monolithically" - it allows for division and argument internally. Not very efficient or streamlined, but honest.

 

[SA-X]

There are a lot of pro-gun liberals, tons of pro marijuana legalization liberals, tons of catholic pro-life liberals and plenty of pro gay-marriage liberals.

Yeah I know, none of them can win the Dem's Presidential nomination though.

 

[Stinkles]

Yeah I know, none of them can win the Dem's Presidential nomination though.

Fair enough.

 

[JayDubya]

I'll answer the question: nothing. Thanks, and goodnight!

 

[Stinkles]

I'll answer the question: nothing. Thanks, and goodnight!

quod erat demonstrandum!

 

[Beer Monkey]

How many current GAF Libertarians think it was a good idea to deregulate the mortgage industry (example: Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, which repealed the Glass-Steagall Act)?

 

[Stinkles]

How many current GAF Libertarians think it was a good idea to deregulate the mortgage industry (example: Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, which repealed the Glass-Steagall Act)?

Whenever anything bad happened that appeared at first blush Libertarian, it was ruined by an undercurrent of over-regulation in other areas.

 

[Beer Monkey]

Whenever anything bad happened that appeared at first blush Libertarian, it was ruined by an undercurrent of over-regulation in other areas.

Maybe the GAF Libertarians can provide specific examples.

 

[Verano]

I'll answer the question: nothing. Thanks, and goodnight!

short and discreet.

 

[Stinkles]

Maybe the GAF Libertarians can provide specific examples.

I am sure the free market will surface specific examples in due course.

 

[JayDubya]

short and discreet.

Yeah, I read this thread while I was gone, I wondered how I'd respond to it, frequently getting quite cranky, but ultimately, I think my response is probably quite adequate, and very accurate.

 

[Stinkles]

Yeah, I read this thread while I was gone, I wondered how I'd respond to it, frequently getting quite cranky, but ultimately, I think my response is probably quite adequate, and very accurate.

Opinions are only accurate in the context of pleasing their expresser.

Anyway, it was a total mug job on Libertarians with nobody around to mount a real defense. Not surprised it made you cranky.

 

[jorma]

Yeah, I read this thread while I was gone, I wondered how I'd respond to it, frequently getting quite cranky, but ultimately, I think my response is probably quite adequate, and very accurate.

I agree that you have no obligation to defend your political preferences in a thread that was started in your absence, or in any thread for that matter. But as for being accurate? Well there are plenty of good posts in this thread that disagrees with you, and you need to do a lot better than that to come across as anywhere near "accurate".

 

[JayDubya]

Yeah. If only the ban hadn't ended so late at night. :lol

I've discarded several drafts of lines of attack for incomprehensibility and I'm practically falling asleep in my chair.

 

[Gaborn]

I agree that you have no obligation to defend your political preferences in a thread that was started in your absence, or in any thread for that matter. But as for being accurate? Well there are plenty of good posts in this thread that disagrees with you, and you need to do a lot better than that to come across as anywhere near "accurate".

What point is there for anyone to go into a thread that is the political equivalent of "why do you enjoy beating your wife?" The participants for the most part created and participated in this thread solely with the intention of starting a flame fest and I think that a regulated market as exemplified by the federal reserve speaks for itself as to the problems of NOT libertarian philosophies.

 

[jorma]

What point is there for anyone to go into a thread that is the political equivalent of "why do you enjoy beating your wife?" The participants for the most part created and participated in this thread solely with the intention of starting a flame fest and I think that a regulated market as exemplified by the federal reserve speaks for itself as to the problems of NOT libertarian philosophies.

I already said that i agreed with that first sentence. But then he DID go into the thread, and i was only pointing out the fact that what he did provide was not good enough if he wanted to come across as accurate. It seems he agreed. If he will leave it there or go ahead is entirely up to him. It WAS a "mugjob", but there were also a lot of good arguments presented by critics.

 

[Stinkles]

Yeah. If only the ban hadn't ended so late at night. :lol

I've discarded several drafts of lines of attack for incomprehensibility and I'm practically falling asleep in my chair.

LET'S GET HIM WHILE HE'S WEAK!

Ayn Rand hypocritically married a person whose mediocrity was ameliorated only by his physical good looks and his impressive-sounding name. Discuss.

 

[JayDubya]

Also, the author of the article stated that his ultimate objection to Libertarianism, the one that defines the others, is moral.

Well great. I think Libertarianism is imminently moral and that's one of its strongest draws.

I'm sure we can have a great argument about our personal philosophical values where we can objectively define who's right. Yeah...

* * *

Also, he rejects outright the notion of multiple political axes, which is bollocks. Two axes is not enough. We are not all of us on one linear continuum of Right and Left, or MLK and Gandhi are close bedfellows with Stalin and Mao.

 

[Crayon Shinchan]

I'll answer the question: nothing. Thanks, and goodnight!

Welp. God has spoken. He's never wrong and thus all he says its right.

Lets wrap up any sort of critical examination, because it's heresy.

 

[Gaborn]

I already said that i agreed with that first sentence. But then he DID go into the thread, and i was only pointing out the fact that what he did provide was not good enough if he wanted to come across as accurate. It seems he agreed. If he will leave it there or go ahead is entirely up to him. It WAS a "mugjob", but there were also a lot of good arguments presented by critics.

For the most part anti-libertarian arguments mostly rely on ignoring entirely the effect of a federal reserve or confusing the result under libertarianism with the result under other philosophies. For example, the Irish Potato Famine's result of many Irish fleeing Ireland makes absolutely perfect sense to most libertarian thought. People left a market that wasn't working and sought a market that was. (For alternatives, compare that result to the result in North Korea which is much more of a closed system)

 

[JayDubya]

LET'S GET HIM WHILE HE'S WEAK!

Ayn Rand hypocritically married a person whose mediocrity was ameliorated only by his physical good looks and his impressive-sounding name. Discuss.

Don't know much about Rand. I was never all that impressed with her writing or her philosophy.

Mainstream Libertarians and Objectivists are like... well, let's try this analogy - evangelicals and Mormons. They agree on a lot, sure, but they don't agree on everything and they sometimes dislike each other more than they dislike the nonbelievers.

 

[Stinkles]

For the most part anti-libertarian arguments mostly rely on ignoring entirely the effect of a federal reserve or confusing the result under libertarianism with the result under other philosophies. For example, the Irish Potato Famine's result of many Irish fleeing Ireland makes absolutely perfect sense to most libertarian thought. People left a market that wasn't working and sought a market that was.

And to be fair, the concept of "spoiled Libertarians" attacks the 20th century American Libertarians who don't flee the "cultural Potato Famine" of contemporary politics.

Don't know much about Rand. I was never all that impressed with her writing or her philosophy.

Mainstream Libertarians and Objectivists are like... well, let's try this analogy - evangelicals and Mormons. They agree on a lot, sure, but they don't agree on everything and they sometimes dislike each other more than they dislike the nonbelievers.

That was mostly jokes. You're tired. Go sleep!

 

[Gaborn]

And to be fair, the concept of "spoiled Libertarians" attacks the 20th century American Libertarians who don't flee the "cultural Potato Famine" of contemporary politics.

And see, you're making the classic mistake again. Libertarianism is about options. People make choices every day in life. Go left or go right? Sit down or stand up? Eggs and toast or cereal? Pancakes or waffles? Grape jelly or strawberry? Flee hurricane Gustav or don't? Vote or don't? You're confusing "choice" and "not choice" and assuming because Libertarians make a choice you wouldn't that they're inherently wrong.

 

[jorma]

For the most part anti-libertarian arguments mostly rely on ignoring entirely the effect of a federal reserve or confusing the result under libertarianism with the result under other philosophies. For example, the Irish Potato Famine's result of many Irish fleeing Ireland makes absolutely perfect sense to most libertarian thought. People left a market that wasn't working and sought a market that was. (For alternatives, compare that result to the result in North Korea which is much more of a closed system)

One million Irish deaths. This argument is just as retarded as saying "Stalin killing millions of Kulaks was perfectly fine, because the collectivisation of their farms would have worked out just fine if the Kulaks hadnt opposed it". You cant counter with philosofical shit like that in the face of one million deaths. It doesnt make sense at all.

 

[Gaborn]

One million Irish deaths. This argument is just as retarded as saying "Stalin killing millions of Kulaks was perfectly fine, because the collectivisation of their farms would have worked out just fine if the Kulaks hadnt opposed it". You cant counter with philosofical shit like that in the face of one million deaths. It doesnt make sense at all.

Stalin didn't allow the free flow of people into and out of the Soviet Union, it was much more of a closed system with highly restricted travel much like North Korea is today or China was for much of the same time period. A free society requires free borders and the right to exit the society (note that that does not necessarily imply the ability in every case, just as the ability to work does not guarantee you a job)

 

[jorma]

Stalin didn't allow the free flow of people into and out of the Soviet Union, it was much more of a closed system with highly restricted travel much like North Korea is today or China was for much of the same time period. A free society requires free borders and the right to exit the society (note that that does not necessarily imply the ability in every case, just as the ability to work does not guarantee you a job)

Whats your point? One million Irish deaths were not as bad, because they had the legal choise to leave, even if not always the financial choise?

That IS the point of redistribution of wealth after all. To provide choise and opportunity to everyone or at least as many as possible - not just the ones that are born strong enough or rich enough to prosper/fend for themselves.

 

[Gaborn]

Whats your point? One million Irish deaths were not as bad, because they had the legal choise to leave, even if not always the financial choise?

Deaths are always bad, that's why millions chose to leave, and so many WERE able to do so because they were able to find jobs as indentured servants in many cases to work for a length of time and then start a new life. No society can save every member and create a perfect life, just as the heat wave in 2003 that killed 10s of thousands of Europeans could have been largely neutralized if everyone had air conditioning or took other measures.

 

[JayDubya]

First, the worship of the already successful and the disdain for the powerless is essentially the morality of a thug. Money and property should not be privileged above everything else-- love, humanity, justice.

(And let's not forget that lurid fascination with firepower-- seen in ESR, Ron Paul, Heinlein and Van Vogt, Advocates for Self-Government's president Sharon Harris, the Cato Institute, Lew Rockwell's site, and the Mises Institute.)

I wish I could convince libertarians that the extremely wealthy don't need them as their unpaid advocates. Power and wealth don't need a cheering section; they are-- by definition-- not an oppressed class which needs our help. Power and wealth can take care of themselves. It's the poor and the defenseless who need aid and advocates.

This is a fallacy. Libertarians neither worship the rich nor condemn the poor.

We do believe that if we are to have taxation, it should be equitable, though we define equity differently than the progressive liberal, which is to say they desire making people pay a disproportionately high rate just because they are the haves.

I personally believe taxation should be flat across the board, abolishing the notion of tax brackets; of course, I also believe the income tax should be phased out in favor of a form of taxation where the notion of brackets could not work in the first place.

Second, it's the philosophy of a snotty teen, someone who's read too much Heinlein, absorbed the sordid notion that an intellectual elite should rule the subhuman masses, and convinced himself that reading a few bad novels qualifies him as a member of the elite.

This is a load of rubbish. There's no superiority complex inherent to Libertarianism. The central tenet of the philosophical and political belief structure is that we should leave people the fuck alone. Having the elite rule just because goes against everything we believe.

Third, and perhaps most common, it's the worldview of a provincial narcissist. As I've observed in my overview of the 20th century, liberalism won its battles so thoroughly that people have forgotten why those battles were fought.

Yes, we just don't appreciate the 20th Century "advances" by "progressives" enough. That must be it.

It's hard to read libertarians without concluding that they've never been out of the country-- perhaps never out of the suburbs. They don't know what Latin American rule by the elite looks like; they don't know any way of running an industrial economy but that of the US; they don't know what an actually oppressive government looks like; they've never experienced a depression; they've never lived in a slum or experienced racial discrimination. At the same time, they have a very American sense of entitlement: a gut feeling that they've earned the prosperity they were born into, that they owe the community nothing, that they deserve to have whatever they want, that no one should stand in their way.

Wow, that's quite a bit of generalization and stereotyping, almost fit for console fanboy interaction.

However he does seem to blindly stumble into something that is correct - I don't OWE the community anything. I can certainly give it what I want at my prerogative.

As for deserving whatever I want... I'm not sure where this asshat gets off, but there's no entitlement complex in the free exchange of goods and services.

I have my own articles of faith. I think a political philosophy should

* benefit the entire population, not an elite of whatever flavor
* offer a positive vision, not just hatred for another philosophy
* rest on the best science and history can teach us, rather than science fiction
* be modified in the light of what works and what doesn't
* produce greater freedom and prosperity the closer a nation comes to it.

Sounds like something I can agree with. I'm glad he finally came around at the end then, to realize he was wrong.

 

[Crayon Shinchan]

Whats your point? One million Irish deaths were not as bad, because they had the legal choise to leave, even if not always the financial choise?

Jesus christ... libetarians really are the coldest most heartless sons of bitches aren't they?

Again... these are the guys expecting charity to sort out that sort of situation?

 

[Gaborn]

However he does seem to blindly stumble into something that is correct - I don't OWE the community anything. I can certainly give it what I want at my prerogative.

For further reading, GAF should consult this wonderful essay by Nobel Prize winner Milton Friedman.

 

[jorma]

Deaths are always bad, that's why millions chose to leave, and so many WERE able to do so because they were able to find jobs as indentured servants in many cases to work for a length of time and then start a new life. No society can save every member and create a perfect life, just as the heat wave in 2003 that killed 10s of thousands of Europeans could have been largely neutralized if everyone had air conditioning or took other measures.

No. But every society can try their damned fucking best. If Ireland had banned the export of wheat and tried their best to provide food for as many as possible, reducing the number of deaths and maybe also reduced the number of emigrants - would that not have benetfitted the Irish society as a whole? And not just the ones that died or were forced to flee halfway across the world.

To stare this disaster in the face and still say "political doctrine require us to do nothing, and if we forced the wealthy landowners to sell their wheat in Ireland, well then that would be illegal and immoral" is just cold. Ice cold. Just Like Stalin.

 

[Gaborn]

No. But every society can try their damned fucking best. If Ireland had banned the export of wheat and tried their best to provide food for as many as possible, reducing the number of deaths and maybe also reduced the number of emigrants - would that not have benetfitted the Irish society as a whole? And not just the ones that died or were forced to flee halfway across the world.

To stare this disaster in the face and still say "political doctrine require us to do nothing, and if we forced the wealthy landowners to sell their wheat in Ireland, well then that would be illegal and immoral" is just cold. Ice cold. Just Like Stalin.

That's a pretty big leap, first in assuming it's not desirable to flee Ireland at that time in favor of a potentially better life, second that banning the sale of a product to an overseas market would do anything other than make an already poor country even poorer (just ask a farmer in the 1930s about the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act), and third, that the issue is promoting Irish society. I'm not concerned with promoting the health of a society, if a society fails it deserves to. I'm concerned with individuals having the opportunity to make the best choice for themselves, not necessarily for their society.

 

[Slavik81]

In practice, libertarianism enhances and advances the position of the priviledged few, this is why the conservatives and the well to do have often found it an attractive economic and political doctrine.

Those who believe that they have the strength to succeed in a society where your position is based on merit would be more likely to be in favour of libertarianism. Those who are already successful are the most likely to believe that they have that strength. Therefore, those who are already successful are more likely to support it.

Of course that's the way it works. Similarly, unsuccessful people are less likely to support a society where their social and economic position is based on merit. I'm not saying all opposition to a more free society is incompetent. All cats are animals, but not all animals are cats. Similarly, all incompetent people certainly should oppose more freedom (after all, they need society to save them from themselves)... but not all people who oppose a more liberal society are incompetent. (On the other side of things, some incompetent people also support a more free society simply because they're incompetence prevents them from realizing this is not in their best interests.)

Personally, I value social mobility based on merit so much more than absolute equality. And, at the very least, want good reasons for the restrictions of freedoms.

 

[jorma]

That's a pretty big leap, first in assuming it's not desirable to flee Ireland at that time in favor of a potentially better life, second that banning the sale of a product to an overseas market would do anything other than make an already poor country even poorer (just ask a farmer in the 1930s about the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act), and third, that the issue is promoting Irish society. I'm not concerned with promoting the health of a society, if a society fails it deserves to. I'm concerned with individuals having the opportunity to make the best choice for themselves, not necessarily for their society.

Neo-liberal/libertarian experiments in a society tend to fail. I'm with you there. I'm fairly sure that's why Russians idolise Putin to the extent they are - in the face of the neo-liberal failings that was forced on Boris Yeltsin anyone would look like a genious.

 

[jorma]

Those who believe that they have the strength to succeed in a society where your position is based on merit would be more likely to be in favour of libertarianism. Those who are already successful are the most likely to believe that they have that strength. Therefore, those who are already successful are more likely to support it.

Of course that's the way it works. Similarly, unsuccessful people are less likely to support a society where their social and economic position is based on merit. I'm not saying all opposition to a more free society is incompetent. All cats are animals, but not all animals are cats. Similarly, all incompetent people certainly should oppose more freedom (after all, they need society to save them from themselves)... but not all people who oppose a more liberal society are incompetent. (On the other side of things, some incompetent people also support a more free society simply because they're incompetence prevents them from realizing this is not in their best interests.)

Personally, I value social mobility based on merit so much more than absolute equality. And, at the very least, want good reasons for the restrictions of freedoms.

I'm opposed to your idea that a neoliberal society is a more free society. I put it forward that a state that offers extensive redistribution of wealth has a much better potential to offer freedom to a greater number of people. I'm not saying this is a given, because this same society might be opposed to individual liberties. And then we are back to measuring what is most important, social freedom or economic freedom. I say social freedoms are the only really important ones. I'd be a lot more favourable in my opinion of neoliberals if they werent always so focused on their "taxation is theft" mantras.

And i am also well competent, so my anectotal evidence says "hi".

 

[Karakand]

Yeah, I read this thread while I was gone, I wondered how I'd respond to it, frequently getting quite cranky, but ultimately, I think my response is probably quite adequate, and very accurate.

You still love me, right Jay-Dub? I hate farm subsidies still!!

 

[Instigator]

Did I summarise correctly your position on the Great Depression, Jay?

There are only so many ways to explain criminal negligence.

 

[JayDubya]

Criminal negligence?

Yes, the Federal Reserve should have been eliminated after that, I concur.

Also, 7:32-2:12 = 5 hrs, 20 min... Ugggh. Why am I up?