Posted on 02/25/2013 3:04:49 PM PST by Shout Bits
Last week, conservative Ann Coulter took a swipe at libertarians, calling them "pussies" for their stance on marijuana. Coulter's best qualities are her bluntness (get it?) and her willingness to fight. In her "pussies" comments, she argued that, since the US is a socialist welfare state, people's choices regarding their lifestyles are her business – hence MJ should be illegal. Coulter has a point; socialism turns strangers into family. However, her conclusion that statism and central control are warranted is an abandonment of principle.
Libertarians come in several flavors, and nearly equally from left and right backgrounds. The actual Libertarian Party is dominated by barely reformed hippies and ideologues, who put drug policy front and center. Most libertarians, however, do not belong to the LP. While libertarians like GOP Sen. Rand Paul do not support the war on drugs, that issue is just an example in the spectrum of Constitutional abuses and overreaches by today's government. Perhaps coincidentally, the Tea Party has embraced much of the constitutional libertarian platform of confining government to its enumerated powers.
When conservatives complain about the cost of providing services to immigrants and their children, libertarians blame welfare, not immigration. When conservatives like Coulter complain about the harm drugs do (never mind tobacco and booze), libertarians blame socialized medicine, not drugs. Perhaps Coulter is being pragmatic by acknowledging the US socialist family, but she is conceding this generation's key battle and even the soul of the US by doing so.
Socialists refer to their subjects as family much as dictators refer to their subjects as their children. Under collectivism, the consequences of an individual's bad choices (e.g. smoking, or drinking, or irresponsible debt) are borne by everyone. This creates what economists call a moral hazard. By mitigating the negative consequences of bad behavior, the deterrent is minimized. Why not borrow too much when the government will always bail me out? Why not smoke crack when food, shelter, and health care are available no matter how worthless drugs make me? Of course the government might outlaw crack, but the criminal deterrent has proven to be less effective than the personal ruin deterrent. The best policy regarding vices is for people to live with their decisions' consequences, but socialism is a family where consequences are limited.
Coulter is a big sister who thinks MJ should be illegal so she does not have to pay for whatever negative consequences its users might incur. However, the socialist family is not one which libertarians wish to join. Banning drugs is ineffective at best, and the consequence of proscription might actually be more drug use based on decades' long trends. Libertarians are not in favor of MJ, they are opposed to substituting personal responsibility for the socialist family. Liberals just like MJ for policy reasons. While MJ is a popular example and a clear policy argument, the issue is only an example of why the government should not be the master of a socialist family.
Still, Coulter has a point. The US is a socialist welfare state, and she is forced to be responsible for the bad choices of others. She is not wrong to expect good behavior from her wards. Perhaps Coulter has illuminated the key difference between conservatives and libertarians – Coulter is willing to be a member of today's deeply flawed US socialist family, while libertarians are still willing to fight. As such a famous fighter, Ms. Coulter should try harder and expect a little more.
Shout Bits can be found on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ShoutBits
You can tolerate “decriminalized” (not legalized) stuff if the users are a small, marginalized minority and this stuff doesn’t get the governments approval.
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When I created an idealized country it was illegal to import, export or advertise illegal drugs. As long as no-one knew you were doing it, even your kids, then it wouldn’t be an issue.
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The war on pedophilia and the war on child prostitution also never ends. Oh wait, I think the Libertarian Utopianists want those legal too
An adult... don’t pretend the libertarians limit this crap to adults
...and your post makes the key point: the libertine in me wants to say do whatever, leave me alone. The realist in me knows that a drugged out society would result, and then that society would lay down for even more and faster socialism. Catch 22. Maybe this is why the USA ain’t in Revelation.....
You are right, libertarians didn’t foist Mitt on us as a candidate, but they helped foist Obama on us as President.
No candidate has ever trampled on my freedom. A lot of elected officials have.
You didn’t answer. Who owns YOUR body?
I think Coulter drastically underestimates the cost incurred by criminalizing drugs. Violence, incarceration, etc. It has been catastrophically expensive in direct and indirect expenditures to maintain a war on drugs through direct enforcement and incarceration as well as indirect costs like rendering thousands of people unemployable for petty possession charges under three strikes laws. It’s no different than the catastrophic consequences seen during the prohibition of alcohol which was rightfully recognized as a giant failure though alcohol is far more dangerous than many of the drugs on the black market today.
lol.
Such an obvious question. You never saw my FR page, I guess.
There is a huge difference between liberty and license and Liberdopians have totally forgotten it
Who owns the body of the guy driving 120mph on highway?
If you do not think there are and should be limits then you are insane.
They don’t misunderstand things. They don’t care that they are lying any more than liberals care about lying. It’s a statist thing not a right or left thing.
I recall only a few candidates whom weren’t of the body politic (Cain); hence, they have ALL infringed upon some Right or another.
I’ll support drug legalization on the condition that no tax payer welfare/healthcare be given to druggies and if they cause harm to another person while on drugs they get long jail/prison sentences and the govt taxes the formerly illegal drugs.
You missed my point...which was in context of the post I replied to. Perhaps I should have copied it....
Coulter is right that as long as we socialize the costs of bad behavior we must accept some regulation. I don’t like the Libertarian label much because they do seem to associate too much with themes like freedom to drug, abort and do whatever you want. I like to start from a non-coercion principle instead and apply it across the board. I don’t think we should be able to tell someone they can’t smoke pot or else we’ll jail them, shoot them, etc. But I don’t think if they sit around high all day they should be able to tax me or else jail me, shoot me, etc., so they can get food stamps, health care etc. In such a free market, bad behavior would be self limiting because of the costs. And under true freedom and justice people would behave better.
If you own my property, to pay for your habit, then you are trying to own my body in a much more aggresive way.....
I am curious, do all of the prohibitionists on this thread abstain from alcohol?
So, where does that Power come from? The Fed is (supposed) limited to A1S8, I’ll presume here it’s a State issue?
We survived 150+ years w/out 99% of the ‘Laws’ we have today, but you believe, somehow, what we have today is Freedom/Liberty? License is easy to define = permission from gov’t to do what would otherwise be unlawful.
When one can dictate to another, through the force of Law, one becomes a slave and no longer Free, the former, master.
You bring up the tired cliche about driving....how does the Law work today? Well enough, with bans on alcohol, eating food, texting, etc.
It seems Coulter is quite content we are no longer a Constitutional Republic, as long as her side are the Fascist ‘in control’.
Usually, when people have a point, they don’t have to resort to crude insults to get it across.
Now, I have used the "welfare state" argument to counter libertarians' insistence on open immigration. I think it would bankrupt us [faster].
But the drug users' medical bills we would be responsible for would probably be balanced out by reduced court and imprisonment costs.
The fact remains: enforcement can stop illegal immigration; enforcement cannot stop illegal drug use.
“I don’t know how libertardians think those things will bring about a better civilization”
I’m just as perplexed as to how folks like you think more government will bring about a better civilization.
Very well said!
(If Ann Coulter understood what you wrote, she’d either say something useful or shut up. She doesn’t seem to be learning anything as the years go by. Some sort of mental block, perhaps.)
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