Posted on 11/09/2006 1:18:32 PM PST by Keltik
The Republican Party is not "just as liberal as the Dims." Just check the voting records and ADA or ACA ratings of congresscritters. Even most RINOs have better records than most Demonrats. Mainstream Republicans have much better ratings. A libertarian radio guy once exploded into venom when I told him that there were more libertarians in the Republican Party than in the Libertarian Party. There is a sizable minority of the Rep. Party which is hard-core conservative. The present leadership is the problem, plus the veto power exercised by a handful of RINOs and loose-cannon egomaniacs like McCain, who block good judicial appointments. Like it or not, third parties do not work under our system of national politics. NY State was a special case, and the founders of the NY Conservative Party said so at the time of their founding.
It was the imperialists in the mother country who were radically changing the status quo, imposing central Parliamentary control over a bunch of colonies which had been left to pretty much govern themselves. The American "Revolutionaries" wanted to preserve "English liberties" against an encroaching remote central government. That puts them right in the same camp with today's conservatives. The American Tories were analogues to today's liberals: happy with expanding central government. There's a lot of historical literature documenting that the American "revolution" was a conservative one, a movement to protect gains in freedom which had already been achieved. Just read the Declaration of Independence. It accuses the King of many radical moves against existing rights and liberties.
Indeed it does, and I believe that accounts for the "libertarian" component of "libertarian revolutionaries". Overthrowing an existing establishment of government and replacing it with a totally different form of government, independent and sovereign from the original is a revolution.
"Their only "revolutionary" action was in throwing off the yolk of an imperial power which had left them to their own devices for much of their history, and was trying to tighten control in the late 18th century."
But throwing off the yolk would leave only the white... is THAT what they were about? Lower Cholesterol before it became faddish... KEWL. Had it been me, I would have thrown off the imperial YOKE... It's far less confusing.
Yes, most people were incredibly frightened at the high speeds of the automobile. It takes a lot of training for people to get used to anticipating things traveling at forty miles per hour.
This is a standard ultra-left denunciation of Eeeeevil Corporations
Corporations are hardly innocent doves. The good life can be endangered from the private sector as well as the public.
This is another bit of contempt for the masses who obstinately refuse to live as you would prefer them to live.
Hey, my contempt is first for the government which bulldozed people's neighborhoods, and only then for those citizens like my hypocritical self who say "problem? What problem?" as we cruise along to our destination.
Second, the question should be open whether the masses are "contemptible," that is, unfit to rule, just as much as it should be a question of whether we personally are contemptible or unfit to rule. Otherwise we are simply being dogmatic democratists.
***BZZZZZZTTTT!*** Thank you for playing.
Yeah, I guess that's why they just didn't sell....
The good life can be endangered from the private sector as well as the public.
Obviously, the people who buy what the corporations are selling have concluding that having those things IS "the good life". The fact that some Vision Of The Anointed may disagree is irrelevant in a free society.
the question should be open whether the masses are "contemptible," that is, unfit to rule
There is no question of "ruling". When I buy a car, I do not exercise "rule" over anyone who prefers to walk.
"If Libertarians are so powerful as to give an election away, if Republicans need us so much, perhaps a more fruitful tactic would be trying to find common ground, instead of insulting us and then wondering why we don't want to hang with y'all."
No, you see, there's this magical pool of voters that's going to spring out of nowhere and vote Republican in '08. That's going to make up for getting rid of all of the libertarians and conservatives that we're going to cut loose.
In effect you are claiming that most every choice is valid, simply by fact of being a choice, and hence beyond criticism. That's as uncritical as you can get. We deserve better than pusillanimous anti-elitist canards.
There is no question of "ruling". When I buy a car, I do not exercise "rule" over anyone who prefers to walk.
In politics, at best some people win and others lose; at worst, everybody loses. When you continue to patronize government-funded road projects, you are benefiting from a political decision which privileges car-driving over walking. What do you make of those urban neighborhoods destroyed by government bulldozers? Eggs broken on the way to making an omlette?
They merely separated themselves from the British imperial regime. They remained governed by their own colonial legislatures, as before. So there was no "totally different form of government!" They simply replaced the British parliament, in which they had no representatives, with the Continental Congress. Replacing an absolute monarchy with a republic, as in France, or with a Soviet dictatorship, that's what a change to a "totally different form of government" looks like. At first they had only the weakest of central governments, because they lacked any real executive branch. The government set up by the Constitution rectified that. There was no attack on any of the social fabric, such as happens in most revolutions, where the Church and upper classes are targeted.
The Founders merely preserved English-style representative government on American soil. Unlike libertarians, they didn't start with an ideal utopian vision of government. They kept an established system, which was anything but libertarian. There was slavery, established churches in several colonies, tariffs (the main source of revenue to the new government), etc. There were no fanatic dopers in the Revolutionary government, either ;-)
Aargh. I feel as if my house just got "egged," or maybe even "shelled."
I think I had those oval things for breakfast, and must have still had them on my mind. You have egged me on to be more careful in the future. But I won't chicken out completely and stop posting, no matter how much you crow over my mistake.
Can you document that the Constitution Party pulled enough votes to change the outcome in any elections? Hmmm? I'm waiting.
In 2 Senate races, the Liberaltarians pulled enough votes away from the Republicans to give the Dems those seats and thereby control of the Senate, putting an end to any chance of more originalist SCOTUS judges. Thanks a lot.
There is also no evidence that the "religious right" deserted the Republican Party. One of the best predictors of Republican voting continued to be regular church attendance.
You're evading the issue. The problem is that the GOP listed so far toward the Religious Right that it drove off the swing voters that determine most elections.
Given that taxes are the important issue, what's the problem?
If you can separate libertarianism as a philosophy - the idea the the nation as a whole will be better off if it assumed that the people can take care of themselves better than the government can do it for them - from the crackpots in the Liberarian Party then I don't think this discussion is going anywhere.
Could be, but it sure doesn't appear that way with the ones I've talked with. But even if they only want the 'soft' drugs legalized, I'd still be in disagreement.
just the penalties reduced.
Another point of disagreement.
Ah, the classic apples-and-oranges comparison.
Not at all. You implied that the 'war on drugs' should be stopped because it hasn't been successful. The same can be said for the 'war on murder.'
Which solution do you prefer, the kick-down-the-door failure of a WOD or letting Darwin work its magic?
I prefer to keep drug sale and use illegal, and I prefer that those laws be enforced.
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