Exactly.
The pain you feel today is the strength you'll have tomorrow.
Posted on 09/22/2012 2:37:20 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
............my reaction to Mises' work underscores my particular problem with libertarianism in general: the fact that it has little to no soul,reducing man to a rational,pleasure-seeking animal. The central premise of Human Action, the basic theory of Mises' praxeology,is that all men are united by one logic,one universal bent toward happiness, which they seek in the most advantageous way possible. In short,man,though capable of making poor decisions,will even in failure choose the most logical poor decision known to him;he furthermore always desires one object more than everything else at any given moment,and the object of his desire is revealed only by his logical action.
Praxeology, the study of human action, doesn't concern itself with whether men want the right things;it concerns itself with man's attempt to become happy. Instead of making value judgments,as religions and ethics do,it says that men simply want to experience happiness,and then concerns itself with whether or not a certain approach to society results in the desired ends.
Surely all thinkers can agree about man's primary pursuit: both St Francis of Assisi and the banking tycoon did what they did because it brought them happiness. And voluntary cooperation,libertarians say, is the best method by which men may achieve their goals;but cooperation toward what? Mises says that division of labor brings societies together and provides them with luxuries unprecedented;he says this is the reason why men banded together in the first place,and gave themselves a collective name (I'm more inclined to believe that men united in self-defense).But if man's community,his happiness,can be largely predicated upon material gain,if men cooperate and behave ethically mainly because of production,and worldliness constitutes our entire civilization,then it's only fair to say that living man died long ago. His society is little more than a comfortable coffin,his family a breed of intelligent gnats..................
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
OK......... I’ll bite..
What is this argument against private roads anyhow?
This sounds like it could get interesting...
(warning, I live on a private road)..
Just another long, fancy sounding call for government to force us to follow the right path. The problem is , who forces the goverment to follow the right path. The Bible, as well as subsequent history, is full of examples of governments following the wrong path, and forcing the wrong path on their subjects, and that sort of government outnumbers any righteous variety.
They call this sort of thinking “progressivism.” It’s shown up in various incarnations, some claiming religious justification, some claiming class justification, but the worst ones are the ones who claim to be forcing us on the right path for our own good.
Thanks Cincinatus’ Wife.
I disagree, God is not a libertarian but he is the Father of Liberty. The liberty he bestows upon us is not freedom from his benevolent will but from the tyranny of sin and the sinful wills of each other.
The Founders allowed for so much, in this land of the free. They realized there were large differences among themselves, so of course they had to invent a system that allowed for vast differences to co-exist.
Nevertheless, as a philosophy, Libertarianism reduces things to a point where meaninglessness is a problem. To say that everyone should be free to their own pursuits, and take it to the nth degree, is not exactly expressing the moral/spiritual undergirdings of our Founding, is it?
Yes, God gave us freedom to choose, even wrongly, and the Founders based everything on that, and made the people sovereign, not the government.
However, unless people are engaged in expressing that moral/spiritual undergirding the Founders understood, the ability to hold any kind of system together, much less the one the Founders made, disappears.
For examples, look at the Democrats. (No, Republicans aren’t perfect, but they aren’t the Democrats, either). Look at what they have become. Look at what they are trying to force upon us, against our will.
They have long violated the beliefs of our Founders. For them, it’s all about POWER and CORRUPTION.
They have now succeeded in corrupting the news media, with the willing help of the media itself, who wanted to be corrupted and who want Obama, Reid and Pelosi to rule us rabble out here with an iron hand.
You say Libertarians have the answer?
They are busy supporting same sex marriage and drug legalization. Not all of them, but enough of them. They couch the marriage issue in different lingo...they call it “marriage equality”.
There is a moral component here, people. If Americans lose the moral compass, and the ability to unite at least a majority to vote accordingly, our Founders understood America as they founded it WILL NOT SURVIVE BECAUSE IT CANNOT.
Exactly.
The pain you feel today is the strength you'll have tomorrow.
“Jeremy Egerer is a convert to biblical conservatism from radical liberalism and the editor of the Seattle website www.americanclarity.com.”
fwiw
All the long winded sophistry on this thread by Libertarians to the contrary, Libertarians in real life are hedonists. I see it all the time here in Alaska, we are swamped with ‘em. While against gun control, they are anti-religion, atheists, new age, dupes of Dan Brown’s Di Vinci code stuff, for the legalization of marijuana - they are a bunch of dopeheads - could care less about the push to homosexualize America (many of them queers themselves), the push for same sex marriage,etc. and etc.
These long haired hippy type antichrists come up from places like California in droves to “get away from it all” and head out into the bush to practice their hedonist lifestyle. As a Christian first, and political conservative second, I loathe all of it. Ask one of ‘em what party they identify themselves with, and they will tell you to a man they Libertarian.
I loathe Libertarians. They are hedonists not conservatives. I wish they’d go back to California where they came from.
Yes. Morality is essential to freedom and democracy.
Just look at “popular culture.” The president goes on Leno and Letterman rather than govern.
Given the quality of his "governing" decisions lately, I'd as soon he go on Leno and stay there.
:)
But Obama “M-M-M” has no talent other than what his handlers fabric.
He’s an empty suit.
An empty chair.
Yep. He does not understand that in his case they went Alinsky on him not because he won an argument, but because he is an incredibly annoying person.
They can’t make the distinction between persuasion/process and the end goal or results.
To reach a goal..say convincing someone of your opinion, you can’t bludgean them. Yet, most Paul supporters don’t know how to argue to persuade. They are out to win.
And..if we join this battle with the Left to simply win then we will lose because the purpose is to educate politely and persuade others of our argument, not conquer them.
there are varying degrees...
are all republicans conservatives?
of course not..
not all libertarians are ron paul nut jobs...
if you look at the libertarian party platform, most of it mirrors the republican party platform.
The 2 area's where it does not are also the 2 area's I disagree with.
But, the libertarians will stick with their platform, unlike the republicant’s, who once elected will abandon said platform, and turn into socialists.
small l libertarians are liberty loving constitution believing persons. I do not need a petty bureaucrat telling me what I can do, what I can or cannot put into my body, what I must believe and how I should act.
Those decisions are mine and mine alone.
The only exceptions are when I interfere or trespass upon someone else’s civil rights (life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness)..
As I understand it, though, the problem with Mises is more that he's a top-down rationalist thinker. You also need some bottom-up empiricism to understand the world, and people who embrace Mises as their hero-thinker don't always recognize that.
For me the problem with libertarianism is similar. Libertarians try to get outside what's going on and build a system from the ground up, but we're born into a situation where some assumptions and commitments have already been made and some unpleasant realities have already been learned from experience.
The rational-ideal model doesn't always have much to say about where we are now, where we should go from here, or how to procede. A road map of Utopia isn't that helpful when you're trying to get from one real world place to another.
Ping
Food for thought indeed. The philosophy of Libertarianism appears great, but what nation on this earth has ever been a purely Libertarian government/society?
The pain you feel today is the strength you'll have tomorrow.
Statism
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Leftism ------+------ Conservatism
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Libertarianism
All of ideology is instinct (borne of r and K-selected reproductive strategies), not reason or logic. Libertarianism is just the normal outlier reproductive strategy you would see in any population, where r and K strategies mix - that’s why Libertarianism is such a small minority strategy, despite it’s promise to be something everyone should be able to agree upon, if logic were guiding us. (Though the strategy may gain some favor under conditions of low population density due to resource limitation.)
You are driven to Libertarianism by instinct, you then construct arguments which generate good feelings in you (according to your political/r/K instincts), and which you feel should construct good feelings in others, and judge Libertarianism correct, because of those good feelings. I know, because I was a diehard Libertarian until a few years ago, and did the same thing.
I defected because I realized true Libertarianism fosters the growth of Liberalism in a society through tolerance, which is deadly for that society. It’s why Liberals will tolerate Libertarians (That alone should give you pause). Liberalism rises, probably no matter what, but Libertarianism speeds it up considerably.
In the end, true reason and logic should yield one conclusion. Liberalism destroys whatever society it grows within, like a cancer. Thus it needs to be stopped no matter what, and anything favoring it should be avoided. I finally concluded that rather than tilt at windmills, promoting an ideology which would never go anywhere for reasons of biology and evolution, the US would be better served if everybody just allied with Conservatives, and sought the destruction of Liberalism.
I think it is pretty much the only way to have a chance at saving this Republic.
I also have to say, my last interaction with the Libertarian movement was bizarre. Cato has a gay guy who is out and out nuts running their online journal. I assume he is a Lib trying to push Liberalism from that side, especially in light of the “bleeding heart Libertarianism” crap they were pushing. Get to know the movement leaders, and I think you’ll find yourself more Republican.
You speak of feelings.....
I speak of the constitution-—
Feel good or not’ the only way to reverse current course is through strict constitutionism’not some feel good kinda adhere to the constitution like the past 25 years of republicans..
Demon rats and republic ants both have one thing in common’ they only buy into parts and pieces of the constitution, discarding what interferes with their goals.
Both parties have proven they will not shrink government, both parties have proven they back entitlements’ both parties have no problem passing laws that infringe on our personal liberties.
My point wasn't to support Republicans, or ignore the Constitution. My point was that the social aspects of Conservatism are necessary, from a biological standpoint, to keep Liberalism in check. Ostracizing the r-selected Liberals is a necessary means of maintaining a society's competitiveness and greatness. Fail to do it, and down you go.
Of course, making single mom's suffer by pulling welfare to a bare, bare minimum, imprisoning “impregnate and run” fathers for child abuse, and strengthening marriage as solely between a man and woman aren't in conflict with our founding document. Nor are most aspects of Social Conservatism, which all were considered normal at our founding.
Like I said, I was Libertarian, and spent my early adulthood just like Faust with a whole group of Mephistos. I'm not instinctively judgmental. I don't support the whole of Conservatism today for any reasons other than an understanding of biology, and a desire to see the Republic remain great. Deviate in any way, and you help Liberals begin the decline.
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