Posted on 06/24/2013 11:41:35 AM PDT by jagusafr
Mrs. Colonel and I were watching Stossel's "Illegal Everything" last night and it led to a discussion of what, precisely, the precepts of libertarianism are. Anybody got suggestions on a succinct, unwonky treatise or explanation?
Well, stay away from the Libertarian Party stuff.
They are just a liberal group that hijacked the name “libertarian” and cloak themselves in a few cherry-picked concepts.
A group I like a lot is “Libertarians for Life” which I learned about right here on FreeRepublic.
1. Human offspring are human beings, persons from conception, whether that takes place as natural or artificial fertilization, by cloning, or by any other means.
2. Abortion is homicide — the killing of one person by another.
3. One’s right to control one’s own body does not allow violating the obligation not to aggress. There is never a right to kill an innocent person. Prenatally, we are all innocent persons.
4. A prenatal child has the right to be in the mother’s body. Parents have no right to evict their children from the crib or from the womb and let them die. Instead both parents, the father as well as the mother, owe them support and protection from harm.
5. No government, nor any individual, has a just power to legally “de-person” any one of us, born or preborn.
6. The proper purpose of the law is to side with the innocent, not against them.
The World's Smallest Political Quiz
There are a number of policy statements to which you can agree or disagree. You should be able to recognize the trend.
Use their gray matter to stand in the gray area on all issues. Any issue that it seems contains any social undertone they immediately become tepid.
“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action, according to our will, within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others.” — Thos. Jefferson
I am apprently somewhere betweeen a conservative and a libertarian.
Libertarians - if you can believe them - are the only Constitutionalists. And why not? Libertarians wrote the dang thing.
Oh. And pass that joint, man.
The “leave me the he!! alone” party.
http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz/quiz.php#
How to find out if you are one(above)The libertarian party unlike any other political party abides by its declared platform as nutty as most of us self described Libertarians are the platform embodies the things government should and should not be doing.
I’ve actually seen libertarians being more reasonable on a lot of drugs, in that a fair amount of drugs make people dangerous to others (e.g., meth).
They also always agree that private employers can have whatever rules they want regardign drugs and can fire people for drugs all day long.
I view them as throw backs to Thomas Jefferson liberalism. Lofty idealism that emphasizes personal freedom over constant nanny-state oversight. They tend to be anti-government and anti-control and pro-individual and pro-freedom.
The actual making of the sausage and the detailed approach to define them gets muddied pretty quickly because being libertarian means they can’t agree with themselves as to what they stand for as a political party. They are the ultimate “herding cats” party, which is why they will most likely never become a national party.
That being said, the vision of libertarians is similar to our founding fathers as far as their desire to remove government interference from day-to-day life and both the Republicans and Democrats tend to agree with them on different aspects and issues from time to time.
The libertarian party is the best source for libertarian politics, when the libertarians formed a party they had to actually write down what their politics are, rather than merely tell you whatever you want to hear.
Libertarians are a cult like fantasy, that is why they can gear their message to any audience there is, they merely give the portion that reflects whatever that particular audience prefers.
If the audience is conservative, then you tell them how you support their belief in smaller government, lower taxes, second amendment rights, etc.
If the audience is liberal, then you tell them how you support gay marriage, gays in the military, gay adoption, and abortion, open borders, drugs, pornography, a weaker military, etc.
The political party known as the Libertarian Party attempts to apply this concept to politics. It seeks to work within the political realm to achieve a more libertarian society -- a more free, limited government as envisioned in the Constitution.
Because there are differences in how a philosophy and a political party work, the philosophy (small "l" libertarian) may seem more absolute while the political party (big "l" Libertarian) can be more accepting of a more gradual approach as long as the step or trend is n the right direction.
Those who don't actually smoke it, want it for
their comrades.
As the rest of us deal with the homosexual agenda and argue and fight about gay marriage, gay adoption, homosexuals in the military and see it as a fundamental fight for survival of America and of Western civilization, the libertarians have a simple, child-like, answer to the issue that they think solves all the conflict of the lessor humans, like conservatives and Christians.
1.3 Personal Relationships
Sexual orientation, preference, gender, or gender identity should have no impact on the government's treatment of individuals, such as in current marriage, child custody, adoption, immigration or military service laws. Government does not have the authority to define, license or restrict personal relationships. Consenting adults should be free to choose their own sexual practices and personal relationships.
It isn't that libertarians are pro-immorality, but rather they are pro-private property and against the initiation of force.
Respect for private property is the foundation of civilization, and hence why communism is the antithesis of civilized society. Communism is social disintegration.
Any libertarian worth his salt is guided by these two overarching principles. His stance on various issues is the result of being consistent to these two ideas.
That is libertarianism as I see it; it's nothing exceptionally radical.
Libertarians are usually one of two things: older people that love drugs and hate taxes, or kids that are liberal but think the liberal label is lame, while libertarian sounds “edgy”. But they always vote for big government.
Best explanation so far.
A better quiz
http://www.gotoquiz.com/what_is_your_political_ideology
The World’s Smallest Quiz says you are libertarian no matter what you answer, IMHO
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